Except unlike China the USSR was actually consciously structured as a union of separate nations which were able to break apart with some degree of continuity. China has probably had a majority of its modern land mass since like 1000 AD. Outside of the East Turkestan movement and Tibet, are there even movements within China that would even want to form a separate nation?
Not really. Many regions with cultural minorities like Inner Mongolia seem to have some tensions over things like Language education, but no real separatist movements worth mentioning
I have a feeling that even the Tibet and East Turkestan separatist movements are exaggerated. Certainly they are no more serious than the Catalan independence movement that was quite brutally crushed with hardly a side note in the media. For the rest of China, I don't even think it is on the radar.
Must be nice, here the catalan movement is brought up whenerver it looks like the government might do something good for Catalonia.
"Hurr durr, our government is trying to get their support with bribes, grumble grumble" "Our government is trying to break Spain, grrr"
The government might FINALLY pardon and release some independentist leaders and the conservative press is being extremely annoying. (Just like the liberal press, which is "concerned").
I'm Canadian and it sounds roughly similar to Quebec. Everyone always complains that they are sort of bribed to stay in Canada. Really they just know how to do politics.
It’s hard for a westerner to gauge the popularity of these things with the sources available to us because like Chinese government certainly publishing any polls about the popularity of Tibetan independence, and you obviously expect US sources to exaggerate these things, but I have no doubt that there is probably a fair number of people who support that, but if there were even a few cranks supporting independence for whatever region the usual suspects would be running with the story.
It's not really a black and white issue because you can have greater autonomy while staying a part of China. From what I can understand, some degree of regional autonomy was basically baked into the system when it was realized fairly early on that China was way too big and complex to be effectively centrally planned, and that a degree of regional autonomy was essential. I think it is only natural that these regions should agitate for a greater degree of regional autonomy, but if they break completely from China then they only leave themselves open to exploitation by other imperialist forces.
Would be nice if they released more polling on this sort of thing. Mind you, no one would believe it and they know that so why would they bother I guess.
PRC likes doing this X autonomous region/prefecture thing for their minorities and makes conscious effort to preserve their language and culture. Maybe that could be construed as a union of separate nations?
I think that's on the level of like saying that the different native reservations in the USA would become separate states. Except not really because the Autonomous regions actually have significantly more autonomy than the reservations do.
Not usually. The more autonomous a nation(I'll say for simplicity's sake) is to operate within a state while benefiting from the state, the less likely it is to want to separate. There are a lot of costs associated with being a state, so the advantages of separation are very small compared to the disadvantages.
Except unlike China the USSR was actually consciously structured as a union of separate nations which were able to break apart with some degree of continuity. China has probably had a majority of its modern land mass since like 1000 AD. Outside of the East Turkestan movement and Tibet, are there even movements within China that would even want to form a separate nation?
Not really. Many regions with cultural minorities like Inner Mongolia seem to have some tensions over things like Language education, but no real separatist movements worth mentioning
People eagerly awaiting the break up of China are the same ones penning articles about how foolish it would be for Scotland to exit the UK.
I have a feeling that even the Tibet and East Turkestan separatist movements are exaggerated. Certainly they are no more serious than the Catalan independence movement that was quite brutally crushed with hardly a side note in the media. For the rest of China, I don't even think it is on the radar.
Must be nice, here the catalan movement is brought up whenerver it looks like the government might do something good for Catalonia.
"Hurr durr, our government is trying to get their support with bribes, grumble grumble" "Our government is trying to break Spain, grrr"
The government might FINALLY pardon and release some independentist leaders and the conservative press is being extremely annoying. (Just like the liberal press, which is "concerned").
I'm Canadian and it sounds roughly similar to Quebec. Everyone always complains that they are sort of bribed to stay in Canada. Really they just know how to do politics.
It’s hard for a westerner to gauge the popularity of these things with the sources available to us because like Chinese government certainly publishing any polls about the popularity of Tibetan independence, and you obviously expect US sources to exaggerate these things, but I have no doubt that there is probably a fair number of people who support that, but if there were even a few cranks supporting independence for whatever region the usual suspects would be running with the story.
It's not really a black and white issue because you can have greater autonomy while staying a part of China. From what I can understand, some degree of regional autonomy was basically baked into the system when it was realized fairly early on that China was way too big and complex to be effectively centrally planned, and that a degree of regional autonomy was essential. I think it is only natural that these regions should agitate for a greater degree of regional autonomy, but if they break completely from China then they only leave themselves open to exploitation by other imperialist forces.
You make a fair point, but is it likely though, considering the approval ratings?
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Still talking about millions of people.
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Would be nice if they released more polling on this sort of thing. Mind you, no one would believe it and they know that so why would they bother I guess.
PRC likes doing this X autonomous region/prefecture thing for their minorities and makes conscious effort to preserve their language and culture. Maybe that could be construed as a union of separate nations?
I think that's on the level of like saying that the different native reservations in the USA would become separate states. Except not really because the Autonomous regions actually have significantly more autonomy than the reservations do.
Shouldn't that encourage separatism?
Not usually. The more autonomous a nation(I'll say for simplicity's sake) is to operate within a state while benefiting from the state, the less likely it is to want to separate. There are a lot of costs associated with being a state, so the advantages of separation are very small compared to the disadvantages.