Journal of Democracy, Volume 14, July 3, 2003.
By Lobsang Sangay
Tibet’s decades-long struggle for liberty is famous around the world. Less well-known is the tale of how the Tibetan government in exile and large numbers of Tibetans abroad have worked to foster not only the freedom of the homeland from which they have been driven, but also the practice of democracy among themselves. Their hope is that one day the institutions they have been nurturing—founded squarely upon the principles of government by consent and liberty under law—can take root and flourish in the soil of a free Tibet. This is an analysis of the democratic phemonenon within the Tibetan diaspora.
There are approximately 130,000 exiled Tibetans spread across about 25 countries. Seven-tenths of them reside in India, with another 13 percent in Nepal and Bhutan, followed by 8 percent in North America, 4 percent in Europe, and the rest scattered as far as Australia, South Africa, Japan, and Taiwan. Tibet’s government in exile, which is headquartered in the North Indian city of Dharamsala, administers no territory and has no military or police forces. Yet in some respects it functions much like other governments, running cabinet-level agencies concerned with finance, education, and health as well as interior and foreign ministries. 1 The foreign ministry runs 13 Offices of Tibet (effectively semi-embassies) in New York, Geneva, Moscow, Budapest, Pretoria, and Taipei. The elected legislature (Chitue) meets twice annually to legislate budget and policy matters and oversees the work of the directly elected prime minister and his cabinet (Kashag). The autonomous Audit Commission monitors how funds are spent and investigates mismanagement, while the Supreme Justice Commission tries civil cases. [End Page 119] There are roughly 3,500 full-time government employees. Most work in Dharamsala, which also contains the residence and office of the Dalai Lama. The overwhelming majority of these employees are from “commoner” backgrounds; only about one out of a hundred has ties to the traditional hereditary aristocracy of Tibet.
The democratization of Tibet’s exiled government is a phenomenon of recent vintage. Before 1959, when forces sent by the Chinese Communist regime of Mao Zedong made the Dalai Lama flee and effectively turned “the roof of the world” into a Chinese colony, Tibet was a feudal realm run by centuries-old customs that accorded the Dalai Lama supreme authority in political as well as spiritual matters.
While the switch to democracy was made in a peaceful and orderly fashion after substantial deliberation, questions naturally arise: Has democracy truly displaced feudalism, or is this a ploy to win the support of host country India and the West? Is it all just to make the Chinese look bad? How do internal, regional, and sectarian divisions within the exile community reflect and correspond to this nascent democracy? What is the Dalai Lama’s role? And finally, how genuine and deep is the democratic transition in the Tibetan community in exile? What are its limitations and successes?
Before 1959, Tibet was ruled under a two-tiered feudal system. At the top was the Dalai Lama (whom his followers believe to be a manifestation of the Buddha of Compassion; the current Lama is the fourteenth in the line) as the nominal supreme ruler, with roughly equal numbers of Tsidrung (monk-officials) and hereditary Kudrak (aristocrats) controlling the government.
Domestic Reaction and Foreign Invasion
Lay commoners—as well as, so some sources say, the Lama himself—had little or no power, almost of all of which lay in the hands of the entrenched monastic establishment and the landowning nobles. Both the monks and the grandees were strongly averse to reform. In 1923 and again in 1945, they shut down embryonic attempts to offer English-language instruction to a few Tibetan children, and also opposed the thirteenth Dalai Lama’s efforts to modernize the armed forces. These reactionary attitudes and the corruption that they fostered left Tibet shackled to feudalism and helpless to stop the Chinese Communist invasion of 1951. When troops sent by Beijing overran Tibet that year, their swift victory threw the entire self-absorbed old order into a profound crisis.
The Communists brought with them a militant ideology that trumpeted egalitarian ideas. While Beijing honored these principles in the breach rather than the observance, its rhetoric introduced into the Tibetan language such terms as maangtso (people’s democracy), rawang [End Page 120] (freedom), and dranyam (equality). 2 Some Tibetans were drawn to Communist ideals. The young Dalai Lama—who had passed his early life as the son of a modest peasant family before being removed at the age of 7 for monastic training as Tibet’s spiritual-political leader—saw affinities between Marxist professions of concern for the oppressed and Buddhist teachings about the importance of compassion. In 1954, the 21-year-old Lama created the 60-member Legchoe Lekhung (Reform Committee) to aid poor peasants and nomads by providing debt reduction, tax exemptions, and land taken from aristocratic and monastic estates. Sensing a threat to their franchise on “liberation,” the Communists shut it down.
