Falun Gong

Falun Gong
Falun Dafa logo
Traditional Chinese	法輪功
Simplified Chinese	法轮功
Literal meaning	Practice of the Wheel of Law
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Fǎlún Gōng Yue: Cantonese Jyutping fat2 lun4 gung1
Falun Dafa
Traditional Chinese	法輪大法
Simplified Chinese	法轮大法
Literal meaning	Great Law of the Wheel of Law
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Fǎlún Dàfǎ Yue: Cantonese Jyutping fat2 lun4 daai6 fat2

Falun Gong (alternatively Falun Dafa) is a system of beliefs and practices founded in China by Li Hongzhi in 1992. The practice emerged at the end of China's "qigong boom" in the early 1990s as a form of qigong. Falun Gong differs from competing qigong schools through its absence of daily rituals of worship, its greater emphasis on morality, and the theological nature of its teachings. While the Chinese government has declared Falun Gong to be a "cult" since 1999, Western academics generally describe Falun Gong as a new religious movement (NRM) or a "spiritual movement" based on the teachings and instructions of its founder Li Hongzhi, with a heavy emphasis on morality in its central tenets - Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance (Chinese: 真、善、忍). Its teachings are derived from qigong, Buddhist and Taoist concepts, and draw upon modern science.

The movement grew rapidly in China between 1992 and 1999. Government sources indicated that there may have been as many as 70 million Falun Gong practitioners in the country by 1998. Its rapid growth generated attention from Chinese journalists, skeptics, scientists, and religious institutions,. Falun Gong responded to its critics through protests and lobbying aimed at minimizing negative publicity for the practice. In April 1999, after one such protest in Tianjin, some 10,000 Falun Gong practitioners gathered at Zhongnanhai, home of China's ruling elites, in silent protest, while its leaders reportedly negotiated with government representatives.

In July 1999, the Chinese government banned Falun Gong through a crackdown and began a large propaganda campaign against the practice. Between 1999 and 2004, human rights groups reported that Falun Gong practitioners in China were subject to a wide range of human rights abuses. Falun Gong groups have since moved abroad, and continue to levy charges against the Chinese government by lobbying Western governments and proselytizing in public places, alleging that its practitioners have been subject to organ harvesting, forced labour, and torture under the hands of the Communist Party of China. Falun Gong practitioners have since founded media-outlets such as the Epoch Times, NTDTV and the Shen Yun Performing Arts as channels to publicize their cause and criticize the Chinese government, and the group has emerged as a notable force in opposing the Communist Party and its policies. Falun Gong websites claim there are over 100 million practitioners of Falun Dafa in "114 countries and regions around the world".

The symbol

Template:Image stack The movement's symbol incorporates elements of Buddhism and Taoism. Visually, it is an orange circle composed of a central, counterclockwise-pointing swastika, a symbol of the Buddha School—and an ancient auspicious symbol in India known by its Sanskrit name of Śrīvatsa. The central Śrīvatsa is surrounded by four smaller Śrīvatsas, and four Taijitu, symbols from Taoism.

It is viewed as a miniature model of the universe. Some advanced practitioners are believed to see the symbol as the revolving dharma wheel, which radiates or absorbs cosmic energy depending on its rotational direction.

Beliefs and teachings

Main article: Teachings of Falun Gong

Practising the fifth exercise of Falun Dafa in Thailand.

Falun Gong was introduced to the public by Li Hongzhi (李洪志) in Changchun, China, in 1992. Its teachings cover spiritual, religious, mystical and metaphysical topics while promising health benefits to the practitioner and places heavy emphasis on morality. The three central tenets of the Falun Gong system, as articulated by founder Li Hongzhi, are 'Truthfulness' (眞), 'Compassion' (善), and 'Forbearance' (忍). Together, these three ideas are regarded as the fundamental characteristics of the cosmos — an omnipresent nature that permeates and encompasses everything. In the process of cultivation, practitioners are supposed to assimilate themselves to these qualities by letting go of "attachments and notions," thus returning to the "original, true self." In Zhuan Falun, Li Hongzhi said that "As a practitioner, if you assimilate yourself to this characteristic [sic], you are one that has attained the Tao."

Falun Gong is an introductory book that discusses qigong, which introduces the aforementioned principles and provides illustrations and explanations of the exercises involved in Falun Gong practice. The main body of teachings is articulated in the core book Zhuan Falun (轉法輪), published in late 1994. According to the texts, Falun Gong (or Falun Dafa) is a "complete system of mind-body cultivation practice" (修煉).

Falun Gong presents itself as a virtuous form of self-cultivation which draws on Oriental mysticism and traditional Chinese medicine, criticizes self-imposed limits of modern science, and views traditional Chinese science as an entirely different, yet equally valid knowledge system. Yuezhi Zhao, professor in the University of California, describes it as a "quasi-religious fundamentalist movement with apparent conservative sensibilities"—where the religious facet is covered by the Taoist and Buddhist influences; the conservative facet is its resistance to the "prevailing pursuit of... the entire value system associated with the project of modernization". Spiritually, it claims supernatural powers, health and longevity, yet it borrows the language of modern science in representing its cosmic laws. Zhao says that Falun Gong is a "multi-faceted and totalizing movement that means different things to different people.. from physical exercise... to a moral philosophy...and a knowledge system". Practitioners, which include doctorate holders from prestigious American universities, see it as "a new form of science."

