China
China has a long tradition of Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism, which have undergone a revival due to many of the government’s restrictions on religious practice having been lifted since the 1980s. The Han Dynasty (202 BCE-220 CE) promulgated Confucianism as the state culture, which it has largely remained. Buddhism gained significant influence by the 5th century and mixed considerably with native Daoism. The Communist Party implemented state atheism when it came to power in 1949 and attempted to expunge religion from society during the Cultural Revolution (1966-76). However, religious practice surged as prohibitions eased. Chinese religious policy is freedom of belief and practice with government oversight of organization and political action. The government oversees officially organized religious bodies, though underground organizations also exist, particularly for Christianity. Foreign proselytism is illegal, and Communist Party members are required to be atheist. Internal conflicts tend to have a religious element, as seen in the cases of the Tibetan Autonomous Region and Xinjiang province.
ESSAYS ON CHINA
Religion and State through the Imperial Era
The nexus between the state and religion in China can be traced back to the Shang Dynasty (Seventeenth-Eleventh century BCE), where divination records suggest spirit and ancestor worship at the royal court and in connection with military campaigns. The subsequent Zhou Dynasty (1045-265 BCE) instituted the idea of the Mandate of Heaven, whereby a just ruler would retain rule and an unjust ruler would be overthrown. From this era dates the emergence of Confucianism and Daoism, philosophical and religious movements that would shape the subsequent development of culture, society, and politics in China. The Han Dynasty (202 BCE-220 CE) established Confucianism, with its emphasis on social order and filial piety, as the philosophical underpinning of the state. During the Fifth and Sixth centuries CE, Buddhism spread from South and Central Asia into China. The transition from the Tang (618-907) to the Song Dynasty (960-1270) saw an active competition for political influence among the country's three major religious and philosophical traditions: Confucianism, Buddhism, and Daoism. After a period of Mongol rule that included sustained contacts with Islam and some interaction with Christianity, the Ming (1368-1644) and then the Ching (1644-1911) dynasties instated a Neo-Confucian system of strict state control of religious organization. The final decades of the Ching were marked by imperialist incursions from the West and internal crises, including the devastating Taiping Rebellion (1851-1864), a challenge to state authority led by a heterodox Christian convert, and the Boxer Rebellion (1899-1901), partly directed against the influence of Western imperial governments and their Christian missionaries in China.
From the Republic through the Cultural Revolution
The Chinese Revolution of 1911, led by Sun Yat-Sen and his Nationalist Party, precipitated four decades of instability and political and ideological struggle. During the 1920s, under the banner of the May 4 Movement (1919), radical intellectuals mobilized both against a post-World War I territorial settlement that transferred control of German-held Shandong to Japan rather than repatriate it to China, and against a Confucian tradition many rejected as reactionary. Chiang Kai-shek, the Nationalist who assumed power in 1928, supported Confucian principles but was unable to consolidate his rule in the face of Japanese incursions and the rise of the Chinese Communist Party. After Japan's defeat in 1945, the Communists under Mao Zedong prevailed in the civil war against the Nationalist forces, who fled to Taiwan. During the decade after the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, the government created Patriotic Associations to control five officially recognized religious traditions: Buddhism, Daoism, Catholicism, Protestantism, and Islam. The Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), Mao's effort to radicalize the country and maintain his power, included a frontal assault on religious practices and institutions. While it failed in its professed goal of eradicating religion, it did result in the wide-scale destruction of religious property and the disruption of centuries-old religious practices.
An Era of Opening
China’s religious landscape changed dramatically in the wake of the economic liberalization and opening to the world initiated under Mao’s successor, Deng Xiaoping (1976-1992). During the 1980s and 1990s, the country experienced an upsurge in religious belief and practices. In keeping with the party’s political monopoly, the government revived and updated the Patriotic Association structure first implemented in the 1950s, instituting the regulation of religious activities and organizations in line with the principles of political stability and national unity. Into the new century, concerns with stability and unity have underpinned the state’s ongoing opposition to the Tibetan Buddhism of the Dalai Lama and to Islam-inspired activism in Muslim-majority Xinxiang Province, as well as certain new religious movements, including the Falun Gong. The focus on national unity also has a foreign policy dimension. The government places controls on foreign missionary activity and names its own Catholic Bishops, perpetuating an official Church and an “underground” Church loyal to Rome (although both organizations overlap in many ways). Over the past several decades, the official Chinese approach to religious freedom – freedom of belief and practice but not of organization and political engagement – has complicated its foreign policy, particularly in relation to the United States. On the domestic front, the leadership under Hu Jintao, who succeeded to power in 2002, has emphasized the potential of religious communities to contribute to economic and social development under the banner of “Building a Harmonious Society.”
