Guns and politics are often interlinked. In America the Second Amendment enshrines the right of Americans to bear firearms while in China it was Mao who famously commented that 'political power grows from the barrel of a gun' (枪杆子里面出政权- qianganzi lichu zhengquan). Guns also had a large part to play in the violent birth of both nation states. But modern America, and indeed many Western countries, have a very different relationship with guns than modern China does. Rarely a day passes in America or Western Europe where a shooting does not feature in the news, while in China an event like the fatal shooting in Nanjing last month of a man at a bank made headlines because of its relative unusualness. Just why is there so much less gun crime in China compared to Western countries, despite its size and the enormous task faced by the authorities in policing firearms?
The Stats
According to Gunpolicy.org, which references Karp's Small Arms Survey 2007, Cambridge University Press, there are over 40,000,000 privately held guns in China (numbers are only estimates due to the difficulty in sourcing information in this field in China). That might sound like a lot but when you compare that figure to the total population of China and contrast it to the 270,000,000 guns which are privately held in the US it suddenly doesn't seem too bad! In fact in an estimated ranking of the rate of private gun ownership, China ranks 102 out of 179 countries while America is, you've guessed it, number 1.
While there are no figures for China for the amount of gun homicides the overall homicide rate is 1.22/100,000 (2007), which when contrasted to the US rate of 5.61/100,000 (2007) (in light of the contrasting levels of gun ownership), suggests that guns have a large part to play in a country's murder rate. So, first and foremost you are statistically safer in China because there are fewer guns as a proportion of population.
The Law
China has some of the most stringent guns laws in the world. It is illegal for civilians to possess firearms and there is a two year prison penalty if caught doing so. Firearms are issued for certain uses such as hunting or professional shooting but are strictly licensed. In all cases fully automatic and semi automatic assault weapons are prohibited and the penalty for homicide committed with a firearm is usually death.
However, China offers a stick and carrot approach to enforcing gun law. Frequent collection and seizure programmes are run throughout the country, sometimes with financial incentives to turn in illegal firearms. Between 2005 and 2008 around 291,000 firearms were collected and destroyed in conjunction with a UN programme to eradicate illicit trade in small firearms. You are safer in China because the law comes down firmly against private gun ownership and the penalties for breaking the law are severe.
Drugs, Guns and Politics
The modern relationship between guns and drugs is well established; one is often produced to fund the sale of the other and murder and mayhem are the frequent by-product. But it was here in China during the Opium Wars mid 19th Century that an early precedent was set for this violent gun-drug symbiosis, when the British used overwhelming firepower to coerce the Qing government into allowing the import of opium. Perhaps the early experience of this drug-gun link had a factor in shaping current attitudes to gun possession and explains why gun laws are so strict (as indeed are drug laws)?
And as Mao in fact went on to say after his famous one line quote, "our principle is that the Party commands the gun, and the gun must never be allowed to command the Party." China is a country which is socially and politically biased against gun ownership, unlike America where an organisation like the NRA (which boasts millions of members) wields certain social and political influence in favour of gun ownership.
Gun Culture
It was in 1969 that guns were formally banned in China when two boys accidentally shot out a window of the Great Hall of the People in Beijing while trying to shoot a pigeon. These days the only real guns you are likely to see in China are the over sized shotguns toted by the skinny, young security guards who accompany the cash collection vans to banks (accidentally being shot by one of these guys is probably your only real risk of gun injury in China!). Otherwise, the guns you are likely to see will be on a TV screen in a Second World War Chinese resistance movie where some invincible young heroine machine guns thousands of Japanese soldiers.
But the popularity of the gun is rising in China. The modernisation of China's military has created a fetish of modern weaponry and seen the rise in popularity of firearms magazines so common in the US. A search on Alibaba or other sourcing platform will also yield thousands of suppliers offering gun replicas and related shooting paraphernalia. Little kids are running around with toy guns all the time too now, and Counterstrike and other violent gun-based videogames have become so popular here that they do re-enactments at temple fairs.
The 2008 Olympics and China's five gold medals in shooting also arguably helped to peak interest in guns and marksmanship, and created a boon in the BB gun industry to the further detriment of China's remaining wildlife.
But overall, it is fair to say that guns have less allure and glamour to younger Chinese than to their Western counterparts. This probably also has a positive impact on the levels of gun related crime.
History, laws, and yet…
As you might expect from the country which invented gunpowder, guns have featured prominently throughout China's history and it is arguably in this history that China's current antipathy to firearm ownership can be traced. However, while having some of the strictest domestic gun ownership laws in the world, China is more relaxed when it comes to their export; the middle kingdom happens to be one of the major small and medium firearms manufacturers in the world.
