Many of the elite population in China believe the peasant population is ignorant and incapable of understanding democracy, but a study by Yang Zhong, a political science professor at the University of Tennessee, shows just the opposite.
“The elites have benefited from recent reforms (in China), so they do not want to rock the boat,” said Zhong, who discussed his recent study on peasants’ view of democracy during the U’s Chinese Culture Week.
The week-long event included a speech contest, presentation of Chinese calligraphy and musical concert. The Confucius Institute invited Zhong to discuss the findings of his recent study, when he spent a year in the Southern Jiangsu province studying the idea of democracy from local people.
“Rural Chinese democracy has become more popular in the last 15 years,” Zhong said.
The study found that people from the rural part of Jiangsu believe local leaders and village representatives should be elected and democracy should prevail over ineffective leadership. He said peasants support political reform in China and a free market economy, as opposed to a planned economy. The study also found the population is somewhat dissatisfied with its government and favors a free press, which China does not have.
Zhong said the peasantry will become a larger political force once the standard of living improves in rural China, especially because people have increased access to the Internet. He said leaders of the Chinese government are afraid of modern technology, as it could cause disarray. He also said the major barrier for democracy in China is the institutional government, citing the fact that it is against the Chinese constitution to directly elect village leaders, who are appointed by the Communist Party.
Zhong said the only way for China to become more democratic is through the government or through an uprising.
“(The peasants) have nothing to lose,” Zhong said. “They are leading the way in democracy.”
He said even though China’s government is ambivalent to democracy, the international community has sentiments for it.
The government is more concerned with stability than experimenting with democracy, but through prosperity, China could become more democratic, he said.
However, Lincoln Neugebauer, a sophomore in Asian studies, disagrees, and said that instead, democracy brings about prosperity.
Lily Run, a graduate student in English, said she believes one day China will become a democracy.
“For 5,000 years (China was) a democracy and led the world,” Run said. “History repeats itself.”