Foreign Affairs Committee on May 27th, 2008

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Bonjour, chers collègues. Welcome. This is meeting number 32 of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development, Tuesday, May 27, 2008. Today we are continuing our consideration of our subcommittee's draft report on the Canada–China bilateral human rights dialogue.

We're very pleased today to have a number of guests with us. In our first hour we will hear from Dr. Gregory Chin, a professor at York University, and Dr. Pitman Potter, a professor of law and director of Chinese legal studies and director of the Institute of Asian Research at the University of British Columbia.

Welcome by teleconference. I trust you can hear me.

[Dr. Pitman Potter, Professor of Law and Director of the Institute of Asian Research, Director of Chinese Legal Studies, Centre for Asian Legal Studies, University of British Columbia]

Yes, I can. Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

All right.

Also appearing as an individual is Dr. Jeremy Paltiel, a professor at Carleton University.

We welcome all our guests. Perhaps we'll give the courtesy of beginning to our friend in British Columbia, via video conference.

Dr. Potter, go ahead, please.

Generally, just as far as the procedure here goes, if you have opening remarks of fairly close to 10 minutes, then we'll go into a number of rounds of questions.

Dr. Potter.

[Dr. Pitman Potter]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I'm honoured and pleased to be here.

I have not prepared a brief, but I do have some talking points, and I've brought copies that can be sent to you at some point. I thought someone would be here to collect them—but in any event, let me just begin with a few remarks.

Human rights are, of course, an important dimension in Canada's relationship with China. I agree that it's very important for this committee to hear from as wide a range of specialists as possible in order to make informed decisions on this important matter.

My expectation is to give a short presentation, limiting myself to the ten minutes you mentioned, and then to be available for questions and answers.

At the outset, I think we need to acknowledge that China's human rights record is somewhat problematic. The U.S. State Department has classified the record as poor, and there are many examples of this, most of which you have probably already heard about: imprisonment of dissidents; religious repression in Tibet, Xinjiang, and elsewhere in China; ethnic repression in Tibet, Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, and other areas; media controls on domestic and foreign journalists; a crackdown on lawyers, both so-called rights defenders and defenders of Tibetan demonstrators.

Most of these abuses are justified by reference to Chinese law. However, that law is designed to support authoritarian rule rather than the rule by law, or the rule of law, as that term would be understood in Canada. So the record is problematic, but nonetheless there has been some progress: China's ratification of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, China's signing of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the very recent agreement to resume a bilateral human rights dialogue with the United States, and, more broadly, an effort to what we might call legalize government administration, including an open government information regulation that is going into effect this year, an increased reliance on public law, and an increased role for legal specialists and lawyers.

In a sense, the crackdown on lawyers that has recently been reported by Human Rights Watch, while regrettable, still indicates a change in condition of institutional capacity that was simply not even possible ten years ago. For lawyers to be important enough to be cracked down on is itself a sign of progress of a sort. It reflects that changes in the structure of law and the treatment of human rights are possible due to an increasing role of legal specialists, an emerging middle class, and emerging constituencies within Chinese society that are interested in improving the standard of their lives and the human rights treatment they receive.

It seems to me that understanding China's behaviour on human rights is conflicted. We have problematic examples, and many of them, but we do have progress, and the question is how to sort those out. I would suggest that this depends on an appreciation of the norms and values that inform the Chinese legal system, its human rights policies, and also the institutions and structures that are involved.

In my published work, a list of which I have submitted—and I'm happy to share copies of articles with you if you wish—I have referred to these two approaches as selective adaptation, with regard to the question of the norms and values, and institutional capacity, with respect to institutions and structures.

I think it's important to recognize that the norms and values that inform Chinese government decision-making and the operation of the legal system are quite different from those that are implied by the legal and political terminology. When the terms “judiciary”, “open government”, and “rule of law” are used, these mean very different things in China than they do here in Canada. Institutions as well behave very differently than might be predicted due to a combination of resource constraints, political mandates, and so on.

