ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the relational composition of the state by exploring the emergence of new actions on the pressing social problems of violence against women (VAW) and domestic violence (DV). The interactions between the matrix of interest groups concerned to eliminate VAW and DV in China support the notion central to this volume that a complex web of negotiations both propels changes in the state and comprises the very formation of the state. However, this chapter also argues that influences from outside China have increasingly important roles to play in influencing domestic actors in their production of the ‘state-in-society’. Two prime agents seeking change in China on the issue of VAW and DV are the All China Women’s Federation (ACWF) and the dispersed and loosely connected anti-VAW activist groups mobilising around V-day. The former is an arm of the Party-state, being an official Mass Organisation of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The latter is a loose group of university-based activists (including both students and staff) in key Chinese urban areas who have mobilised around an international movement to combat VAW called Vday. The ACWF carries the legitimating imprimatur of the Party-state and expresses the CCP’s original intention to embed the state apparatus within broad societal contexts. In contrast, the V-day activists are a marginalised and often derided, ever-changing, multi-sited set of individuals with no official affiliation to each other. Both the ACWF and the V-day activists have complementary agendas on this issue of eradicating VAW and DV, yet both invoke different international partners. The weight of the international partners’ influence helps keep both actors’ agendas on the public stage – albeit appealing to different target audiences. The multiple differences in approach, appeal and style between the ACWF and the V-day activists present an opportunity for exploring the new mechanisms by which lobby groups contribute to the evolution of the state – reinforcing Migdal’s notion of the importance of recognising the ‘state-in-society’ (Migdal 2001: 11).1