Beijing’s own policies followed classic colonialist lines. The Communists recruited aristocrats and high-ranking lamas by giving them money and important-sounding titles. Ordinary Tibetans, resenting the disruption of their traditional lives by antireligious outsiders, and disgusted by the readiness of so many among the privileged to make deals with the invaders, began staging popular revolts in the mid-1950s. They culminated in a full-scale explosion in early 1959 in Lhasa, Tibet’s capital. The brutal Chinese counterattack forced the Dalai Lama and around 80,000 Tibetans to flee to India.
Soon after he went into exile, the first major challenge the Dalai Lama faced was to ensure the acceptance and survival of 80,000 Tibetans in an alien country with a tropical climate. India, itself a fledgling democracy facing huge development challenges, generously donated humanitarian assistance and helped thousands of Tibetans to find jobs (often as road builders). In addition, the government in Delhi provided land on which to establish separate Tibetan settlements. Indian magnanimity thus not only helped to save lives, but also aided the preservation of Tibetan national identity and sustained the Tibetan freedom struggle.
Not wishing to add extra strain to its already-difficult relations with China (the two countries would go to war in 1962), India took a cautious stand recognizing Chinese “suzerainty” over what Beijing insisted on calling the “Autonomous Region of Tibet.” In keeping with this low-profile policy, the “Central Tibetan Administration” (India has never formally recognized any Tibetan “government in exile”) was deliberately sited in then-remote Dharamsala—today a popular tourist destination for both Indians and international visitors, but in 1959 far off the beaten track.
Soon after setting up his office in Dharamsala, the Lama tasked his foreign department with devising a Tibetan constitution based on “people’s democracy.” Drawn up by Indian legal experts and officially adopted in 1963, this document closely followed the constitution of India, though not without a few uniquely Tibetan twists, including provisions for the Buddhist offices of Dalai Lama and Monk Regent. [End Page 121] Among the most controversial features was an article providing for the impeachment of the Dalai Lama. Most exiled Tibetans fiercely opposed this clause, and only the fourteenth Lama’s personal intervention kept it in. Years later, when asked how the constitution was adopted, one veteran of the first legislative assembly observed simply: “The Dalai Lama said so.” 3
In 1960, the Lama oversaw the first-ever election of representatives to the Tibetan national assembly. In the interest of unity and equality, this body gave equal representation to each of Tibet’s three regions and four Buddhist sects (Bon, the indigenous pre-Buddhist religion, was left out). The parliament, however, did not choose the cabinet, which remained under the Lama’s traditional sway and continued to handle the most important issues while legislators debated domestic matters and investigated administrative problems.
Yet even while Tibetan democracy remained more nominal than real, the practice of elections had significant spillover effects. Something like a civil society began to emerge; the use of voting and consultative measures became commonplace even in monasteries; Tibetan exiles were making the custom of rule by consent part of their everyday lives.
Turning Westward
In the 1960s, the Lama began to receive visits from Westerners interested in Tibetan Buddhism. Often members of the Western “counterculture” with left-wing political sympathies back home, these outsiders had an antimodern streak that reinforced Tibetan traditionalism and threatened to undermine democratization. While the Lama leaned tactically in the direction of a “Buddhist-Marxist dialogue” for larger geopolitical reasons in the 1970s, he always firmly opposed Marxist depredations such as the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution (the latter of which represented a particularly disastrous time for Tibet) and never gave in to the “countercultural” temptation to view Tibet less as a nation with a future than as a kind of living museum of quaint, premodern values maintained for the delectation of tourists with a taste for the exotic.
