Cultic Studies Review, Vol. 7, No. 2, 2008, Page 14
Communists in the 1950s (Fu-Sheng, 1962:160, 173 Schein with Schneier and Barker,
1961:50), and then again during the Cultural Revolution (MacInnis, 1972:360-366 Rice,
1972:291), used labor as part of their re-education efforts (see also Pomfret and Pan,
2001:A22).
Moreover, according to Amnesty International‘s 2007 report on China:
Hundreds of thousands of people were believed to be held in Re-education
through Labour facilities across China and were at risk of torture and ill-
treatment. In May 2006, the Beijing city authorities announced their intention
to extend their use of Re-education through Labour as a way to control
‗offending behaviour‘ and to clean up the city‘s image ahead of the Olympics.
(Amnesty International, 2007:3)
Amnesty‘s report specifically named a Falun Gong practitioner who received a two-and-a
half-year sentence into one of these re-education and labour programs for having possessed
the group‘s literature (Amnesty International, 2007:2).
China, however, is not the only ideologically driven body to use labour as part of its re-
education efforts. Studies published in 2000 and 2001 showed that both the Children of
God/The Family and Scientology had used labour as part of their confinement and re-
education programs to ‗reform‘ supposed deviants in their respective organizations.
Scientology‘s program is called the Rehabilitation Project Force, and it has operated in
various forms since 1974 (Kent, 2001). Likewise, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the
Children of God/The Family put teens through hard labour in its teen detention programs
(Kent and Hall, 2000:67). No information exists, however, abut whether the designers of
either program consciously borrowed the idea of forced labour from the earlier Chinese
camps.
Conclusion
Clearly we have much to learn about the contemporary situation of Falun Gong in China,
and at some point an entirely new wave of publications is likely to appear about these
reputed brainwashing programs. Certainly, too, these publications will return to the classic
brainwashing literature in an attempt to see whether the new Chinese techniques and
programs differ from ones used in the 1950s.
Descriptions of the Chinese government‘s anti-Falun Gong campaign are only a few of many
social contexts in which laypeople and professionals are using the brainwashing concept. Its
widespread use does not necessarily mean that that it is a legitimate social-scientific term.
As a British writer, Dominc Streatfield, concluded in his recent, book-length history of
brainwashing, it ―is a useful term because it can be used to describe anybody who performs
actions out of character…. Although no one really seems to know exactly what
‗brainwashing‘ entails, how it works, or who uses it, the term is applied all over the place‖
(Streatfield, 2006:357). Indeed, this article has documented that the brainwashing term is
in fact applied ―all over the place‖—courtrooms, terrorism discussions, analyses of
interpersonal undue influence, abusive teen behaviour modification programs, high-demand
business settings, and so on. Streatfield may misstate, however, just how much various
people know about what ‗brainwashing‘ entails, how it works, and who uses it. While the
content of such programs varies according to the groups or individuals operating them, all
seem to involve manipulative, systematic efforts at reformulating the attitudes, beliefs, and
behaviours of target populations. Nothing in any of the techniques is mystical or magical all
of the techniques—in whatever combinations they may appear within particular programs—
use well-understood social psychological means (albeit usually for ends that likely are
harmful for the targeted persons).
Communists in the 1950s (Fu-Sheng, 1962:160, 173 Schein with Schneier and Barker,
1961:50), and then again during the Cultural Revolution (MacInnis, 1972:360-366 Rice,
1972:291), used labor as part of their re-education efforts (see also Pomfret and Pan,
2001:A22).
Moreover, according to Amnesty International‘s 2007 report on China:
Hundreds of thousands of people were believed to be held in Re-education
through Labour facilities across China and were at risk of torture and ill-
treatment. In May 2006, the Beijing city authorities announced their intention
to extend their use of Re-education through Labour as a way to control
‗offending behaviour‘ and to clean up the city‘s image ahead of the Olympics.
(Amnesty International, 2007:3)
Amnesty‘s report specifically named a Falun Gong practitioner who received a two-and-a
half-year sentence into one of these re-education and labour programs for having possessed
the group‘s literature (Amnesty International, 2007:2).
China, however, is not the only ideologically driven body to use labour as part of its re-
education efforts. Studies published in 2000 and 2001 showed that both the Children of
God/The Family and Scientology had used labour as part of their confinement and re-
education programs to ‗reform‘ supposed deviants in their respective organizations.
Scientology‘s program is called the Rehabilitation Project Force, and it has operated in
various forms since 1974 (Kent, 2001). Likewise, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the
Children of God/The Family put teens through hard labour in its teen detention programs
(Kent and Hall, 2000:67). No information exists, however, abut whether the designers of
either program consciously borrowed the idea of forced labour from the earlier Chinese
camps.
Conclusion
Clearly we have much to learn about the contemporary situation of Falun Gong in China,
and at some point an entirely new wave of publications is likely to appear about these
reputed brainwashing programs. Certainly, too, these publications will return to the classic
brainwashing literature in an attempt to see whether the new Chinese techniques and
programs differ from ones used in the 1950s.
Descriptions of the Chinese government‘s anti-Falun Gong campaign are only a few of many
social contexts in which laypeople and professionals are using the brainwashing concept. Its
widespread use does not necessarily mean that that it is a legitimate social-scientific term.
As a British writer, Dominc Streatfield, concluded in his recent, book-length history of
brainwashing, it ―is a useful term because it can be used to describe anybody who performs
actions out of character…. Although no one really seems to know exactly what
‗brainwashing‘ entails, how it works, or who uses it, the term is applied all over the place‖
(Streatfield, 2006:357). Indeed, this article has documented that the brainwashing term is
in fact applied ―all over the place‖—courtrooms, terrorism discussions, analyses of
interpersonal undue influence, abusive teen behaviour modification programs, high-demand
business settings, and so on. Streatfield may misstate, however, just how much various
people know about what ‗brainwashing‘ entails, how it works, and who uses it. While the
content of such programs varies according to the groups or individuals operating them, all
seem to involve manipulative, systematic efforts at reformulating the attitudes, beliefs, and
behaviours of target populations. Nothing in any of the techniques is mystical or magical all
of the techniques—in whatever combinations they may appear within particular programs—
use well-understood social psychological means (albeit usually for ends that likely are
harmful for the targeted persons).
