The Blue Dragon village is located in the Northeast of China but does not exist according to authority papers. It cannot be found on any map and no one in the village has an official ID required to travel or work. The government of China promised the villagers to give them back their identifications but they never did. The problem arises from over a decade ago when the local authorities forced the villagers out after building a reservoir on their ancestral lands to provide fresh water for an expanding city nearby called Harbin. Instead of abandoning their lands and moving into other cities, the Blue Dragon village relocated itself beside the reservoir without the official's permission. The local authorities is said to be aware of the issue and have stated that they have paid a lot of compensation money to each family despite allowing the villagers to illegally return to their lands. He also commented that the local authorities forced the villagers out of their lands because the area was prone to flood instead of economic reasons.
The main Areas of knowledge involved in the issue is history while the ways of knowing involved are language. The issue being brought up in this article is whether or not the villagers of Blue Dragon village should be issued an legal official ID and documents that allows them to have their own existence and therefore allowing them to find jobs and travel on transportations outside the village. This raises the question of what constitutes a person's identity and being existent? Do documentations define a person's existence or does that person have to be physically breathing to be considered alive and existing? The article doesn’t clearly state the stance the Chinese officials hold on the topic over whether to give IDs to the villagers, but it can be assumed that the officials would give the villagers IDs once they leave the reservoirs. If the officials have solid evidence to prove that the land the villagers are living on are prone to flooding, then they can convince the villagers that they have the right under protection of civilians to evacuate the villagers to other places. On the other hand, one might argue that the villagers didn’t do any wrong and that they are just trying to keep their ancestral lands and therefore shouldn’t be punished by not being recognized as being existent. Should the government save the culture of Blue Dragon village and its people or abandon it for the economic development? Personally, I would choose culture over economic development because China has one of the greatest and richest culture. The results of the cultural revolution from 1966-1976 has clearly showed that destroying a society's culture doesn't help its country's economy and does exactly the opposite. To solve this problem quickly and efficiency, the Chinese government should issue the documentations for the villagers and somehow negotiate with the villagers so that the land and the reservoirs don't interfere with each other.
Other minorities around the world today have the same problem as the Blue Dragon village do. Aborigines or minority cultures are constantly wiped out in order to expand a country's land and wealth. For example, the government of Tasmania is planning on building a bridge straight over a site filled with Aborigine artifacts. Although the government ensures that the bridge will bring no harm to the site, the Aborigine leader argues that this project is 'cultural vandalism'. The debate boils all down to should people sacrifice culture for technological/economical development or preserve the culture for the new generation? It's a hard call, but one way or another, there will be consequences.
This is an interesting article in that it is an exemplar to what China is known to do best-taking advantage of its citizens. Do take note that this is not a radical or extreme point of view, but merely one based on observations. The government of China has had numerous history in regards to hazing citizens in incidents like Tienanmen Square and the 'liberation' of Tibet. From a purely pragmatic point of view, those that present a significant threat to the government should be eliminated. However. This defeats the whole purpose of having a governing higher organization in that the right of the people is what is being taken away, not reinforced. Therefore, it seems that there is no logical way for the Chinese government to solve this problem without going against the laws that the country is based upon. There doesn't seem to be any way for the villagers to get around this predicament except to conform to the government's orders.
ReplyDeleteAnother similar example is Ayer's Rock in Australia. It is commonly known as a tourist attraction in the middle of Australia that is also a challenging hike to climb as the rock is over 9km in circumference. However, in actual fact the rock belongs to the Aborigines, who do not like others climbing it as it is sacred to them. In the souvenir stores in the area, there are shirts, mugs, keychains etc. that say "I climbed Ayer's Rock", but there are also the same merchandize that say "I respected the Aborigines and did NOT climb Ayer's Rock". Although the Australian government wants to use the rock as a tourist attraction and have done so by legally allowing it, the Aborigines are still grateful when people do not climb their sacred rock. The Aborigines have the same issue as the citizens of the Blue Dragon Village, and therefore, the same issue is pertinent. Is culture more important than economic development? In my opinion, culture is more important, but from the government's perspective, economic development is obviously more beneficial. So how can the issue be resolved? Perhaps the two sides should come to a consensus like the Aborigines and the Australian government have with Ayer's Rock. They opened the rock to tourists to climb, but remind everyone that it is sacred to the Aborigines and that they prefer people to leave the rock alone. The Aborigines also have the right to close the rock off to the public when they want to use it. I think that the Chinese government should be lenient to the Blue Dragon villagers as they have already moved away from their original homes. They should give them back their I.Ds as a compromise for their moving.
ReplyDeleteI like the WoK raised in your article. Your questions really highlight the idea of language being involved. I certainly didn't think of it that way before. The existence of a person really should not be based off a piece of paper; nevertheless, in order to maintain order in the growing community, which is the world, people need to have some sort of identification. Imagine if someone has committed a crime, there would be no way of finding out who it was if there was no legal documentation about the person. Crimes could persist without prosecution. (Sorry, I went off on a tangent). But in reality, to exist in the current world, one must have an I.D. to be recognised as a 'person'.
ReplyDeleteI understand, and acknowledge, that each community has it's own culture. But, in this article, you don't elaborate on why the history of this small town is worth saving; instead, you talk about the dynamic culture of China as a whole. That does not really help your argument; without knowing the contribution of this town, there really is no known fact that it is worth preserving. China is not the Blue Dragon Village, so China's history is not really applicable.
I think that economic development should take precedence over a single villages culture. The reservoir was built to provide a greater number of people with water. A lone of people's culture is arguably less important than an entire city of people. The government is simply taking out the culture of a small village and not that of the entire country as it attempted to during the culture revolution. This will not have as much consequence in the long run as attempting to destroy the culture of an entire nation. Furthermore, the land the villagers are now occupy does not count as their ancestral land because they have relocated to another point near the reservoir and they have been compensated for their loss. At least the government is not forcibly reprimanding the villagers and forcing them to evacuate. However, I do believe that the government is punishing the villagers for not conforming to their wishes and moving to the city by not giving them identification papers.
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