Excellent insight from Asia Expert Orville Schell on the significance historically and politically of the student protests in Hong Kong. He gives a cogent analysis of what the protests now happening mean to the students and to the PRCs Communist Party and what is most likely to be the PRCs response further down the line. Ive been asking myself the questions and issues posed in the article: What possible outcome can these demonstrations have? Do we think the students are brave? Are they foolish? What has been the PRCs response in the past? What reforms took place as a result? Those in the West may be rooting for the democracy home team. But the images of idealistic young students fearlessly denouncing the Communist Party recalls the sudden violence of June 4, 1989 in Beijing, the smell of blood on the streets, and later, the aftermath of suppression, informants, arrests, a paranoiac static in the air, and an entrenched Communist Party that does not tolerate public humiliation with patience, nor Western intrusion and opinion with amusement. Compromise or crack down? Answer: begins with a C, ends with tragedy and silence. China has had a long history of study protests. I cannot think of a single one that did not end in tragedy. Yet, some of them have led incrementally to revolution of vast proportions--including the rise of the Communist Party. Lets hope that lives are not lost during this protest.
Posted on: Tue, 07 Oct 2014 08:12:41 +0000
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