Talk:History of Tibet (1950–present)

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Neutrality
This page is a scam, merely bloated with Chinese propaganda, no sources, a complete disgrace for an encyclopedia. I strongly request that this page receives a neutrality disputed status.rudy (talk) 23:32, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
 * You are welcome to add such a tag yourself. Be bold! --Gimme danger (talk) 01:19, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * OK then, I put the POV tag. It is common knowledge in the media - especially after the recent unrests in Tibet in preparation to the 2008 Olympics in China - that the political status and history of Tibet is a controversial issue, as can be read in eg. Tibetan sovereignty debate this article however only expounds on the Chinese governments point of view, and uses misleading statistics to prove their point. For example, as the article mentions, the number of Chinese soldiers is left out of the statistics, but these number tens of thousands, probably more... Whereas it is about Tibetan culture, it leaves out the virtual annihilation of the most prominent aspects of Tibetan culture under Chinese rule; everything related to Tibetan Buddhism, (which forms the core of Tibetan culture, from architecture to painting to sculpting). People with more knowledge on political matters then me are invited to improve this article. (talk) 12:45, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

POV label removed
I removed the POV label because with User:Rédacteur Tibet's effort, it's no longer a POV article. --虞海 (Yú Hǎi) (talk) 08:00, 5 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, I do not claim I could remove all the non neutral aspect, therefore, I have to put the POV label, I am sorry. --Rédacteur Tibet (talk) 21:35, 14 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Then explain what's the other non neutral aspect before add a new POV label. --虞海 (Yú Hǎi) (talk) 08:39, 12 March 2010 (UTC)
 * The POV label clearly needs to be re-added. "Chinese sources generally claim progress towards a prosperous and free society in Tibet, with its pillars being economic development, legal advancement, and peasant emancipation." <-- are you kidding?  Adrade (talk) 05:46, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

POV label added to first section
I am adding a POV tag to the first section. The introduction and first section of this article scream pov. "it was obvious", "lords and manorial estates", "was permitted", "...'de facto' independence period." "serfs". The terminology alone is suspect. I also don't fully understand why the point about the UK recognition of Chinese rule over Tibet is relevant. Mentions of surrender, but nothing of what led to it - the actual happenings on the ground, no mention of deaths. Much of this seems like a history of the Chinese military in Tibet, not a history of Tibet. "agitators" and "only after" don't lend to objectivity. A point of history from 1959, outside the temoral limits of this section, doesn't belong, as it appears to be included to temper the statement preceding. Adrade (talk) 06:36, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

Main article for Tibet under the People's Republic of China
History of Tibet refers to this article as the main article for its "Rule of the Chinese Communist government" section, and now Tibet makes the same reference for its "Tibet under the People's Republic of China" section. Can we work on organizing most of the material from those sections in those articles, into this article? Bertport (talk) 03:18, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

HRW
This HRW report does not seem to have been utilised in the article: http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/2008/07/06/china-s-forbidden-zones-0 Zujine (talk) 15:40, 11 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the tip. Generally speaking, the voice of independent human rights organizations is important, but missing, in this article. Bertport (talk) 20:11, 11 March 2010 (UTC)

Any reason why? Zujine (talk) 22:50, 11 March 2010 (UTC)


 * How about, because we haven't thought of it and then followed through with the work yet? Bertport (talk) 14:34, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

I would like to help. I will start adding information there. Maybe it could be broken off into a separate article later. Zujine (talk) 13:17, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Language
We seem to have an editor whose command of English is not as good as he thinks it is. I'd appreciate some discussion of recent edits on the first sentences of the "Language" section. Bertport (talk) 07:10, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

I rewrote that slightly. Can I ask why the article is divided up mostly by different views, and not content theme? That seems an unusual structure. I would like to make a human rights section, but I'm not exactly sure where it would belong. Zujine (talk) 13:28, 13 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks, your changes are at least intelligible. Yes, I find the organization of the article into "views" problematic, too.  This is not supposed to be an article about a controversy, it's supposed to be a history. Bertport (talk) 15:28, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Indeed. It would take some time to untangle what is happening on the page and construct a standard narrative rather than a narrative of viewpoints. If you take the lead, I may follow. Zujine (talk) 15:39, 15 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Just to explain, I am going to go ahead with a reconfiguration of the page so the information is presented less as 'View from Tibet' and 'View from CCP', but instead by subject-matter. This would be a far more logical way for the reader to engage in the material. If there are hugely divergent views in each theme (which there probably are) then they could be given subheadings where the views are explored. Zujine (talk) 13:40, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

