Federalism and the Future of Tibet

Abstract

The Tibetan problem is a serious, long-term dispute. Early in the 1950s the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) forced through "socialist reform" in the regions of Qinghai and Chamdo (Amdo and Kham), causing large numbers of Tibetans from these regions to flee. After the Communist forces arrived in the capital, the people in the Lhasa region daily faced the constant threat of forced "reform." In March 1959 they broke out in a spontaneous protest movement: roughly ten thousand people surrounded the Narbulingka–the Dalai Lama's residence–determined to protect him. Chinese Communist troops dispersed the crowds by force. Confronted with the Tibetan people's unplanned and spontaneous protest, the CCP authorities in Beijing looked for an excuse to suppress it and eventually labeled the protest an "armed rebellion by reactionary Tibetan forces." Afterward the troops stationed in Tibet received instructions to "put down the insurrection." Between March 1959 and March 1962 the struggling Tibetan people were subject to the Communists' suppression: more than sixty thousand fled Tibet for Nepal and India. [By the official Chinese account, nearly eighty-seven thousand were killed between March and October of 1959, and nearly 10 percent of the population was imprisoned.—Eds.] During the Cultural Revolution the devastation in Tibet forced tens of thousands more Tibetans to leave their homeland; they ended up not only in India and Nepal but also in Europe and North America.