[Marxism] An Appeal to the Chinese People from His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama

[Fred Feldman]

I want to point out an important factual statement by the Dalai Lama that
weighs on our earlier round of discussion, particularly the exchanges on the
Marxism List between Saul Thomas and myself on Han Chinese and Hui Muslim
immigration into Tibet:

The DL said:

I appreciate and support
President Hu Jintao's policy of creating a "harmonious society", but this
can only arise on the basis of mutual trust and an atmosphere of freedom,
including freedom of speech and the rule of law. I strongly believe that if
these values are embraced, many important problems relating to minority
nationalities can be resolved, such as the issue of Tibet, as well as
Eastern Turkistan, and Inner Mongolia, where the native people now
constitute only 20% of a total population of 24 million. 

Note the DL makes no reference to large population shifts in Tibet. He does
not at all suggest that the Tibetan population has been or is being swamped
with immigrants from the Chinese-populated sections of China. "Swamped" is
the term I overconfidently used, possibly influenced by memories of what
happened to Latvia and Estonia under Stalin.

The Dalai Lama refers instead separately to Eastern Turkistan and Inner
Mongolia, where the native people now constitute only 20% of a population of
24 million." So he is referring to a danger he obviously worries could roll
over into Tibet someday but has not decisively done so yet. And for reasons
of climate and natural environment, as another subscriber pointed out, this
would be very difficult to get Chinese to  do voluntarily and very unpopular
to compel them.

So the DL lends no support whatever here, as I_read the passage, to the
claims of some exiles that Tibetans are now a minority in their own region.
He in fact clearly suggests that this is not the case. (This would have
required the movement of well over 6 million Chinese into Tibet in the last
ten or 15 years. Population movements of this scope into a border region
would not have gone unnoticed and unrecorded except for the claims of
exiles, in my opinion.)

It does seem probable that the protests in Tibetan regions were directed at
Chinese immigration.  But this seems to be targeted more at their relative
social position, and relative job and income security of the Chinese, their
owning businesses and so forth, as well as the fact that the "autonomous"
region is basically run by Chinese, in Tibet and from Beijing. 

So Saul was basically right in challenging my assertions about population
shift.  I had come to realize that the proof of the extreme assertions I had
picked up from unreliable Tibetan sources was lacking, to say the least.
And I explicitly corrected them when I sent versions of my comments to the
Green Left and Socialist Voice lists. But here I decided to wait until there
was a good hook for the correction, which the DL has kindly provided.

Late in his statement, the DL quotes the Panchen Lama. This is a deliberate
move to reconcile the old-line forces who identify with the former regime
with those Tibetans who supported the overturn of feudalism.  For in 1959,
the Panchen Lama was part of the coalition of Tibetan forces that allied
with the Chinese government in getting rid of feudalism in Tibet. He broke
with the regime (or vice versa) around the time of the (in my opinion,
unspeakably reactionary in this respect as in many others) "great
proletarian cultural revolution).

Generally, the DL's statement is a very effective statement of his position,
and puts the Chinese regime on the spot politically and diplomatic,
especially his clear rejection of the desirability of independence or
separation.  

Of course, this will also facilitate efforts to get more progressives and
leftists to demonize China and  treat China as the main enemy" around the
Olympics. A campaign which can only facilitate imperialist efforts to
undermine China's independence and sovereignty, and that of all other
oppressed and former colonial or semicolonial countries. A campaign which
ultimately leads to war against China, just as it led to war against Serbia
and Iraq.

Imperialist hands off Tibet and all of China!
Fred Feldman