A Game-Theoretic Analysis of Tiananmen Square Protest in 1989
Abstract: The Tiananmen Square Democratic Protest, which nearly set China on the road
towards democratization, is undoubtedly one of the severe tragedies that have shaped the
history of China. In fact, if we trace the reality of that time and comprehensively examine
the ideas and actions of both sides, we find that it would have been possible for both sides
to find a peaceful compromise. This article illustrates the process of the Tiananmen
Protest in Beijing 1989 by game-theoretic models, using the Theory of Moves. It can be
shown that at the first stage of the protest, both players attempted to use their threat
powers to induce a better payoff for themselves, but the overwhelming power of the party
ensured the effectiveness of its threat power, successfully achieving its best payoff and to
some extent mitigate the severe condition. In the second stage, however, the students
became myopic under the influence of the emotional mass and gave up the chance of
achieving a better outcome, resulting the game in a Pareto-inferior state with no actual
winner.
Key word: democratic movement, game theory
Key word: democratic movement, game theory
A Game-Theoretic Analysis of Tiananmen Square Protest in 1989 | |
File Size: | 231 kb |
File Type: |
Legitimacy Problem and China's Japan Policy
Abstract: Recent tensions between China and Japan have caught world’s attention. Unlike previous
continent attitudes, China changes the tune this time, showing unprecedented hardline to Japan.
Although the Chinese attitude is of course caused by various international factors, this thesis is
designed to find domestic reasons of China’s hardline. It argues that it is legitimacy status of
China that determines its attitude when facing diplomatic confrontations and the hardline
towards Japan results from current Chinese legitimacy problem. Using theory of state legitimacy,
I examine the historical trajectory of legitimacy status of China, finding that China has its own
historical routine of being hardline: when suffering legitimacy problems, China dares to be
hardline and even to resort to war. Moreover, continent attitudes of China in previous conflicts
with Japan stems from secured legitimacy status and it is current legitimacy problems suffered
by China that leads to its tough attitude. Therefore, without solving legitimacy problems, the
hardline policy of China will continue, as well as the tension.
Key word: China, Sino-Japanese conflict, Chinese diplomatic policy, legitimacy
Key word: China, Sino-Japanese conflict, Chinese diplomatic policy, legitimacy
Legitimacy Problem and China's Japan Policy | |
File Size: | 460 kb |
File Type: |
Country-Specific "Political Selection Institution" Analysis: China
Abstract: This article mainly discusses Chinese politics in the scope of selectorate theory. China, as a one party dictatorship authoritarian country, has a body of selectorate that refers to all the CCP members. The winning coalition is not simply half of its selectorate, but varies in different periods. The current winning coalition contains about 500 members who are decisive to the selection and the retaining office of current General Secretary of the Party Xi Jinping. The overall trends of the size of winning coalition of Chinese leader is like a bimodal curve and the size will be stabilized and may continue to increase in the future. The article finds that when the size of winning coalition becomes larger, the Chinese leaders tend to conduct intensive reform policy; relatively, when the winning coalition is small, the leaders prefer to reserve the status quo. In addition, by acknowledging the importance of economic growth, officials use their political power to exploit private goods.
Key word: China, Selectorate Theory, Selectorate, Winning coalition
Key word: China, Selectorate Theory, Selectorate, Winning coalition
country-specific__political_selection_institution__analysis-_china.pdf | |
File Size: | 191 kb |
File Type: |
A Critique on Schumpeter’s Competitive Elitism: By Examining the Case of Chinese Politics
Abstract: Schumpeter’s democratic theory of competitive elitism distinguishes itself from what the classical democratic doctrine advocate. Democracy, here, gotten rid of the classical values, degenerates to a political method to elect political leaders and empower them to make political decisions. In this method, people’s vote and competition between potential leaders are important elements and these two elements largely account for why Schumpeter calls his theory as democratic. According to the five conditions Schumpeter proposes to achieve democracy, the reality of Chinese politics seems to meet all of them. But it is obviously that China does not have people’s vote and competition. In this sense, I think it is necessary to reevaluate the role of people’s vote and competition in Schumpeter’s theory and find that Schumpeter’s model can exist without people’s vote and competition, which means these two elements are unnecessary.
