/ 1 April 2011

Students screened for ‘radical thoughts’

Students Screened For 'radical Thoughts'

One of China’s most prestigious universities has announced plans to screen all students and identify those with “radical thoughts” or “independent lifestyles”, provoking angry reactions from undergraduates and comparisons with the Cultural Revolution.

Administrators at Peking University say their focus is helping those with academic problems. But the institution’s announcement identifies nine other categories of “target students”, including people with internet addiction, psychological fragility, illness and poverty, and those with radical thinking and independent or “eccentric” lifestyles.

“The objective of the consultation programme is to help individual students achieve an all-around and healthy development.”

The administrators say that officials should respect students’ individual differences but add that they must “address ideological problems and practical issues” and help to guide them.

Zha Jing, the deputy director of the office of student affairs, insisted the university was not trying to punish or control students but to “create an environment for healthy growth”.

Zha said: “We’ve noticed — some students having radical thoughts and bigoted character and are encountering difficulties in interpersonal communication, social adaptiveness and their studies.

“They cannot analyse and handle their problems in daily life in a rational and manifold way. For example, they cannot get on well with roommates, cannot handle love setbacks in a calm way and cannot adapt to career life after graduation.”

‘Radical thought’
Earlier, when asked about students with “radical thoughts”, he told the Beijing Evening News: “For instance, some students criticised the university just because the food price in the canteen was raised by 2 jiao [three US cents].”

Although some students have voiced support for the university, others are furious. One student told the newspaper that the college at the university where the scheme had been piloted since November was known for liberal thinking, but that the new rules would make people think it wanted to cage its students’ minds.

Peking University has a similar standing to Oxford or Cambridge but, unlike those institutions, has a reformist reputation — its students played a crucial role in the May 4 movement of 1919 and the 1989 pro-democracy Tiananmen Square demonstrations.

Zhang Ming, a politics professor at Renmin University, also in Beijing, said: “For a university to see a student having radical thoughts or independent thinking as a bad thing that has to be punished is terrible.

“How do you define radical thinking anyway? And who will define it? College students are all young and energetic — it is normal for them to have differentiated, active thoughts. It is their right to be radical. If a university punishes this, the university is morally degenerating.”

Xiong Bingqi, the deputy director of the 21st Century Education Research Institute in Beijing, told China Daily: “The university is somewhere to cultivate people’s independent personalities and thinking, so it’s totally wrong for Peking University to intervene in students’ freedom to express their different opinions.”

A university spokesperson told the Guardian that all interviews had to be requested seven days in advance. The ministry of education had not responded to faxed queries at the time of writing.

The scheme is due to be rolled out in May, although a statement posted this week said there would be further research and consultation. — Guardian News & Media 2011