Li Yitian: Earthquake in Sichuan and Ecological Reconstruction: A Dialectic Tension between Chinese Political System and Environmental Protection

 

China has a powerful government. And public policies are made and implemented from top to bottom by the government, not by the citizens. So it is said that Chinese political system is authoritatist and not so democratic, according to the weatern view. As for ecological governance and environmental protection, such a political system is inclined to make unsuitable deciscions because of its bureaucratism which can interrupt the connection between the citizens and the officials and therefore distort the real informations from the bottom. With the case of Sichuan earthquake in 2008 and some situations before and after it, this paper will make a reflection and criticism to the idea above, in order to reveal the dialectic relationship between Chinese political system and environmental protection more comprehensively.

1. The Sichuan Earthquake happened on 12 May 2008 in the Wenchuan area of Sichuan Province, China. It caused over 80,000 deaths and disappearances, leaving 370,000 people with injuries and disabilities. Several million families lost their homes and possessions. According to Chinese Government statistics, the total area of collapsed buildings caused by the Sichuan Earthquake was more than 125,000 square meters, within which the severely damaged area was over 15,000 square meters. Most deaths in the earthquake were due to the collapse of buildings. Special geographical conditions in Sichuan made the damage even worse. An earthquake can be a natural ecological disaster. Its explosive force is due to the activity of earth plates and the internal energy accumulation of its subterranean geology. However, the great losses caused by the explosion - lives, buildings, the large scale damage of forestry, the disappearance of wild animal habitat, and the destruction of ecological systems - are more often related to inappropriate human activities and their excessive exploition.

2. The deciscions of excessive exploition are made by local governments. Central strategy of "Reformation and Openness" and its focusing on the development of economy are the backgounds or contexts of such deciscions, while the common people's aspiration of promoting their living conditions and economic levels underlies the legitimacy of them. Accoding to the investigation of the status of natural resources, geographical conditions and social bases, provincial and county governments are responsible for stipulating plans and considering concrete projects. And then the local governments will report those plans and (larger) projects to the Central. Until they are approved or even imbursed by the central government will the local officials not carry out the deciscions downforward. However, the Central assigns the economic developmental missions every year and the local plans are always optimistic -- partly for they are urgent to bring a better life to common people, and partly for their investigation and consideration have not included enough opinions of citizens -- so the decisions of excessive exploition will be created and implemented unavoidably.

3．Without the excessive explotions, the loss caused by the earthquake could have been smaller. Nevertheless the earthquake has brought a good chance for chinese governors to have a self-reflection with the tragic and terrible costs. From the Central, the provincial to the local county levels, environmental protection have been regarded as a key during the governments are summarizing the lessons and making the future plans. Some departments in the Central go to Sichuan for the field research and finally set up "The State Overall Planning for the Post-Wenchuan Earthquake Restoration and Reconstruction"; Sichuan provincial government designs the concrete policies which require the reconstruction of indutries, roads and urban-rural buildings should be fit with ecological constrainer; and the Counties stipulate and carry out the more detailed descisions. They have closed some highly-polluted factories, been more cautious to accept the investments of high-consumption and highly-polluted industrial corporations, speaded green ideas directly to the citizens and encouraged some green NGOs to participate the reconstruction.

4. In the view of western world, Chiese political system is certainly not a (full) democratic polity and has many defects which are inclined to bring about errors. However such a system implies a kind of elitist confidence and a stronger capability of social mobilization, which emphasizes the plans and orders. So as long as it takes a change and turns to a right way, it will also be powerful and effective. Of course, the coditions for change are that the governors can be aware of their past errors, consider as many opinions as possible of the common people and scholars, adjust their ideas and attitudes to the right direction of enviromental protection. Therefore we can draw two conclusions: (1) There is a dialectic tension between Chinese political system and environmental protection, in which it is unnecessary that the former will be harmful to the latter; actually the former can promote the latter in certain conditions. (2) It is not necessary (or sufficient) for successful evironmental protection whether there is a (full) democratic political system. The key among the difficulties of environmental protection in China is not the absence of full democracy, but the high social costs if you want to realize the above conditons and change to an ecological way.