Li Hongzhi began teaching Falun Gong outside China in early 1995. His first stop was in Paris, where, upon invitation from the Chinese ambassador to France, he lectured on his teachings to the embassy staff and others.[1] Between 1995 and 1999, Li held lectures in other major cities in Europe, North America, Asia, and Australia. Falun Gong is now practiced over 80 countries, and the teachings have been translated to over 40 languages[2]
Since 1999, Falun Gong practitioners around the world have conducted activities aimed at raising awareness about the their plight in China. These include lobbying, passing out of flyers,[3] participating in sit-ins in front of Chinese consulates, as well as participating in show, parades and demonstrations.
Falun Gong have set up groups CIPFG and WOIPFG to lobby foreign governments/legislators, human rights organizations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, who now expressed their concerns over allegations of torture and ill-treatment of Falun Gong practitioners in China. They have also urged the United Nations and international governments to intervene and bring an end to the ongoing persecution.[4][5]
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All ethnographic fieldwork studying Falun Gong so far has concerned overseas practitioners. While Kavan (2008) has studied ethnography in the small Falun Gong practitioner base in New Zealand,[6] Ownby's fieldwork mainly dealt with practitioners in Eastern Canada and Northeastern United States.[1]
Ownby regards the secondary, i.e. overseas community of Falun Gong practitioners as highly important. The activities of practitioners outside China to counter the persecution "caught the attention of the world's media for months on end." As the events unfolded, overseas Falun Gong efforts began to graft their "pleas for relief from suppression and torture" onto Western, Enlightenment-based human rights discourse, such as freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and freedom of religion.
Ownby notes that one difficulty with gauging the scope of Falun Gong in North America is the lack of organisation. Local groups post their practice site times on Falun Gong websites, but do not attempt to keep up with how many practitioners there are in certain areas. Nor are there, he notes, "mid- or upper-level tiers of the organization where one might go for such information." He says that practitioners are not "members" of an "organization", and do not fill out any forms at any point. There is no registry for collecting local statistics. The only expressions of Falun Gong above the local level are on websites, which make available transcripts of Li Hongzhi's speeches, and providing information which helps local groups, or individual practitioners, to participate in anti-persecution activities. These are publicly available, but make no attempt to summarise the practitioners' activities continent-wide.
Ownby estimates that the Western to Chinese practitioners ratio in North America is about 1 to 9. Practitioners usually divide by language when studying Li Hongzhi's works or planning activities. At experience-sharing conferences, headsets are sometimes distributed, and translations (from Chinese to English and English to Chinese) are provided.
Western practitioners mostly appear to be "spiritual seekers", according to Ownby, "often closer to the 'hippie' or 'nonconformist' profile than most of the Chinese, who in general seem to be the straightest of straight arrows."[1]
The hundreds of thousands of Chinese emigrating during this period "seriously altered the nature of the Chinese diaspora" in North America, Ownby writes. These immigrants make up the bulk of Falun Gong practitioners in North America, having learned Falun Gong after emigrating to the West. Ownby says evidence suggests that Falun Gong appealed to a broad spectrum of social groups, "including university professors and students, high party and government officials, well-educated cadres and members of the comfortable middle class, and [...] the old, the infirm, the unemployed, and the desperate."[1] In contrast to the typical pre-ban Chinese practitioner, who was middle-aged and from lower income groups,[7] Ownby's survey at practitioners' conferences in Montreal, Toronto, and Boston between 1999 and 2002, found the average Chinese practitioner in North America to be "young, urban, dynamic".[1] The stereotypical practitioner, Ownby says, "lives in the suburbs and drives a Ford Taurus to her job in computers or finance," while those still studying share similar orientations. Professor Scott Lowe, Chair of Philosophy and Religious Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, observed that the make up of Chinese expatriate Falun Gong practitioners in Western countries "clearly represent[ed] the expatriate elite,"[8] who have found a "surrogate family" and a supportive community among Falun Gong practitioners... many of whom claim to have discovered both perfect health and existential purpose through Li's teachings.[8]
While significant numbers of Falun Gong practitioners are doing far better financially than the average North American, many also reported being considerably poorer than the national averages. About half of the survey respondents in the three cities reported earning less, or significantly less than the national average. For example, 50% in Montreal reported an annual household income of $20,000 Canadian dollars or less, and 27% reported $10,000 or less.[1] Most practitioners in leadership positions are among the wealthiest, and Ownby believes they voluntarily bear the vast majority of the expenses in organizing Falun Gong activities. In gender terms, the majority of practitioners in North America are female.[1] He said he observed no gender tensions during his fieldwork, since practitioners are taught to respect one another and discard attachments to sexuality.