The Lama made his first trip to the West in 1973, and got an eyewitness look at how modern democratic systems function. In 1979, he traveled to the United States. Since then, he has visited North America and other parts of the world nearly every year. In 1987, while addressing the U.S. Congress, he offered a “Five-Point Peace Plan” which held that:
Fundamental human rights and democratic freedoms must be respected in Tibet. The Tibetan people must once again be free to develop culturally, intellectually, economically and spiritually and to exercise basic democratic freedoms. 4 [End Page 122]
Constantly learning and heartened by Western support, the Lama deepened his belief in the value of democratic ways and institutions. In June 1988, he presented the European Parliament with his “Strasbourg Proposal,” 5 a major international document in which he reiterated his insistence on a democratic future for Tibet and disavowed any desire to take an “active part” in its government. During the late 1980s—a time of general ferment in China—Lhasa and other places in Tibet witnessed a series of sporadically violent rallies for independence led by monks and ordinary Tibetans. In March 1989, Beijing imposed martial law on the Tibet Autonomous Region.
Throughout this time, the Lama continued to call for a settlement based squarely on the principles of nonviolence and democracy. In 1989—the fateful year of the Tiananmen Square massacre and the fall of the Berlin Wall—he won the Nobel Peace Prize. In his acceptance speech, the Lama offered summoning words. Citing affinities between democracy and aspects of Buddhism, he declared that the desire for freedom is part of the universal nature of humanity. “The great changes that are taking place everywhere in the world, from Eastern Europe to Africa,” he said, “are a clear indication of this.” Turning to China, he struck a sober but hopeful note by observing that [T]he popular movement for democracy was crushed by brutal force in June this year. But I do not believe the demonstrations were in vain, because the spirit of freedom was rekindled among the Chinese people and China cannot escape the impact of this spirit of freedom sweeping many parts of the world. The brave students and their supporters showed the Chinese leadership and the world the human face of that great nation. 6
It is clear that the Dalai Lama’s political maturity and embrace of democracy deepened over time. His world travel (183 trips to 57 countries between 1954 and 2000) and exchanges with figures such as Pope John Paul II, Václav Havel, Desmond Tutu, Amartya Sen, Karl Popper, and Robert Nozick, to name a few, helped him toward a bone-deep certainty concerning the virtues of free self-government, respect for the dignity of the human person, and liberty under law.
Aside from the Lama’s noble personal journey, the main impetus for further democratization came from within the exile community itself. This was a less exalted tale of sectarian and regional divisions, political intrigues, and power struggles, all taking place within the inherent weaknesses and limitations of an exile government. The founding of the Chitue along regional and sectarian lines back in the early 1960s had been meant to unify Tibetans, but instead perpetuated divisions. Later in the decade, exiled Tibetans from two less-populous regions, three Buddhist sects, and the indigenous Bon religion rejected the Chitue and set up a parallel organization. The exile government, lacking any organs of compulsion, was powerless to stop this. The controversy lingered for more than a decade. [End Page 123]
In 1982, the secular Tibetan Youth Congress proposed a “one person, one vote” solution that would do away with sectarian and regional factors and simply let Tibetans cast their votes for parliament as individuals. Leaders from the minority regions (accounting for less than a third of the electorate) fought vehemently against this measure, complaining that it would mean perpetual majority dominance. They would only give up their electoral rights to the Dalai Lama, they insisted, and so under this duress he reluctantly appointed the next two Chitues. Leaders were known to quarrel bitterly over the proper regional affiliation of small districts—truly “much ado about nothing” with all of Tibet under Chinese occupation, and hardly behavior calculated to reflect credit on democracy.
The most severe problem, however, had to do with the “Taiwan affair.” This imbroglio began when one person charged that an official of the Tibetan exile government was secretly funneling money from the intelligence services of the Kuomintang government to Dharamsala. Since the Chinese Nationalist constitution claimed Tibet as part of the Republic of China, such contacts were taboo. Instead of swiftly investigating and resolving the matter, which at its core came down to one individual’s allegations about the behavior of another, the Chitue and the Kashag made the case a factional football and dragged the matter painfully out. (It is important to note that since the democratization of Taiwan and the Dalai Lama’s two visits there, the relationship between Dharamsala and Taipei has improved markedly.)