cleanup and the Panchen lama's succession
I've done a thorough copy edit on the article and removed the "cleanup needed" flag at the beginning, which was already redundant before I started. In the process, I've moved the material on the Panchen lama's succession from "Economic development" (where it was not coherently integrated) to "More recent history" and merged it with the same material already there, which it mostly duplicated. I'll try to get the time soon to do a follow-up cleanup of some formatting. Moonsell (talk) 10:31, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

Dalai Lama Succession
This section needs to be moved to be after "More recent history" and the same material in the latter to be merged with it. It should incorporate the Panchen lama succession material, which is coherent with it and should be merged with it. The section should be renamed to "Panchen Lama and Dalai Lama successions" Moonsell (talk) 10:46, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

Removal of POV Tag
I have removed the neutral POV Tag, since there is no explanation added in Talk page, in addition, it was added by an IP address, and could well be vandalism : http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tibet_since_1950&diff=367531259&oldid=364135377 --Rédacteur Tibet (talk) 17:13, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

Proposed move
Since this page is a fork of History of Tibet, I think it should be moved to History of Tibet (1950–present), in the model of History of the People's Republic of China (2002–present). In addition to being stylistically regular, it would help with some of the NPOV issues, because it would focus solely on history. The way the article is written now, it looks like it's describing a political state, with "economy", "human rights", "foreign relations", etc. Splittist (talk) 20:46, 2 August 2010 (UTC)


 * This edit makes sense to me, but what was wrong with having the Chinese name of the region there?— Zujine |talk 03:05, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Question for "Owlservice"
I notice you have made many changes to the article. I tried to write you a note but on your Discussion Page it seems you are not a registered editor. I haven't had time to go through them all yet, but I notice that among your many edits you have removed the section on Tibetan music saying you have moved it to a more appropriate article - would you please tell us where you have moved it to? Many thanks, John Hill (talk) 11:36, 15 January 2011 (UTC)

Hi John, this is my first time to use a discussion page so I hope this comes out ok. The "help" section on this was not very helpful! I intended to move the comments on music to a more appropriate section, however I discovered that it had in any case been copied entirely from the article: Tibetan_music. That is a far more appropriate place for it, as Phurbu Namgyal winning a singing a prize has not had a major impact on modern Tibetan history which is what this article is concerned with. Owlservice (talk) 12:03, 15 January 2011 (UTC)

P.S. not sure why I'm not a registered editor. Is there a way to fix that? Owlservice (talk) 12:05, 15 January 2011 (UTC)

Neutrality
I've just been reading through this article, and it has a clear anti-Chinese bias, from the lead which gives a lot of weight to anti-Chinese arguments to the See Also choices, which until today didn't include Tibetan Autonomous Region but do include every possible human rights violation or rebellion since 1950. -- Eraserhead1 &lt;talk&gt; 22:40, 27 April 2011 (UTC)
 * It should be better now. So I've removed the tag. -- Eraserhead1 &lt;talk&gt; 09:18, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Sources 4 to 6 are not reliable. A website named friends of Tibet is not neutral.

"According to one Chinese source, the PLA 'exterminated' more than 5,700 Tibetan 'soldiers,' and imprisoned more than 2,000 in different areas of eastern Tibet between 7 and 25 October 1950[5] During China's invasion, the Chinese army imprisoned hundreds of Tibetans for their political and religious activities, while monks and nuns were tortured and killed for being pro-independent and for aligning with the Dalai Lama."

How comes a pro Tibet source can say "According to Chinese sources" there should be a chinese source for this.

The second sentence: reports of human right violations by exile groups must be treated with caution, they likely exaggerate.