So it's important to understand the differences in norms and institutional structures when we form our expectations about the performance of the human rights system and the legal system, and again I'd be happy to send you copies of my published work on this.

The challenge is how to encourage continued expansion of positive human rights behaviour and discourage abuses. In my view, there are three main factors in this, and I would list these as engagement, style, and legitimacy. Each of these reflects an appreciation of the normative and institutional factors that I mentioned.

In my view, engagement with China is essential.

If we compare the changing conditions over the past 30 years on human rights issues in China and, say, Burma, China with all its problems is still considerably better from a human rights perspective than Burma.

The reason, primarily, is the degree of openness and engagement with the west, including Canada, through dialogue, joint research programs, educational exchanges, commercial relations, and NGO linkages. These are essential to a healthy relationship between Canada and China. They help modify normative positions, they help change values, and they help build institutional capacity. So engagement is critical.

But the style of engagement is also very important. I think it's important to recognize, and we've seen this just in the last month, that both the Chinese regime and many Chinese people are extremely sensitive to criticism from outside China. There is a very strong awareness and sensitivity about western domination of China in recent history, and by that I mean not only the imperial period of the 19th and early 20th centuries but even more recently.

The intellectual property rights conflicts with the United States, the issues over relations with Taiwan, human rights criticism, matters about Tibet, and so on have tapped into a very deep and vibrant reservoir of nationalism. That nationalism is very strong in China and is easily triggered. It is certainly encouraged by the government, but the government recognizes that it is a two-edged sword—and that's not surprising when we think that the Chinese Communist Party itself really grew out of the May 4th movement in 1919, which itself was a nationalist movement.

So nationalism is a critical feature in the sensitivities of both the government and people in China. One result of that is that hectoring on human rights conduct is not productive. Regardless of whether it might be warranted or not, it is not productive.

Engagement, including criticism, needs to be contextualized to China's policy priorities: for example, development and stability. Engagement on human rights needs to acknowledge the complexity of China's conditions: the population situation, continued poverty issues, developmental challenges.

Some of these contexts and conditions are used as excuses for political repression, but many are real. Acknowledging China's contexts and conditions while not allowing these to be an excuse for repression depends on understanding the normative and institutional frameworks that I mentioned earlier.

In addition to engagement itself and the style of engagement, legitimacy is an important factor in a Canada-China relationship. Legitimacy is a major motivator. Canada's capacity to confer legitimacy on the Chinese regime is possibly the most important asset Canada has in managing its relationship with China.

Despite our long history of cooperation and friendship with China, Canada simply does not loom large in the consciousness of Chinese leaders and people as a source of power and influence. But we are important as a source of legitimacy, and that legitimacy should be conferred with care.

This can be very helpful in adjusting the terms and the style of engagement. For example, the consequences of engagement that are acceptable to Canada can and should be publicized, but we should avoid unconditional engagement and unconditional dialogue because this often works to confer legitimacy without requiring action. Attention to legitimacy as a motivator can support constructive, normative engagement and institutional capacity-building.

In summary, Canada should continue to recognize the importance of human rights in China. The Chinese government's record on human rights tends to fluctuate, and at present looks discouraging, but the question is what to do. In my view, the most effective response for a healthy Canada-China relationship is continued engagement, attention to local contexts and conditions for that engagement, and awareness of the power of legitimacy to adjust engagement so that it fits the interests of Canada in the relationship with China.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you very much, Dr. Potter.

We'll go next to Dr. Chin, please.

[Dr. Gregory T. Chin, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Graduate Studies and Department of Political Science, York University]

Thank you for the opportunity to provide some brief remarks before you today.

I'm an assistant professor in the department of political science at York University. I've been researching and teaching China's politics and economy since the early 1990s, first as a student and now as a professor. One of my areas of specialty is political change in China and China's role in the international system.

