381 Georgina Higueras Dissent and Human Rights in China Prize in 1996 as a “symbol of the struggle for democracy in China and of the dialogue with the Tibetans”2. Over and above the CPC’s slogan “to get rich is glorious”, many Chinese launched their own personal search during the 1980s. And from this point, personal freedoms, emancipation of the mind, and human rights were placed in the spotlight of the battle between conservatives and liberals at the head of the CPC. Millions of urban youth who, during the previous decade had been sent to the countryside and had embraced the radical spirit of the Maoist communes, returned to their cities of origin to find themselves lost and disorientated in this new reality. “Many began to express their bewilderment through narratives, theatre plays, rock songs, poems, paintings, stories and films; some of which were censured by party officials, although most of them circulated more freely than at any other point since 1949”3. The conservative wing couldn’t stand this level of “licentiousness” and, in the interests of ensuring that there would be no backtracking in the market economy system that the liberals considered a priority for their strategy of modernisation of the country, the liberals accepted the implementation of two significant repressive campaigns: one against “’spiritual contamination’ and the other against ‘ideological pollution’. Through these campaigns, they aimed to place limitations on any deviation that tried to integrate capitalist middle-class concepts into Chinese life. In the areas of culture, ideology, morals, and politics, the Chinese socialist guidelines were to be strictly followed; and for economics and trade, the successful Western way of doing things could be used. Despite these campaigns, Chinese youth became more and more critical and independent with each passing day. University students, conscious of the fact that they were the elite of the future China, looked ever more insistently towards the West, searching for alternative thought systems. Hu Yaobang, General Secretary of the CPC, supported the student demonstrations that took place at the end of 1986 – demonstrations that demanded greater transparency in the selection process of provincial leaders. Hu’s “swing to the right” unleashed the wrath of the conservatives, who demanded that Deng Xiaoping bring an immediate end to his protégé. In January 1987, Hu was forced to resign and to self-criticise. The fear of a revolt that would bring an end to the CPC’s leadership was very clear at the time. “Seeing how the political environment was becoming increasingly repressive, the young generations of Chinese lost hope. More and more of them were leaving, mainly as post 2 See http://www.radicalparty.org/es/content/el-parlamento-europeo-concede-el-premio-sakharov- al-mas-celebre-disidente-chino-wei-jingshen Consulted: 17/05/2014 3 SPENCE, Jonathan D., The Search for Modern China, Barcelona: Tusquets Editores, 2011, p. 897
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