87.139.215.154 (talk) 10:38, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I've removed the content backed up by those sources. -- Eraserhead1 &lt;talk&gt; 17:38, 18 May 2011 (UTC)


 * I take some issue with these diffs. I agree that in a couple instances, it would be preferable to have a more neutral RS cited, rather than Tibetan advocacy organisations. That said, I think the information that was deleted here is fairly well established, and if you're truly concerned about the citations, perhaps a preferable course of action is to seek better references, or to ask for them, before blanking content. Moreover, deleting the information from ICT seems pretty heavy-handed. ICT, though it has an advocacy position, is nonetheless well regarded on Tibetan human rights issues, and the information provided in the ICT article is verifiable. If the language of "independence" is at issue, I would suggest stating that "several countries noted that Tibet was not previously governed by a foreign country, and was not a part of China" at the time of the invasion. Is that a sufficient remedy, in your opinion? — Zujine |talk 03:32, 19 May 2011 (UTC)


 * I also find the question of why a pro-Tibet source can say 'according to Chinese sources' to be strange. Why not? Human rights organisations, scholars, and government bodies regularly cite Chinese sources in order to illustrate what the official policies or positions are. Now, I wouldn't trust Xinhua to accurately report the position of the CCP's adversaries, but I do trust a group like ICT to report honestly on the position taken by Chinese sources (even if they do bring to the topic a certain ideological filter).— Zujine |talk 03:41, 19 May 2011 (UTC)
 * The first thing removed are figures - if they are to be included they need to be included from a source that meets WP:RS, because otherwise we don't know which figure is accurate - ideally you need a Chinese source and a Western source, as both of them will be bias.
 * The second thing I removed because I don't actually believe it. No country recognised Tibet as independent on China between 1912 and 1949, and in the Simla accord with the British the Tibetans signed to say that they were actually part of China. So I'm not really clear about these complaints made to the UN. Additionally that site made several falsehoods which are clearly incorrect even given my extremely limited knowledge of Chinese/Tibetan history. -- Eraserhead1 &lt;talk&gt; 07:37, 19 May 2011 (UTC)


 * The sentence removed was "Numerous countries made statements in the course of UN General Assembly debates following the invasion of Tibet that reflected their recognition of Tibet's independent status, and The United States of America joined most other UN members in condemning the Chinese "aggression" and "invasion" of Tibet.". I agree that this sentence was not neutrally worded and was not very accurate, either. I did some reading on the UN reaction to events in Tibet at that time. Their response in 1951 was minimal, basically following the lead of the U.S., the UK, and especially India, who preferred to drop the issue. There was a dramatic move by El Salvador to have the issue considered by the General Assembly, but it did not succeed. As far as I could find, there were no statements by "numerous countries" in 1951, and there weren't really debates, either. The Tibet issue was fairly obscure to the most of the world at the time.


 * It's an oversimplification to say that no country recognised Tibet as independent. The way the Salvadorian statement on Tibet reads, it's pretty clear that they did think of Tibet as an independent country, despite the fact that they had given no indication of this position prior to 1951 (no exchange of ambassadors, etc). It's also worth noting that the British Foreign Office studied the issue at the time and determined that Tibet was an independent state with the right to bring issues before the UN, although this never became official British policy and the opinion was not made public at the time.


 * By 1959, Tibet had become much more visible, and there was actually a much stronger international response. Chinese suppression of the uprising was well-known and very unpopular in the strongly anti-Communist countries and in the Buddhist countries (Tsering Shakya writes that South Vietnamese volunteers signed up to go to Tibet to fight). There were also strongly worded UN resolutions against Chinese policies at that time. The savetibet article is perhaps conflating the events of 1951 and 1959 (which is not terribly uncommon).&mdash;Greg Pandatshang (talk) 06:52, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

tibetant government in exile does not exist
the official name should be central tibetant administration because tibetan government in exile does not exist. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.56.215.179 (talk) 08:04, 14 August 2011 (UTC)


 * That is correct, but it's a bit of a conundrum because "Central Tibetan Administration" is prone to being misunderstood by readers.&mdash;Greg Pandatshang (talk) 00:03, 15 August 2011 (UTC)
 * what confusion? government in exile is a very subjective title from many, but the real title is central tibetant administration.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.56.215.179 (talk) 01:33, 15 August 2011 (UTC)