Just by way of background, prior to joining York University in 2006, I was a Canadian diplomat in our embassy in Beijing, responsible for managing Canada's foreign aid to China and North Korea. From 2000 to 2003 I worked in the China and Northeast Asia division of CIDA and the China-Mongolia division of Canada's Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade. I was a visiting fellow at Peking University from 1997 to 1998. I'm a Canadian of Chinese ancestry. My grandfather came to Canada in 1904. I speak Mandarin and Cantonese. In the past 10 years I've lived five years in China.

In the short time that I have here, I wish to address two issues related to Canada-China human rights dialogue: first, Beijing's willingness to accept, uphold, and enforce human rights standards from less acceptance to more; and second, the conditions under which Beijing is most likely to adhere to international standards of human rights.

One, to what extent is China willing to accept, uphold, and enforce human rights standards? I think it's fair to say that China's position on human rights has evolved significantly over the last 30 years. It has come to accept the basic idea that there are universally accepted human rights, a departure from the Maoist period, when it held that the west's notions of “human rights” embodied “capitalist” and “bourgeois” thinking that did not apply to China and other socialist states. It has begun to accept the idea that this universal definition of human rights includes political and civil rights as well as economic and social rights. It has yet, however, to ratify the international convention of civil and political rights.

Despite Beijing's gradual and growing acceptance of the concept of universal human rights, significant gaps remain between its position and that of Canada. China continues to insist that human rights are not absolute, that their promotion must be weighed, according to Beijing, against other considerations, particularly China's transitional stage of economic development and political stability.

It argues that political and civil rights can only be implemented gradually, at a higher level of economic and societal development, and with broader adherence to the rule of law and greater political stability.

There is also the possibility that China is trying to develop a new model of politics and governance that it will call “democratic”, which may contain elements of pluralism but will not contain multi-party contestation or direct popular elections to the highest offices in the country, elements that Canada regards as intrinsic parts of a democracy.

I would suggest that equally important for the committee's purposes is Beijing's ambivalence towards international enforcement of human rights standards in other countries where they are being violated. More recently, China has been increasingly willing, though, to subject some cases of human rights violations to international pressure and has gradually shifted position on North Korea, Darfur, and Burma.

However, China continues to regard economic sanctions and security-led humanitarian intervention as unacceptable violations of sovereignty of the country in question, except in cases of the most severe internal conflict or where there may be spillover effects that threaten international stability. However, Professor Allen Carlson, at Cornell University in the United States, has shown that China has shifted slowly on its position on international intervention over the past 15 years. So there appears to be possibility also for movement on this front.

Two, when does China appear most apt to adhere to international standards of human rights? China appears more likely to adhere to international standards of human rights:

1. When Beijing sees that the standards and norms in question are truly universal, when the standards are supported by the vast majority of states in both the developed and developing worlds. This explains China's growing acceptance of some of the international civil and political rights—for example, child rights and gender rights.

2. When China sees its behaviour in keeping with human rights standards and norms in keeping with its own interests, and behaviour that violates those standards could potentially threaten China's own objectives. But here we're really talking about “threats” of the highest order in terms of national survival. This is perhaps the main reason why China has come to support the nuclear non-proliferation regime.

3. When China sees that the international organization enforcing the norms is widely regarded as legitimate and effective. This is reflected in China's willingness to take security issues to the United Nations Security Council and its more cautious response toward the advances of the G-8. China tends also to react strongly against proactive and provocative rights advocacy at the bilateral level.

4. When Beijing knows it will be isolated in terms of world opinion if it obstructs the enforcement of the international human rights standards or norms. This lesson can be drawn from the embarrassment that China suffered recently when it tried to transport conventional arms to Zimbabwe.

5. When China sees that other major powers, especially the United States, abide by the international human rights norms that it expects China to honour.

