Tibetans In China Research Articles

Tibet and nationalist China's frontier: intrigues and ethnopolitics, 1928-49

Preface Part 1: The Setting 1 The Nationalist Government, National Image, and Territorial Fragmentation in the Prewar Decade (1928-37) 2 The Professed Policy, the Policy Planners, and the Imagined Sovereignty Part 2: The Prewar Decade, 1928-37 3 The Unquiet Southwestern Borderlands 4 The Mission to Tibet 5 The 'Commissioner' Politics Part 3: The Wartime Period, 1938-1945 6 Building a Nationalist-controlled State in Southwest China 7 The Issue of China-India Roadway via Tibet 8 Rhetoric and Reality in Wartime China's Tibetan Concerns Part 4: The Postwar Period, 1945-49 9 Postwar Frontier Planning vis-a-vis non-Han Separatist Movements 10 The Sera Monastery Incident Epilogue Notes Bibliography Index

Chinese Nationalism and the Fate of Tibet: Implications for India and Future Scenarios

Chinese nationalism primarily represents Han nationalism and ignores ethnic minority sub-nationalisms and identities in the larger cause of the state's unity and integrity. The Chinese state calls for submerging of all minority identities within the predominant Han identity, for promoting national cohesion and nationalism, effectively precluding the possibility of the assertion of Tibetan nationalism and autonomy. Because of the suppression of Tibetans in China, a large number of them have fled and settled in India and elsewhere. The Tibetan movement for safeguarding their identity, culture and political space has grievously suffered as a result of Chinese nationalism and China's Tibet policy. The fate of Tibetan nationalism is, to a large extent, tied to the dynamics of the Sino-Indian relations and the course of the internal Tibetan politics and that of its relationship with the community in exile in the post-Dalai Lama era.

Assessing the ecological security of the Tibetan plateau: Methodology and a case study for Lhaze County

A system for assessing the ecological security of Lhaze County in China's Tibetan Autonomous Region was developed using a pressure-state-response model and the analytic hierarchy process. We then used this model to comprehensively evaluate the status of ecological security in Lhaze County. Our results showed that the ecological environment in Lhaze County has deteriorated from an ‘early stages of damage status’ in the 1980s to ‘moderately damaged status’ today. This deterioration has become a major barrier to local economic development and social advancement. Natural and social aspects related to the population explosion, resource exploitation, and climate change that led to this ecological deterioration are discussed. Furthermore, we have suggested proposals for improving the ecological environment that include controlling population growth and enhancing the system of laws that protect the environment, upgrading 3 882.6 ha of low-yield farmland, planting 2 425.8, 548.8, and 1 207.4 ha of shelter belts for farmland protection, soil and water conservation, and fuelwood, respectively, and seeding 2 358.1 ha of artificial grassland. In the meantime, we propose strengthening the controls that limit soil and water loss, and optimizing industrial sectors that aspire to achieve high-efficiency, ecologically responsible agriculture.

Learning to love the motherland: educating Tibetans in China

A major goal of education for Tibetans, as for all China's ‘minority nationalities’, has been to encourage patriotism towards China and to foster a sense of nationhood. This paper considers the ways in which this priority has conditioned the schooling of Tibetans since 1950. Although this priority is unchanging, the paper looks at how it varies in degree and content as political leaders or policies change. An analysis of the primary curriculum reveals the process whereby Tibetan ethnicity is recreated through selective rendering of elements of Tibetan culture, history and religion to reposition it in the Chinese national context. It argues that while in central China the ideological content of the curriculum may have diminished with economic development, in Tibet, as in other border regions, the particular blend of patriotic and moral education is likely to continue as long as the Chinese state feels threatened by outside cultural and political influences.

Un-Mapping Republican China's Tibetan Frontier: Politics, Warlordism and Ethnicity along the Kham/Xikang Borderland

(2005). Un-Mapping Republican China's Tibetan Frontier: Politics, Warlordism and Ethnicity along the Kham/Xikang Borderland. The Chinese Historical Review: Vol. 12, No. 2, pp. 167-201.

Problems of Studying Minorities in the Middle East

The Middle East like many other regions of the world, is heterogeneous and comprises of numerous ethnic, national, religious and linguistic societies, groups and sects. Much of the troubles facing this region revolve around the treatment or mistreatment of its minority population. Most of the post-Ottoman states are yet to evolve a national identity that would encompass and reflect their multi-ethnic social composition. At the same time, discussions on minorities have often been controversial and politically loaded. States by their very nature are sensitive towards any outside criticisms over their treatment of their minority population and consider it to be a sovereign and inviolable subject. Simultaneously, they do not hesitate to use the treatment of minorities by their adversaries as a useful foreign policy instrument. Great powers and regional players have used the plights of Tibetans in China, Muslims in India or Christians in Indonesia to promote their narrow national agenda. The Middle East is no exception to this prevailing trend and discussions on the treatment of Middle Eastern minorities such as Egyptian Copts, Israeli Arabs, Turkish Kurds or Iranian Bahais have been highly politicized. It is undeniable that substantial gaps exist between the official positions vis-avis minorities and the perceptions of the latter concerning their status. Whenever a society is threatened by an external enemy or an internal crisis over its identity,

Evil and the demonic: a new theory of monstrous behavior

The notion of evil- does it exist? what forms does it take? -has always fascinated humankind. The evil underlying such atrocities as the Holocaust, Communist China's Tibetan abattoir, and the murderous ethnic cleansing undertaken by the Serbs and Croats seems beyond explanations or analysis. In this powerfully original work, Oppenheimer analyzes the phenomenon of evil in a mental behavior that emerges in particular conditions. Oppenheimer argues that evil contains specific, predictable ingredients. By understanding its nature, we can diagnose its specific manifestations in mass murder, genocide, and serial killings. Utilizing a variety of cinematic and literary genres in developing its evidence, the book considers such familiar films as The Silence of the Lambs and Brazil, and draws upon such literary works as Richard III, Oedipus the King and the Picture of Dorian Gray. Evil and the Demonic takes a bold first step, providing a framework in which to place the horrors of human existence.

Rural Urbanization in China's Tibetan Region—Duilongdeqing County as a Typical Example

Beginning in the late 1970s and early 1980s, China's rural areas embarked on the road to urbanization under the influence of the great tide of reform and the open policy. Has Tibet, a broad, interior region on the southwestern borders of the fatherland, been swept into this urbanization tide? What progress has been made? What are the influences of urbanization on Tibetan society, its economy, and its culture? In November 1993, we made a case study of Duilongdeqing County on the near suburbs of Lhasa to find answers to the above questions.