 * If we say "Central Tibetan Administration" many readers would think that we were talking about the actual government of Tibet (i.e. the TAR government). It's more commonly, albeit informally, referred to as the government-in-exile.&mdash;Greg Pandatshang (talk) 22:46, 16 August 2011 (UTC)
 * personally, I think people who understand the tibetant situation should be able to separate cta and the official government of tibet. the major problem of using tibetan government in exile is that it contradicts with other articles with in wikipedia.  thus I believe that cta is a much better title than calling it tibetan government in exile.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.56.215.179 (talk) 18:23, 17 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Let's refer to it as the "exile Central Tibetan Administration", which is its name + one word of description. On the first mention, we should also say that it is sometimes informally called the "Tibetan government-in-exile."&mdash;Greg Pandatshang (talk) 00:05, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
 * should just stick with the formal name because people are not going to confuse that name with the chinese government runned tibetan administraion and I think its name is peoples what ever — Preceding unsigned comment added by 148.239.131.19 (talk) 02:20, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
 * "government-in-exile" is far clearer than any other title... it is unquestionably not the provincial government of China, but instead that being run from India. This is, indeed, what the Central Tibetan Administration, in fact, is - so calling it by its definition versus its name means the same thing, and is clearer for the reader. Adrade (talk) 05:46, 16 July 2013 (UTC)

major problems with this part
The History of Tibet from 1950 to the present was heralded by the People's Liberation Army entering Tibet in 1950-51. Before then, Central Tibet had unilaterally declared independence from the Qing Dynasty in 1913, after which the Dalai Lama continued to act as both the religious head of Tibetan’s Buddhist populace and as the political head of Tibet at that time. In 1959 the Dalai Lama fled Tibet to northern India where he established the Central Tibetan Administration.
 * first thing is qing dynasty officially ended in 1911. which makes the part about declaration of independence in 1913 makes absolutely no sense.  second part is the problem of calling dalai lama the religous leader of the buddhist populace and political leader which represents a very one sided opinion because tibetan buddhism has 4 different sects and dalai lama only represents the yellow sect.  was the dalai lama the political leader for all tibetant people or was he just the leader of the population of tibetants with in the Ilhasa area.  till this day, there is no prove that dalai lama was actually a leader of all the tibetant people.  for sure he was probably the leader of the exile community but was he the leader of all the tibetants who were in china during the 1950s or now?  the only one who comes out and claim that dalai lama is a leader of all tibetans is the tibetant exiles which make such claim very suspicious.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.139.1.19 (talk) 20:10, 18 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Regarding your first point, the current wording is not wrong but it is confusing. The 1913 declaration stated, among things, that Tibet had always been independent of China. So it was retroactively declaring independence from the Qing dynasty. Moreover, it also addresses recent disputes between the Qing regime and the Dalai Lama, which might seem irrelevant in hindsight, but at that time there was no way of knowing whether the Qing emperor would be restored (especially from the Dalai Lama's distant vantage point). It would be more appropriate to reword and simply say that the Dalai Lama declared Tibet's independence from China.


 * I agree with your second point in general, although it's a bit complicated because 1) the Dalai Lama was probably the most prestigious lama in Tibet during this period and 2) the Geluk was essentially the state church in political Tibet during this period and the Dalai Lama was its de facto leader. I agree that this should be reworded, although I'm not sure exactly how.
 * calling dalai lama as the most prestigious lama in Tibet may completely depend on subjective opinions. the reality is he is probably the leader for the yellow sect, but different areas of tibet (political or traditonal) were controlled by different religous groups or government.  the reality about china before 1949 was that it was a country controlled by different warlords and local gangs and it was really hard to know what gang was controlling what parts.  personally, I think it is better to eliminate certain parts about dalai lama without redundance because the title of the article is about tibet from 1950 and not about dalai lama.


 * Regarding the Dalai Lama's political role, the Tibetan government at this time claimed to be the rightful government of all the Tibetan ethnic regions, although it only ruled about half of that area. In practice, then the Dalai Lama was not the ruler of all Tibetans. After the other local Tibetan governments (Derge, etc.) were destroyed by the warlords and the PRC, the Tibetan populations of those areas may have switched their loyalties toward the Dalai Lama.&mdash;Greg Pandatshang (talk) 00:04, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
 * first about, it is important to separate the difference between 13th and 14th dalai lama. due to limited knowledge,13th dalai lama was running government after 1913 and it was the 14th who fled to india in 1959.  in the paragraph, using just the dalai lama made it seem like it was same person  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.56.215.179 (talk) 02:11, 19 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Good point, and I agree, although again with reservations. In many situations, when we talk about "the Dalai Lama" we're really talking about the institution built up around the individual. However, I definitely agree that we should err on the side of being clearer and more specific.&mdash;Greg Pandatshang (talk) 03:21, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
 * for u, dalai lama represents an institution. However, most person think of the dalai lama as a person.  By not distiguishing the difference between 13th and 14th, most readers would think the sentence is referring to the same person.