Surveys reveal that close to 30% of practitioners were attracted to Falun Dafa for its "intellectual content", 27% for "spiritual enlightenment", 20% for "health benefits", 15% the exercises, 7% for Li Hongzhi himself, and 2% for the community. The "intellectual content", according to Ownby, refers to the value of Falun Dafa doctrine in describing the "functioning of the moral and physical universe; the two are linked."[1] Scott Lowe's survey found that Falun Gong's spiritual teachings and promise of good health were the most common reasons for people to have taken up the practice. 22 respondents gave "Master Li's philosophy and his answers to life's most difficult questions" as their primary attraction to the practice, while another twenty were attracted for health benefits. Nine were drawn by the moral principles, twelve by the books, ten by the exercises, and small numbers of others by a variety of other facets.[8] Others apparently realised that other forms of qigong were "shallow, exoteric, and superficial," while they came to believe that Falun Gong is the "most complete, efficacious, and comprehensive system of spiritual cultivation on the planet."[8]
The practitioners were asked if their attraction to and focus on Falun Gong practice had changed over time. Ten claimed that they had no change, since they started Falun Gong with the intention of gaining enlightenment, which is the goal of practice.[8] Others, over time, put less emphasis on the health improvements they experienced, which they later saw "as a relatively trivial result of cultivation." Twenty-six respondents said they felt a newfound sense of moral certitude and spiritual growth, while ten "discovered a firm determination to carry their cultivation through to the end goal of enlightenment or consummation, no matter what obstacles might appear in their path."[8]
Falun Gong practitioners have set up international media organizations to promote their cause and criticize the Communist Party of China. These include The Epoch Times newspaper, NTDTV, Sound of Hope radio station,[9] and Epoch Press Inc.[10] Maria H. Chang of the University of Nevada, says these organisations seem to be "[treated as] front organisations to influence public opinion via a concerted information-PR-propaganda campaign". She argues that, like the Chinese state, Falun Gong has to create organisations that are publicly unaffiliated with it for the organization to survive. According to Maria H. Chang of the University of Nevada, the paper was founded based on the socio-political environment in China. She argues that for the organization to survive, Falun Gong has to create organisations that are publicly unaffiliated with it, such as the Epoch Times. Chang states that such strategies are counterproductive in democratic societies, and that "being secretive and deceptive will just play into the image they're a kooky group with something to hide." [11]
Together these organizations also promote Falun Gong activities, including the Chinese New Year Spectacular, performed by the Falun Gong-affiliated Shen Yun Performing Arts troupe.[12][13] In addition, Falun Gong has a considerable presence on the Internet,[14] with websites such as clearwisdom.net, faluninfo.net, mingui, pureinsight etc., which they use not only to spread Li's teachings, but also to publicise the plight of practitioners with graphic testimonials.[12]
While Chinese media have launched an unrelenting assault on Falun Gong since 1999, its response through its various media organizations has earned the practice considerable public relations clout in the West. In North America and Europe, where Falun Gong practitioners are a strong presence, media obtain much of their information about the spiritual group through Faluninfo.net, although Kavan says it comes from a public relations firm for Falun Gong managed by Gail Rachlin, who is considered part of Li’s inner circle.[15] Kavan also compared Falun Gong practitioners' media strategies with those of the Chinese Communist Party: common traits include intolerance of criticism, issuing blanket denials when accused, exaggerating and sensationalizing claims, and deflecting blame by charging the other of the same offence.[15]
Practitioners also utilize various parade venues around the world to publicize their group and its message. These have included large events such as the Independence Day Parade in Washington, D.C. to smaller events such as the Auckland New Zealand's Santa Parade. These parades also offer an opportunity for the group to disseminate promotional literature.[16] The response to Falun Gong involvements in some parades has been mixed.[17][18][19]
Kavan and Ownby agree that individual time spent in meditation and reading Zhuan Falun is seen as more important.[1][20] Respondents to Ownby's surveys reported spending around half of the time they set aside to Falun Dafa on individual cultivation. Ownby says this confirms what Li Hongzhi and practitioners say, that "the goal of cultivation is individual enlightenment; everything else is secondary and instrumental."[1]