According to Kai-Ti Chou, traditional Chinese cultural thought and modernity are clearly two main focuses in Li Hongzhi's rhetoric. From the angle of traditiional Chinese cultural thought, Falun Gong's reinterpretaion allows adherents to build a link with their life-experiences on the basis of their existing knowledge. And,

Li Hongzhi's broad adoption of quasi-scientific language in his rhetoric many well be the result of recognising the influence of science on the Chinese mind. Modern science seems to be a dominant element in most modern people's worldviews. Li Hongzhi must, therefore, react to it and place it in his rhetoric. On the one hand, he criticises the blindness and arrogance of modern science and the limitations of the scientific paradigm. On the other hand, he seeks to create a para-scientific view, which can replace modern scientific epistemology.

Craig Burgdoff notes that while Li may emphasise millenial themes, the organizational structure of Falun Gong works against totalistic control, with no hierarchy in place to enforce orthodoxy and little or no emphasis upon dogmatic discipline. There is no "official" membership, and practitioners are free to participate as much or as little as they like without censure, Burgdoff says. There is no attempt to isolate practitioners from society, and no manipulation of sexuality or finances other than emphasizing the need for strict moral behavior. "In my positive experience of Falun Gong, I have found practitioners to be engaged seriously in a highly disciplined spiritual and ethical practice."

Theoretical background

Qigong refers to a wide variety of traditional "cultivation" practices that involve movement and/or regulated breathing designed to be therapeutic. Qigong is practiced for health maintenance purposes, as a therapeutic intervention, as a medical profession, a spiritual path, or a component of Chinese martial arts. In contrast to attitudes in the West, where many may believe that qigong is a socially neutral, subjective, New Age-style concept incapable of scientific proof, a segment of China's scientific establishment regards qi as a scientific concept. Controlled experiments by the Chinese Academy of Sciences in the late 1970s and early 1980s concluded that qi, when emitted by a qigong expert, "actually constitutes measurable infrared electromagnetic waves and causes chemical changes in static water through mental concentration."

Falun Gong also incorporates Buddhist and Taoist teachings, as well as some aspects of Christianity and Judaism. According to Kai-Ti Chou, "the possible influence of the Daoist religiion on Falun Gong can be found in the use of mantra of practice (Koujue) and in the meaning of the master's rule," and Falun Gong's asceticism (getting rid of attachments and the neccessity of tribulation) is clearly a Buddhist idea. Moreover, theories about the cultivation of elixir (dan), "placement of the mysterious pass" (xuanguan shewei), among others, are also found in ancient Chinese texts such as The Book of Elixir (Dan Jing), Daoist Canon (Tao Zang) and Guide to Nature and Longevity (Xingming Guizhi). Falun Gong's teachings tap into a wide array of phenomena and cultural heritage that has been debated for ages. However, the definitions of many of the terms used differ somewhat from Buddhist and Daoist traditions. Asia Times reporter Francesco Sisci wrote that Falun Gong "re-elaborated old, well-known Taoist and Buddhist routines, used the old vocabulary that people found familiar, and revamped them in a simple, persuasive way."

According to Sumner B. Twiss, Falun Gong is built on indigenous practices of qigong, in addition to incorporating moral ideas and meditative practices from Buddhism and Taoism. It represents an indigenous spiritual, moral, and health movement that appears to be an opposite to Marxism with Chinese characteristics.

History

Main article: History of Falun Gong

File:UNGenevaFalunDafaLecture.jpg

Li Hongzhi lectures on Falun Dafa at the UN General Assembly Hall, Geneva, 1998

Falun Gong was founded by Li Hongzhi. Chinese authorities assert that he was a former army trumpet player and grain clerk at the Changchun Cereals Company. While in his spiritual biography, Li Hongzhi claims that he was taught ways of "cultivation practice" (xiulian) by several masters of the Dao and Buddhist traditions, including Quan Jue, the 10th Heir to the Great Law of the Buddha School, a Taoist master from age eight to twelve, and a master of the Great Way School with the Taoist alias of True Taoist from the Changbai Mountains. Li also claimed numerous supernatural feats, including invisibility, levitation, and weather modification.

Li Hongzhi introduced Falun Gong to the public in May 1992, in Changchun, Jilin. Early versions of Zhuan Falun stated that the system was tested extensively in the years prior to its introduction; later, as part of the anti-Falun Gong media campaign, the Chinese government asserted that Falun Gong was based on existing Qigong systems, namely Chanmi Gong and Jiugong Bagua Gong. Like many qigong masters at the time, Li toured major cities in China from 1992 to 1994 to teach the practice. During this time, Li was granted several awards by Chinese governmental organizations, including the "Qigong Master most acclaimed by the Masses" and "The Award for Advancing Boundary Science." According to David Ownby, Professor of History and Director of the Center for East Asian Studies at the Université de Montréal, neither Li nor Falun Gong were particularly controversial in the beginning. Li became an "instant star of the qigong movement," and the movement enjoyed success and rapid growth.

File:PrePersecutionFalunDafaPracticeinChina.jpg

Group practice in China in July 1999

Li made his lectures more widely accessible and affordable in later years, charging less than competing qigong systems for lectures, tapes, and books. On 4 January 1995, Zhuan Falun, the main book on Falun Gong, was published and became a best-seller in China. In the face of Falun Gong's rise in popularity, a large part of which was attributed to its low cost, competing qigong masters accused Li of unfair business practices. According to Schechter, the qigong society under which Li and other qigong masters belonged asked Li to hike his tuition, but Li refused. By 1995, Falun Gong had established, according to Lowe, a clear advantage over alternative qigong groups in its emphasis on morality and life philosophies, low cost, and its benefits to practitioners' health, and rapidly spread via word-of-mouth. Its rapid growth within China was also related to family ties and community relationships. Falun Gong attracted a wide range of adherents from all walks of life.

