Investigation into the Earthquake Student Casualties

The project below was interviewed during the first phase of our research, in early 2010. We have since determined that it fits more within the categories of general citizen engagement and/or activism in areas outside of transparency and accountability, rather than within the specific criteria we have defined for the purposes of our research.

Quick Look

Ai Weiwei defied the Chinese government by investigating into the exact identities of the Sichuan Earthquake student casualties.

Beginning Date: 
December 5, 2008
Project Scale: 
Actor: 
Function: 
Types of Tools: 
Specific Tools: 
Location:
China

Context

On May 12 2008 students were in class when the Sichuan Earthquake struck. Thousands of students were killed when buildings collapsed. The official casualty number released by the government is 5,335. But all levels of government refused to admit that there was quality problem in the construction of the school buildings.

Ai Weiwei, an artist, one of the architects of Beijing Olympic National Stadium (aka The Bird's Nest), and son of celebrated poet Ai Qing, started the investigation to compile a name list of the student victims since December, 2008. By July 2009, he and his team documented 5,212 cases of student casualties. 4,851 were confirmed with all basic information such as name, age, gender, school and class. There are 27 schools with casualties ranging from 30 to 786.

The initiative began by calling on all levels of governments, institutes, and schools in Sichuan, to ask questions. What were the names of the students? How was the relief funding appropriated? Etc. But the answers were always the same: This is impossible. The list was state secret, and it would not be disclosed to any individual. For those who did not even bother to reply, Ai Weiwei filed a lawsuit against the government according to regulations on government disclosure that took effect on May 1, 2008. However, because the legal system in China is not independent from the ruling party, the court replied with the same answers.

Volunteers were then assigned to different areas to do investigate. There were about 300-400 people aging from 10+ to 80+ who volunteered to help. There were finally around 100 volunteers who participated in the investigation, 50-60 of which were doing field work. Tan Zuoren, another citizen who investigated into the poor construction of the schools and proposed to build a database for the student victims was arrested in May 2009 and sentenced to five years imprisonment for "incitement to subversion of state power" in Feb 2010. Ai Weiwei and 10 other volunteers flew to Chendu to testify for Tan in August, 2009. But they were woken by police entering their hotel rooms at three in the morning. Ai Weiwei was beaten up, which led to severe brain injury. He was prohibited from leaving China until after the trial was adjourned.

Before his investigation into the Sichuan earthquake victim students, Ai Weiwei was also known for his active participation in the Yang Jia case. He wrote 60 blog posts about Yang, who killed 6 police officers with a knife after he was arrested, interrogated and beaten for riding an unlicensed bicycle. Ai Weiwei's blogging helped turn the treatement of Yang Jia into more sympathetic coverage. He even became an online national hero on some blogs and websites. The answers to the following interview questions were based on the thousands of interviews that Ai Weiwei has done so far. He says that he conducts 600 interviews every year, with 12 interviews in one day as the personal record.

References:

http://www.bullogger.com/blogs/aiww
http://chinadigitaltimes.net/china/the-numbers/
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-Pacific/2010/0209/China-sentences-quake-activist-Tan-Zuoren
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tan_Zuoren
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yang_Jia
http://www.bullogger.com/blogs/duting/archives/357326.aspx
翟明磊 《中國猛博---新媒體時代的民間話語力量》 天地出版社 2009

Media

Interview

What are the biggest obstacles to your success?: 

In our field trip and interviews, most of the families of the students victim were reluctant to reveal their identities. They were living in horror, because many of them were imprisoned or threatened. They were not willing to endanger themselves and to tell the real, simple facts.

What problem is your project aiming to overcome?: 

An earthquake is a public incident. It is the government's responsibility to investigate and release the casualty number and the names of the victim. Names are a part of a person's basic right. They reflect the substance and dignity of the victims' lives. Disclosing these information is of great assistance to improve transparency of public incidents, to enhance the governments accountability and credibility, and to reinforce the public's right of knowing. However, the government just uses a number to represent lost lives. All the basic facts were missing. Without the right to information about the earthquake, the public would not take any responsibility; by the same token, without transparency, a government would not be able to realize justice and righteousness. The government was handling the earthquake in a very disappointing way. They handed out subsidies for every family that has a victim. They must have a complete name list.

