From The Economist
Published: October 28, 2010
AT A gathering of intellectuals in Beijing, Xin Ziling, an author and former defence official, posed an interesting question. How would Marx have coped with the restrictions on civil liberties evident in China today? He would have needed government permission to publish his Communist Manifesto, and this would have been refused. "You say our capitalist system will disappear!" Mr Xin imagined priggish 19th-century English censors exclaiming. "You can't say that!"
Freedom of speech and the press are enshrined in China's constitution. But in reality there is only so much that people can say or write without getting into trouble. The occasion for the gathering at which Mr Xin spoke was the recent release from jail of Xie Chaoping, a former prosecutor and journalist who had written and published a book about the forced relocation of hundreds of thousands of people during the construction of a massive dam on the Yellow River in the 1950s. He had been detained for nearly a month by local officials in Shaanxi province who disapproved of his writings. The manager of his printing company was also detained. The case attracted great publicity, with many activists and intellectuals agitating for the two men's release.
Mr Xin was one of two dozen retired officials, academics and Communist Party elders who, citing Mr Xie's case and others, argued recently for greater press freedom in a signed open letter to the leadership of the National People's Congress (NPC), China's parliament. The mismatch between the right to freedom of the press, loftily asserted in the constitution, and the restrictions that are crudely enforced in practice, the group wrote, amounts to a form of "false democracy" that has "become a scandalous mark on the history of world democracy."
This is not the first attempt to expand press freedom in China. During a period of relative political liberalisation in the late 1980s, NPC members spoke openly about the need for a liberal press law. But that movement was doomed by the government's anxious, brutish response to the Tiananmen Square demonstrations of 1989. The censor's pen is still much in evidence. None of China's thousands of newspapers and periodicals escapes it. And although officials pay occasional lip service to the fourth estate's important "supervisory" role as a check against corruption and other abuses, they also define its primary role as a prop to social stability.
It is not only dissidents who find their voices muffled. The open letter to parliament also complained that recent support for political reform expressed by Wen Jiabao, the prime minister, in speeches at the United Nations and elsewhere, had been scrubbed from the Chinese media.
Yet many activists are optimistic that liberal change is coming. Dai Qing, a prominent dissident pundit, notes that activists are finding it easier to raise money for their causes at home. They "no longer have to rely on money from people like George Soros," she says. She is also impressed by the diverse backgrounds of those pushing for a press law: they include young journalists, seasoned party members and officials, and even one or two military men.
假民主？中國媒體挑戰新聞自由
作者：經濟學人 出處：Web Only 2010/10
相關關鍵字：經濟學人
在一場於北京舉行的聚會中，前中國解放軍官員辛子陵提出了一個有趣的問題。馬克思如果碰上了目前中國對公民自由的限制會怎麼樣？馬克思得需要政府核准才能出版共產黨宣言，而且政府不會核准。
中國的憲法中寫著言論與新聞自由，但實際上並非如此。此次北京的聚會是為了最近被釋放的謝朝平而辦，謝朝平自費出版了一本書，內容與1950年代黃 河大壩興建時強迫居民遷徙有關。他被拘留了近一個月，印刷廠人員也遭拘留；該案引起許多關注，許多運動人士和知識分子也要求政府釋放兩人。
最近，二十幾位退休官員、學者、共黨老幹部，連名寫了一封公開信給全國人民代表大會。信中指出，憲法主張新聞自由，實務上卻採行嚴格限制，這是一種「假民主，成為世界民主史上的醜聞」。
在政治相對自由的1980年代末，全國人民代表大會的成員曾公開表示應制訂新聞自由法。但在1989天安門事件後，此事也隨之告終。審查仍隨處可 見，中國數千家報社和雜誌社都逃不出掌心，即使官員偶爾會不真心地讚揚新聞媒體的監督角色，他們還是認為新聞媒體的主要任務是維持社會穩定。
許多運動人士樂觀地相信，自由改革即將到來。著名的異議分子戴晴表示，運動人士現在在國內籌措資金比過去容易，不再需要倚賴索羅斯等人的資金。另一件讓她相當驚奇的事，就是推動媒體法案的人擁有各種不同的背景，有年輕記者、資深黨員、官員，甚至還有一、兩位軍人。
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