Falun Gong and the Future of China

Falun Gong and the Future of China PDF

Author: David Ownby

Publisher: OUP USA

Published: 2008-04-16

Total Pages: 306

ISBN-13: 0195329058

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In 1999, 10,000 Falun Gong practitioners gathered outside Zhongnanhai, the guarded compound where China's highest leaders live and work, in a day-long peaceful protest of police brutality against fellow practitioners in the neighboring city of Tianjin. This book explains what Falun Gong is and where it came from.

Bloody Harvest

Bloody Harvest PDF

Author: David Matas

Publisher:

Published: 2009

Total Pages: 236

ISBN-13:

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Falun Gong is a modern day spiritual/exercise movement which began in China in 1991 drawing on and combining ancient Chinese traditions. The Chinese Communist Party, alarmed at the growth of the movement and fearing for its own ideological supremacy banned the movement in 1999. Falun Gong practitioners were arrested in the hundreds of thousands and asked to recant. If they did not, they were tortured. If they still did not recant, they disappeared. Allegations surfaced in 2006 that the disappeared were being killed for their organs which were sold for large sums mostly to foreign transplant tourists. It is generally accepted that China kills prisoners for organs. The debate is over whether the prisoners who are killed are only criminals sentenced to death or Falun Gong practitioners as well. The authors produced a report concluding that the allegations were true. Bloody Harvest sets out the investigations and conclusions of the authors.

Falun Gong's Challenge to China

Falun Gong's Challenge to China PDF

Author: Danny Schechter

Publisher:

Published: 2000

Total Pages: 272

ISBN-13:

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The People's Republic of China has banned Falun Gong, a spiritual practice based on traditional exercises and mediation. What is Falun Gong's appeal and why does China fear it? These and other questions are addressed in this timely, inside look at a bizarre case of political repression.

The Religion of Falun Gong

The Religion of Falun Gong PDF

Author: Benjamin Penny

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2012-04-13

Total Pages: 278

ISBN-13: 0226655016

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Concentrates on the beliefs and practices of Falun Gong members.

Falun Gong in the United States

Falun Gong in the United States PDF

Author: Noah Porter

Publisher: Universal-Publishers

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 288

ISBN-13: 1581121903

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Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, has been described in many ways. It has been called qigong, one of many schools of physical exercises that aim at improving health and developing supernatural abilities. Scholars and mainstream media have referred it to as a spiritual movement or religion, although practitioners claim it is not a religion. It has been called a cult, in the pejorative sense rather than in a sociological context, by the Chinese government and by some Western critics. In the writings of Li Hongzhi, the founder of Falun Gong, it is referred to in different ways, though primarily as a cultivation practice. The question of how to define Falun Gong is not just an academic issue; the use of the cult label has been used to justify the persecution of practitioners in China. To a limited degree, the Chinese Government is able to extend the persecution overseas. How society defines Falun Gong has implications for action on the level of policy, as well as the shaping of social, cultural, and personal attitudes. This research project addresses what Falun Gong is through ethnography. Research methods included participant-observation, semi-structured ethnographic interviews (both in-person and on-line), and content analysis of text and visual data from Falun Gong books, pamphlets, and websites. Research sites included Tampa, Washington D.C., and cyberspace. In order to keep my research relevant to the issues and concerns of the Falun Gong community, I was in regular contact with the Tampa practitioners, keeping them abreast of my progress and asking for their input. My findings are contrary to the allegations made by the Chinese Government and Western anti-cultists in many ways. Practitioners are not encouraged to rely on Western medicine, but are not prohibited from using it. Child practitioners are not put at risk. Their organizational structure is very loose. Finally, the Internet has played a vital role in Falun Gong's growth and continuation after the crackdown.

Minghui Report: the 20-Year Persecution of Falun Gong in China

Minghui Report: the 20-Year Persecution of Falun Gong in China PDF

Author: The Minghui Group

Publisher:

Published: 2020-05-05

Total Pages: 437

ISBN-13: 9781733481908

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Minghui Report: The 20-Year Persecution of Falun Gong in China takes readers through a silent battle raging in every corner of China today: the Communist Party's suppression of 100 million practitioners of the Falun Gong spiritual and meditation discipline. This milestone report, based on exclusive firsthand information from China and elsewhere, presents the brutality faced by Falun Gong practitioners in China and the Communist Party's extension of the persecution globally through economic pressure and intimidation of political, civic, and business leaders in other countries.