What are the roots of that problem?: 

In China, the biggest interest of the government is to "maintain the stability" of society. To achieve this goal, generations of people have already been sacrificed. On the other hand, people who are submissive under the current social system are also a power that impedes democracy in China. People were swamped in shit and do not have time to think about problems other than not be being drowned in shit.

Why did you personally become involved in this project?: 

After more than 300 days of the earthquake, I saw news that the government has released the name list of 19,065 victims and the total casualty was still under evaluation. However, we made more than 150 phone calls to all levels of government/departments, hoping to actually see the names of the 19,065 victims. None of them know where was it published and how was it published. It was not on any government website, either. My own investigation began because the government was opaque and lacked respect for the victims.

Are you providing unofficial channels of information that should be provided by the government?: 

Yes. We collected information mainly through three channels: 1) existing statistics on the website provided by volunteers. 2) our field trip and talking with the victim students' families and friends. 3) information provided by longterm investigators after they get to know our endeavors.

Why is the government not providing the information?: 

The whole system is paying for its partial corruption. This will be a huge cost as China will have to pay for its social reform. The government is afraid that as the investigation of the poorly constructed schools unfolds, more problems will emerge. In China, there's a nine-year mandatory education policy. It should have been a good policy. Nonetheless, it also required that all schools in the project needed to be built within a year. The local government did not have the money. The Central government offered to pay half. For instance, if the school building cost 500RMB per square meter, the Central government will pay for 250RMB of it. However, 250RMB per square meter was still too much for the local government. Corruption and poverty has led to a great number of poorly constructed schools. This is a mistake of the policy, which China never admits. After all, the one they admit will likely bring out many other mistakes.

Further Questions

On May 12 2008 students were in class when the Sichuan Earthquake struck. Thousands of students were killed when buildings collapsed. The official casualty number released by the government is 5,335. But all levels of government refused to admit that there was quality problem in the construction of the school buildings.

Ai Weiwei, an artist, one of the architects of Beijing Olympic National Stadium (aka The Bird's Nest), and son of celebrated poet Ai Qing, started the investigation to compile a name list of the student victims since December, 2008. By July 2009, he and his team documented 5,212 cases of student casualties. 4,851 were confirmed with all basic information such as name, age, gender, school and class. There are 27 schools with casualties ranging from 30 to 786.

The initiative began by calling on all levels of governments, institutes, and schools in Sichuan, to ask questions. What were the names of the students? How was the relief funding appropriated? Etc. But the answers were always the same: This is impossible. The list was state secret, and it would not be disclosed to any individual. For those who did not even bother to reply, Ai Weiwei filed a lawsuit against the government according to regulations on government disclosure that took effect on May 1, 2008. However, because the legal system in China is not independent from the ruling party, the court replied with the same answers.

Volunteers were then assigned to different areas to do investigate. There were about 300-400 people aging from 10+ to 80+ who volunteered to help. There were finally around 100 volunteers who participated in the investigation, 50-60 of which were doing field work. Tan Zuoren, another citizen who investigated into the poor construction of the schools and proposed to build a database for the student victims was arrested in May 2009 and sentenced to five years imprisonment for "incitement to subversion of state power" in Feb 2010. Ai Weiwei and 10 other volunteers flew to Chendu to testify for Tan in August, 2009. But they were woken by police entering their hotel rooms at three in the morning. Ai Weiwei was beaten up, which led to severe brain injury. He was prohibited from leaving China until after the trial was adjourned.

Before his investigation into the Sichuan earthquake victim students, Ai Weiwei was also known for his active participation in the Yang Jia case. He wrote 60 blog posts about Yang, who killed 6 police officers with a knife after he was arrested, interrogated and beaten for riding an unlicensed bicycle. Ai Weiwei's blogging helped turn the treatement of Yang Jia into more sympathetic coverage. He even became an online national hero on some blogs and websites. The answers to the following interview questions were based on the thousands of interviews that Ai Weiwei has done so far. He says that he conducts 600 interviews every year, with 12 interviews in one day as the personal record.

