ABSTRACT

Time: late August 1995. Place: NGO Forums in Huairou County, Beijing. In one of the hundreds of tents set up for concurrent panels organized by 30,000

women activists around the globe, a group of Chinese female judges on the panel “Women and Law” were presenting their papers on the progress women in the PRC had made in achieving legal equality. When questioned if there was a law prohibiting domestic violence in China, women judges on the panel replied that there was no domestic violence in China. They did not realize that right before the panel feminists from abroad had circulated photocopies of a Chinese article describing a case of domestic violence. It was an embarrassing moment for the Chinese women panelists who had to follow the official script on the taboo issue in front of feminists from abroad.