Some generalizations: China has come to increasingly accept a wide range of international norms in contrast to the Maoist period, but it still defines some of those norms differently than does Canada, including those governing human rights. China continues to hold that the enforcement of norms should be constrained by commitment to the principle of national sovereignty. And China appears most likely to adhere to international human rights standards when it sees the norms or standards, or the enforcement agency, widely accepted as legitimate.

My personal view is that Canada has the most leverage in promoting Canadian and international values on human rights in China when it promotes international standards and norms at both the multilateral and bilateral levels through a strategy of constructive engagement in which, bilaterally, Canada focuses on building a sustained and comprehensive political policy dialogue with China and through sustained and systematic programs of constructive socialization at the bilateral level. This would mean, to some degree, pursuing more advocacy-oriented agendas at the collective multilateral level.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chin.

We'll go to Mr. Paltiel.

[Dr. Jeremy Paltiel, Professor, Carleton University, As an Individual]

Thank you very much.

It's a great privilege to be called before this House of Commons committee to testify on the need for a human rights dialogue with China. I have been involved with China since my undergraduate days, and I've worked on human rights in China for two decades.

First, it must be acknowledged that the human rights situation in China has improved immensely since I first set foot on the soil of the People's Republic of China in October 1974. Second, it is absolutely incontrovertible that much more needs to be done. Third, Canadians all share in the consensus that our foreign policy must be consistent with and adhere to Canadian values. There is no question that our policy toward China must include a human rights component. The only questions before us are: what are our goals with respect to human rights in our relations with China, what form should our expression of concern about human rights take, and what are the best means available for us to achieve our human rights goals?

I have read Professor Charles Burton's report on past human rights dialogue, and I concur with the main outlines of its conclusion and concerns. The main conclusion that I see flowing from this report is the need for us to reassess whether this format is the best conduit through which to convey our human rights concerns to the Chinese side and whether the dialogue format is the best means to engage with elements of Chinese society working to improve respect for human rights in China. I will address these questions later in my remarks.

I think we must prudently avoid two extremes: one would be to reduce our entire relationship with China to an expression of our dissent from the Chinese government's record of human rights. Not only would this do nothing to improve the human rights situation in China, it would run counter to our own vital interests. The other extreme would be to simply subsume or sublimate our human rights concerns under our commercial relationship. That would disappoint the aspirations of millions of Chinese as well as interested Canadians who look to Canada to stand up for the values embodied in the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which the Canadian John Humphrey played a seminal role in drafting 60 years ago and the anniversary of which we will celebrate on December 13 this year; it would also run counter to our interests in seeing China evolve into a rule-of-law state that consistently conforms to a rules-based international order that not only do Canadians profoundly believe in but on which our prosperity as an open economy depends.

I have only just returned from China within the past month, where I participated in a high-profile human rights forum that was attended by ministers of the State Council of China, a vice-president of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, as well as senior officials of the UN and leading persons from human rights commissions of a number of nations. I was the only Canadian invited to attend.

This conference was held in the shadow of the riots in Lhasa and the widespread demonstrations that took place in March across Tibetan-inhabited zones in China, as well as the controversy that dogged the Olympic torch relay that followed. I was able to forthrightly press my viewpoint that the Chinese government's handling of protest in Tibet merited international scrutiny, that attacks on the integrity of the Dalai Lama damaged China's international image as well as the feelings of the mass of Tibetans, and that sincere dialogue with the Dalai Lama was the best and possibly only way to burnish China's image ahead of the Beijing Olympics.

Despite the fact that the Chinese organizers made every effort to convey the Chinese government's perspective to the participants, and the fact that I was pressed by representatives of China's official media to join in the official condemnation of the politicization of the Olympic torch relay, I simply persisted in upholding the right of free, peaceful political expression. Upon returning to Canada, I sent an evaluation of China's human rights media strategy to the organizers of the forum in Chinese and received a polite and respectful reply that acknowledged my points of concern. My experience, therefore, is that human rights dialogue is possible with China.