References:

http://www.bullogger.com/blogs/aiww
http://chinadigitaltimes.net/china/the-numbers/
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-Pacific/2010/0209/China-sentences-quake-activist-Tan-Zuoren
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tan_Zuoren
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yang_Jia
http://www.bullogger.com/blogs/duting/archives/357326.aspx
翟明磊 《中國猛博---新媒體時代的民間話語力量》 天地出版社 2009

What measures did the government take to impede your investigation?

A. They shut down blogs: At 10pm, May 28 2009, all 3 of Ai Weiwei's blogs on sina, sohu and 163.com were shut down. These blogs are where Ai Weiwei published his investigation updates. In Ai Weiwei's words, under China's special social system, blogs have become the most important platform to promote democracy and the boot camp for educating citizens to practice their rights. Through the following numbers you may understand why. The sina blog was started in 2005. It has accumulated 12,070,000 clicks and 2,500 posts by March 2009.

B. Arrest, Search, Confiscation and Threats: About 80% of the volunteers had once been detained and interrogated by the police, some of them up to 3-4 times. The questions that the police asked were mostly: a. What is you purpose? b. Why do you want the list? c. Which organization is supporting you, who funded you? etc. Mostly 5 to 10+ police would take turns to interrogate. The volunteers were treated like criminals. Some of the volunteers were even beaten. None of these arrests or searches or interrogations were supported by any forms of warrants. The police improvised with "oral orders" such as "Government people do not need to show certificates to stop pedestrians on the street", "The police uniform is the proof of police identity", "I say you are illegal then you are illegal" "No need to show search warrant to do body search","If you do not go with me, I'll beat you", etc. As much as Ai Weiwei and his team were shocked by the "oral orders", they understand that these police did not mean evil. Nonetheless, Ai Weiwei's team understood how state power has trampled the agents and executors of its power. They were passively obeying orders from their superiors.

C. Persuasion and Repatriation: One common statement by the police was: I understand that you mean well. But individuals' efforts are limited. This investigation should be conducted by the government. You should believe in the government." Some of them were polite in the whole process and they seemed to sympathize with Ai Weiwei and his team. They would "take care" of them and send them back to Chengdu, the capital city of Sichuan Province.

D. Denial, Deception, and Buck-passing: To avoid leaking "state secrete", the government departments frequently denied that they had the list, and told Ai Weiwei's team to ask another department.

What are your opinions about NGOs in mainland that promotes transparency in China? What do you think about their prospects? Is there a sustainable model for NGOs that promote transparency in China?

I think these NGOs will be very important. Only by asking questions more frequently and specifically can we put pressure on the liars or the silent person in the conner. Of course many skills and techniques are needed in the process. For example, they will have to be very familiar with the laws and regulations in mainland China. The laws and regulations are actually giving us room and support. It was just that the government was not respecting and enforcing what the laws actually say. We should put everything under the sun, to clarify who are violating the laws and under what circumstances. Currently we can do nothing but file lawsuits against the government. We are expected to be ignored. But we are such nice, non-violent people. What other options do we have?

Comments

the rights of average person,why there are so many barries

When i read the research report,i fell that why the government don't open up greatly which will benefit not only the government itself but also the citizens of her country .If the concened government change his mind ,look at the transparency of other countries,if the government concerned can learn more from others ,i belicve there will be a good future.
Konwing the name of the casualtes is the basic rights of people .The casualties'family , friends and social workman have the right to konw the specific information of casualties.Also ,doing this is the dignity to the casualties.
The concened goverment have the responsibilites to investigate the situation of the casualtes not Ai mimi and so on .Even when Aimimi investigate the situation ,the concerned government should give them surport not barries.

impressive

I find this case profoundly moving. Ai Weiwei and the volunteers are very brave. It's hard for outsiders to understand how controversial it can be to hold governments accountable to their own laws.

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