Related links
Do You Feel Safe? – A Look at Violence in China
The Ten Safest Cities in China
One Hand in Your Pocket – How to Stay Safe from Pickpockets in China
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Keywords: gun control China gun related crime in China Chinese criminal law Chinese gun culture firearms China
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Joe,
I see your feathers have been ruffled there.You are right that China provided weapons for Ghaddafi,but the US actually carried out Genocide in Iraq,going to the level of peeing on Iraqi prisoners,tethering them like animals.Why is it that America's behaviour is worst whereever it goes? The reason you are carrying guns is because China supplied Ghaddafi with some! I`m talking about "America",there's no mention of the West in my write up.In the US,when Paris Hilton carries drugs in her purse,drunk drive,and when Linsey Lohan steal from supermarkets,Cops don't gun them down.But they followed a young blackman a month ago and shot him in his home.He did not have an arm.This shows that you guns are not meant to protect you from thieves.They are meant to eliminate the people you don't like.About 160,000 Iraqis died from your guns,because of your thirst to kill,not because they had any weapons of mass destruction.You can call me names,experience has shown that you guys are not very bright and polite.You insult everybody in your country,hang the effigies of your president on trees,call your women "sluts" and "prostitutes",burn sacred books like the Koran.What is left of your morality? Continue carrying guns! You will never murder all the blacks in your country.They will keep coming.One of them is already working his butt off to clean up your filthy ways.Enslaving people,you;murdering innocent people,you;running your country to the ground with credit cards,you;turning into an orphan with cap in hand begging from other countries,you!Gossiping in China in order to be given jobs,you.Bring on the invectives,but we will stay on facts!
Mar 09, 2012 02:13 Report Abuse
Justify the carrying of guns in the US as you can,but experience has shown that it is not working.The "superrace" knows how to steal from the other peoples of the world,and later use guns to scare anyone that will pick a dime from them.After stealing both human and natural resources from Africa and other regions of the world for centuries,they erroneously thought big prisons were going to keep criminals away from them.That did not work,so they are forever hanging onto their guns.Every now and then,one of them aims at the white House to show their beastiality.They are now all consumed by the crab syndrome.The US is a country of contradictions.This is a country that wants to transport democracy to the unwashed around the world,while it is experiencing the terror it pretends to fight against in its households and neigbourhoods.Clinging on to guns shows Americans are living in perpetual fear of each other.If you are a country of immigrants and you can't stsnd each other,what is there to boast about? Security men show up in classrooms and have to gun down kids for holding up toy guns.Living in this type of neurotic state doesn't prove that the US is the land of peace it wants to project.Why not contnue to feel your prisons with people from minority groups? It is a vicious cycle,because when this people leave prison,they become even more dangerous to society.The world knows the reason why Americans are hanging on to guns.It is to murder people from minorities,especially blacks,because the whites know the historical scar left by slavery,and are afraid of the "angry black".Chinese can easily control their people because they have nothing to hide against a particular race or ethnic group.The people also easily support their gov't,not like the angry people in the US,who would even shout at their President when he is making a speech in a joint session of congress.Let's say Americans are truly afraid of thieves ane carry guns,but what warrants the venom the whole world witnesses from politicians to Tea party what not,to Talk Radio skinheads? Show us any other country in the world where people spew that much hatred against their own people like the US.Is this the country of immigrants you boast about? When somebody of a minority challenges an American,he or she always ask them to go back home if they don't feel fine in the US,but when Chinese utter the same words here,hell breaks loose.What lessons can the world learn from a country that worships guns,lives in hate,and pretends to be a giver of lessons?
Mar 08, 2012 20:48 Report Abuse
I guess you aren't aware that China is providing guns for genocide, offered to supply Gaddafi with arms, etc. Idiots like you are the worst kind of idiot cause you're naive as shit and also just attack anything "western" like a total moron.
Mar 08, 2012 22:27 Report Abuse
Guns are illegal cause they can be used against the government. And I really don't feel any safer here than anywhere else. Ever notice the amount of stabbings that happen in China? As well, any FEELING of safety you may have would well be due to the fact crime is NOT reported in media here.
