September 1999

Since the Chinese Communist Party leaders will not allow themselves to be criticized in the press or on television, critics have had to find other means to express their political grievances. Historically speaking, one of the most telling ways to make a protest known has been to bring it to Tiananmen Square, long the epicenter of political power in China. Indeed, there is an almost religious belief among Chinese that if the advocates of a cause can only gain entrance to this sanctum sanctorum of political rule, or come close to it, quasi-mystical political legitimacy will be conferred on them. Again and again, from the May Fourth Movement in 1919 to the present, Chinese protesters have been drawn to the square, sometimes suicidally.