Fifteen years after the People's Liberation Army cracked down on pro-democracy demonstrators in Tiananmen Square, a controversy has arisen regarding the authenticity of The Tiananmen Papers, which was edited by prominent China scholars in the United States.
The book, purported to be a compilation of top secret documents smuggled out of China, was widely hailed when it was published in 2001.
Now, a Canadian scholar has challenged the veracity of the documents. Political science professor Alfred Chan, of Huron College University, argues in an 8,000-word article in the current issue of The China Quarterly that the book is part fiction and part documentary history, fabricated by utilising public and semi-public sources. The China Quarterly is the most authoritative academic journal in China studies. In his article, entitled The Tiananmen Papers Revisited, Professor Chan discusses what he calls 'fundamental flaws ... which greatly undermine its claim to authenticity'.
The documents were provided by a man using the pseudonym Zhang Liang, who approached Andrew Nathan, of Columbia University, a noted China scholar. Professor Nathan then brought in two other renowned scholars, Perry Link, of Princeton University, and Orville Schell, of the University of California, Berkeley. The papers were first published in English. A much longer Chinese version appeared later.
The Chinese government immediately denounced the papers as forgeries, but did not provide any specific proof. Since then, the documents reproduced in the book have been widely accepted as authentic, even though the editors admit they have not seen any originals, only a computer printout of selected transcriptions.
Professor Chan points out that the documents are 'peppered with Zhang's personal interpretations, running commentary, analyses and even his reading of the minds of the protagonists'. Mr Zhang's style 'is very much that of a genre of historical and political novels, dramas and docudrama that is popular in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan', wrote Professor Chan. He said that large sections of a conversation found in the memoirs of Xu Jiatun, who fled to the US in 1989, appear in the book.