Furthermore, no one who has watched the heartbreaking efforts of the Chinese government, from top to bottom, in bringing relief to the victims of the unspeakable tragedy of the severe earthquake that struck Wenchuan, Sichuan, on May 12, 2008, can be in any doubt about the Chinese government's depth of concern and active commitment to its people. There is much common ground here.

The recent controversy over the Olympic torch relay also makes one thing clear with respect to Chinese reactions to criticism. Public condemnation of China, particularly in conjunction with a project of immense national pride such as the Beijing Olympics, only excites a nationalist reaction among Chinese that does more to harm domestic efforts at human rights improvement than any misguided effort to score points on China's human rights record.

While at the conference, the only media outlet that genuinely sought out my views on a subject related to human rights was the Southern Metropolitan Daily. What they asked me about was whether people who were condemned to death deserved conjugal visits, but I will leave that aside.

This newspaper, shortly before I left China, broke a story concerning trafficking in child labour spanning the western province of Sichuan and the southern manufacturing base of Dongguan County in the Pearl River Delta. The story was subsequently picked up by foreign correspondents and relayed around the world, but it began as a purely domestic effort in investigative journalism relating to human rights.

Unfortunately, the deputy editor of the paper was subsequently removed from his post over an article he posted regarding self-censorship in the reporting of news from Tibet. This illustrates much better than my own opinions that close association between nationalist sensitivities and human rights progress in China. Western efforts to talk down to China tend to set back the cause of human rights in China. We should avoid making public accusations that adopt a holier-than-thou attitude toward China.

Does this mean we should avoid making controversial statements, including statements about Tibet? Not at all. Shortly before I arrived in China, the incoming Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd, gave a speech in Chinese at my alma mater, Peking University, in which he argued for candour among friends as a Chinese tradition and where he also made a statement about Tibet.

I believe we can share our views with China on the impact of economic development and on ethnic tensions, and perhaps we should engage them on our experience and difficulties involving first nations groups as stakeholders in economic development projects.

Our past efforts in this regard have borne little fruit because the Chinese counterparts in these human rights dialogues are not the people on the ground facing human rights problems. They are, instead, human rights bureaucrats designated to deal with foreigners. We should insist on a human rights dialogue that is genuinely addressed at solving mutual concerns. Specific consular concerns are best addressed in private. They should be brought up with our Chinese counterparts as part of normal diplomatic dialogue.

We must make it clear that our interest in developing friendly relations with China goes well beyond specific consular cases, but at the same time we insist that the ways in which Chinese officials resolve issues of specific interest to Canadians go some considerable way toward establishing an atmosphere of mutual trust in which friendly relations develop.

We should make it abundantly clear to Canadians that our country has a considerable stake in developing friendly relations with China. China isn't just the world's most dynamic economy that doubles in size every five or seven years; it is now our second-largest trade partner and has overtaken us as the largest trade partner of our largest market, the United States. It is also Japan's largest trade partner, as well as that of South Korea and every state in East Asia.

But our interest in China is far more than commercial. China is now Africa's largest aid donor. It is the largest investor in Latin America. And it is the largest contributor of UN peacekeeping forces among the permanent five of the UN Security Council. It is also the world's largest holder of foreign exchange reserves, at over $1.7 trillion U.S.

It isn't Canada that needs China, it is the world. But China also needs the world, and a patient, focused, and nuanced human rights dialogue with China will help narrow our differences and help relations.

We should implement a human rights dialogue that, one, makes clear our varying approaches to human rights at the official level but which engages those people and organizations that are actively involved in promoting human rights domestically; two, is aimed at identifying and disseminating best practices rather than empty principles; and three, is pursued in a spirit of common exploration in a field where every country falls short of its ideals.

