The “Tibet question”: Tibetan, Chinese and Western perspectives

Abstract

The historical conflict between Tibet and China goes back almost a thousand years. Both sides use history to argue their point about the core issues in this dispute – Tibet's claim of independence and autonomy, and China's of suzerainty. This article looks at the historical roots of this conflict, particularly since 1949, when China began its gradual takeover of Tibet. Chinese policies toward Tibet, which have been driven by a desire to communize and sinicize Tibet, has been met by stiff resistance from the Tibetans, who see Han Chinese dominance as a force that will, over time, destroy Tibet's unique religion, language, culture, and history. This resistance has drawn the attention of the West, who see Chinese policies in Tibet as a symbol of the failings of Beijing's rulers to embrace a strong commitment to human rights at the same time that China is becoming a global economic power. The 14th Dalai Lama, a key figure in this conflict, and his government-in-exile have served as bridges to Western efforts to try to force Beijing to embrace more open, humane policies toward Tibetans throughout China. His retirement as political head of the exile government in 2011, coupled with China's growing economic and strategic power globally, raises serious questions about the willingness of the USA, and other democratic powers to risk their relationships with Beijing to continue to promote true human rights and autonomy throughout the Tibetan Plateau.

Keywords:

• Tibet
• Dalai Lama
• China
• human rights
• autonomy
• Tibetan Plateau
• immolations

Acknowledgements

I thank Nawang Thokmey, the curator of the University of Virginia's vast Tibetan library and archives for his advice and support in researching this article.

Notes

1. In 1924, Sir Charles Bell differentiated between a “political” Tibet, the land “controlled by the Tibetan Government and the Tibetan tribal authorities”, and an “ethnographic” Tibet, a much larger area “inhabited by people of Tibetan race” in China, Sikkim, Bhutan, Nepal, and India. Today, “political” Tibet encompasses the TAR, while “ethnographic” Tibet includes the Tibetan prefectures, counties, and municipalities of those parts of western China with significant Tibetan populations as well as those outside of the Peoples’ Republic of China (PRC) (Bell 1968, 5–9).

2. The 2000 Chinese census showed a Tibetan population of a little over five million in the TAR and in the four provinces with significant Tibetan populations.

3. The Mongols conquered Tibet and China in the thirteenth century and set up the Yuan dynasty (1279–1368). It was succeeded by the Ming dynasty, which ruled China from 1368 to 1644. China's last imperial dynasty, the Qing or Manchu, ruled from 1644 to 1912.

4. The Atlantic Charter was issued by President Franklin Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill in the summer of 1941. It laid out eight wartime goals including the promise that neither the USA nor Great Britain sought territorial gains from the war and the right of peoples to self-determination.

5. Goldstein, History of Modern Tibet, II, 28–30, 245–247, 414–421, confirms the general gist of the conversation between Stalin and Mao. He also provides considerable details about China's efforts to build roads in Tibet to aid military development and supply Chinese troops there.

6. The text of the 17-Point Agreement can be found in Sino-Tibetan Agreemant (2003, 607–609).

7. There were 115,000 monks in 2500 monasteries; the Tibetan government-in-exile said in 2008 that there were 6259 monasteries and nunneries in Tibet with more than 592,558 monks and nuns in 1951, 41.

8. Rummell claims that between 1949 and 1987, the “Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has probably killed 35,236,000 of its own subjects.” He attributes most of these deaths to the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution; Chang and Halliday, Mao, 438, 547. They estimate that almost 38 million died during the “Great Leap Forward and the famine”, and 3 million during the Cultural Revolution.

9. 279–283. French, who is very sympathetic to Tibetan suffering, estimates that as many as a half million Tibetans may have died as a “direct result” of Chinese policies.

10. Estimates are that a million Chinese became purge victims of these radicalized youth cadres. Shakya, Dragon in the Land of the Snows, 317, 323–324, 326–327, 329–330, 343–344.

11. Kapstein agrees, though he also notes that “antipathy to Chinese domination as it has developed so far [has] combined with the positive ideal of Tibetan autonomy and freedom, embodied for many in the figure of the Dalai.” “Concluding Reflections”, 149.