China's Democracy Wall
Witness History
BBC
4.5 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 14 May 2021
⏱️ 13 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
How a brick wall in Beijing became a beacon for those calling for change. But when Wei Jingsheng posted an essay demanding democracy in 1978, he was arrested and imprisoned for 18 years. He's been telling Rebecca Kesby why he thinks it was worth it.
(PHOTO: BEIJING, CHINA: China's prominent dissident Wei Jingsheng (R) laughs as he talks to reporters at his Beijing apartment 20 September 1993. Wei was arrested again shortly after this and eventually released from prison on medical grounds in 1997. He currently lives in the USA. (credit MANUEL CENETA/AFP via Getty Images)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Choosing what to watch night after night the flicking through the endless |
| 0:06.8 | searching is a nightmare we want to help you on our brand new podcast off the |
| 0:11.8 | telly we share what we've been watching |
| 0:14.0 | Cladie Aide. |
| 0:16.0 | Load to games, loads of fun, loads of screaming. |
| 0:19.0 | Lovely. Off the telly with me Joanna Paige. |
| 0:21.0 | And me, Natalie Cassidy, so your evenings can be a little less |
| 0:24.9 | searching and a lot more auction listen on BBC sounds. |
| 0:29.2 | Hello and welcome to this witness history podcast from the BBC World Service with me Rebecca |
| 0:39.1 | Kesby. Today the story of a pioneer in China's democracy movement, long before the student-led |
| 0:45.9 | demonstrations in Tiananmen Square in 1989, young Chinese had been pushing for |
| 0:51.7 | change. I've been speaking to Wei Jin-Seng, whose dramatic actions |
| 0:56.0 | in the late 1970s would result in years of prison and exile. |
| 1:07.0 | What I did was for the day. What I did was for China and for all Chinese people. |
| 1:10.0 | It was a historic moment for the democracy movement, even though my own personal sacrifice was significant. |
| 1:17.0 | I do think it made a big difference, and so, yes, I think it was worth it. |
| 1:22.0 | This is Wei Jin-Seng. |
| 1:23.0 | In the late 70s, a short essay he wrote criticizing the communist one-party state |
| 1:29.0 | caused great excitement on the streets of Beijing, but caused him to spend 18 years in jail. |
| 1:36.5 | After the death of Maude D'Sedong in 1976, Deng Xiaoping had risen to the Premiership, promising reform and development, |
| 1:44.6 | and there was a slight easing of the authoritarian ways of Mao. |
| 1:48.5 | In 1978, Deng set out a plan called the four modernizations designed to boost the economy |
... |
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