Innovating Repression

Policy Experimentation and the Evolution of Beijing’s Re-Education Campaign in Xinjiang

Bibliographic Data

ID12422298
AuthorsAdrian Zenz (0000-0002-8648-8363, China Studies, corresponding author)
Year2024
Volume34
Issue152
Pages328-349
Publication date2024-01-30
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Contemporary China (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1067-0564 • E-ISSN: 1469-9400
PublisherRoutledge (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/10670564.2024.2302484
OpenAlexW4391361611
LanguageEN
Citations received9

This article argues that Beijing's campaign of mass internment in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region evolved through a creative local policy experimentation process. This resulted in an 'innovative repression' solution to widespread ethnic discontent in the region, which the party-state has framed as 'religious extremism' and portrayed as a major national security threat. Amid significant top-level steering by the central government and despite extreme political sensitivities surrounding Xinjiang, Beijing used a form of 'policy experimentation under hierarchy' to catalyze localized development of mass 'de-extremification' in dedicated re-education internment camps. While scholars disagree to what extent policy experimentation continues under Xi Jinping's more centralized approach to governance, the state's atrocities in Xinjiang indicate how policy experimentation continues to facilitate the development of next-generation repressive securitization strategies

Beijing · Biology · China · Economic growth · Economics · Political science · Psychological repression · Asian Geopolitics and Ethnography · China's Ethnic Minorities and Relations · Law · Public Administration · Vietnamese History and Culture Studies

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