Talk:Weiquan movement

Non-neutral POV
Ex: 'However, because the legal system is not independent and mature, and the fact that the central government is suspicious and local governments even hostile toward it, weiquan movement has been encountering difficulties in the course of its development.' Obv. POV pushing. Bunch of external links to stuff that are only remotely related, and are already in the infobox. removed. &eta;oian  &Dagger;orever &eta;ew &Dagger;rontiers  06:53, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Also references are shotty. removed crosswiki reference, and only remains a site with (appearantly, sp?) a bias, so fails WP:NPOV as it doesn't present the other side's POV (unbalanced). &eta;oian   &Dagger;orever &eta;ew &Dagger;rontiers  07:11, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Why not Merge?
Explain to me why this isn't a part of Human rights in the People's Republic of China? TheAsianGURU (talk) 18:09, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

@TheAsianGURU, Weiquan movement covers wider scope, and more detailed, than Human rights, such as forced eviction, illegal land development, plus others. With China's political tension getting worst by the days, Weiquan movement will be a big topic. It deserved to be on it's own. Plus 'Weiquan' is a verb, it conveys 'action', pro-active.

And Chinese wiki has an same name article:zh:中國維權運動  Arilang   talk  13:31, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Quotation from Chinese wiki: 同樣是2003年，中國企業ST輕騎出現嚴重虧損，四川小股東趙剛認為，ST輕騎並非經營性虧損，而是因為被母公司輕騎集團佔用的30多億元資金被「一筆勾銷」所致，開始提出「股東維權運動」(Share holder Weiquan movement)；[5]這此數年間，全國各地亦出現多宗業主維權運動(Landlord Weiquan movement).  Arilang   talk  13:56, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

No merge. Weiquan movement is a specific issue in Human rights in the People's Republic of China. And it's long enough to deserve a separate article. --Neo-Jay (talk) 15:03, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Is this actually a movement, or a generic/poorly translated term/idea?
The article states: "A new adjective is being applied to people and activities: weiquan, meaning simply “rights defending,”"

which implies that it is a sort of neologism/new word created to describe something, or a group of people/activists not necessarily describing themselves by the name. Apart from the two basic citations sources on this article, there aren't really any that attempts to balance the view, or present a complete picture. I have yet to actually see a source that verifies the people consider themselves to be part of this "movement", and it is not in the three people mentioned's wiki article either. If these people don't consider themselves part of the "WeiQuan Movement", and are only in the article because the adjective "describes them correctly", then that to me seems to be OR/SYNTH. Just because a source calls a person by a adjective doesn't mean its correct or notable. If so, then the article needs clarification in the text.

&eta;oian  &Dagger;orever &eta;ew &Dagger;rontiers  04:04, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Adding new sections?
I was considering adding two or three new sections to this article, but wanted to solicit some feedback beforehand. The first of these proposed sections would enumerate what type of impact the Weiquan movement has had (if any) on legal culture and processes in China. At the very least, it could explain what has been attempted (for instance, the lobbying to have elections to select the leader of the Beijing all lawyers association). I would also propose a section explaining the response by the party-state to these efforts. About two dozen Weiquan lawyers have been disbarred (to my knowledge), and several have been tortured, detained, or sentenced to RTL or prison terms for their work. This is significant. Finally, I might suggest including a list of notable Weiquan lawyers as its own section. Notable might include individuals who have been featured in articles by reputable news organizations and/or been the subject of human rights reports. This would mean not only including the Chen Guangchengs of the world, but also folks like Zhang Kai and Tang Jitian, etc.

I suggest that the following individuals may be noteworthy. This is a partial list, of course:

Chen Guangcheng, Hu Jia, Gao Zhisheng, Liu Xiaobo,Tang Jitian, Zhang Kai, Liu Wei, Li Heping, Gao Fengquan, Zhang Lihui, Li Jinsong, Li Fangping

Thoughts? Homunculus (duihua) 19:16, 28 November 2010 (UTC)
 * No comment until someone answers my question above. I'm more concerned that this article is actually a synonym for an article that already exists which just has the title translated completely into English. From my guesses based on pin yin quan means rights and wei means protecting or for (depending on which word), so it is not far-fetched for this to be just a mistranslation by western media to refer to "human rights activists." The article probably also needs to distance itself from associating the word/term based on my above guess with a specific movement since it feels very generic to me (definitely would not strike me as a new word), as seen by the above references to landlord rights or whatever. (anyone can claim to be fighting to rights, noble rights, capitalist rights, lack of rights, etc. etc. A general article on the word or idea "fighting for rights" should not be limited to one type, and probably should be merged into a better translated title if it already exists as it feels very much like it overlaps with already existing articles) &eta;oian   &Dagger;orever &eta;ew &Dagger;rontiers  10:54, 2 December 2010 (UTC)
 * You probably know more about this than me though. &eta;oian   &Dagger;orever &eta;ew &Dagger;rontiers  11:02, 2 December 2010 (UTC)


 * My exposure to the Weiquan movement has been almost exclusively in the context of lawyers who seek to uphold and defend rights, broadly defined. Human rights activists, dissidents, petitioners, and the like are therefore (in my understanding) not part of the Weiquan movement, strictly speaking. Your translation is correct, but I would argue that the Weiquan phenomenon is a distinct movement in China, particularly given the potential implications for the rule of law and the tight-knit nature of the group. Homunculus (duihua) 03:20, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

