A place of my own (to park my car)
If hiring a journalist is a way around censorship to reach a political goal, maybe we shouldn't be surprised if finding a parking place in China leads to ownership reform and more democracy. This report is from The Economist.Counter-revolution in the car park -- Local disputes speed the growth of Chinese civil society
"CAR owners the world over fret about parking, but in China the competition for spaces can be especially fierce... New housing complexes have sprung up in the suburb... Rows frequently erupt over control of parking spaces within them. These and other local confrontations signify a huge change in the balance of power in Chinese cities.
"Until the 1990s the state owned almost all urban housing. Most residents lived close to their state-assigned workplaces. They had no bargaining power. Neighbourhood committees were controlled by Communist Party...
"In recent years, along with the sweeping privatisation of almost all urban housing, a new force has emerged: landlord committees, many of them formed spontaneously by home-owners to protect their new assets.
"These committees, often democratically elected with little party interference, have become increasingly powerful in asserting the rights of home-owners against encroachment by the state... The fight for control of parking spaces is one of the many modest causes that have brought a change in the urban mentality—beyond a consciousness of limited legal rights, to a growing awareness of the need for a more active “civil society” as a balance against arbitrary officialdom...
"[A] new law makes clear that parking spaces occupying what the law considers to be land owned collectively by the home-owners, such as roads within estates, are also collectively owned. It obliges developers to give priority to the parking needs of estate residents. It is vaguer on the subject of how home-owners and developers are supposed to cooperate...
"Party leaders say that a top priority in the development of a harmonious society is strengthening democracy and the rule of law. They reject any idea of a multi-party system, but they have begun to talk more about a need for greater 'public participation' in policymaking... But developers remain an obstacle. Faren magazine, a legal journal, said this month that out of 3,000 residential estates in Beijing, only 500 had set up landlord committees. It quoted legal experts as saying this was because developers and property management companies often refused to cooperate with them. When it comes to developing democracy, China’s new capitalists can be as obstructive as old-style communists."
As for that last sentence, "...China’s new capitalists can be as obstructive as old-style communists," could it be that China's new capitalists and its old-style communists are the same people?
Labels: China, civil society, democratization
posted by Ken Wedding @ 7:47 AM
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