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Human Rights from the Left: The Early Chinese Democracy Movement

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Human Rights in Asia

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Abstract

This chapter examines the potential that lies in the Asian attempts to adapt human rights to indigenous value systems and worldviews in the region. This is done through an analysis of the Chinese debate on human rights that took place through the Democracy Wall Movement from 1978 to 1981, exploring how such an indigenous adaptation process could take place under the strict Marxist, or Maoist, intellectual atmosphere that still prevailed in China during this period. The chapter is also a contribution to the discussions of what “Asian values,” after all, are.1 Must “Asian values” be derived from some of the great cultural and religious traditions of the region? Or, can they possibly arise from something more modern, and yet still influential to peoples in (East) Asian societies—in this case—Marxism? As it is argued here, attributing “Asian values” to these traditions is not enough in modern Asian societies. Values are not fixed and perpetual; new ones are being acquired, remade, and recycled as we speak.

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Authors
  1. Lauri Paltemaa
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Asia-Pacific Studies of the Renvall Institute, University of Helsinki, Finland

    Leena Avonius (Senior Researcher) (Senior Researcher)

  2. School of International and Political Studies, Deakin University, Australia

    Damien Kingsbury (Associate Professor and Associate Head) (Associate Professor and Associate Head)

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© 2008 Leena Avonius and Damien Kingsbury

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Paltemaa, L. (2008). Human Rights from the Left: The Early Chinese Democracy Movement. In: Avonius, L., Kingsbury, D. (eds) Human Rights in Asia. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230615496_4

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