As I go about reading ‘Man Monk Mystic’ all over again to determine the extent of revision an updated edition might require, I cannot but get struck by some of the comments made by the highly regarded Chinese scholar Dr. Orville Schell nearly a decade ago.
Once you get past the unabashed self-absorption that most journalists display in occasionally quoting from their own work, you would see that Dr. Schell does makes some very compelling arguments. So here are some excerpts from my own book in my own blog, which until recently, only I read.
The inevitable question of what the Dalai Lama's options are prompted a mixed response. “The Dalai Lama has done as good a job as he possibly could given the parameters of his own principles. It's the paradox of life that sometime might trumps principles and morality. One wishes it were otherwise but it isn't always. I can't think what else he can do. In many ways is an exemplar of absolutely the opposite of what China is all about. The problem is that China has so polluted itself with its own propaganda in regard to Tibet and Taiwan that it is very hard for China to think in a very revolutionary way and solve Tibet, something we can do in five minutes. Nothing would be lost and everything would be gained. China would become a truly great power in the eyes of the world, cosmopolitan, sophisticated which might be emulated in ways that even the United States cannot be emulated.”
The solution, he said, is for the Dalai Lama to go back. “Let the Dalai Lama go back as a cultural figure, given real political autonomy. Defense and foreign policy can be in Chinese hands. Do experiments the way Canada does with Quebec or the way Britain does with Scotland. This will have a very salutary effect on Hong Kong and Taiwan. It could do a one country, two systems that is real.”
Schell sent this proposal to the standing committee of China’s politburo. He said he knows for a fact that its translation was distributed among the higher-ups in the party. “I think they know it but there is something blocking the way, probably the military. We don't really know the conservatizing effect and power of whole blocks of Chinese institutional society, the security bureau, the People's Liberation Army, the party, and so on. I think people are aware of this but evidently no leader or block of leaders feels compelled or strong enough to launch a new policy initiative,” he said.
As things stand now Schell agrees that it is a dead end. “Yes, but you never know. Look at what happened to Eastern Europe or Russia. I don't think China is right now going to implement a well-ordered, well-articulated reform program with the goal of making Tibet a more autonomous or independent entity with the Dalai Lama playing some considerable symbolic role. They are going to pass out little scraps to a few delegations here and a few delegations there. That keeps everybody quiet and shuts everybody up and it keeps the status quo.”
In Schell’s assessment the question of Tibet is not territorial but psychological. “It is certainly not economic. To a minor extent they imagine it being strategically important. I think it has to do with the humiliation of China being dismembered in the 19th century. There is no reason for the Communist Party to govern unilaterally other than for nationalistic reasons. Communism is dead. It is Leninist form of capitalism. It is their one claim to fame and to continue on this one-party system is that it has made China whole. Tibet is a very important piece of it,” he said.
I suggested that perhaps the Dalai Lama could do something radical like showing up in Lhasa surreptitiously, the way he had left it in 1959. “It is an exciting idea, almost like a Hollywood movie. I am sure he would laugh his deep-throated chuckle at the idea. Although doing something like that does not sound like him, I cannot say it would not delight me if he did something like that. He is not that kind of person. He is not a provoker. But then that is about the only thing he could do something utterly shocking. May be hop on a horse and go the same he came out. Right now he plods around the world doing events for fawning Westerners. They love his spiritual cuddly side and he feels powerless to help his own people,” he said.