Property Rights & Tiananmen

Today's WSJ ($) carries a front-page story on new types of protesters in Tiananmen Square. They're actually demanding many of the same rights as their predecessors 15 years ago, but their frustrations are more pragmatic -- at least on the surface. It seems that unscrupulous developers, in cahoots with corrupt local officials, have engaged in bait-and-switch with many new middle class professionals in Beijing and other cities.

After buying new apartments in high rises promising pools, parking, and retail shops, many new home owners are unsatisfied with their surroundings. The promised amenities have a way of never appearing and, what's worse for any city dweller, newer buildings that were never in the original plans are going up right next door. This obstructs the views the home-buyers paid for, increases parking problems, and has led more than a few to protest violations of their property rights. The lack of rule of law is creating new classes of civic activists.

The Journal reports on their Tiananmen protest: "In July [of 2003], defying a police ban on demonstrations in Tiananmen square, about 200 residents printed up signs and T-shirts declaring 'Protect our rights,' piled into their new Hondas and Volkswagen Passats and paraded through Tiananmen Square to the Beijing city planning office."

Furthermore: "Propelled by market reforms that in the past six years have privatized the once state-controlled housing market, homeownership has become increasingly common, especially in Beijing. Traditionally assigned apartments by their work units, many Chinese now live in neighborhoods defined by their income. Until she bought her new apartment three years ago, for example, Ms. Liu, a lawyer who used to work for a legal newspaper, was assigned to live in a complex with neighbors including workers from the company cafeteria and janitors.

"Economically, the surge in homeownership is boosting industries like construction, durable goods and interior design. Politically, homeownership is giving people a new stake in society, emboldening them to make more demands of their local governments."

Such demands are precisely what the architects of America's foreign policy toward China have hoped for and follow patterns already seen in South Korea, Taiwan, and elsewhere. Not that the Chinese leadership is likely to knuckle under to sign-wielding white collar workers and grant broad political freedoms voluntarily. But the creation of a property-owning middle class, many of whom were educated in the West and know first-hand the wonders of a free society, is having an impact at the grassroots level, especially in urban areas.

Episodes like these also demonstrate the symbiotic relationship between private property and other liberties. Once large numbers of people have a personal stake in their homes, they seek to protect them and demand redress for wrongs committed against them. It's been noted time and again that the middle class won't be satisfied with mere economic rights, and that's true. What's overlooked in such statements is that, in practice, it's impossible to bifurcate such rights in the long run because they're intrinsically related. Owning property is a foundational building block of civil society, and, bearing in mind that China is still a dictatorship whose leaders have a brutal record on human rights, the Journal's story is nevertheless encouraging.