I would urge resumption of a human rights dialogue, which would take place at two levels: one, an annual consultation of topics of mutual concern; and two, joint exploration of common areas of concern that would go forward on a multi-year basis involving official organizations and NGOs from both sides and that would aim at tackling issues of common concern in specialized working groups. The topics can be identified by the dialogue partners of the ministries of both sides but should be implemented by organizations with the capacity and interest to make a difference on the ground. We should commit the linguistic and logistical resources to make this possible.

Third, needless to say, our government and our civil society must unequivocally have the ability to make known to Chinese officials individual cases of concern. We can draw on civil society for information about cases of concern. These should be conveyed by officials at the highest level—that means we must have meetings at the highest level—but are best handled in ways that are not intended to cause the Chinese government public embarrassment. Once the cases are made known to the Chinese government, they should be followed up through normal diplomatic channels. Questions of principle can be addressed in public dialogue. Individual cases are best handled quietly, but with persistence and determination. Public shaming is a last option.

China's progress in the area of human rights is evident in the heartbreaking scenes that are unfolding on our TV screens since the May 12 earthquake. The Chinese people are not only demanding relief, they are demanding the right to participate in providing relief and are demanding information in support of their concerns for their fellow countrymen.

China's top leaders have also shown direct commitment to the needs of the people. Scenes of China's premier, Wen Jiabao, working day and night on the front lines of disaster relief have changed attitudes of Chinese about the role and personality of their leaders forever. Some of this comes out of awareness of relief efforts by other countries. Time is definitely right for engagement, and there is no room left for one-sided preaching from one country to another.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Paltiel.

And indeed, thank you to our other two guests as well for very in-depth and comprehensive testimony.

We're going to go to our first round. I'm going to welcome Mr. Chan to ask questions of our guests.

[Raymond Chan, Liberal, Richmond, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, gentlemen, for joining us, and particularly Mr. Pitman Potter, for meeting you again.

All three of you have to some degree been saying there is improvement in human rights in China. Jeremy, you talk about immense improvement. Could you be more specific on what kind of improvement has been achieved, both on individual freedom and also on religious freedom?

[Dr. Jeremy Paltiel]

Is this specifically addressed to me?

[Raymond Chan, Liberal, Richmond, BC]

No. I would like to hear answers from all three of you.

[Dr. Jeremy Paltiel]

I'd like to start with the last part first, with the religious freedoms. There are problems with the religious freedom side. In terms of immense improvement, that has to do with the time when I was in China in the mid-1970s, when all places of worship were closed. Today, people openly worship in China in both recognized religious forms and also some unofficial ones, and the unofficial ones are the ones that are the most problematic these days.

There are temples open. People worship at them openly. I saw this on my most recent visit. But there is still a problem in terms of state control and state supervision. The difference is that there is a recognized space for religious activity in China that was not present before.

Another example has to do with the media openness I saw, not only with respect to this story, again, about child labour, which was reported by the domestic press, but also with respect to the reporting from the earthquake zone, the use of the Internet and blogs, people actually talking about problems connected with...their active concern about problems that might have been corruption in the past and current concerns about possible corruption in relief. All of these things are relatively new.

Although there are problems—as I said, the editor gets dismissed—what you get in China today is that concerns are bubbling up from society. And those channels are opened up. What happens is there might be one person who's targeted, as perhaps the instigator, but then again the bar gets moved and people expect a higher level of involvement.

Of course, Professor Potter is much better equipped than I to talk about changes in the legal norms, but there have been immense changes in the role of lawyers. Most recently, there was the threat of sanction against lawyers who defended some of the demonstrators in Tibet, but the fact is that the lawyers came forward to provide a pro bono defence. Again, these are changes.

I can't go much further without taking up all our time. I'll let other witnesses speak.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

We'll move to Mr. Potter, and then to Mr. Chin if he wants.

[Dr. Pitman Potter]

I just have a few responses to that question.

First, as a matter of conceptualization, I really do think, with the greatest respect to all concerned, that comparing today to the days of Mao is not a very helpful comparison. Life today in China is so different from life under the Maoist regime that a comparison is just not very helpful.