Verification of source required
I have added this tag after "Sautman stated that the claim (in the "Secret Panchen Lama Report" of 1996) that Tibet was the region most hit by China’s famine of 1959-1962 is based not on statistics gathered in Tibetan areas, but on anonymous refugee reports lacking in numerical specificity »", because when analysing this quote also present on French WP, I found that Sautman do not refer here to the report of the Panchen Lama, but to publication of AFP ''Secret Panchen Lama Report Confirms Chinese Atrocities? 1996. Agence France-Presse, October 5.'' as indicated in the book of Sautman page 255 :. The present version of the article wrongly state that Sautman used the Report of the Panchen Lama as source of this claim, which is wrong, since he cites the AFP. Indeed, the report of the Panchen Lama do not contain reports from Tibetan refugees. In addition, it was published in 1998, and not in 1996 (see . --Rédacteur Tibet (talk) 16:36, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

Added Link
I added a link to Robert Barnett's essay from Steve Lehman, The Tibetans: Struggle to Survive, Umbrage Editions, New York, 1998, in footnote 79 where it is referenced. The essay has been posted online: http://info-buddhism.com/the_tibetans_robert_barnett.html. 213.187.72.218 (talk) 22:19, 17 December 2012 (UTC)

Adding subsections for clarity
I've started to add subsections to section 3. Uprising and upheaval in order to make the organization clearer. In most cases, this involves just the addition of a new header where there wasn't one before.

For example, previously, section 3 was one long, undifferentiated section, and hard to navigate or understand, especially since parts of it jumped around, dealing with things out of a general chronological sequence. Now, there are six H3 subsections and four level H4's.

After a series of incremental edits, the new subsection structure for section 3 currently looks like this: 3. 1959–1976: Uprising and upheaval 3.1 1959 uprising 3.2 Famine 3.3 ICJ Human rights report 3.3.1	Background 3.3.2	Occupation and genocide 3.3.3.	Cultural suppression 3.3.4	Criticism of report 3.4 Establishment of TAR 3.5 Cultural revolution 3.6 Demographic repercusssions

These new section headers do not represent new content. They are merely new section headers, where the titles were chosen simply to identify the text that was already there. In some cases, an additional sentence or two was copied and adapted from related articles in order to provide fill-in material for certain gaps. In other cases, paragraphs of the original were moved around, to better fit the actual chronology and the organizational flow.

Besides better organization and clarity, there were other beneficial side effects of adding new subsections:
 * violations of chronological order became clearer. For example: The paragraph on the Reprisals for the 1959 Uprising was far down the original long section, coming after the text about the Great Famine, and after the cultural revolution.  This got moved up.  There were other examples like this.
 * moving things into their proper subsection, sometimes pointed out missing introductory information. Again, the section on the 1959 revolt dealt solely with the "reprisals": there was no introductory material to say what the 1959 revolt was.  In this case, I adapted a few sentences from the summary of the main article, and added them (with references) so the subsection on the 1959 Uprising wouldn't start out with "Reprisals".
 * the division made it easy to use the main template to provide links to the main article concerning the material in the subsection. There are now four main templates in section #Uprising and upheaval.
 * the subsection division also makes clearer the general weight given to each subtopic of Uprising and upheaval, and may point to areas that should be beefed up, or trimmed down. For example: is the subsection on the #IJC Human rights report really worth a treatment three times as long as #1959 uprising?  I don't think so, but I don't attempt to judge any of this or change it here; it's just a lot easier to see and compare with the subsections there, than it was before.  I leave it to others to compare and evaluate, and modify the article (or not) accordingly.
 * the new division may also show entire subject areas that are entirely missing and worth a treatment.

The other main sections of the article either already have subsection headers, or are much shorter and may not need them. Mathglot (talk) 23:36, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

Notes

For a class assignment I have compiled a bibliography of sources that may help with the neutrality issues.

