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Bulldozers and the law: When might means right
By Wang Yong |
December 11, 2010, Saturday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
IT'S all about bulldozers, it's not about bulldozers. It's all about the law, it's nothing about the law.
"You can't bulldoze China into good politics, social harmony or genuine urbanization," wrote Wang Jinwen, a 29-year-old doctoral candidate in law at Beijing-based Qinghua University, in an online letter addressed to an official in his faraway hometown, dated November 17. "Rather, you will stir instability and petition."
Before the 8,000-plus-word letter went online to a chorus of media and netizen acclaim, the house of Wang's parents in a village in Weifang City, Shandong Province, was razed in the wee hours of November 17.
Thus he addressed Weifang's mayor: "You may well argue that you have built a new Weifang City, even a new China, with bulldozers, but in doing so you have bulldozed me homeless."
The letter, bolstered with critical legal reasoning and enlivened with rare literary flair, is set to be a landmark in what I call responsible free speech in modern China. With just a pen, the author took the bull by the horns in laying bare the brutal behavior of many a local official in whose eyes the law lies only in a bulldozer.
Indeed, in the eyes of those thuggish officials, everything is made possible by a bulldozer - law, money, power and promotion - and nothing matters to a bulldozer - lives, dignity, conscience or justice.
In March, bulldozers began to rumble across the village where Wang's parents lived. In April, Wang asked the Weifang municipal government to show the villagers documents that demonstrated the demolition had been approved. In May, Wang got a written reply from the municipal government, verifying that the project had not been approved.
"Demolition went ahead without any required government approval," Wang told the Beijing News on December 1. Xinhua news agency and many other leading news outlets reprinted the interview the same day.
At about 2am on November 17, he said, bulldozers razed his parents' house, swept away all the furniture, clothes and stored food, and made a mess of all the books he read from junior middle school to college.
"This is the way you show me by example what 'disgrace of Weifang style' means," Wang wrote. A local official confirmed on November 30 that Wang's house had indeed been pulled down.
Before he publicized the letter in the depths of his despair and disgust about abuse of power, Wang had communicated with local officials to no avail. "Whenever I called the mayor's hotline, there was either an eerie silence or a blunt answer that they wouldn't respond unless someone had perished," Wang wrote.
Earlier, he had criticized some local officials for lacking everything required of an upright official, and those officials quipped: "Yes, you're very right, we indeed have nothing you want from us."
What brazen officials they are. Wang's letter strengthens my doubts about how these thuggish people could have legitimately found their way into government posts.
In the letter, Wang said he and other villagers would welcome demolition or urbanization as long as it was for the public good and there was transparency about all decisions and actions. According to Chinese law, demolition and attendant compensation are negotiable, but Wang wrote: "So far, neither I nor other villagers have seen any real estate developer or its certificate. We have been denied due process of democratic discussion and voting."
In Wang's view, it's all in the law - his right to know, to negotiate, to vote, to veto. In the view of those lurking behind bulldozers, it's nothing to do with the law - they are a law unto themselves.
Wang's letter is "responsible" free speech because he does not instigate violence or, in the words of legendary American justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, falsely shout "Fire!" in a crowded theater. Wang simply appeals to law, to conscience, to common sense. Of course, he has an unusual power: he recorded all his conversations with those officials.
Let us heed this kind of responsible free speech and act on our conscience. Don't bulldoze it into irresponsible shouting of fires.
"You can't bulldoze China into good politics, social harmony or genuine urbanization," wrote Wang Jinwen, a 29-year-old doctoral candidate in law at Beijing-based Qinghua University, in an online letter addressed to an official in his faraway hometown, dated November 17. "Rather, you will stir instability and petition."
Before the 8,000-plus-word letter went online to a chorus of media and netizen acclaim, the house of Wang's parents in a village in Weifang City, Shandong Province, was razed in the wee hours of November 17.
Thus he addressed Weifang's mayor: "You may well argue that you have built a new Weifang City, even a new China, with bulldozers, but in doing so you have bulldozed me homeless."
The letter, bolstered with critical legal reasoning and enlivened with rare literary flair, is set to be a landmark in what I call responsible free speech in modern China. With just a pen, the author took the bull by the horns in laying bare the brutal behavior of many a local official in whose eyes the law lies only in a bulldozer.
Indeed, in the eyes of those thuggish officials, everything is made possible by a bulldozer - law, money, power and promotion - and nothing matters to a bulldozer - lives, dignity, conscience or justice.
In March, bulldozers began to rumble across the village where Wang's parents lived. In April, Wang asked the Weifang municipal government to show the villagers documents that demonstrated the demolition had been approved. In May, Wang got a written reply from the municipal government, verifying that the project had not been approved.
"Demolition went ahead without any required government approval," Wang told the Beijing News on December 1. Xinhua news agency and many other leading news outlets reprinted the interview the same day.
At about 2am on November 17, he said, bulldozers razed his parents' house, swept away all the furniture, clothes and stored food, and made a mess of all the books he read from junior middle school to college.
"This is the way you show me by example what 'disgrace of Weifang style' means," Wang wrote. A local official confirmed on November 30 that Wang's house had indeed been pulled down.
Before he publicized the letter in the depths of his despair and disgust about abuse of power, Wang had communicated with local officials to no avail. "Whenever I called the mayor's hotline, there was either an eerie silence or a blunt answer that they wouldn't respond unless someone had perished," Wang wrote.
Earlier, he had criticized some local officials for lacking everything required of an upright official, and those officials quipped: "Yes, you're very right, we indeed have nothing you want from us."
What brazen officials they are. Wang's letter strengthens my doubts about how these thuggish people could have legitimately found their way into government posts.
In the letter, Wang said he and other villagers would welcome demolition or urbanization as long as it was for the public good and there was transparency about all decisions and actions. According to Chinese law, demolition and attendant compensation are negotiable, but Wang wrote: "So far, neither I nor other villagers have seen any real estate developer or its certificate. We have been denied due process of democratic discussion and voting."
In Wang's view, it's all in the law - his right to know, to negotiate, to vote, to veto. In the view of those lurking behind bulldozers, it's nothing to do with the law - they are a law unto themselves.
Wang's letter is "responsible" free speech because he does not instigate violence or, in the words of legendary American justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, falsely shout "Fire!" in a crowded theater. Wang simply appeals to law, to conscience, to common sense. Of course, he has an unusual power: he recorded all his conversations with those officials.
Let us heed this kind of responsible free speech and act on our conscience. Don't bulldoze it into irresponsible shouting of fires.
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