Skeptics and critics emerge

Falun Gong's rapid growth in China garnered widespread attention from the media, academics, and China's religious community. As early as 1995, critics called Falun Gong "superstitious" and were skeptical of its claimed health benefits. By 1996, the Buddhist Association and Buddhist journals were issuing in-depth critiques of Falun Gong.

Skeptic and journalist Sima Nan spoke out against qigong movements as early as 1995, arguing in books, articles and documentaries that qigong masters relied on deception and pseudoscience to trick the uneducated and gullible, and performed "nothing more than dime-store magic" when demonstrating "supernormal abilities". Sima drew special attention to Falun Gong, alleging that Li Hongzhi used psychological manipulation and a questionable mixture of traditional thought and modern science to sustain his teachings.

Major Chinese newspapers published articles critical of Falun Gong. On June 17, 1996, a week after Zhuan Falun, volume II, was listed as no.10 bestseller at a Beijing book market, the Guangming Daily, criticised Falun Gong. The author wrote that the history of humanity is a "struggle between science and superstition," calling on Chinese publishers not to print "pseudo-scientific books of the swindlers." The article cited Zhuan Falun as an example of the rising number of publications ridden with "feudal superstition" (fengjian mixin) and "pseudoscience" (wei kexue). After the Guangming Daily article had set off a wave of press criticism, with twenty major newspapers also issuing criticisms of Falun Gong, the Central Propaganda Department banned publication of Falun Gong books on July 24. Until this juncture, Falun Gong had successfully negotiated the space between science and native tradition in the public representation of its teachings, avoiding any suggestion of superstition. In response, founder Li Hongzhi called on disciples to "defend the Fa" by lobbying media outlets and government officials to censor content critical of Falun Gong. Li emphasised that activism to defend Falun Gong was an essential aspect of Dafa cultivation, and, according to David Palmer, adjunct professor of anthropology and religious studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, "would separate the false disciples from the true ones." These attempts were successful, resulting in the retraction of several newspaper stories critical of Falun Gong. Falun Gong books remained officially proscribed, however.

In its January 1998 meeting, China's Buddhist Association compared it to dangerous sects like Aum Shinrikyo and calling it xiejiao.

In June 1998, Tianjin professor He Zuoxiu appeared on a Beijing Television talk show, and openly disparaged qigong groups, making particular mention of Falun Gong. Some 2,000 Falun Gong practitioners invaded He's house, and then they gathered every day at the station during two months to protest the airing of the show, saying that it "slandered" Falun Gong. The lobbying from practitioners generated significant results - the reporter responsible for the show was fired, and a program broadcasting content favourable to Falun Gong was aired a few days later. According to Ownby, the protest at the TV station was "an act of considerable audacity." The manifestations happened also at other 14 media outlets. The Beijing Television incident resulted in directives from authorities to cease publishing any content critical of Falun Gong to "ensure stability" in the lead-up to the ten-year anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989. Zuoxiu was unable to get any critical article published, and he wrote to the Party head Jiang Zemin in vain.

Tianjin and Zhongnanhai protests

In April 1999, He Zuoxiu published a short editorial in Tianjin Normal University's Youth Reader magazine. Elaborating on what he had said months earlier on Beijing Television, he again launched into attacks on qigong groups that purport to give people supernatural powers and heal disease. He said that he was particularly opposed to qigong practice amongst youth, saying that qigong-related trance and delusions could affect students for a lifetime, and made special mention of a case where a student of his practiced Falun Gong and refused to "talk, eat, sleep, or drink" as a result. After the article was published, Falun Gong practitioners gathered to protest in Tianjin and sent petitions and appeals to the Tianjin party headquarters and municipal government for the retraction of He's piece. The Tianjin party and government authorities did not respond favourably, police were dispatched and practitioners were beaten and arrested. For Palmer, the Tianjin protest was another sign of Falun Gong's "militancy"; for Gutmann, it was because "refuting lies" is a central part of Falun Gong's moral system.

Dissatisfied with the treatment in Tianjin, on 25 April, around ten thousand Falun Gong practitioners lined the streets near Zhongnanhai, the residence compound of China's leaders, in silent protest. It was Falun Gong practitioners' attempt to seek redress from the leadership of the country by going to them and, "albeit very quietly and politely, making it clear that they would not be treated so shabbily." Many Falun Gong practitioners were party members, who openly lobbied for the group. While Falun Gong's pre-1999 political involvement is difficult to verify, no other disenfranchised group has ever staged a mass protest near the Zhongnanhai compound in PRC history. The incident raised questions about the Party's control over the country. A World Journal report suggested that certain high-level Party officials wanted to crack down on the practice for years, but lacked sufficient pretext until the protest at Zhongnanhai, which they claim was partly orchestrated by Luo Gan, a long-time opponent of Falun Gong. There were also reportedly rifts in the Politburo at the time of the incident. Some reports indicate that Premier Zhu Rongji met with Falun Gong representatives and gave them satisfactory answers, but was criticized by General Secretary and President Jiang Zemin for being "too soft." Jiang is held by Falun Gong to be personally responsible for the final decision: Peerman cited reasons such as suspected personal jealousy of Li Hongzhi; Saich postulates at party leaders' anger at Falun Gong's widespread appeal, and ideological struggle.

