Overview

The Buddha Party tells the story of how the People's Republic of China employs propaganda to define Tibetan Buddhist belief and sway opinion within the country and abroad. The narrative they create is at odds with historical facts and deliberately misleading but, John Powers argues, it is widely believed by Han Chinese. Most of China's leaders appear to deeply believe the official line regarding Tibet, which resonates with Han notions of themselves as China's most advanced nationality and as a benevolent race that liberates and culturally uplifts minority peoples. This in turn profoundly affects how the leadership interacts with their counterparts in other countries. Powers's study focuses in particular on the government's ""patriotic education"" campaign-an initiative that forces monks and nuns to participate in propaganda sessions and repeat official dogma. Powers contextualizes this within a larger campaign to transform China's religions into ""patriotic"" systems that endorse Communist Party policies. This book offers a powerful, comprehensive examination of this ongoing phenomenon, how it works and how Tibetans resist it.

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9780199358151

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Reviews

Powers compellingly guides the reader to a nuanced understanding of Chinese efforts to control and shape opinion about Tibetan history, Tibet's international standing, and the Dalai Lama. He investigates Chinese domestic and international propaganda strategies and the judicial, security, and educational methods directed at controlling Tibetans' thinking. Most valuable of all, he skillfully unveils the ways in which Chinese approaches utterly fail to change Tibetan attitudes. --Derek F. Maher, translator and annotator of Tsepon Shakabpa's <em>One Hundred Thousand Moons: An Advanced</em> <em>Political History of Tibet</em> Why can't China and Tibet just get along? Could the PRC government really believe their own propaganda about Tibet? Does the Communist Party really believe that only they are capable of recognizing reborn lamas? What is Patriotic Re-education in Tibet, and why do Tibetans hate it so much? If you want answers to these questions, and wish to understand contemporary Sino-Tibetan relations, read this book. John Powers brings his extensive scholarship and personal experience in Tibet and with the Central Tibetan Administration, as well as a reading of the patriotic re-education training manuals to bear in this masterful and engaging account of a political situation that both absurd and tragic. --Jay L Garfield, Doris Silbert Professor in the Humanities, Smith College, Visiting Professor of Buddhist Philosophy, Harvard Divinity School and Adjunct Professor of Philosophy, Central University of Tibetan Studies

Powers compellingly guides the reader to a nuanced understanding of Chinese efforts to control and shape opinion about Tibetan history, Tibet's international standing, and the Dalai Lama. He investigates Chinese domestic and international propaganda strategies and the judicial, security, and educational methods directed at controlling Tibetans' thinking. Most valuable of all, he skillfully unveils the ways in which Chinese approaches utterly fail to change Tibetan attitudes. --Derek F. Maher, translator and annotator of Tsepon Shakabpa's One Hundred Thousand Moons: An Advanced Political History of Tibet Why can't China and Tibet just get along? Could the PRC government really believe their own propaganda about Tibet? Does the Communist Party really believe that only they are capable of recognizing reborn lamas? What is Patriotic Re-education in Tibet, and why do Tibetans hate it so much? If you want answers to these questions, and wish to understand contemporary Sino-Tibetan relations, read this book. John Powers brings his extensive scholarship and personal experience in Tibet and with the Central Tibetan Administration, as well as a reading of the patriotic re-education training manuals to bear in this masterful and engaging account of a political situation that both absurd and tragic. --Jay L Garfield, Doris Silbert Professor in the Humanities, Smith College, Visiting Professor of Buddhist Philosophy, Harvard Divinity School and Adjunct Professor of Philosophy, Central University of Tibetan Studies

Powers compellingly guides the reader to a nuanced understanding of Chinese efforts to control and shape opinion about Tibetan history, Tibet's international standing, and the Dalai Lama. He investigates Chinese domestic and international propaganda strategies and the judicial, security, and educational methods directed at controlling Tibetans' thinking. Most valuable of all, he skillfully unveils the ways in which Chinese approaches utterly fail to change Tibetan attitudes. --Derek F. Maher, translator and annotator of Tsepon Shakabpa's One Hundred Thousand Moons: An Advanced Political History of Tibet Why can't China and Tibet just get along? Could the PRC government really believe their own propaganda about Tibet? Does the Communist Party really believe that only they are capable of recognizing reborn lamas? What is Patriotic Re-education in Tibet, and why do Tibetans hate it so much? If you want answers to these questions, and wish to understand contemporary Sino-Tibetan relations, read this book. John Powers brings his extensive scholarship and personal experience in Tibet and with the Central Tibetan Administration, as well as a reading of the patriotic re-education training manuals to bear in this masterful and engaging account of a political situation that both absurd and tragic. --Jay L Garfield, Doris Silbert Professor in the Humanities, Smith College, Visiting Professor of Buddhist Philosophy, Harvard Divinity School and Adjunct Professor of Philosophy, Central University of Tibetan Studies

Author Information

John Powers is Professor of Asian Studies in the College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University. He specializes in Indian and Tibetan Buddhism and Tibetan history and is the author of 17 books and more than 80 articles. His books include A Bull of A Man: Images of Masculinity, Sex, and the Body in Indian Buddhism (2009) and Historical Dictionary of Tibet (with David Templeman; 2012).

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