Published by: The Shanghai National Party (SNP)
Date: January 01, 2022
English Translation by Hon Yan
The Shanghai Independence Movement is striding into its fifth year. In the year 2022, the Shanghai National Party will continue to uphold its long-standing principles: we are against tyranny and against the Chinese Unification, and aim to secede from China and return to Europe in a complete Westernization. In the year 2022, we will continue to voice our demands of independence and self-determination of the Shanghai people.
In the past four years, all SNP members have worked in honesty and solidarity, bringing the flags and mottos of “Shanghai Independence” to tour across 48 States of the Continental US, and extended our presence in as far as Europe, to UK, Germany, and Switzerland. We partook in conversations as well as actions: in multiple cities we have taken part in rallies and protests against the tyrannical Chinese government’s persecution of the Uyghur, Tibetan, and Hong Kong peoples. And in the virtual community, we in the SNP have never stopped revealing and critiquing the system of a centralizing unified Chinese regime [大一統中央集權制度].
As the new year dawns, to all friends that are in support of the Shanghai Independence Movement, with sincerity we hereby relay our views on the topics we all concern.
1) The Chinese Communist Party and The People’s Republic of China
The CCP is a violent terrorist organization made up of Han Chinese; the PRC is a totalitarian nation constructed by the CCP by means of violence — a regime that is predicated upon the idea of grand unification [大一統] and centralization of power [中央集權]. Be it the communism by Mao Zedong, be it the reform and opening up of market economy by Deng Xiaoping, be it the Chinese Dream and the Grand Rejuvenation of the Chinese Nation by Xi Jinping, it is nothing but an excusing synonym for the cruel, violent reign of a Han Chinese regime imposed upon all ethnicities and peoples, including the Han Chinese themselves. Whoever becomes the highest ruling figure of the CCP and the PRC, be it Mao, Deng, Jiang, Hu, Xi, or anyone else, regardless of their political principles and their policies for the nation, either rigidly opposed to change or seemingly friendly in embracing change, individual freedoms under the Chinese society to increase or to decrease, it is abundantly clear that the organizational nature of the CCP is an anti-human terrorist group, and the nature of Chinese state being a continuation of the regime of unification and centralization [大一統中央集權專制帝國] of the past two thousand years.
The Chinese Communist Party is a political group of the Han Chinese, the People’s Republic of China is a regime of the Han Chinese, just as the Manchu-Qing empire two hundred years ago was a Manchu state ruled by the Aisin Gioro. The Chinese government under the CCP is doing ethnic cleansing and genocide on Uyghurs, Tibetans, and other ethnic groups; it is extinguishing and erasing the cultures and languages of peoples such as Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Cantonia, among others; it is implementing digitized fascist rule upon all peoples, including the Han, within its borders.
Therefore, the Shanghai National Party declares: we consider the subversion of the Chinese Communist Party to be our task, and the annihilation of the People’s Republic of China to be our sacred duty.
2) Slavery and the Chinese People
The people in the People’s Republic of China are the ones that have lost their basic human rights. Under the totalitarian rule of the Chinese Communist Party, they do not have right to free speech, nor the right to supervise the government to hold it accountable, nor the right to be protected by the national constitution and law, nor the right to elect their own central and local government officials, nor even the right to decide how many heirs they can procreate. Under the coercion of the tyrannical Chinese government, they are forced to pay high taxes, forced to express their support of the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese government, forced to defend the system of the centralized rule under grand unification [大一統的中央集權制度], forced to endorse that the Chinese government represents the interests of its peoples, and forced to opposed the Western system of democracy.
The totalitarian society of China is essentially slavery — an ancient wickedness now revived in our times. The Chinese people are slaves in the modern era: they are deprived of freedom of speech and other basic human rights, deprived of the right and freedom of reproduction, and also deprived of the ability of unbiased independent thinking. Some of them have been tamed to become those slaves that voluntarily care about their oppressor; yet these slaves have not only become accomplices, but now also viciously share the concern with their slave-master on whether their world order can continue to have this grand unification intact [其天下之維持大一統], and whether there are other fellow slaves attempting to resist or secede from the governance of the slave-owner.
3) The Grand Unification and the Chinese Democratic Movements
From the fifth modernization proposed by Wei Jingsheng to the 1989 student-led democratic movement, there has always been the tendency to defend the Grand Unification across all democratic movements by the Chinese in our times. The Shanghai National Party declares that we unequivocally oppose any such Chinese democratic movement defending the Grand Unification and categorically oppose all Chinese democratic movements that exclude self-determination. Under the current rule of CCP, it is utterly impossible that Shanghai may achieve its independence: which is as unlikely as China achieving its democracy at the present stage. However, just as the pro-democracy Chinese activists think it is possible to achieve democracy after the collapse of the CCP, we the Shanghai-independence activists think it is viable for Shanghai to achieve independence after the CCP regime has been subverted.