A more useful way of comparing it is by looking at stages over the past three decades. If we look at human rights conditions, even in the mid- and late eighties, prior to the Tiananmen crisis, if we look at human rights conditions in the mid-nineties, for example, after Deng Xiaoping's visit to the south, and if we look at human rights conditions today, it is fair to say that there are many areas where human rights conditions have actually deteriorated. And I think religion is one of them.

It is true that many people are participating in religious faith in China, but China's policy, grounded in the constitution and in national regulations on control of religion, and so on, makes it very clear that although people are entitled to freedom of religious belief, they are not entitled to freedom of action to act on that belief.

There is a large question as to whether that's consistent with the international standards. But that also means the state is paying a lot of attention to the behaviour of religious adherence. I'm not only talking about the outlawing of so-called cults like the Falun Gong; I'm really talking about the underground Christian churches. I'm talking about Islam and the domination of the teaching of Islam in Xinjiang, and also the control over Tibetan Buddhism, not only in Tibet but also in Inner Mongolia.

It is important to recognize that there are some bumps in this road. It's important to recognize that the government is very apprehensive about and hostile to competing organizations, whether they be religious, economic, or civil. So I think the religious issue has to be looked at in more context.

In terms of media, I think it is absolutely the case that there is more media freedom in China now than has been the case in the past, and that's largely due to work by media participants to push the envelope, if you will.

Another area is the increase in pluralism in politics. If we look at debates within the National People's Congress, even debates within the party system, there is increased pluralism, and that is increasingly tolerated. Within the party, the effort to install institutions of inter-party democracy and to actually pass laws and regulations that govern the rights of party members to freedom in inter-party debates is another very important step.

Lastly, I would say there is the growth of legal institutions. I would underscore the point I made with regard to the recent Human Rights Watch report on China's repression of lawyers; that is the fact that lawyers are now as important as they are. They just passed a new lawyers' law, trying to increase state control on lawyers. That can be seen as an indication that the lawyer community in China is trying to be more and more assertive about rights, about the rule of law, and so on, and to a very large extent, that is permitted.

The last thing I would say is that there are the so-called areas where debate is not really permitted. Taiwan, Tibet, and Tiananmen are three that come to mind. But the scope for free debate and discussion and expression in China outside of those issues is increasingly broad. So I do think there have been major improvements over the last three decades, but there are also areas of concern, as there will be for the foreseeable future. The issue is, how do you balance the two?

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Potter.

Unfortunately, we're out of time here, Mr. Chin. We're going to give you the first opportunity in the next question.

[Dr. Pitman Potter]

Greg, sorry about that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Madame Barbot.

[Vivian Barbot, Bloc, Papineau, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Potter, you said that Canada does not loom large in Chinese consciousness, but that we are important as a source of international legitimacy. Could you expand on that and give us an idea of the extent to which we can use China's need for legitimacy in the defence of human rights? From what all three of you said, I gather that positive changes have taken place in China. But I would like to know more specifically what has been done in terms of governance and accountability. Can specific evidence be seen in the street? For example, today, could Canada work to promote human rights with human rights groups, with organizations in Chinese society? Is that now possible?

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Madame Barbot.

I'm going to go to Mr. Chin first, and we'll all have an opportunity. Questions and answers are seven minutes, so we have to be fairly concise.

Mr. Chin.

[Dr. Gregory T. Chin]

My apologies to Madame Barbot. I didn't have the earpiece in, so I couldn't hear your questions. I'll let Professor Potter and Professor Paltiel try to respond to your question.

I'll just try to respond to the first question.

Your question was very concrete--specific examples of individual and religious freedoms. My colleagues have already talked about the constraints.

On leisure time, I think we can say the party state has withdrawn more and more from leisure time, so it's individual leisure time.

There is also the right, for example, to choose your job and where you want to work, so market society, consumption rights, and economic rights. I think that's where we see the increase of individual freedoms and rights in China.

