PBS - China from the Inside (2008) Part 4 Freedom and Justice

China from the Inside

China from the Inside is a series of four documentaries that survey China through Chinese eyes to see how history has shaped them, and where the present is taking them. Episodes include Power and the People, deals with the governance of China, The Women, talks about the past and future for Chinese women, Shifting Nature, looks at China's environmental challenges, and Freedom, explores China's conflict between personal freedom and governance.

Part 4: Freedom and Justice Freedom and Justice How free are the Chinese people? How free to worship as they please? To learn the truth from the media? To hear the truth from the Communist Party and the government? How can people with a grievance negotiate with the state? Tibetan Buddhism has long been feared as a rallying point and cover for Tibetan independence. Worship is not permitted on the Party’s strict terms – government employees nor are students allowed to practice. A study in contrasts, official Catholicism – administered not by the Vatican but by the Communist Party – is far from China's unofficial churches with 40 million adherents who want nothing between them and their God. The film also explores Falun Gong and the threat it posed to the Chinese government as well as examining the limits on the right to assembly and press freedom. The final sequence in the series is the story of what happened to Taishi Village, which sought to use the law to impeach and remove its corrupt leaders. Praised by the leading Party newspaper in China one minute, the village was overrun with police and militia the next. The corrupt old leaders were reinstated by local government amid violence, intimidation and arrests.

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