Bibliography


 * 1) Barnett, Robert, and Shirin Akiner. Resistance and reform in Tibet. Motilal Banarsidass Publishe, 1996.
 * 2) Heath, John B. Tibet and China in the twenty-first century: non-violence versus state power. Saqi Books, 2005.
 * 3) Norbu, Dawa. Red star over Tibet. Sterling Publishers Pvt., Ltd., 1987.
 * 4) Smith, Warren W. "The nationalities policy of the Chinese Communist Party and the socialist transformation of Tibet." Resistance and Reform in Tibet (1994): 51-75.
 * 5) Sperling, Elliot. "Tibet and China: The interpretation of history since 1950." China Perspectives 3 (2009): 25.
 * 6) Yeh, Emily T. "Modernity, Memory And Agricultural Modernisation In Central Tibet, 1950–1980." Proceedings of the Tenth Seminar of the IATS, 2003. Volume 11: Tibetan Modernities. Brill, 2008.BMcCann (talk) 17:12, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

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Edits removed/censored without comment, article has a clear anti-China bias
Two of my edits here were removed without comment or appearing in the editing log, which can only be viewed as political censorship.

Currently the article has serious issues with a clear anti-China biased POV. At least one other user has noted problems with neutrality in the "1950-5" section but the whole article is problematic. Sources cited include pages like "International Campaign for Tibet" (savetibet.org), International Commission of Jurists (funded by the CIA and more or less their propaganda instrument), various Tibetan exiles loyal to the Dalai Lama, as well as the current Dalai Lama himself. Yet, when I added this to the 1950-5 section:

In 1949, seeing that the Communists were gaining control of China, the Kashag expelled all Chinese connected with the Chinese government, over the protests of both the Kuomintang and the Communists. Both the Republic of China (ROC) and the People's Republic of China (PRC) have maintained China's claim to sovereignty over Tibet. According to the _Tibetan Central Administration,_ Tibet had de facto been its own country between 1913-1951, _although, based on historical records, including an edict issued by the Republic of China in 1940 that approved the enthronement of the 14th Dalai Lama, China maintains that Tibet has been part of China for approximately 700 years. _

It was removed without a trace (my additions are preceded and followed by _). What is the issue with this, and was it removed without any comment? In the same section, there is a citation from the Dalai Lama, and an article entitled "Encouraged By Rising Support From Intellectuals in China: His Holiness the Dalai Lama" (on a pro-independence site - for lack of a better word, since in practice the Dalai Lama and many of his followers have relied on the CIA). Is a source representing the viewpoint of over a billion people (including many ethnic Tibetans) not worthy of note? As one commentator has noted, China's claim to Tibet is stronger than the American claim to the Western United States (or arguably for that matter, the American South, over which it fought a war that ended slavery - in the United States, that is, slavery still continued in Tibet until the PRC put a stop to the practice). Did ROC not approve the enthronement of the current Dalai Lama? Is it "the ghost's" position that the other historical documents are fake?

This edit was also removed:

Starting in 1950-1, the People's Republic of China (PRC) began undertaking democratic reforms in Tibet. At first they began gradually. The earliest reforms were the building of the only existing hospitals, roads, the reduction of interest rates, and then introduction of running water and electricity. Before the PRC abolished slavery and unpaid labour, some sources say that as much as 95-98% of the population lived as serfs; by 1961, hundreds of thousands of acres of land formerly owned by lamas and lords was redistributed to tenant farmers and landless peasants. Corporal punishment was abolished, and mutilation was outlawed.

Michael Parenti is a well-respected political scientist and I don't see the problem with citing him, either (or the Guardian article cited). This history is factual and directly related to the subsequent uprisings, as sections of the Tibetan elite did not like the progress and reforms that were being carried out. In fact, the only information in the article about the improvement of living conditions under the PRC (which is very limited) is in the 1988- section. There is nothing about the improvements that started immediately. I have my suspicions that this is due to the fact that the Panchen Lama has praised Deng Xiaoping's reforms. The whole article has serious issues with POV, reflecting the views of a minority of Tibetan exile leaders. The Chinese perspective is almost absent, except in criticism. How can the article justify exlcluding this and still claim neutrality? The page does not really reflect a general Tibetan view either, just that of Tibetan exiles whose connections with the CIA and other foreign countries are well-documented Also, the CIA documents confirm much of what China said - THhis document says that Tibet was a feudal theocracy - This OSS Film states that 200 families own 95% of the wealth https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=esvCpX0he3E - This 1959 paper also confirms the system of feudal sefdom. https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP82R00025R000100060022-5.pdf

