Leadership in China's Urban Middle Class Protest: The Movement to Protect Homeowners' Rights in Beijing

Abstract

AbstractIn the last few years, the demands of homeowners in Chinese cities have gradually shifted away from economic rights and towards political ones. At the same time, alliances across different communities have emerged and vigorous attempts to form citywide solidarities have been made. In this process, a group of dedicated leaders has emerged, contributing greatly to the escalation of collective actions. This article focuses on a core group of Beijing activists behind the organization, expression and participation of homeowners' associations. Relying on data collected from interviews, documents and participatory observations conducted over a period of more than two years, we were able to pin down the socio-economic, social and political backgrounds of these leaders, as well as their attitudes, objectives and repertoire of actions. We describe leaders as falling into a two-by-two typology that is defined by a motivation dimension and an activeness dimension. Depending on his or her goals and approaches, a protest leader can be variously viewed as a political actionist, a frustrated changer, a double harvester or a tiger rider. These different types of leaders are all in one way or another promoting socio-political changes in China.