Key word: Schumpeter, democracy, people’s vote, competition, Chinese politics
Key word: Schumpeter, democracy, people’s vote, competition, Chinese politics
a_critique_on_schumpeters_competitive_elitism.pdf | |
File Size: | 167 kb |
File Type: |
On the Reforms in China and the Soivet Union: From the Perspective of Comparative Civilizations
Abstract: From the late 1970s, the communist world embraced a wave of reform and two typical reform routes emerged in the Soviet Union and China. But the two reforms resulted in opposite outcomes: the radical reform in the Soviet Union led to the collapse of communist regimes and trapped them in long period of economic pitfall and political instability; while the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is still in power and the economic growth in China rocketed. This paper aims at interpreting reasons that accounted for disparate reform choices between the two countries from the perspective of distinctions of the Russian and Chinese civilizations, arguing that were it different cultural traditions rooted in the two civilizations that fundamentally resulted in disparate choices of reform and their opposite outcomes. These different traditions contribute to hypotheses of this paper that are following: (a) the different living forms of Russian and Chinese ancient people, nomadism and agrarian economy, inherited opposite philosophies of the world in two civilizations. Exclusiveness and inclusiveness respectively in the Russian and Chinese civilization, to a large extent differentiated the level of intensity in two reforms. (b) The different views toward human nature salvation inclinations that largely shaped by religion or major thought in respect countries between the Russian and Chinese civilization influenced the strategy of political reform in the two cases. (c) The different tradition of governance, specifically the attitude of government toward regulating the economy, made the key points in the two reforms differ. In sum, differences all above resulted in opposite outcomes of reforms: catastrophe in Soviet Union and prosperity in China.
Key word: China, Soviet Union, Reform, Civilization
Key word: China, Soviet Union, Reform, Civilization
on_the_reforms_in_china_and_the_soivet_union-_from_the_perspective_of_comparative_civilizations_.pdf | |
File Size: | 221 kb |
File Type: |
Recruitment Tactics of Army of Chinese Communist Party in Chinese Civil War
Abstract: The Chinese Civil War was the first civil war in the world after World War II. The eventual winner of the war, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was just a small political party, which had only a few hundred members and no more than 30,000 soldiers when they began their armed struggle in 1927. However, two decades later in 1947, its army had grown to more than 3000,000 soldiers, which represents an increase of 100 times. Why did the number of CCP soldiers rise so rapidly in such a short time? Recent literature examining the conscription activities of the CCP army mostly focuses on recruitment tactics in certain periods and regions. The goals of this paper are to present an overview of the CCP’s recruitment action in a consecutive historical trajectory and figures out specific tactics that CCP used between 1927 and 1949 as the situation changed. These tactics can be summarized as (1) putting forward social incentives like ideological attraction, (2) offering economic endowments like distributing lands from landlords to peasants, (3) forcing people to join army, (4) using social endowments like patriotism and nationalism as incentives and (5) using captives as soldiers.
Key Words: Chinese Communist Party (CCP), Kuomintang (KMT), recruitment, economic endowments, social endowments
Key Words: Chinese Communist Party (CCP), Kuomintang (KMT), recruitment, economic endowments, social endowments
recruitment_tactics_of_army_of_chinese_communist_party_in_chinese_civil_war.pdf | |
File Size: | 306 kb |
File Type: |
Democratic Movement and Democratization in Eastern Asian Countries
Abstract: Democratic movements in South Korea, Taiwan and China (PRC) in the 1980s are interesting cases for comparison. Around the 1980s, Taiwan, South Korea and China broke out huge wave of democratic movement. In late the 1980s and 1990s, although once repressed, democratic movement in Taiwan and South Korea eventually propel their country to democracy but China, after the crackdown of democratization movement, still maintains an authoritarian regime and the claimed political reform is in stagnation. So why did the democratic movements under these three authoritarian regimes have such different results? This article mainly focuses on the factors that affect the outcome of democratic movement in Eastern Asian countries, arguing that a potent of middle class, the establishment of formal democracy and intimate relationship with the US are factors that are contributive to a democratic movement to propel the democratization process of a country.
Key word: democratic movement, democratization, middle class, formal democracy, foreign relationship.
Key word: democratic movement, democratization, middle class, formal democracy, foreign relationship.
democratic_movement_and_democratization_in_eastern_asian_countries.pdf | |
File Size: | 483 kb |
File Type: |