Yuezhi Zhao argues that a number of factors contributed to the souring of relations between Falun Gong and the Chinese state and media. These included infighting between China’s qigong establishment and Falun Gong, speculation over blackmailing and lobbying by Li’s qigong opponents and "scientists-cum-ideologues with political motives and affiliations with competing central Party leaders," which caused the shift in the state’s position, and the struggles from mid-1996 to mid-1999 between Falun Gong, the mainstream media, and the Chinese power elite over the status and treatment of the movement. While Falun Gong had some elite support, it was fundamentally at odds with official ideology, and there were individuals within the scientific, ideological, and political establishments predisposed to attacking Falun Gong in the media.

The ban

On 20 July 1999, the Chinese government declared the Research Society of Falun Dafa and the Falun Gong organization under its control to be outlawed for having been "engaged in illegal activities, advocating superstition and spreading fallacies, hoodwinking people, inciting and creating disturbances, and jeopardizing social stability." Xinhua further declared that Falun Gong was a highly organised political group "opposed to the Communist Party of China and the central government, [that] preaches idealism, theism and feudal superstition." Xinhua also affirmed that "the so-called 'truth, kindness and forbearance' principle preached by Li has nothing in common with the socialist ethical and cultural progress we are striving to achieve." In response, Li Hongzhi declared that Falun Gong did not have any particular organization, nor any political objectives. Falun Gong groups in China also responded swiftly immediately following the ban. On July 21, 1999, several thousand protesters demonstrated in front of provincial government offices in Hubei, 700 in Anhui, an unspecified number in Henan, and 2000 in Guizhou. Chinese media reported that there was "307 sieges of government and party buildings" between the April Zhongnanhai incident and August 1999.

The Chinese authorities branded Falun Gong, along with some other practices, movements or organizations xiejiao (Chinese: 邪教), it used the English word "cult" or "evil cult", and introduced a barrage of media material criticizing Falun Gong. A nationwide crackdown ensued with the exception of the special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macau. In October 1999, four months after the ban, legislation was created to outlaw "heterodox religions" and applied to Falun Gong retroactively. Leung remarked that the effort was driven by large-scale propaganda through television, newspapers, radio and internet. According to Johnson, the campaign against Falun Gong extended to many aspects of society, including the media apparatus, police force, military, education system, and workplaces. An extra-constitutional body, the "6-10 Office" was created to "oversee the terror campaign." Within the first month of the crackdown, 300-400 articles attacking Falun Gong appeared in each of the main state-run papers, while primetime television replayed alleged exposés on the group, with no divergent views aired in the media. Human Rights Watch (2002) noted that families and workplaces were urged to cooperate with the government's position on Falun Gong, while practitioners themselves were subject to severe coercive measures to have them recant.

Media campaign

Since October 1999, three months after the Chinese government banned Falun Gong, it has repeatedly classified the movement as a xiejiao Anti-Falun Gong propaganda activities dominated the Chinese media during that time as the government justifed its actions, arguing that Falun Gong practice was dangerous, and damages people's physical and mental health like the Branch Davidians and Aum Shinrikyo. This strategy was vital in the government’s logic, because such reference to cults in nations and regions that have been critical of China’s stance on the FLG were supposed to stall criticism by drawing similarities between China’s actions and those of other countries, effectively justifying the government's actions.

David Ownby and Ian Johnson have argued that the Chinese state gave the cultic appellation to Falun Gong by borrowing arguments from Margaret Singer and the West's anti-cult movement to blunt the appeal of Falun Gong. According to John Powers and Meg Y. M. Lee, because the Falun Gong was categorized in the popular perception as an "apolitical, qigong exercise club," it was not seen as a threat to the government. The most critical strategy in the Falun Gong suppression campaign, therefore, was to convince people to reclassify the Falun Gong into a number of negative categories. They write that virtually from the beginning of the campaign, the authorities began using "negatively charged religious labels" to refer to the Falun Gong. For example, that it was an “evil cult,” a “sect,” or a “superstition.” Further, the group’s non-violent and relatively silent protests were reclassified as creating “social disturbances” and “disruptions of the social order.” Powers and Lee write that in this process of reclassification and relabelling, the government was attempting to tap into a "deep reservoir of negative feelings related to the historical role of quasi-religious cults as a destabilising force in Chinese political history."

Chinese media adopted three strands of rhetoric in attacking Falun Gong. The first adopted the language of past "anti" campaigns to argue that Falun Gong was a threat to order; the second adopted a rhetoric of science and modernity to argue that Falun Gong threatened progress; and a third used anti-Western rhetoric to argue that Li was a "dupe of the West." It was a "multipronged attack designed to appeal to a broad cross-section of Chinese society," according to Frank.

Continued protests and statewide suppression

Amnesty International states that despite the persecution many Falun Gong practitioners continued to hold exercise sessions in public, usually as a form of peaceful, silent protest against the persecution and imprisonment; they were often attended by large numbers of people, including significant numbers of elderly and women. The Party declared the sessions to be "illegal assemblies;" practitioners or others who "spoke up" for the movement would be detained by officials, at the beginning for several days.

