Thread by @wjhurst

I've been studying various aspects of #protest & contentious #politics in #China for 25 years.

What's happening now is novel, interesting, & potentially quite important. But we need to be careful about drawing conclusions or making predictions. A🧵:
1/22
@CamGeopolitics @NCUSCR

Since 1989, we've seen 5 main strands/repertoires of contention in China:

1) labour protest
2) rural protest
3) student protest
4) urban governance protest
5) systematic political dissent

Each of these has usually been disaggregated locally and separated from the others.

2/22

Labour politics has seen millions of laid-off (xiagang) SOE workers take to the streets, as well as many hundreds of thousands of their counterparts among migrant workers in export-processing manufacturing industries.

3/22

Most demanded workplace protections, union rights, or welfare benefits. But they didn't usually link up cross-regionally or seek common cause with rural residents, students, or others. One significant exception was the so-called Jasic Incident and its aftermath in 2018...

4/22

Rural protests have tended to revolve around payment for grain (IOU Crisis), "peasant burdens" (农民负担), provision of essential public goods, or corruption/malfeasance by local officials.

These often have significant impact locally, but seldom beyond.

5/22

Student protests have been rarer, but usually either about campus issues or general and philosophical in nature. Occasionally, as in the Jasic Incident, they can be in solidarity with workers, villagers, or others. But they've been largely less significant since June 4.

6/22

Many have also noted the prevalence of protests around urban governance and the provision of basic public goods and services - from neighbourhood services to environmental protection, even education and healthcare. These also have tended to be local and specific in nature.

7/22

Generalised political dissent is very rare in its expression, but we've seen it from time to time, as in the Charter 08 movement & other manifestations.

Usually repressed quickly and harshly, its impact has mostly been confined to a small set of cosmopolitan intellectuals.

8/22

Aside from these, we've also seen ethnic/minority protest (e.g. among Uyghurs or Tibetans), but this has had very limited resonance across the wider population. It's also been extremely harshly repressed, especially since about 2013.

9/22

What's happened in the past 24 hours is novel in that protesters have appeared on the streets in multiple cities with apparent knowledge of what is happening in other parts of the country. They're all mobilising around #Covid, but this is refracted through distinct lenses.

10/22

Workers in Zhengzhou and elsewhere are engaged in labour protests, but with #ZeroCovid as a kind of frame for their grievances. Students across dozens of campuses, similarly are mounting familiar kinds of protest, but also framed around Covid.

11/22

Finally, we've seen a few sensations incidents of generalised dissent (e.g. 四通桥), but in the past 24 hours crowds in at least one or two cities have appeared overtly calling for #XiJingping to leave office and for the #CCP to lose power.

12/22

The protesters in these crowds don't look to be either workers or students. They appear to have mobilised first around #Covid & urban governance issues - in particular, in reaction to the fire and failed response in Urumqi two days ago. But they've morphed beyond that.

13/22

By taking up slogans and frames of generalised dissent, as well as at least implicitly signally solidarity with workers' and students' mobilisation, these crowds are crossing a boundary and helping merge four of the five strands/repertoires outlined above.

14/22

This is what makes the current moment especially interesting and possibly important and dangerous. But the trajectory from here is not certain.

I can see at least three possible ways forward, in declining order of likelihood & increasing order of importance/danger...

15/22

What is also very interesting, though, is that the state response last night was not nearly as harsh, repressive, or even coordinated as we might have predicted.

16/22

If we look at this lacklustre response through the lens of experiences across #Indonesia & SE Asia, it might suggest the lurking presence of at least tacit elite allies. Such a factor would substantially complicate the picture.

17/22

But, if we assume no elite backers, the most likely scenario I can see is that the protests fizzle out (as most such movements do in most countries). Having erupted spontaneously in a short period, they will fade away without reaching any climax or denouement.

18/22

A second possibility is some form of comprehensive & decisive repression.

This could take the form of a coordinated and possibly quite violent crackdown (as in 1989) or it could be slower-motion and at least somewhat less bloody (as in HK in 2019-2020).

19/22

Either form of repression would be extremely costly for the state, however (both in fiscal and reputational terms). It would not be undertaken lightly, as it would also raise the stakes. It's thus a decidedly second-best option and not as likely as the protests fizzling.

20/22

A third and much less likely option would be concessions or systemic change. This could range from a relaxation of some #ZeroCovid measures to genuine political opening of some sort. I very much do not think this is in the cards, and would peg probability as extremely low.

21/22

If things fizzle - or even if the strands/repertoires become disentangled - all will return to the somewhat uneasy quotidian of a few weeks ago.

If not, this could prove a critical juncture. But not one that will be easy to read in real time or with a happy ending.

22/22 (END)

Very happy to be interviewed by @pwinn5 for today‘s edition of @TheWorld about the issues in the thread above:

npr.org/podcasts/38144…

Also on these issue, just published in @monkeycageblog of the @washingtonpost:

washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/…