A couple of decades ago Chinese had only one primitive method for seeking redress from the government. Citizens wrote petitions outlining their grievances and hand-carried them to government departments hoping that a sympathetic official might take notice. Hundreds of petitioners still gather each day at various offices in Beijing; truly desperate people try to stop the cars of top-ranking leaders, especially Prime Minister Zhu Rongji, who is perceived as more sympathetic than others to the woes of common folk. But these days most such hopefuls are illiterate peasants who don’t know any better. Thanks in no small measure to the regime’s fear of violence among unemployed workers, urban Chinese now have a variety of more effective ways to make their complaints known.
Such “safety valves” for urban tensions run the gamut. The most popular city mayors have special hot lines for irate citizens to vent their problems. In February 2000, a district in the southern city of Shantou began holding elections for the “five worst civil servants,” after which “work manners improved greatly,” according to local media. For the past decade law offices and legal-aid organizations have proliferated in big cities. Courts in Hainan even have a Web page listing legal procedures and verdicts in more than 2,000 cases. The Beijing City Procurators Office Branch No. 2 recently set up a similar e-grievance Web site for people to offer information on civil and economic crimes. (A procurator is similar to a prosecutor.) “We expect active participation from all Net surfers concerned about our work!” the site proclaims.
While they remain an inexact science in China, public opinion polls help bureaucrats anticipate problems before they reach critical mass. (According to recent surveys conducted by the private polling organization Horizon, joblessness is the No. 1 worry among urban Chinese.) Some government departments hold seminars to gauge public reaction to potentially explosive proposals such as the imposition of a road tax.
Of course, just because officials know that the local work force is hopping mad doesn’t mean they can always head off protests. In some cities laid-off workers and elderly pensioners routinely block main highways, prompting local officials to rush to the scene and beg, cajole, mediate–and often, buy–their way out of a crisis. Many local governments have a sort of quick-reaction unit tasked with intervening in disputes between workers and bankrupt factories. “Each municipal government has a fund for resolving protests before they get out of hand,” says an influential economist.
At the same time, the authorities are equally skittish of giving workers too much rope. Unlike in the countryside, urban plaintiffs can increasingly find professional lawyers to take up their cases. Those who are too successful–like Shenzhen’s Zhou Litai, who helped more than 800 workers who had been maimed or otherwise mistreated in their factories–are often forced to close shop. Even in China’s cities, speaking out remains a risky proposition.
title: “Keeping The Lid On” ShowToc: true date: “2023-01-01” author: “Doreen Quezada”
The New York Daily News bought a copy at a Brooklyn health-food store, reported some inconsequential details, got sued by J. K. Rowling and her publisher for $100 million–and a spooked Reuters news service even withdrew its report on the Daily News’s story. On Friday, a day early, USA Today ran a review; the Potter Police are threatening to sue it, too. Even the U.S. Postal Service circulated a panicky memo. “We must get this right… absolutely none delivered on Friday. You will be expected to provide an explanation for each and every piece that does not meet these expectations.” If this had gone on much longer, Scholastic would have called in the Department of Homeland Security.
Why a one-day laydown for a high-profile title, instead of rolling it out like any other book? Partly because, with so many outlets, some bookseller’s bound to feel burned. “It’s unfair when someone can get their hands on it before we all can get it,” says Dinah Paul, who runs A Likely Story in Alexandria, Va. But sometimes a publisher embargoes a book so neither reviewers nor word of mouth can kill a much-touted turkey. And sometimes it’s to amp up suspense and forcibly synchronize media coverage. When Riverhead Books published Kurt Cobain’s diaries (excerpted in NEWSWEEK), it kept the originals in a safe in its HR department. “You want the press to happen the first week,” says Julie Grau, Riverhead VP and publisher. “Then there’s the orchestrated leak, to create anticipation.” Suspicions confirmed.
In the recent case of Hillary Clinton’s “Living History,” though, the leaked revelations seem to have been genuinely inadvertent. Simon and Schuster threatened to sue the Associated Press over them–not what you do if it’s all wink-and-nudge. But the payoff for S&S turned out to be much the same. “One could suggest that all the ballyhoo just whetted people’s appetites,” says Stuart Applebaum, head of publicity at rival Random House.
But Hillary was last week. This week Harry will displace her, thanks in part to all this nonsense–but mostly to the simple fact that people want the book, and would have bought it even if some killjoy had leaked the last sentence in skywriting over Yankee Stadium. If Rowling and Scholastic go ahead with the Daily News suit for what appear to be wholly imaginary damages, that spectacle might be fun to watch, too. Just not very edifying.