This method was later seen as inadequate, because upon release, practitioners would resume protest activities. The authorities treated these practitioners as "recidivists" and saw them as particularly problematic. By 2000, the Party upped its campaign by sentencing "recidivist" practitioners to "re-education through labor", in an effort to have them renounce their beliefs and "transform" their thoughts. Terms were also arbitrarily extended by police, while some practitioners had ambiguous charges levied against them, such as "disrupting social order," "endangering national security," or "subverting the socialist system." According to Bejesky, the majority of long-term Falun Gong detainees were processed administratively through this system instead of the criminal justice system. Upon completion of their re-education sentences, those practitioners who refused to "recant" were then incarcerated in "legal education centers" set up by provincial authorities to "transform minds". Human rights organizations condemned this treatment of Falun Gong practitioners. Notably, Amnesty International declared that the crackdown was politically motivated. Human Rights Watch delivered a comprehensive report on abuses to Falun Gong practitioners, and reported that access to the camps were heavily restricted, the practitioners were subject to a wide range of human rights violations, including forced labour and a wide array of physical abuses. Falun Gong claims that the Chinese government's crackdown against the group has resulted in torture; genocide; violation of the right to life; violation of the right of liberty and security of the person; arbitrary arrest and imprisonment; violation of the freedom of thought, conscience and religion; and conspiracy to commit violations of civil rights within the United States.

Despite Beijing's heavy hand against practitioners, protests continued well into 2000. According to Time magazine, a Falun Gong website editorial instructed followers to "step up" demonstrations, "especially in Tiananmen Square". Founder Li Hongzhi urged followers to immobilize the police and other "evil scoundrels" through use of supernatural powers. Tiananmen Square thus became one of the prime locations where practitioners routinely demonstrated despite government deterrence. By 25 April 2000, within one year after the massive demonstration at Zhongnanhai, a total of more than 30,000 practitioners were arrested there, and seven hundred Falun Gong followers were arrested during a demonstration in the Square on 1 January 2001.

On the eve of Chinese New Year on 23 January 2001, seven people attempted to set themselves ablaze at Tiananmen Square. The official Chinese press agency, Xinhua News Agency, and other state media asserted that the self-immolators were practitioners while the Falun Dafa Information Center disputed this, on the grounds that the movement's teachings explicitly forbid suicide and killing, and further alleged that the event itself never happened, and was a cruel but clever piece of stunt-work. The incident received international news coverage, and video footage of the burnings were broadcast later inside China by China Central Television (CCTV). Images of a 12 year old girl, Liu Siying, burning and interviews with the other participants in which they stated their belief that self-immolation would lead them to paradise were shown. Casting doubts on strident practitioners of Falun Gong revolved around the use of suicide as a form of protest, the Falun Dafa Information Center said, "Mr. Li Hongzhi ... has explicitly stated that suicide is a sin." Falun-Gong-related commentators pointed out that the main participants' account of the incident and other aspects of the participants' behaviour were inconsistent with the teachings of Falun Dafa. Time reported that prior to the self-immolation incident, many Chinese had felt that Falun Gong posed no real threat, and that the state's crackdown had gone too far. After the event, however, China's media campaign against Falun Gong gained significant traction.

Despite the sweeping nature of the campaign, China's leaders and ruling elites were far from unified in their support for the crackdown. Some leaders suggested that the group be brought under bureaucratic control of the party, like other religious institutions. Many managers of enterprises and bureau chiefs were also not enthusiastic about the crackdown. They treated "recantations" of practitioners under their jurisdiction as a mere formality and turned a blind eye to continued practice of Falun Gong. In February 2001, in an attempt to show unity, the Communist Party held a Central Work Conference and discussed Falun Gong. President and party head Jiang Zemin insisted that all seven members of the Politburo Standing Committee "testify" on the need to eradicate Falun Gong in front of some 2,000 party cadres. Under Jiang's leadership, the crackdown on Falun Gong became part of the Chinese political ethos of "upholding stability" - much the same rhetoric employed by the party during Tiananmen in 1989. Jiang's message was echoed at the 2001 National People's Congress, where Premier Zhu Rongji made special mention of Falun Gong in his outline of China's tenth five-year plan, saying "we must continue our campaign against the Falun Gong cult," effectively tying Falun Gong's eradication to China's economic progress.

According to the Chinese government, Falun Gong activists have launched attacks against Sinosat's satellite-broadcast and jammed television signals, replacing regular state television broadcasts with their own material. For example, in March 2002, Liu Chengjun, a Falun Gong practitioner, managed to intercept eight cable television networks in Changchun City and Songyuan City, Jilin Province, and televised a program titled “Self-Immolation or a Staged Act?”. Liu was arrested and subjected to 21 months of torture that led directly to his death.

Response outside China

Main article: Falun Gong outside mainland China

Template:Image stack Due to its ban in mainland China, Falun Gong practitioners have taken to their cause internationally, especially in Australia, Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom. Since the ban in China, Falun Gong has alleged that its practitioners in China were subject to torture. Falun Gong related cases comprise 66% of all reported torture cases in China, according to the Special Rapporteur on torture, and at least half of the labour camp population. Amnesty International urged the government to "take seriously its commitment to prevent torture and take action immediately." The United Nations asked the Chinese government to respond to the various allegations by Falun Gong and human rights groups.

Falun Gong practitioners in the United States routinely file cases in U.S. federal courts against Chinese leaders once they step upon foreign soil. According to International Advocates for Justice, Falun Gong has filed the largest number of human rights lawsuits in the 21st century and the charges are among the most severe international crimes defined by international criminal laws. Practitioners engage in promotional activities by handing out flyers in busy intersections, in the subway or at the mall, leaving Falun Gong literature in stores, libraries, laundries etc. Although some of the literature deal with Falun Gong's situation in China, other publications also include the Nine Commentaries of the Communist Party, a critical editorial of the Communist Party of China, which are distributed by practitioners in both DVD and book form. Falun Gong members also openly participate in activities such as marches, parades, and celebrations of Chinese culture. Response to these appeals has been mixed.