Falun Gong and the Future of China

Falun Gong and the Future of China PDF

Author: David Ownby

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2008-04-16

Total Pages: 312

ISBN-13: 9780199716371

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On April 25, 1999, ten thousand Falun Gong practitioners gathered outside Zhongnanhai, the guarded compound where China's highest leaders live and work, in a day-long peaceful protest of police brutality against fellow practitioners in the neighboring city of Tianjin. Stunned and surprised, China's leaders launched a campaign of brutal suppression against the group which continues to this day. This book, written by a leading scholar of the history of this Chinese popular religion, is the first to offer a full explanation of what Falun Gong is and where it came from, placing the group in the broader context of the modern history of Chinese religion as well as the particular context of post-Mao China. Falun Gong began as a form of qigong, a general name describing physical and mental disciplines based loosely on traditional Chinese medical and spiritual practices. Qigong was "invented" in the 1950s by members of the Chinese medical establishment who were worried that China's traditional healing arts would be lost as China modeled its new socialist health care system on Western biomedicine. In the late 1970s, Chinese scientists "discovered" that qi possessed genuine scientific qualities, which allowed qigong to become part of China's drive for modernization. With the support of China's leadership, qigong became hugely popular in the 1980s and 1990s, as charismatic qigongqigong boom, the first genuine mass movement in the history of the People's Republic. Falun Gong founder Li Hongzhi started his own school of qigong in 1992, claiming that the larger movement had become corrupted by money and magic tricks. Li was welcomed into the qigong world and quickly built a nationwide following of several million practitioners, but ran afoul of China's authorities and relocated to the United States in 1995. In his absence, followers in China began to organize peaceful protests of perceived media slights of Falun Gong, which increased from the mid-'90s onward as China's leaders began to realize that they had created, in the qigong boom, a mass movement with religious and nationalistic undertones, a potential threat to their legitimacy and control. Based on fieldwork among Chinese Falun Gong practitioners in North America and on close examinations of Li Hongzhi's writings, this volume offers an inside look at the movement's history in Chinese popular religion.

Falun Gong

Falun Gong PDF

Author: Li Hongzhi

Publisher: B Jain Publishers Pvt Limited

Published: 2022-09

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9788131907504

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Falun Gong is an introductory text, systematically presenting the practice of Falun Gong. This book includes instructions and photo illustrations for performing the five sets of Falun Gong exercises. Falun Gong is a high-level cultivation practice guided by the characteristics of the universeTruthfulness, Benevolence, and Forbearance. Cultivation means continuously striving to better harmonize oneself with these universal principles. Practice refers to the exercises five sets of easy-to-learn gentle movements and meditation. Cultivating oneself is essential; practicing the exercises supplements the process.

The Cultural Economy of Falun Gong in China

The Cultural Economy of Falun Gong in China PDF

Author: Ming Xiao

Publisher: Studies in Rhetoric & Communic

Published: 2011

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9781570039874

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Emerging in China in the early 1990s, Falun Gong is viewed by its supporters as a folk movement promoting the benefits of good health and moral cultivation. To the Chinese establishment, however, it is a dissident religious cult threatening political orthodoxy and national stability. The author, a Chinese national once involved in implementing Chinese cultural policies, examines the evolving relationship between Falun Gong and Chinese authorities in a revealing case study of the powerful public discourse between a pervasive political ideology and an alternative agenda in contention for cultural dominance. Posited as a cure for culturally bound illness with widespread symptoms, the Falun Gong movement's efficacy among the marginalized relies on its articulation of a struggle against government sanctioned exploitation in favor of idealistic moral aspirations. In countering such a position, the Chinese government alleges that the religious movement is based in superstition and pseudoscience. Aided by her insider perspective, the author deftly employs Western rhetorical methodology in a compelling critique of an Eastern rhetorical occurrence, highlighting how authority confronts challenge in postsocialist China.

The Battle for China's Spirit

The Battle for China's Spirit PDF

Author: Sarah Cook

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2017-05-16

Total Pages: 140

ISBN-13: 1538106116

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The Battle for China’s Spirit is the first comprehensive analysis of its kind, focusing on seven major religious groups in China that together account for over 350 million believers: Chinese Buddhism, Taoism, Catholicism, Protestantism, Islam, Tibetan Buddhism, and Falun Gong. The study examines the evolution of the Communist Party’s policies of religious control, how they are applied differently to diverse faith communities, and how citizens are responding to these policies. The study—which draws on hundreds of official documents and interviews with religious leaders, lay believers, and scholars—finds that Chinese government controls over religion have intensified since November 2012, seeping into new areas of daily life. Yet millions of religious believers defy official restrictions or engage in some form of direct protest, at times scoring significant victories. The report explores how these dynamics affect China’s overall social, political, and economic environment, while offering recommendations to both the Chinese government and international actors for how to increase the space for peaceful religious practice in a country where spirituality has been deeply embedded in its culture for millennia.