I created a new section, and will build it out later. If anyone wants to get to it first, that would be nice too.Homunculus (duihua) 03:32, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

Removed section
I removed a section from overview that did not transition well from the overview of Weiquan as a word/idea/collection of civil right lawyers. I could not think of a way to fix the section without major reorganization/addition of other sections. It is more of an organizational issue, as I feel it more aptly belongs in an article about criticism of CCP rather than this idea as a whole. &eta;oian  &Dagger;orever &eta;ew &Dagger;rontiers  05:12, 10 December 2010 (UTC)

Focus of Article/Themes
I feel like the large section on themes is inaccurate since themes implies the section will talk about the movement as a whole and their position on the theme, rather than the partial biographies that I see now. &eta;oian  &Dagger;orever &eta;ew &Dagger;rontiers  05:18, 10 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Agree. I've started collecting research to do this, but it is snowballing into a rather large task. Part of the challenge is that there are several more themes that ought to be included beyond those currently listed, including reproductive/women's rights, religious freedom issues, labour rights, judicial independence, and a good number more. I will get to it, but the changes may be incremental....or maybe not.  We'll see. Homunculus (duihua) 04:49, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Neutrality?
What's with the neutrality tag? The section previously discussed as a potential problem has been removed. What outstanding issues are there? Please discuss. Homunculus (duihua) 04:20, 18 December 2010 (UTC)


 * The neutrality tag was there from back in the day when the article was blatantly POV. I looked at the article again, and I agree with removing the neutrality tag. (although like the Human Rights in China article, further separation of PoV's into categories such as western, public, and government, is possible) &eta;oian   &Dagger;orever &eta;ew &Dagger;rontiers  20:12, 19 December 2010 (UTC)


 * The nice things about a page that seems to have only two editors is that it's easy to reach consensus. Do you have any thoughts on my earlier proposals of how the page might be expanded? I like the idea of building out sections dealing with the government and western response (I'm not sure what there is to say about public response. I could look into it.)Homunculus (duihua) 04:20, 21 December 2010 (UTC)

Heads up
Yesterday I restored a background section with all new content detailing the environment that gave rise to the Weiquan movement. In the next couple days I am also going to work on building out the section on the government's response to the movement, including its 'socialist rule of law' campaign, and a more complete description of the suppression of lawyers. On another note, we currently have an empty section describing the public (Chinese) response to the Weiquan movement. I am at a loss of what to put in here. Maybe I'll check some Chinese blogs, but this is not a topic that Chinese citizens can openly express their views on, so it will be tough. Any suggestions? Homunculus (duihua) 18:32, 23 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Try this one:http://twitter.com/aiww, and http://www.youtube.com/user/aiweiweidocumentary. Ai Weiwei has become the champion of Weiquan movement in China. Arilang   talk  05:37, 10 February 2011 (UTC)


 * I've added some content to the section on minorities regarding defense of Tibetans. It is by no means comprehensive, but it is a start on this topic. I notice that there is a section on women's rights waiting to be filled out. I may have a go at that in the coming days. — Zujine |talk 03:53, 20 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Good start, but please bring in a couple more citations (ie. on Li Fangping's involvement, and on the statistics you cite concerning imprisonment and execution after 2008 unrest). I was hoping you might be lured into women's rights too. Not sure how familiar you are with this topic, but Chen Guangcheng may be a good place to start, FYI. Homunculus (duihua) 04:20, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

I am removing or reordering the last vestiges of the "other initiatives" section, which until now contained one-sentence biographies of random assorted human rights activists, writers, and intellectuals. Xu Zhiyong is already mentioned elsewhere in the article, and I am rewriting the line on him to be about the Open Constitution Initiative more broadly. Feng Zhenghu, while notable, does not seem to be involved in the Weiquan movement from what I can find; he is an economist and pro-democracy activist with "some knowledge of the law," so I am removing him from the list (I am open to challenge on this one, though). Yang Chunlin is similarly not a lawyer, but a farmer-turned-activist. I moved his story to the section on land rights, adding that he was defended by Weiquan lawyer Li Fangping. Wu Gan, also, does not seem to have any involvement in the Weiquan movement, but is instead a dissident writer, so I am removing him. There are innumerable Chinese activists and dissidents, but not all of them, no matter how "prominent" or "notable," can be counted as part of the Weiquan movement. I would like to suggest that we define Weiquan participants only as those who are lawyers (whether legitimate or 'barefoot') or legal scholars like Teng Biao. If someone does not fall into either category, but is prominently associated with the Weiquan movement by reliable sources, exceptions could be made. The 'other initiatives' section is going to be pretty bare after I make this edit, but that's not for lack of possible content. There are a number of other things that could be included there, such as the tainted milk scandal, Sichuan earthquake parents, environmental issues, or isolated but high-profile cases, etc. Homunculus (duihua) 17:35, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Uighurs?
I've been looking at expanding the section on ethnic minorities (namely Tibetans), but realised that we've yet to include any information on Weiquan lawyers taking up cases on behalf of Uighurs. I'm not as familiar with the topic as some editors, so before diving into research blind, I wanted to see if anyone has good leads on this topic, or would like to contribute themselves.— Zujine |talk 04:20, 28 May 2011 (UTC)


 * I recall Jiang Tianyong having some difficulties for getting involved with Uyghurs. L talk 01:34, 26 June 2011 (UTC)