Contemporary Affairs
Recent events in the People’s Republic of China have largely centered on the tension between ethnoreligious minority groups and government authorities, particularly in the Muslim-majority Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. In July 2009, protests in the region’s capital, Ürümqi, began with calls for a full investigation into an incident in southern China in which Hans – the country’s ethnic majority – killed two Uyghurs during a brawl. The protests quickly became violent when Muslim Uyghurs attacked Han Chinese, who then retaliated, leading the army and police to quell the protests. The official death toll for the series of riots was 197, though non-government sources have reported higher totals. In the weeks following the riots, security officials temporarily closed mosques and arrested over 1,000 Uyghurs, at least 25 of whom have since received death sentences. Anticipating similar unrest in the Tibet Autonomous Region for the 50th anniversary of the 1959 Tibetan uprising, government security forces preemptively heightened restrictions on gatherings of Tibetan Buddhists. Tensions between the Dalai Lama and the Chinese government, which flared up during and after demonstrations and violence in Tibet in early 2008, persist. The Dalai Lama has accused the government of increased repression of Tibetans and their cultural and religious traditions, and the government has accused him and his supporters of separatism.
Religious Freedom in China
While freedom of religion has expanded in China since the country began opening to the outside world in 1979, it is still limited in significant respects. The Chinese Constitution provides for freedom of religious belief but also places restrictions on religious organization and practice. The government recognizes five religions – Buddhism, Daoism, Islam, Catholicism, and Protestantism – and requires that all religious activities take place under the auspices of a religion’s respective “patriotic religious association,” government bodies charged with regulating that tradition’s practice in the country. The Constitution also forbids foreign control of religious groups, which poses particular problems for Chinese Catholics whose official Church consequently has no direct tie to the Vatican. The government also bans “cults"; Falun Gong, for example, has been outlawed since 1999. Religious divisions follow ethnic and geographic lines in the cases of Tibetan Buddhists and Uyghur Muslims. In an effort to solidify central state control, state authorities significantly restrict the practice of Tibetan Buddhism in Tibet and Islam in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. Restrictions have increased in the wake of violence in Tibet in 2008 and in Xinjiang in 2008 and 2009. Members of the Communist Party must be atheists, effectively limiting opportunities for political involvement to those who do not belong to a faith tradition. The US State Department’s annual Report on International Religious Freedom has regularly labeled China as a “country of particular concern." The Chinese government rejects these reports as an unwarranted intervention in the country's internal affairs.
Religion in the Chinese Constitution
The Constitution of the People’s Republic of China was adopted by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in 1982, and was last amended in 2004. Article 36 of the Constitution stipulates that state and public organs are prohibited from discriminating against individuals based on their religious beliefs and from compelling citizens to believe in any religion. The Constitution also prohibits religious bodies and affairs from being subject to foreign domination, and proselytizing by foreigners is illegal. Religious organizations must be registered, and religious activities must be government-sanctioned. Only religious activities permitted by the State Administration of Religious Affairs are allowed. The government bans cults and cult worship, but the definition of a cult remains discretionary. Religious activities may not disrupt public order. Members of the Communist Party are required to be atheist, and government officials are not required to be Communist, although most high-ranking public officials are members of the Communist Party.
Article 34: Right to Political Participation
All citizens of the People's Republic of China who have reached the age of 18 have the right to vote and stand for election, regardless of ethnic status, race, sex, occupation, family background, religious belief, education, property status or length of residence, except persons deprived of political rights according to law.
Article 36: Freedom of Religion
Citizens of the People's Republic of China enjoy freedom of religious belief. No state organ, public organization or individual may compel citizens to believe in, or not to believe in, any religion; nor may they discriminate against citizens who believe in, or do not believe in, any religion. The state protects normal religious activities. No one may make use of religion to engage in activities that disrupt public order, impair the health of citizens or interfere with the educational system of the state. Religious bodies and religious affairs are not subject to any foreign domination.
