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SCMP Reporter

THE prospects for political liberalisation in China could hinge on the struggle between the civil society and its enemies.

  The former refers to socio-economic entities and initiatives outside the orbit of the Chinese Communist Party. Their foes are conservative elements in the CCP which will not brook any challenge to Marxist orthodoxy and one-party dictatorship.

  In spite of the strengthening of the police-state apparatus after the June 4, 1989 crackdown, the civil society has experienced phenomenal growth thanks to the development of the non-state economy and the budding spirit of tolerance and diversity at the social and cultural level.

  While most non-party-controlled set-ups operate under heavy surveillance by state security, the seeds for the flowering of some form of people power with Chinese characteristics have been sown.

  According to official statistics, there are 1,700-odd non-official social organisations at the national-level, up 44 per cent from 1990. Those at the local level have since 1990 increased by 11 per cent to exceed 200,000.

  Most of these are academic, professional, and cultural units with hidden but substantial party and government affiliations.

  However, a minority represent private initiatives in areas ranging from consumerism and environmental protection to education and law and order.

  For example, citizens' groupings have been instrumental in helping government inspectors in the campaign against fake products, 370,000 serious cases of which were discovered in the past three years.

  In Guangdong, outfits similar to vigilante associations in the West have in the past two years given 4.5 million yuan worth of rewards to 1,500 volunteers who have distinguished themselves in nabbing criminals.

  At the grassroots, nascent people power has manifested itself in an avalanche of legal action taken by individuals, families and groupings against government departments.

  In the five years ending 1994, different levels of courts heard 167,882 counts of 'lawsuits on administrative procedure', mostly citizens suing the government for dereliction of duty or deprivation of human and property rights.

  A common area is forced requisition of urban and rural land for re-development - and complaints by evictees about miserly compensation. The success rate for the plaintiffs was a surprisingly high 37 per cent.

  This, however, has not prevented other individuals and blocs from taking a more direct route to air their views.

  Internal party documents showed there were more than 12,000 demonstrations, sit-ins, petitions and other forms of protest by disgruntled workers and peasants in the first 10 months of last year.

  Underpinning the civic awareness of the man in the street is the leaps-and-bounds growth of the private wealth and the private sector in the economy.

  Chinese have three trillion yuan (about HK$2.7 trillion) deposited in banks and co-operatives. Last year, they paid an estimated 12 billion yuan in income taxes, up 80 per cent from 1994.

  In spite of the fact that compared with former party boss Zhao Ziyang, President Jiang Zemin is much less enthusiastic about private entrepreneurs, 'red capitalists' are gaining ground.

  Non-government-run businesses displaced 'wholly people's owned' factories and mines as the mainstay of industry in 1994. Official economists reckon that non-state-run enterprises could become the predominant sector of the entire economy in less than 15 years.

  As in Europe, the amassing of private wealth is a catalyst for political change. The nouveau riche in China want a say in government to ensure that their hard-earned gains will not be confiscated, and that they have the wherewithal to send their children to study overseas.

 Moreover, like taxpayers the world over, they have a quasi-legal basis for demanding that their indirect employees, the civil servants, do their bidding.

  For private entrepreneurs, there is the life-and-death question of bending government policy so that they can compete on level ground with state units.

  It is not surprising that it is socio-economic organisations and activities started by the red bosses and other well-heeled individuals that are making the greatest contribution to political pluralism.

  Through donations and other means, a sizeable number of private entrepreneurs have become grassroots-level people's deputies and heads of village committees.

  They have also formed chambers of commerce and trade organisations to lobby for their economic rights. Such outfits often boast senior or retired cadres as 'advisers' and patrons. Many have their own newspapers and propaganda outlets. Little wonder that in a recent internal directive, the CCP's Organisation Department warned cadres 'not to go to too many of the millionaires' parties and banquets'.

  And the CCP has taken elaborate measures to ensure that the civil society will not intrude upon its turf, or otherwise dilute the 'dictatorship of the proletariat'.

  Strict guidelines have been given to the Ministry of Civil Affairs, which registers non-official organisations, and the Ministries of State Security and Public Security, which keep an eye on them.

  No private organisations can engage in political activities, including public gatherings or the printing of manifestoes broadcasting their beliefs.

  Permission for an environmental-awareness outfit was held up for fear they might hook up with radical green groups abroad.

  One exception in recent years was police tolerance of a group of activists seeking war-time reparations from Japan.

  The indemnity seekers, however, might have been seen by Beijing as diplomatic pawns to be used to extract concessions from Tokyo.

  Workers cannot form labour organisations outside the domain of the official All-China Federation of Trade Unions.

  In view of the increasing popularity of underground churches and sects, the CCP has stepped up action against clandestine religious activities, which the official media equate with 'feudalist superstition'.

   Cadres are so nervous that tens of organisations specialising in fung shui, divination and qigong have been dismantled. The CCP leadership has used the Wei Jingsheng case to serve a warning to civil-society activists with a political agenda.

  A key piece of evidence cited against the dissident was that he tried to form an underground ring of disaffected intellectuals, to start a private newspaper, and to run businesses to finance his 'anti-government plot'.



Why the liberals want to be civil