If China’s democracy is to be achieved upon the loss of self-determination for nations like Tibet, Uyghur, Hong Kong, and Shanghai, then we oppose such Chinese democracy. If China’s democracy is to be achieved upon the basis of “Ask 1.4 billion people for their approval of Shanghai Independence”, then we oppose such Chinese democracy. If China’s democracy is to be achieved upon the premise that “You may vote for a president of China and a mayor of Shanghai, but not a president of Shanghai”, then we oppose such Chinese democracy. If China’s democracy is to be achieved upon the premise that “Only after China’s democratization can there be any talk of Shanghai Independence”, then we oppose such Chinese democracy.
4) China as Democracy, and China as Autocracy
The Shanghai National Party is opposed to the envisioned Chinese democracy that would deprive the self-determination of the Shanghai nationhood — this does not mean that we would ever support CCP’s tyrannical rule. Likewise, the Shanghai National Party is opposed to CCP’s tyrannical rule, and this does not mean that we would support the Chinese democratic movements that would endanger Shanghai’s self-determination. Despite their seeming contradiction, we are opposed to both the tyranny of CCP and the tyranny of an envisioned Chinese democracy defending the Grand Unification — because either of them would infringe Shanghai’s right to self-determination of its nationhood. If the democratization of China does respect Shanghai’s self-determination, then once Shanghai achieves independence, we will not interfere with China’s internal affairs; this non-interference includes non-interference in China’s political system, be it autocracy or democracy. In that case, we duly expect full reciprocity: China shall recognize Shanghai as a sovereign state, and must not by any means interfere with Shanghai’s internal affairs.
Autocracy is detestable, but democracy is not necessarily advantageous. If a Chinese democracy — well after the demise of the Communist Party — still inherits the abominable Grand Unification of China under a centralized power [大一統中央集權的衣缽], then this form of Chinese Democracy is no different from the democracy of the DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of [North] Korea), is no different from the democracy of the DDR (Die Deutsche Demokratische Republik), and is no different from the “Whole-Process Democracy” [全過程民主] of Xi Jinping. We resist such unifying nationalist narrative in the disguise of democracy.
5) The Shanghai Independence Movement and the Shanghai National Party
All discourse and action asserting Shanghai Independence are part and parcel of the Shanghai Independence Movement. All individuals endorsing and contending Shanghai Independence are contributing members to the Shanghai Independence Movement. Anyone can claim themselves a Shanghai-secessionist; anyone can establish a Shanghai-secessionist group that aims to bring out Shanghai’s self-determination and its independence from China.
The Shanghai National Party was established on July 18, 2018 by 51 founding members, and this establishment was then announced widely across media platforms, effectively becoming the first Shanghai-secessionist organization in the history of Shanghai Independence Movement. In 2021, SNP has implemented reforms: removing the application process for new members, so that anyone may join the Shanghai National Party and likewise may leave the Party without announcement; the SNP also abolished the requirement of annual membership fee, and now encourages voluntary donation.
6) The Chinese Nationhood Is a Death-Machine for Nations
The narrative of a Chinese nationalism is a tool for the Han Chinese centralized regime to enslave and fool all peoples within its claimed borders. The totalitarian ruler plots to implement a policy of assimilation — turning all the racial/ethnic minorities into Han Chinese — while using this narrative of Chinese nationalism as a deceptive cover, starting from political and cultural lives, aiming to eventually erase the minority peoples. This Chinese nationalist narrative is also a violent tool oppressing the minorities who often fight against the Han Chinese colonizers in the pursuit of their own self-determination and de facto independence; the Han Chinese regime uses “the Great Rejuvenation of the Chinese Nation” and other propaganda to instigate a chauvinistic Han-Chinese nationalism, effectively oppressing the Han Chinese and, with this nationalist narrative, driving them to discriminate against and oppress other minority peoples.
The Shanghai National Party unequivocally opposes the Chinese nationalist [中華民族] narrative.
7) Confucius Institutes and Shen-Yun [神韻]
The Confucius Institutes are the propaganda arms that the PRC’s Han-Chinese regime deploys to send to the West to propagate the notions of a false legitimacy of the Chinese Unity and its totalitarian governance [中華大一統中央集權專制文化]. The Shen-Yun movement, on the other hand, is another tool to manipulate popular understandings in Western societies and to promote the Grand Unification of China and its totalitarian culture [中華大一統中央集權專制文化] among the Western audience, done by the Fa Lun Gong communities under the disguise of its seemingly innocent artistic performance of cultural traditions. It is the same nature behind both the Han Chinese tyrannical regime and the Falun Gong groups: they all support and defend the Chinese nationalist narrative [中華大一統中央集權專制文化] to perpetuate its rule. What Falun Gong has done, such as “Anti-CCP, but not Anti-Xi-Jinping”, and “Anti-Jiang-Zemin, but not Anti-CCP,” speaks Volumes about their political standpoint.