On the religious side, clearly there are serious constraints on religious freedom in China, but I think the biggest constraints are at the level of not permitting proselytization and ensuring that or wanting religious organizations to gain the approval and licensing from the state. Other than that, though, there have been increases in religious activity in China.

I'll stop there.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you.

Mr. Paltiel.

[Dr. Jeremy Paltiel]

Actually, I will call on Greg Chin to respond, because he has been involved in this.

Yes, there are many human rights NGOs in China, active ones, legally allowed ones, that work. There are all kinds of problems with the NGO community in China, partly because the government has a strange way of....

Again, I would re-emphasize Professor Potter's view that the Chinese Communist Party's main concern is about competing organizations. The way they handle that in terms of NGOs is to have a regulation that allows only either local grassroots organizations that don't have a national network or national headquarters, or national umbrella groups that don't have local grassroots organizations.

There are some organizations that get around this by registering as businesses, and that's a grey zone. But the person who really knows more about this is Greg, who worked with China's NGO community. But there are many Chinese NGOs working on specific human rights areas, and with which our government does cooperate. It has cooperated in the past, and we would like to open more channels on this, because these grassroots groups do real work, and they improve the lives of women, the lives of prisoners, and the lives of migrant workers. These are some of the areas where we have shown particular concern.

Perhaps Greg can elaborate on this.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

We look forward to that, but right after Mr. Potter, please.

[Dr. Pitman Potter]

Thank you.

To respond to Madame Barbot's question regarding Canadian weight, I think the reality is that China looms very large in our consciousness of the world and of Asia, but when we go to China, Canada, given the size of our economy and the size of our population, doesn't loom as large to them as they do to us. I think that's just the reality of it. Of course, when we visit, they're very nice to us. And we have a long history of friendship and collaboration, and every time you get in a cab and say you're from Canada, they talk about Bai Qiu-en and Norman Bethune and so on. So there is that reservoir of goodwill. But largely speaking, I think we don't loom as large in their view as they do in ours.

The legitimacy question, I think, is critical because the entire “China rising” dimension is hinged on the importance of China resuming the important place that it deserves in the world and having legitimacy for its place in the world, and hence legitimacy of its government domestically. A big part of what we saw, in terms of the earthquake relief, was about building legitimacy domestically. That is an area that Canada can actually have some influence in, because when we participate in a human rights dialogue with China, multilaterally or bilaterally, that allows the Chinese government to say, in effect, that the Canadians are supporting what they're doing, and that gives them legitimacy in the face of the world and in terms of their domestic population.

So I think our capacity to confer legitimacy on the Chinese government is a very important asset that Canada has, because of our reputation in the world as essentially a source of good offices and what not, and I think that's something we should explore further.

I would second very strongly the comment on NGO collaboration. That is a critical element in emerging civil society in China. We could debate from now till doomsday whether civil society exists in China or not, but it certainly is emerging, and these NGOs, still somewhat dominated by party and government elements--but nonetheless increasingly independent, increasingly effective, increasingly assertive--are a critical place for engagement by Canada.

In terms of specific achievements in the area of government accountability--to respond to another part of your question, Madame--I would just point to two processes in the legislative area. One is the process of legislative hearings. If we look at rule-making and legislation over the past three to four years--and the property law that was enacted last year is just one very good example--the increasing reliance on ever more public legislative hearings to get input from still elite groups, but nonetheless a great diversity of elite groups, shows a commitment to, again, building legitimacy for law making through participation.

Another example would be the open government regulations. The new open government decision-making regulation that goes into effect this year is a very important step toward government accountability, but it's very important as well to recognize that it's not motivated by notions of government accountability as we would see those here in Canada. It's motivated generally by an effort to control corruption at the local level. Nonetheless, it is a major achievement in terms of bringing some level of accountability to government decision-making.

I hope that answers your questions.