Mar 08, 2012 07:17 Report Abuse
From Experience, China is MUCH safer than the USA. This all depends where you go of course, and also who you are. If you are white tourist in china, you are a target to thieves, just like every developing country. They know you have valuables and are naive to what is going on. You probably cant understand them, and they know the tourist weak spots. Pickpockets will be around. BUT, If we are talking in terms on physical safety in the big cities though, China wins hands down. You can walk through ANY neighborhood there at ANY hour and nothing will happen to you, whereas in the USA, there are at least 50 counties where doing so with any frequency is likely to wind up in your mugging/assault, and very possibly death. Women walk freely alone in the cities late at night whereas you will not see a single woman in most of the USA out alone after dark, this just doesn't happen. In Chinese cities the security is extreme, especially at night. Security guards are outside every shopping center all night, banks, at all the busy tourist spots, and the big brother cameras are everywhere. If you are in any sort of high financial area, or tourist area, you are on TV. Police do care, I have seen them take serious action for small issues, especially when asked to do so, they act. I have also seen them watch prostitution buys and drug sellers for hours, but this could be part of a gathering process or just controls. In California there are over 3,000 gun murders every year, ten times the amount of the iraq-afghanistan war death count per year. At this rate maybe Obama should turn the troops into the streets. Go to any huge crowd in the USA in a big city area like a concert on public transit or big event and pickpockets are everywhere. This is the same in crowds in any country not just China. It is rediculous how one US-ian said that he wants to reserve the right to pick up arms and fight his government. Including being that this has never happened in the countries history, and the few times acts of terrorism like this have been done they have been met with overwhealming government military force anyway, the peaceful movement is of course for anyone possessing a brain, the only option. You will of course not be a hero for being a Timothy Mcvey or Oklahoma bomber, doing your "political deeds" you will be a zero, oh and dead too. So the only sense amongst the tens of thousands of US children maimed and murdered every year by "People FREELY ABLE TO USE FREELY AVAILABLE GUNS to kill people" is to get rid of the guns. Political recalls if need to be done, are freely available without bloodshed to any non-idiot US-ian, as has been done so countless times before. hand over your murder toys, and become an intellectual force for positive change.
Mar 07, 2012 19:58 Report Abuse
Are you sure, you are in China?
you have got a distorted mentality
Mar 07, 2012 17:29 Report Abuse
Quite honestly, your post is an example of the distorted mentality which allows the US to be pretty much the ONLY country in the world, or one of the very few, where civilians are allowed to just buy guns in shops without a special permit or reason.
Look, Western European countries and Japan manage to be perfectly functioning democracies without allowing everyone to keep guns at home. Having people own guns only makes the society more violent and dangerous. People who are not trained professionals should not be able to use their guns to "defend" themselves from crime.
As for resisting tirrany, the fact is that in Western Europe the governments could not have allowed people to own guns in the early twentieth century, since there were large communist, socialist and anarchist movements, and they would have used the guns to fight against the police. The US government has never had to worry about that, since most Americans are far too brain-washed into believing they live in the best country in the world to ever act against the government. The guns only get used by the poor to kill each other, which might explain why they allow you to keep them.
Mar 07, 2012 17:03 Report Abuse
You do know that America and Canada are the top spots for Chinese and other nationals to immigrate to. I'm not saying owning a gun is good or bad but I'd rather own one than have to worry about some idiot who has one for bad puposes and would use it to harm me or my family. Besides that, it beats a knife, bat, sword or anything else a criminal may use to damage my or my families lively hood
Mar 08, 2012 00:13 Report Abuse
Not so Bozo.
The 2nd Amendment is a deterrent to tyranny. Some of us still believe in the Constitution not being soon fed pablum.
Your misdiagnosis of reality is not surprising.
I am sure you mean well, but when tyranny asks you to do something you quite don't agree with- go ahead and try talking your way out of it.
BTW I am Proud to be an American.
I do not loathe my status as you seem to do.
Mar 08, 2012 04:03 Report Abuse
Just in case you wonder i am vehemently arguing AGAINST any anti-gun idiots here.
i had guns since I was 8 years old.
We NEVER pointed them at people.
we learned gun safety and responsibility.
So, speaking to me with your theoretically and politically correct arguments are more like the buzz of a horse fly than they are truth.....
Mar 08, 2012 04:09 Report Abuse
I never said that the US is one giant bloodbath, but it is a fact that there is much more violent crime in the US than in pretty much any other developed nation. I have seen statistics for crime for all the OECD countries which show this, so I am not arguing out of nothing.
I am aware that not all Americans own guns, what has that got to do with anything. Owning guns does not have to be a "right", any more than not having my children vaccinated is a "right". It is not considered a right in most other countries in the world. Have you ever heard the saying "my freedom ends where other people's freedom begins"?
Mar 08, 2012 16:50 Report Abuse
not only just safe but much safer then the west because i myself have experienced the safey by living in china for more then 3 years.people can easily widrawl a huge amount of money without any tension or worries.
Mar 07, 2012 09:38 Report Abuse
Yeah， you are right. People in China fear to use gun, gun set out, a life lost. and murder must pay for the crime, often its own life. also, people without a fun is a common sense in China, so enjoy you safe life in China.
Mar 07, 2012 17:21 Report Abuse
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