How many demonstrations in china

The street protests have mostly died down during the coronavirus pandemic, although some small demonstrations, including singing protesters in shopping malls, have started again as restrictions are gradually eased. Now, China is proposing to introduce a new national security law in Hong Kong, which could be similar to the one withdrawn in It says the legislation is "highly necessary" and would "safeguard national security in Hong Kong".

However, the new proposal is also controversial because it is expected to circumvent Hong Kong's own law-making processes - leading to accusations that Beijing is undermining Hong Kong's autonomy. As it happened: Chaotic scenes as HK protests turn violent. Hong Kong leader defiant after massive protest. Do protests in Hong Kong ever work? Huge Hong Kong protest against extradition bill. Hong Kong-China extradition plans explained. Hong Kong independence 'a non-starter'.

This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. How Hong Kong got trapped in a cycle of violence. Hong Kong has a special status Hong Kong's year in seven intense emotions Young, radical and ready for tear gas Read more about Hong Kong's history. Another sticking point has been democratic reform. Most people in Hong Kong don't see themselves as Chinese. Hong Kongers know how to protest.

Image source, AFP. Demonstrations in went on for several weeks. Do protests ever work in China? Liaoyang's problems then, like Wukan's today, were not atypical: the national movement toward privatization had given party officials special access, allowing them to get rich overnight as part of a new and burgeoning crony capitalist class while powerless workers went hungry.

As in Wukan last month, Liaoyang's protest was exceptional for its size -- tens of thousands marched over several days, shutting down the city and forcing senior Communist Party officials to respond -- but its leaders deliberately stopped short, even after being attacked by security forces, of publicly questioning the Communist Party's total rule. They wrote letters to senior officials, whom they addressed as "respected elder" or "beloved," emphasizing that the protesters were loyal to the Communist Party and asking only for those officials to enforce preexisting laws against corruption.

Philip Pan, a former Washington Post Beijing bureau chief, reported in his book Out of Mao's Shadow that the protest leaders privately agreed that single-party rule was the underlying cause of Liaoyang's problems, but were afraid to publicly criticize it or call for democracy and ultimately decided to appeal to senior Party leaders rather than challenge them. The memory of Tiananmen has faded in the decade since But the dynamic of China's hundreds of daily demonstrations has remained the same.

So has the Party's uncanny ability to keep dissent both "within-system" and small-scale, almost never revolutionary in nature or even publicly critical of the autocracy inherent in Communist Party rule.

Officials are too smart to believe their own rhetoric about the benevolence or necessary permanence of single-party rule -- the CPP is not Bashar al-Assad, and they know better than to meet every dissenter with a bullet.

But so are Chinese, whether activists or workers, aware of the Party's sensitivity to popular anger. So, over time, an informal but well-honed process has developed. And though it allows protesters to often come away unscathed and sometimes with real concessions, just like in Las Vegas, the house always wins.

Again, from Out of Mao's Shadow :. The protests at Liaoyang ultimately won two of their biggest demands: a large chunk of their pensions and the imprisonment of several corrupt local officials. The protest leaders, however, mostly ended up in prison along with the officials, whose seniors in the party escaped unscathed. The causes of the corruption -- single-party rule, state control over industry, a lack of checks against Party corruption -- went unaddressed, in part because the protests did not dare challenge them.

Information on the status of political freedoms and civil liberties in each country is drawn from the annual Freedom in the World reports. David Wong, a James C. Richard Youngs, ed. What Comes Next?

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Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Search in Just Washington All Centers. Global Protest Tracker A one-stop source for following crucial trends in the most significant antigovernment protests worldwide since Over significant antigovernment protests have erupted worldwide. More than countries have experienced significant protests. Over 25 significant protests have been directly related to the coronavirus pandemic. What is Hong Kong's status? Want to know more? Read this:. Hong Kong's young winners and the veterans they toppled What led to a single gunshot being fired?

The background you need on the Hong Kong protests Why Starbucks? And watch this:. This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. The history behind Hong Kong's identity crisis and protests - first broadcast November Hong Kong protests: 'I can't say I love China any more'.

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