Since 2006, a central part of the Falun Gong campaign focused on alleged organ harvesting from living practitioners. The Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong commissioned Canadian parliamentarian David Kilgour and human rights lawyer David Matas to investigate the allegations. The Christian Science Monitor considered the evidence circumstantial, but persuasive, and criticized the Chinese government for a lack of openness in investigating the claims. Likewise, U.N. special rapporteur Manfred Nowak, said the report "shows a coherent picture that causes concern." In November 2008, the United Nations Committee Against Torture noted that an increase in organ transplant operations coincided with “the beginning of the persecution of [Falun Gong practitioners]” and demanded an explanation. The Chinese government has repeatedly denied these allegations, saying that the report was based on "rumors and false allegations". The United States Congressional Research Service report by Dr. Thomas Lum stated that the Kilgour-Matas report relied largely on logical inference without bringing forth new or independently-obtained testimony, and that the conclusions also rely heavily upon questionable evidence. Human rights activist Harry Wu also voiced doubts about conclusions of the Kilgour-Matas report. David Ownby, a noted expert on Falun Gong, said that he saw "no evidence proving [organ harvesting] is aimed particularly at Falun Gong practitioners."

Organisation

The precise nature of Falun Gong's organization has been a subject of some controversy. Chinese authorities portray Falun Gong as a tight, well-structured and well-funded organization, able to mobilize millions of practitioners. Falun Gong denies having an organizational structure, and maintains that it is merely a spiritual group that practices a brand of qigong. It does not have an centralized membership system, and eschews the term 'membership'. As a result, estimates vary over the number of people practicing Falun Gong. Before the ban, the government estimated 70 million, and later revised the figure to 2 million. Palmer writes that Falun Gong was highly centralised, and it maintained "absolute centralisation of thought, healing and money." Power flowed directly to or from the Master, Li Hongzhi, "whose authority was strictly moral and ideological". Political scientist James Tong examined the competing claims and concluded that, "while there are elements of distortion and exaggeration on both sides, the Falun Gong organization appears less fearsome in reality than in the accusations made by Chinese authorities," according to Ownby.

Affiliations and structure

According to state run Chinese media, Falun Gong was unlike other qigong groups from the 1990s that maintained decentralized practice stations around the country, Falun Gong's organizational structure was portrayed as highly centred around Li Hongzhi. Time described it as "hierarchically structured, with neighborhood groups, like cells, acting autonomously but in contact with higher levels." Teachings were propagated through tapes and essays, which followers studied, and no one was permitted to interpret or question the master's words.

After its withdrawal from the Scientific Qigong Association in 1994, the Falun Dafa Research Society (FDRS) applied to be listed as an organization under the National Minority Affairs Commission, to which it was denied. It subsequently applied to the China Buddhist Federation as a cultural organization to study Buddhism, and was also rejected. Its final attempt at registering under a Party-sanctioned organization was an application to the United Front Department as a "non-religious, academic organization", to which it was also rejected. Unable to operate within a state-sponsored framework, Falun Gong pursued a more decentralized and loose organizational structure in 1997, with its main bases located in Beijing and Wuhan. Chinese state media reported that at the time, the Beijing national office was led by Li Chang, Wang Zhiwen, Ji Liewu and Yao Jie; Li and Wang were members of the Communist Party. Regional offices diverged in their organizational structures. After the crackdown, Chinese State media reported that each office generally maintained a "propaganda department", logistics department, and "doctrine" committee, or variations of those functions thereof.

At the time of the movement's suppression in July 1999, Falun Gong websites claim that the movement had no "national organization", no regulations or by-laws, and that practitioners were free to join or leave at any time, and there were no membership rosters. While it relied on traditional network (in a Qigong sense) for dissemination exercise techniques - a nationwide network of local and regional practising stations, the FDRS acted as a national umbrella organisation, headed by Li Hongzhi. Clemens Stubbe Østergaard, Associate Professor of politics at Aarhus University, states (p. 216) that Falun Gong "had so little voice for the rank-and-file members in group political activity that it cannot be regarded as a harbinger of democracy." The Chinese government, in contrast, claims that Falun Gong was a highly organized group, with 39 "main stations", 1,900 "guidance stations", and 28,263 practice sites nation-wide, overseeing a total of 2.1 million practitioners. Østergaard observed that Falun Gong's flat and highly centralised organisation was reminiscent of that of the Communist Party in the 1920s and 1930s, although its communication and marketing are modern. Its central committee and local cells communicate directly via email. Li's charisma and authority gave the organisation great flexibility; it would grow horizontally through splitting of cells when they reached a certain size. According to Frank (2004), Tong (2002) argues that Falun Gong abandoned its formal structure in favour of a looser organisation when scrutiny from the authorities became too overbearing; that the locally-autonomous groups' actions became more militant and escalated the conflict with the state apparatus.

Anthropologist Noah Porter writes that Falun Gong's structure in China was not hierarchical, and that it was able to grow in a restrictive society like the PRC "at first due to its relatively unthreatening small size and official recognition, and, later, after leaving the Chinese Qigong Research Society, due to its maintenance of a network of communication through cell phones, the Internet, and personal interactions at exercise sessions." As Falun Gong separated from the state's qigong association and was unable to be reclassified under the aegis of another agency, it ceased maintaining offices and telephone lines, and eliminated the position of practice site assistant.