EPK — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:183:4200:29A0:507A:F07:4CDC:AD80 (talk) 23:10, 28 December 2019 (UTC)

reply
I agree with this and other posters that this article has a clear anti-China slant and has much that can be improved upon. It would be helpful, for example, to know why China claims Tibet, and what the socialist reforms actually were. It is true that it was theocracy prior to the 1950's with widespread corporal punishment. I will see what I can do, but I still don't know how to post references. — Preceding unsigned comment added by HaoYagpo (talk • contribs) 17:52, 15 July 2019 (UTC)

Cultural Suppression
Only having the US government's perspectives and also the perspective of Tibetan exiles is by definition of not neutral.

The section needs two parts: Tibetan exiles claim that China suppressed the monestary.....

China claims that some of the monasteries had armed militias..... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:183:4200:29A0:507A:F07:4CDC:AD80 (talk) 23:03, 28 December 2019 (UTC)

Sources that are Not Neutral By Definition
Save Tibet is a non-profit organized by Richard Gere. It, by definition, is not Neutral especially since it coordinates with the Dalai Lama. I don't believe it should be used as a source for "objective information"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Campaign_for_Tibet — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:183:4200:29A0:507A:F07:4CDC:AD80 (talk) 23:12, 28 December 2019 (UTC)


 * The name is International Campaign for Tibet; savetibet is its url. Good to use as inline cite when RS uses them as a source. BBC, NYT, French media, many others consider ICT a reliable source, and cite them very often. More reliable than Xinhua, for sure! Pasdecomplot (talk) 20:20, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

1958
This story mentions forced urbanization and starvation beginning in 1958; this seems to be missing from the article. -- Beland (talk) 19:52, 30 July 2020 (UTC)
 * This is now covered in History_of_Tibet_(1950–present). -- Beland (talk) 19:33, 14 January 2023 (UTC)

Goldstein heavy
Weight on Goldstein as source is very heavy. Some of his opinions are contrary to history, RS, customs. I see he's often pushed on other pages, but I added an "According to..." caveat to a questionable interpretation. Tibetologist? Like Radiologist or Cardiologist? Author is the term. Will edit for consistency with his page. Pasdecomplot (talk) 20:27, 28 October 2020 (UTC)


 * His page states he is a Cultural Anthropologist. His degree is in anthropology, and he's an author most recently of articles or book chapters. The page stats also state Cultural Anthropologist.
 * He's also authored lots of books especially on the history of modern Tibet after his membership in the National Committee on United States-China Relations, which began in 1997. Before that, his last book was dated 1989.
 * The NCUSCR reaches out to academics in its programs, and has an interesting outreach program for "public intellectuals" to gain more media coverage, etc: Fellows will gain access to senior policymakers and experts in both the United States and China, and to individuals and fields they would not typically be exposed to, such as the business, arts, health, and civil society sectors in China, as well as to the media in both countries. Fellows will also have access to media coaches to help edit and place op-eds and develop a social media presence. Further, successful applicants will become part of an accomplished community of PIP Fellows who have formed a strong network of mutual support and academic collaboration.. Placing op-eds with the aid of vested interests is an interesting focus. The membership in NCUSCR might or might not be a contributing factor to some of the questionable opinions, while his titles on modern history of Tibet are often used as academic RS in pages on Tibetan Buddhism.
 * A link to his book, where the understanding of Tibetan and buddhist culture is strangely lacking and where many opinions about historical events and characterizations of people are not sourced but are bantered about like irresponsible gossip, imo. Also imo, it's curious. Other thoughts? Pasdecomplot (talk) 21:12, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

The Wall Street Journal
, are you sure that The Wall Street Journal is an unreliable source? The blog linked is a mirror of the original article, blogs that quote such things unchanged are as much a mirror as the Internet Archive, the blog in this case wasn't considered an unreliable source as it simply mirrored a reliable source that has since expired. --Donald Trung (talk) 14:04, 1 January 2022 (UTC)
 * See User_talk:Donald_Trung --Rastinition (talk) 14:08, 1 January 2022 (UTC)