In addition to group exercise and Fa study, practitioners also engage in Hongfa activities, meaning "making known the way." This may be translated as "proselytizing," but Ownby says practitioners believe that people are either "predestined to be saved" or not, and thus do not "attempt to convert" people. Since practicing the exercises in public is also one form of Hongfa, Ownby says this demonstrates that there is no firm distinction between cultivation and publicization. Hongfa activities include handing out flyers in the subway or at the mall, leaving Falun Gong literature in stores, libraries, laundries etc., and participating in activities such as marches, parades, and celebrations of Chinese culture.[1] Kavan, on the other hand, says "Li sets the terms of the debate by directing members to get sympathy by telling listeners about the persecution, with the hidden intention of later turning them into converts (Li cited in Rahn, 2005; see also Li, 2002, 2003a). Members do not see this strategy as deceptive: a Falun Gong spokesperson told me that by focusing on the persecution and not pushing their religion or leader, members were being inoffensive."[21]
Professor David Ownby noted that The Epoch Times was established by practitioners who "have become somewhat paranoid... believ[ing] that they were ill-treated by journalists... [who] all [...] tend to adopt the same attitude as the Chinese Government".[22] They also found sympathisers and formed CIPFG and WOIPFG to lobby governments and NGOs. Some dedicated followers also travel internationally to present Falun Dafa's case at world forums, such as UNESCO in Paris, the United Nations in New York, and the World Court at The Hague, and Group of Eight meetings, among others.
Academics agree that the Internet is important to the growth and perpetuation of Falun Gong, and vector of communication between Li and his community of followers. However, Bell and Boas are wary of overstating the efficacy in Falun Gong's use of the Internet, stating that although Falun Gong can use the Internet as a tool to promote its own interests, others can also use the Internet against Falun Gong.[23] Scott Lowe believes that the Internet was not a significant factor in attracting potential practitioners, but rather influences of family and friends, as well as the prospect of better health, seem far more important in establishing initial interest.[8]
Practitioners have used the Internet in three main areas: delivering Li Hongzhi's teachings, forging and maintaining community, and raising awareness of the persecution.[23] Practitioners maintain hundreds of websites around the world. Most contain content in both Chinese and English, while others include German, French, Russian, Portuguese, Spanish, Japanese, and other languages. Bell and Boas note Falun Gong's use of China-themed chat rooms and bulletin boards, email news lists deliver daily updates. Falun Gong's shortwave radio station, launched in the summer of 2000, also broadcasts on the Internet in streaming audio."[23]
The New York Times' Craig Smith wrote that around the year 2000, practitioners outside China began to make more sophisticated use of the Internet in publicizing Falun Gong beliefs and resisting the persecution. Web sites have been revamped, and now carry images of middle-class Westerners performing the movement's exercises instead of the spinning swastikas and portrait of Mr. Li, presenting "a middle-class spiritual movement and human rights cause," rather than "a mystical movement from China."
Aside from the distribution of “jingwen” [new writings by Li Hongzhi], the Internet is useful as a medium for "experience sharing", where practitioners discuss the benefits they have obtained from the practice and the struggles they have overcome in pursuing it. This contributes to a global sense of community and solidarity among practitioners.[23] The Internet also serves to bridge the experiences of overseas and mainland Chinese practitioners. While Bell and Boas do not regard Falun Gong as a "virtual community," they state that the internet has been an effective medium in creating more opportunities for face-to-face group meetings. Practitioners also post lists of regular practice times and places around the world, facilitating local contact almost everywhere, even where there is no established Falun Gong community.[23] In June 2000, Li designated minghui.org, an official Falun Gong site, giving it tremendous authority among practitioners. The English language version of minghui.org is clearwisdom.net.[23]
Around the time of the 2009 Iranian election protests programs developed by Falun Gong practitioners, called Freegate and Ultrasurf, which allow users to avoid Internet censors, were taken up en masse by disaffected Iranian dissidents. Freegate disguises the browsing of its users, rerouting traffic using proxy servers. Practitioners distributed the programs for free through the Global Internet Freedom Consortium (GIFC), sending a downloadable version of the software in millions of e-mails and instant messages. In July 2008, it introduced a Persian version of its circumvention tool.[24]
After the persecution in 1999, practitioners began holding frequent protests, rallies, and appeals outside mainland China.