Finances

Falun Gong also differentiated itself from other qigong groups in that only the Master, Li Hongzhi, was allowed to give lectures and to teach. Assistants were forbidden from teaching, and also barred from giving Qigong therapy and from collecting money. Branches and stations maintained no resources. These requirements were connected to the supposedly “formless” nature of Falun Dafa practice, where individuals do not manage money in the name of the practice, and where there are no titles, administrative functions, buildings, or offices. Disciples are supposed to “remain in this world to practice cultivation,” Palmer says.

Opinions differ on whether or not Li made money from the practice, and if so, how much. Dai Qing (2000) states that by 1997, Li was receiving annual income in excess of ¥10 million, even arguing that "Li's income is more legitimate than those of corrupt government officials." Others dispute the theory that Li made any serious money from Falun Gong. Ian Johnson links the claim with the government’s campaign to portray Falun Gong as a highly organised group, or a cult, and rejects both, since “during the most dynamic period of the group's existence in China the books and videos were bootleg, so he hadn't received royalties.”

Outside China

Falun Gong practitioners have set up international media organizations to promote their cause and criticize the Communist Party of China. These include The Epoch Times newspaper, NTDTV, Sound of Hope radio station, and Epoch Press Inc. Maria H. Chang of the University of Nevada, says these organisations seem to be "[treated as] front organisations to influence public opinion via a concerted information-PR-propaganda campaign". She argues that, like the Chinese state, Falun Gong has to create organisations that are publicly unaffiliated with it for the organization to survive.

While Chinese media have launched an unrelenting assault on Falun Gong since 1999, its response through its various media organizations has earned the practice considerable public relations clout in the West. In North America and Europe, where Falun Gong practitioners are a strong presence, media obtain much of their information about the spiritual group through Faluninfo.net, although Kavan says it comes from a public relations firm for Falun Gong managed by Gail Rachlin, who is considered part of Li’s inner circle. Explaining the genesis of Epoch Times, Ownby said that practitioners have become "somewhat paranoid" of being ill-treated by journalists during the last decade, "so they decided to publish a newspaper by themselves to publicize their beliefs..." Kavan also compared Falun Gong practitioners' media strategies with those of the Chinese Communist Party: common traits include intolerance of criticism, issuing blanket denials when accused, exaggerating and sensationalizing claims, and deflecting blame by charging the other of the same offence. Craig Smith of the New York Times remarked that Falun Gong is equally intolerant of the Western press–that after writing a story about a $600,000 New Jersey home allegedly a gift to Li from a follower that was later returned, he received irate mail from followers, including one who warned of retribution from the gods.

After its ban in China, a large number of Falun Gong organisations sprung up in other countries. "Falun Dafa Associations" now exist around the world, of which the Canadian and American chapters are the most prominent. Not all practitioners are members of an association. In addition, Falun Gong has a considerable presence on the Internet, with websites such as clearwisdom.net, faluninfo.net, mingui, pureinsight etc., which they use not only to spread Li's teachings, but also to publicise the plight of practitioners with graphic testimonials. Falun Gong contacts in various locales are visible on Falun Gong websites. Li Hongzhi's directives and dissertations are now largely communicated through Falun Gong websites such as clearwisdom.net. Falun Gong have also set up groups CIPFG and WOIPFG to lobby foreign governments/legislators, human rights organizations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, who now expressed their concerns over allegations of torture and ill-treatment of Falun Gong practitioners in China. They have also urged the United Nations and international governments to intervene and bring an end to what is described as an ongoing persecution of practitioners. Friends of Falun Gong USA is a non-profit corporation domiciled in New Jersey which raises funds for Falun Gong causes. Falun Gong has also established university chapters in the United States.

Public debate

Zhao (2003) sees Falun Gong as a profound challenge to China's dominant "meaning system" for Falun Gong's insistence on the public nature of the practice, the imperative to gain positive representation and to make known their dissent.

The 'cult' label

Some debate exists about Falun Gong's classification as a cult, and this classification is more common in some social contexts than in others. Adam Frank identifies five generalizable frames of discourse about Falun Gong, including the use of the "cult" label. These frames are the Western media, the Chinese media, an emerging scholarly tradition, the discourse of Human rights groups, and a sympathetic practice-based discourse. In its January 1998 meeting, China's Buddhist Association called it xiejiao for the first time, a name that translates as "evil cult" in English.

Western media's response was initially similar to that of the anti-cult movement, but later used less loaded terms to describe the movement. Other scholars, for example Cheris Shun-ching Chan, consider cults to be new religious movements that focus on the individual experience of the encounter with the sacred rather than collective worship, and say that Falun Gong is neither a cult nor a sect, but a new religious movement with cult-like characteristics. Some scholars avoid the term "cult" altogether because "of the confusion between the historic meaning of the term and current pejorative use" These scholars prefer terms like "spiritual movement,"new religious syncretism" or "new religious movement" to avoid the negative connotations of "cult" or to avoid mis-categorizing those which do not fit mainstream definitions.

Harvey Hill et al conclude in a study of media reporting on new religious groups that the most influential reporting on religion fails the standards of an "evenhanded, non-judgmental and fair approach," at least in the language used to describe such groups. Since Falun Gong seems highly unlikely to commit acts of violence, and while the agent of violence has been the Chinese government, they write that "the characterization particularly of Falun Gong as "cult" would seem inaccurate and unjust." They attribute the reason for the adoption of such terms to uncritical acceptance of the views of the Chinese government by the media, an acceptance that is "rife with irony." Such negative portrayal of new religious movements is unfair and dangerous, they write, adding that "it would be preferable to use terms less likely to reinforce mutual mistrust and more conducive to real understanding."