The Shanghai National Party opposes propaganda tools of a tyrannical government, such as the Confucius Institutes, and also opposes those entertainment performances, such as Falun Gong’s Shen-Yun, that praise a unified Chinese nationhood along with its brutal political system and culture [大一統專制制度和文化].
8) Western Nations, Uyghur Concentration Camps, and the Fall of Hong Kong
With regard to the Chinese government’s crimes against humanity and genocides in Xinjiang on the Uyghur and Kazakh peoples, Western countries have been clear in their views, but flabby in their actions. Similarly, Western countries have their clear views and flabby actions with regard to the centralized Chinese regime’s sacking of Hong Kong and its fascist persecution of Hong Kong democracy activists and independence activists.
In today’s world of hyper-connected global economy, we understand that Western countries and China need cooperation in economic matters, and need mutual support in a multitude of topics such as climate change, reduction of nuclear weapons, UN peace-keeping, world peace, and de-nuclearizing the Korean Peninsula. We understand that in order for the 2022 Beijing Olympics to uneventfully proceed, the IOC and Beijing government need mutual support and cooperation.
9) Western Nations and China: A Relationship of Competition and Cooperation
The People’s Republic of China as an autocracy is not necessarily the enemy of Western democracies. Their relation is indeed as certain Western countries elaborated — it is a relationship of competition and cooperation. World peace has been maintained for 77 years since the end of World War II, it is understood that the ideological confrontation between democracy and autocracy is not a paramount problem; the global economic development, instead, is the focus of governments across the world. People will be able to see that contention will not impede cooperation, and cooperation will continue alongside with contentions. The ups and downs of the two will become the way Western nations deal with China in the foreseeable next ten years. Since that Xi Jinping is highly likely to be re-elected on the 20th plenary congress of the CCP, even if he leaves office upon the 21st congress five years later, his influence will continue to hold tight until the year 2032, as the top figure controlling China’s power.
10) Covid-19 and Governments’ Responses to the Pandemic
The infectious pneumonia caused by China’s Wuhan Virus has been devastating to the entire world for over two years now; and it is expected to continue its presence in the human world; the global death toll has reached five million. Response to this pandemic varies due to cultural and societal differences across nations; for example, Asian societies such as Japan, South Korea, Singapore, and Taiwan are similar, mainly depending on a high rate of vaccination and voluntary compliance with the quarantine measures. European and American societies have their traditions of honoring liberty, hence the insufficient compliance of people to the voluntary quarantines and therefore higher infection and mortality rates than seen across Asian states.
The zero-covid policy adopted by the Chinese government is symptomatic of the millennia-old notion of the Grand Unification under a centralizing power [大一統中央集權專制]. Securing low human-rights has been the talisman of this oriental empire, to be considered by the government and the governed ones alike as normality and even becoming their pride. Indeed, for a large country of 1.4 billion, the infections and mortalities have been lowered to a minimum thanks to a centralized totalitarian rule, this is something never to be done in the West, in Europe or America. Hence, be it success or failure, it is all from autocracy. Thankfully, the mortality of Covid-19 is not too high: the total death toll in Western societies is still within an acceptable range, otherwise China would really become the winner of this pandemic.
11) When Will Shanghai Achieve Independence
Many on the Internet have asked this question; it is asked in the same format as “when can China achieve democracy”, but the answers to them are about the same. Activists in the Chinese democratic movement are hyper-optimistic, sharing the view that China would almost certainly achieve democracy after the collapse of the CCP rule, while we hold that the independence of Shanghai has its best opportunity right after the collapse of the CCP.
During the Bei-yang Government (1912–1928) of the Republic of China, remarkably there were provincial parliaments and local warlords that declared independence and started political autonomy — all because the previous regime with a centralized power had collapsed and a new one was not yet a full-fledged central government, unable to rule all the places. If it weren’t because of the Northern Expedition [北伐] of Sun Yat-sen and Chiang Kai-shek with their KMT, what is today China would highly likely have become a multitude of nations forming some kind of economic unions, much like today’s Europe, and not a unified centralized totalitarian regime [大一統集權國家] as it is now.
12) Coda
Only the people of Shanghai have the right to support or oppose the Shanghai Independence Movement. People from China have no right to interfere with or deprive Shanghai’s self-determination, nor do any other countries or their governments. The success of Shanghai Independence is contingent upon the choices made by the people of Shanghai themselves. Choosing between Shanghai Independence or continuing under the Chinese rule is a question for the people of Shanghai about their own life and their own fate.
We wish everyone a Happy New Year!
May God bless Shanghai!
Link to the original article on the Shanghai National Party website:
Shanghai National上海民族黨 