6 - Religious Revival and Its Discontents

Summary

This chapter continues with the argument that the built-in tensions of the autonomous system, namely centralization and ethnicization, have intensified in the reform era. The focus of this chapter is religious revival in Tibet and Xinjiang. Religion has been a volatile problem in the state’s relationship with the two outer peripheral regions, thanks to its crucial linkage to ethnic and cultural identity. This identity, in turn, can be linked to ethno-nationalism and even separatism. Heightened institutional tensions for ethnic strife have stemmed, on the one hand, from state sponsorship of religious revival, and on the other hand, from state curtailment of its unsanctioned growth. The alternatively facilitating and constraining roles of the state have intensified centralization as well as ethnicization in the religious development of Tibet and Xinjiang, or cycles of state facilitation/control of religion and ethnic backlash. Foremost among this backlash has been increased radicalization, from private madrassas, Wahhabism, “Arabianization,” and “terrorism” in the Uighur case, to self-immolation in the Tibetan case. These have in turn induced state crackdowns, including deradicalization camps.