Controversies

Falun Gong's teachings are controversial, and have been described as being homophobic, pseudoscientific, messianistic, moralistic, and apocalyptic. Falun Gong claims these are smears planted by the Chinese government. Ian Johnson notes that Falun Gong-beliefs "incorporate traditional morality – do good works, speak honestly, never be evasive – as well as some idiosyncratic notions, such as the existence of extraterrestrial life and separate-but-equal heavens for people of different races." The principal controversies are its views on homosexuality and inter-racial children, and its claims of superpowers.

Quoting Li, the New York Times said "interracial children are the spawn of the 'Dharma Ending Period,' a Buddhist phrase that refers to an era of moral degeneration." Li is also quoted as saying to followers in Australia that, "The yellow people, the white people, and the black people have corresponding races in heaven," Thus, interracial children have "no place in heaven without his intervention." Falun Dafa Information Center claims, without substantiation, that journalists picked up on Li's remarks upon the prompting of Chinese state media, but confirms that "Falun Gong’s founder mentioned the issue."

Li maintains that mankind has been completely destroyed 81 times, and that another round of destruction may be imminent. At least one follower described this destruction as "some sudden change that will be good for good people, but bad for bad people." In Heather Kavan's opinion, Falun Gong members don't leave the group because they believe that it's the only way to save themselves from the predicted apocalypse. On the other hand, Craig Burdoff has said that at the local level, Li's supernatural abilities and fantastic claims seem to be of little theological importance. He notes that Falun Gong practice does not require unquestioning acceptance of all of the Master's teachings, and that more importantly there is no overt emphasis on dogmatically enforcing orthodoxy. "Falun Gong practitioners, like most people who participate in a religious tradition, freely pick and choose from the official teachings according to their individual inclinations... for most practitioners Falun Gong is fundamentally about individual ethical development."

Adam Frank writes that in reporting on the Falun Gong, the Western tradition of casting the Chinese as "exotic" took dominance, and that "the facts were generally correct, but the normaly [sic] that millions of Chinese practitioners associated with the practice had all but disappeared."

Advocacy

John Wong and William Liu write that "Falun Gong must have contained sufficient philosophical sophistication and strong mystical appeal in order to hold such a large number of followers of various backgrounds." Richard Gunde, Assistant Director of the Center for Chinese Studies at UCLA, writes that "Unlike western cults that fixate on death and Armageddon, Falun Gong promises its followers a long and healthy life. This fits in perfectly with the Chinese tradition of searching for longevity." He says that "Falun Gong has a simple, innocuous ethical message—“truth, kindness, and tolerance”—which is also part of its appeal, and its leader, Li Hongzhi, despite his unusual, if not bizarre, statements, is in many ways simple and low key." Seth Faison, former New York Times Shanghai Bureau Chief said that the practitioners he met in China emanated a "sense of calm and generosity" and that they were "achieving a sense of spiritual peace that I could feel."

Marci Hamilton said "there could be no gentler religion than the Falun Gong." Sinologist Benjamin Penny says Falun Gong's apparent last days message "derives much more from a Buddhist notion of the cycle of the Dharma or the Buddhist law," and that "I don't think we should start to think of Falun Gong as being that kind of organisation that believes that the world's going to end next Thursday." He said "The fact that they are often difficult for Westerners to understand should not be any reason to relegate them to the anomalous or quirky or kooky."

Further reading

• David Ownby, Falun Gong and the Future of China (Oxford University Press, 2008) ISBN 978-0-19-532905-6
• Kai-Ti Chou (2008), Contemporary Religious Movements in Taiwan: Rhetorics of Persuasion (Edwin Mellen Press) pp.133-188. ISBN 0-7734-5241-9
• Maria Hsia Chang, Falun Gong: The End of Days (New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press, 2004) ISBN 0-300-10227-5
• Li Hongzhi, Falun Gong (Law Wheel qigong) (1993)
• Li Hongzhi, Zhuan Falun (English translation 2000)
• Danny Schechter, Falun Gong's Challenge to China (Akashic Books, 2000) hardback ISBN 1-888451-13-0, paperback ISBN 1-888451-27-0
• Palmer, David A. (2007). 9. Falun Gong challenges the CCP. New York: Columbia University Press. pp. 247–295. ISBN 0231140665. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)

External links

Sites run by Falun Gong practitioners

• FalunDafa.org, introducing Falun Gong and the exercises.
• FalunInfo.net, with detailed reports and press releases.
• Falun Gong Human Rights Working Group, with UN reports.
• Clearwisdom.net, intended mainly for practitioners, but has daily reports and news.

Sites run by the Communist Party

• Condemn Falun Gong Cult, a series of anti-Falun Gong articles of the state-run Xinhua news agency
• China Association For Cultic Studies, anti-FLG presentation and recent news articles

Other critical sites

• The Rick A. Ross Institute's archives, vast collection of articles criticizing Falun Gong (mainly Communist Party sources)
• Falungong Part 1: From Sport to Suicide, Francesco Sisci, Asia Times, 27 January 2001

Other sites on the issue

• Articles by Ian Johnson (Pulitzer Prize winner), Wall Street Journal (2001)
• Falun Gong: Cult or Culture?, Produced by Chris Bullock, Radio National, 22 April 2001
• press archives, Center for Studies on New Religions
• Spiritual Society or Evil Cult?
• Falun Gong portal, Time
• Apologetics Index : Falun Gong, Falun Dafa, Falungong