Falun Gong supporters in Vancouver, Canada continue to stage the world's longest, continuous protest against the persecution. It which runs twenty-four hours a day, at the entrance to the PRC Consulate on Granville Street.[25] In June 2006, it was announced by the mayor of Vancouver that the protest signs and structures must be taken down, as they violate a by-law against building permanent structures on public property.[26] In early 2009, the Supreme Court of British Columbia gave the City of Vancouver the right to dismantle the protest camp, including a cabin and billboards, which the City has argued is a permanent structure on public property.[27]
Again on April 21, 2006 Hu was also followed by hundreds of protesters during his Yale University visit. Around 2,400 signatures from Yale faculty and students condemning organ-harvesting were collected by the Yale Falun Gong club and delivered to university officials.[28]
Falun Gong parades usually incorporate traditional-style Chinese dances, costumes, song, exercise demonstrations, drumming, floats, and banners. Practitioners refer to this as "bringing people the beauty of Dafa".[29] Another form is a "march", where participants often hold signs and banners, devoting different sections of the parade to different aspects of the persecution. There is usually a section involving participants wearing only white (symbolizing mourning) and holding photos of those killed in China.
Falun Gong practitioners were criticised by Harbinder Singh Sewak, publisher of the Asian Pacific Post, for their censorship when the Epoch Press stopped the printing of its January 8, 2009 edition allegedly because of a negative review of the Divine Performing Arts.[10] Epoch's president Frank Cui, a practitioner, insisted on the removal of quotes from Chinese officials before he would print; the Post was forced to comply to meet deadlines. Cui said "...news reporters feel that they must 'balance' stories about Falun Gong or events they are involved in by adding the bad words or opinions from the [Chinese Communist Party], but in my feeling, between victim and perpetrator there can never be any neutrality or balance." Singh criticised the hypocrisy,[10] and alleged unlawful interference with economic interests, including breach of contract and deceit.[30] Lawyers representing Falun Dafa denied any association with the actions of Frank Cui.[30]
Falun Gong practitioners allege that they are frequently suppressed by the Chinese diplomatic service overseas. They claim that Chinese embassies and consulates are explicitly or, through unidentified individuals or organizations, implicitly, organising disruptions to protests. They further attribute criminal acts, such as beatings, break-ins to homes, and theft of property, to explicit or implicit involvement of the Chinese diplomatic service.
Then Chief Executive of Hong Kong Tung Chee-hwa declared on June 14, 2001 that Falun Gong was "undoubtedly an evil cult",[31] causing significant controversy both in Hong Kong and internationally. John Gittings of The Guardian said it was a "balancing act" to avoid taking definitive action against Falun Gong, such as a ban,[32] which the Wall Street Journal opined would damage Hong Kong's economy and its reputation for religious freedom.[33]
The United States Department of State report on human rights in 2001 noted that three Hong Kong newspapers refused to accept advertisements for Falun Gong.[34] In 2002 the mayor of Santee, California, told the Washington Times of a letter he received from the Chinese consul general in Los Angeles request that "no recognition and support in any form should be given to the Falun Gong cult organization."
