The Analysis of the Anticipated Effects on the Environment: Comparing Opinions concerning the Central versus Local Government's Views on the Three Gorges Project in China as Well as U.S. Views on it From 1992-2006

The purpose of this paper is to explore in detail the conflicting views between the local and national governments within China and the broader areas surrounding the struggles China's leadership faces as it deals with the Three Gorges Project. The project is the largest dam ever built. The Three Gorges Project is presenting to the leadership of China the challenge of forgoing international assistance from the United States and the World Bank in an effort to deliver to its people a source of "clean" electricity.' In the end, this paper will argue that the Chinese leadership, including the current President HU Jintao,2 may well have been correct in building the Three Gorges Project, even with the terrible human toll that it continues to extract, because the other alternatives-namely the continued building of more coal-burning plants and/or the building of additional nuclear power plants3-may be a greater evil to the environment in the long run. This paper addresses three areas: I; Differing Views from the Central versus the Local Governments, II; The Three Gorges Project, and III; The Clinton Administration versus the George W. Bush Administration-The Future of U.S.China Foreign Relations. I. Differing Views from the Central versus the Local Governments China is in a period of real change as more people from the countryside demand rights based upon its 1982 Constitution. It is this Constitution that will f Donald D.A. Schaefer, J.D. (2004, University of Washington), M.A. in Education (2001, University of Michigan), Ph.D. in Political Science (1999, University of Michigan), B.A. in Political Science and B.A. in Religion [double major] (1993, University of Hawaii). The author wishes to thank Professor William H. Rodgers, Jr. to whom he took several environmental law courses from and who first truly inspired him to study global environmental law. He would also like to thank Ms. Nancy Kool who worked as his primary editor and to the editors of this law journal who spent many hours of their time to bring this article to publication. This paper is dedicated to the memories of professors Joan M. Fitzpatrick and Harold K. Jacobson, both of whom were a major inspiration. I William Shapiro, Human Rights and the Environment: IV. China's Three Gorges Dam, 1997 CoLo. J. INT'L ENVTL. L. POL'Y 146, 152-55 (1997). 2 The World Factbook: China, available at https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-fact book/geos/countrytemplatesch.html (last visited Sept. 2, 2009). 3 See Jim Yardley, China's Economic Engine Needs Power (Lots of It), N.Y. TIMEs, Mar. 14, 2004, § 4, at 3, available at http://www.nytimes.coml2004/03/14/weekinreview/the-world-china-s-economicengine-needs-power-lots-of-it.html. Loyola University Chicago International Law Review Volume 7, Issue I Anticipated Effects on the Environment: Three Gorges Project play a greater role as more local Chinese will argue their cases before the courts. 4 Some of the biggest changes have come first, in the way the law is viewed and second, in the role that lawyers have been both viewed and used by the average citizen. In the end, it is President Jintao and those in the State Council who are appointed by the National People's Congress (NPC) that give direction to their nation. This direction, in turn, affects those in the rural areas. Yet, it is the daily lives in the rural areas that will be affected by the Beijing leadership and that will ultimately pay the price-good or bad-for the decisions regarding the Three Gorges Project. Under the traditional ideology of the Qing legal system, there existed the idea that the person had no rights. 5 This absolute theory of power predominated much of early Chinese Law, and it was an ideology that continued into recent times. This is especially apparent with regards to what many in the West consider basic human rights. To be exact, one might say that under traditional Chinese law (post-1900s), there was the sense that the government was the "parent" and the worker "the child."'6 As Stephens explained, "The consistent use by the Chinese themselves, since very ancient times, of the 'father and mother' image of state authority invites, if it does not demand, a disciplinary interpretation of social order in China."'7 It is perhaps this approach that has allowed the Chinese government to rule over its people, and when necessary, to force onto them changes that few Westerners would allow. Governmental and local perspectives differ on what might be acceptable practices by the government with regards to human rights. It is this cultural difference regarding human rights that Li has argued led to a misunderstanding by the West of how China views human rights issues.8 As Li concluded, "The United States and China are so different that one should not expect methods suitable for one society to be appropriate for the other." 9 It is a struggle to understand Chinese human rights from a Western perspective, and one must always realize that the views within this paper are written through an imperfect lens. This flawed view has influenced the way that the West (noticeably the U.S. leadership) has viewed Chinese human rights. It is perhaps this misaligned view 4 There are four levels of courts within China: 1) The Supreme People's Court (SPC), 2) High People's Courts (HPC), 3) Intermediate People's Court (IPC), and 4) Basic People's Courts (BPC). See RANDALL PEERENBOOM, LAWS. COMM. FOR HUM. RIGHTS, LAWYERS IN CHINA: OBSTACLES TO INDEPENDENCE AND THE DEFENSE OF RIGHTS 1 (1998) [hereinafter PEERENBOOM, LAWYERS IN CHINA]; RANDALL PEERENBOOM, CHINA'S LONG MARCH TOWARD RULE OF LAW 283 (Cambridge University Press 2002) [hereinafter PEERENBOOM, CHINA'S LONG MARCH]. There are also over 17,000 People's Tribunals within China that operate in a similar fashion to the BPC, and whose rulings have the same legal effect. PEERENBOOM: CHINA'S LONG MARCH, supra note 4, at 283. 5 PHILIP C.C. HUANG, CIVIL JUSTICE IN CHINA: REPRESENTATION AND PRACTICE IN THE QING 76, 108 (Stanford University Press 1996). 6 THOMAS B. STEPHENS, ORDER AND DISCIPLINE IN CHINA: THE SHANGHAI MIXED COURT 8 (University of Washington Press 1992).