Shanghai Jurist Zhang Xuezhong Launches Online Referendum to Call for Constitutionalism Again
After being summoned by police for a similar appeal last year, Shanghai jurist and former lawyer Zhang Xuezhong launched an online referendum on Twitter on Feb. 16, calling for a “national constitution and peaceful transition” and was immediately interviewed by authorities. Some people appreciated his courage, while others thought he was seeking skin with a tiger.
Zhang Xuezhong, a former law professor at East China University of Political Science and Law, wrote in a tweet: “‘National Constitution, Peaceful Transition’ is a political idea that I have put forward after careful consideration. It is both a path and vision for political modernization on the mainland and a slogan to mobilize public support and promote political change, and is most likely to become a consensus among different classes.” “If you support it, please forward it!”
Zhang Xuezhong attached a photo of himself holding a handwritten slogan, hoping the post would receive more than 10,000 retweets within a week.
After that, Zhang Xuezhong continued to appeal, “Pursuing constitutional democracy in an authoritarian country is never an extremely difficult thing.” “People don’t necessarily agree with my proposition completely, so if you feel that political modernization on the mainland is the most worthy public issue for us Chinese to care about, please show your support by retweeting.”
By Feb. 19 the referendum tweet had received more than 445 retweets.
Twitter users commented.
“Challenging one-party dictatorship and insisting on freedom of speech requires immense courage in the current Chinese Communist state. Tribute to Professor Zhang Xuezhong”
“I don’t necessarily agree with what Zhang Xuezhong did, but I admire his courage, so more people should know about this thing Zhang Xuezhong did” “Knowing that it is impossible to do it and doing it is the nature of being an intellectual! Kudos to Professor Zhang!”
“The key is not in making the constitution, but in doing it. Modern dictatorships also do not like to be called dictatorships, preferring to dress up as liberal democracies.”
“Sending you that famous Trump quote: ‘If this works, why didn’t you tell Obama earlier?'”
“Don’t pretend, if you know that you have to tell empty words, it’s a falsehood.”
Chen Yongmiao, a mainland constitutional scholar in Beijing, told Radio Free Asia that he believes it takes a massive geopolitical collision to promote democratic transformation on the mainland, “I’ve experienced more than that, (Zhang Xuezhong) such expressions placed in the political reality of the mainland, like fireworks in the night sky, released once and gone, the sun still dark as long as it does not rise, still unable to bring the dawn. “
But he also added that the fireworks have been set off, at least to give people some hope.
Zhang Xuezhong tweeted on Feb. 18 that he had been interviewed by the Chinese Communist Party authorities with a warning: “The authorities started asking me to delete this tweet.” “In the interview that just ended, I said, ‘I am a timid and fearful person who would love to live a stable and calm Life. But that life should not be at the expense of freedom of expression, so I really don’t want to delete this tweet’.”
According to Zhang Xuezhong, the current constitution is also not a true constitution. His argument is that the constitution should be the product of the will of all the people, while the mainland’s constitution is made by a group of “representatives” who are not freely elected by all the people, in accordance with the will of a leader or a political party.
In an interview with Free Asia, Wang Tiancheng, a U.S.-based constitutional scholar and director of the Institute for the Transformation of Democracy on the mainland, agreed: “The role of the constitution should be to restrict the government and protect the rights of citizens; but the mainland constitution does not serve this purpose; it is a policy statement of the Communist Party.”
He also said that the “Four Basic Principles” were written into the preamble of the mainland constitution in 1982 during the Deng Xiaoping era, which established the guiding principle that the mainland constitution serves the Communist Party and makes authoritarianism the soul of the mainland constitution.
In May last year, Zhang Xuezhong published an open letter of nearly 10,000 words to the National People’s Congress of the Communist Party of China, calling for the initiation of a national constitution-making process and efforts to achieve peaceful political transformation. The result was that he was taken away from his Home by Shanghai police in the early hours of the morning the day after the open letter was published. After being summoned for 24 hours, Zhang Xuezhong returned home safely. Further before that, Zhang Xuezhong Yu published an online article entitled “The Roots and Dangers of the 2013 Anti-Constitutional Backlash” in June 2013, and he was suspended from teaching at East China University of Political Science and Law in August of the same year and officially dismissed from his position in December.
Recent Comments