Hong Kong is less tolerant of the possibility of disruption by practitioners from outside Hong Kong, some of whom have been denied entry into the territory. More than 100 Taiwanese practitioners attending a series of protests were reportedly denied entry into Hong Kong by the immigration department, in the run-up to the tenth anniversary of the handover on July 1, 2007. Among them, lawyer Teresa Chu, who was repatriated hours after her arrival.[35]
In December 2005, Chinese official Luo Gan visited Argentina. Luo is claimed by Falun Gong groups to be the head of the 6-10 Office. During his visit, Falun Gong practitioners were beaten by a group of about 40 unidentified Chinese men. According to Friends of Falun Gong, "One of the Chinese thugs ran up to a practitioner who was giving an interview explaining why they were protesting and kicked her in the neck right in front of the TV camera."[36] The director of Amnesty International in Argentina, Pablo Marsal, said on 16 December 2005 that "Amnesty International has always supported Falun Dafa", that the group has been assaulted several times in Argentina, that Falun Gong is a peaceful practice, and that it is unacceptable that "the officials of another country are violating our Argentine sovereignty in our country [...] apparently, the persecution has begun to extend to [...] Argentina, a country which is proud to defend human rights."[37]
In 2002, Ottawa practitioner, Leon Wang, claims to have been beaten inside the Chinese embassy after he was caught taking pictures of an anti-Falun Gong exhibit and recognized as a Falun Gong practitioner while attending a New Year "open house night". The embassy said there had been attempts by local practitioners to stop the exhibit, including "dozens of threatening calls and letters."[38] In June 2004, Australian Falun Gong practitioner David Liang was injured in a drive-by shooting while in South Africa. The purpose of his visit was to protest outside South Africa-China Binational Commission (BNC) meetings and to launch a lawsuit against key players in the persecution while they were in the country. Practitioners allege that the drive-by shooting was an assassination attempt. Chinese Embassy officials deny this.[39] According to Falun Gong spokesperson, Sue Zhang, "Johannesburg police have characterized this incident as attempted murder" and that it has been ruled out as random.[40]
Falun Gong practitioners in the United States have filed numerous cases in U.S. federal courts against PRC leaders, once they step upon foreign soil. According to International Advocates for Justice, Falun Gong has filed the largest number of human rights lawsuits in the 21st century and the charges are among the most severe international crimes defined by international criminal laws.[41][42] Ownby stated that, 54 civil and criminal lawsuits were under way in 33 countries in 2006[43] Since 2001, there have been more than 70 legal cases launched by Falun Gong practitioners and sympathisers against those considered responsible for the persecution campaign in the Chinese government.
In 2005, leaders in Sydney's Chinatown denied Falun Gong practitioners the right to participating in a Chinese New Year parade. Australian Falun Dafa Association Chairman John Deller said his group did not want to make a political statement; Organising committee Chairman King Fong said "It's between them (Falungong) and China, we're not a stage for their protest."[44]
In December 2005, practitioners in Montreal took a local Chinese newspaper Les Presses Chinoises to court for alleged defamation after it published a paid advertisement in two November editions which contained descriptions of Falun Gong practitioners being driven to commit suicide and murder, overthrowing the Chinese government and surrendering their will to the movement’s founder, Li Hongzhi. The plaintiffs, 126 Falung Gong practitioners from Montreal, Ottawa and Toronto, each sued the paper and the author for $100,000 for publishing an article of "false or grossly inaccurate distortions made for the purpose of inciting hatred against the practitioners of Falun Gong, causing derision from the Chinese community against Falun Gong in Canada.".[45] The case was dismissed, and the judge described Falun Gong as a "controversial movement, which does not accept criticism."[46]
Chinatown leaders in San Francisco, banned practitioners from the 2006 Chinese New Year parade on the grounds that the group's claimed political agenda was incompatible with the spirit of the celebrations. The organising committee accused Falun Gong of attending the 2004 parade with "more people than they said on their application and then they handed out leaflets that we interpreted as political statements."[47] The Superior Court dismissed the case filed by practitioners.[48]
After Télévision de Radio-Canada broadcast an investigative report entitled "Malaise dans le Chinatown" on 30 October 2008, Falun Gong complained that it "unjustly misrepresented, demeaned, maligned and discriminated against [...] Falun Gong [...] and fabricated a deceptive impression of suspicion about Falun Gong". The ombudsman observed that the report would have been more neutral had Falun Gong agreed to be interviewed, but ruled that "report is otherwise based on serious research, journalistic observations in the field, and analysis by recognized experts. The complaints are unfounded."[49]
Other incidents include the removal of Huang Daiming from membership of the Ottawa Chinese Senior Association in 2005 because she practised Falun Gong. In January, 2006, the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario ruled that the Association had discriminated against her, exposed her to contempt and ostracism from the community. It awarded compensation and ordered that eligible Falun Gong practitioners be allowed to join.[50]
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