ABSTRACT
China's motherland stretches from the vast Manchurian plains to the steep mountains of Tibet, from the foreboding Mongolian desert to tropical Hainan Island. The land itself has changed very little through the ages. Her political authority has likewise persisted. Beginning with the absolutist dictates of Qin Shi Huang, China's first feudal emperor, the idea of a supreme authority — one who stands above the people and guides them to their destiny — has been a fundamental trait of Chinese society. While forms of government ranging from the extreme right to the extreme left have ruled the country, Chinese people have always placed their trust in this notion of a central authority, personified by a national leader, to whom they are fiercely loyal. Cast in terms of unity of purpose and of total devotion to ideological principles, one need not go back further in history than the Cultural Revolution to see clearly the lengths to which this passionate faith can be taken and the consequences it can bring. But today history may be catching up with itself. Perhaps more than anything else, the resistance movement in China, with its twin emphases of freedom and democracy, has strongly challenged the tradition of autocratic rule. It could not have happened without television.