Scandals, Squabbles, and Silver Linings
While such repeated controversies and scandals undermined and distracted the Tibetan government in exile, they were not without a silver lining. Historically, democracy has often progressed less because of pure idealism than because the democratic “rules of the game” seem to offer the best all-around compromise solution to contending parties exhausted by inconclusive conflicts. Tibet’s experience follows this “settlement of stalemate” storyline. The Lama made his most dramatic moves on behalf of democratization with the unseemly domestic controversies mentioned above very much in mind. External factors mattered too, as communism fell throughout the Soviet world, apartheid ended in South Africa, and the global third wave of democratization made its influence felt. Perhaps the most immediately relevant external factor, however, was the June 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. This atrocity dealt a terrible setback to the third wave and prompted the Lama to stress democracy even more firmly as the only decent alternative to the one-party tyranny that was slaughtering unarmed student protestors in the heart of Beijing even as it continued to trample the people of tiny, far-off, and defenseless Tibet under its iron boot heel. [End Page 124]
Sensing a readiness among Tibetans, the Lama initiated dramatic democratization in May 1990 by dissolving the Chitue and calling for the election of a new parliament expanded to 46 members, at least six of whom would be women. This assembly met for the first time a year later. Its first task was to draw up a new charter to replace the 1963 constitution. The 350-year-old custom of having the Lama appoint the Kashag was abandoned in favor of letting parliament choose the cabinet. The clause to impeach the Dalai Lama was retained. The term maangtso (“people’s democracy”), borrowed from Communist Chinese literature, was replaced by the Tibetan word mangtso (“rule by the majority”).
In order to settle controversies within the exile community, the first Supreme Justice Commission (SJC) was established in September 1991 and became open to public litigation in January 1997. The SJC functions like a court, but because India does not officially recognize the Tibetan exile government, the SJC tries only civil cases in which all parties are Tibetans, and employs the premises of arbitration law. All criminal matters go to the Indian judicial system. Since 1997, the SJC has ruled on nine cases ranging from a defamation complaint against a popular newspaper to a suit aimed at overturning a decision of the Election Commission. In each instance, the parties followed the decision of the SJC even though it lacks a mechanism for enforcement.
Since May 1991, the new Chitue has steadily assumed lawmaking responsibilities, and the cabinet has abided by its legislation. The Chitue has adopted more than 25 major legislative acts detailing parliamentary procedures, election laws, administrative rules and regulations, and budgetary processes. The goal in every case has been to make the exile government and its agencies more accountable and transparent. Adding to the shift in favor of parliamentary power have been cases in which the Chitue has investigated allegations of corruption in executive agencies and forced officials to resign.
Despite all the progress of establishing democratic institutions and processes, some critics continued to level charges of patrimonialism and theocracy. In every cabinet chosen between 1991 and 2001, for instance, at least one minister and sometimes two came from the Yabshis, the Dalai Lama’s family. The Yabshi members, who included the Lama’s older brother, younger sister, and several in-laws, were quick to point out that they were elected by the democratic parliament enjoying the mandate of the people and not appointed by their relative. Opponents retorted that the Yabshis were elected because of their familial affinities and the extended charisma of the Dalai Lama, an advantage that ordinary Tibetans lack. The Lama himself was sensitive to the danger of patrimonialism and resisted appointing family members during the 30 years when he had sole power to name the cabinet. Nonetheless, his elder brother Gyalo Thondup, holding the traditional post of Sawang [End Page 125] Chenpo (Great Lord), exerted strong influence throughout, even though the Lama on eight occasions between 1978 and 1986 resisted pressure to appoint him prime minister. 7
The second criticism asserts that with or without official constitutional authority, the Dalai Lama remains the most powerful and influential leader among Tibetans, which points to the paradox of having a figure whose claim to significance rests on the religious belief that he is a manifestation of Buddha remain as the leader of a democratic nation. The Lama, on this view, deserves great credit for guiding Tibetans down a democratic path, but must give way politically to a popularly elected leader and let his office become a purely spiritual one. There is no doubt that he enjoys the mandate of the Tibetan people, but if he is to lead them to full democracy must he not step aside and let a secular system flourish?
To address this issue, the Dalai Lama in 1992 made a major statement regarding his plans, saying that “I have made up my mind that I will not play any role in the future government of Tibet, let alone seek the Dalai Lama’s traditional political position in the government.” 8 He went on to lay out a detailed plan for transitional government and the eventual election of a president. In his 10 March 2000 statement (equivalent to a State of the Union address), and later in an address to parliament, he proposed changes amending the charter to allow for the direct election of the prime minister in a system akin to the French mixture of presidential and parliamentary principles.
Voting in the Diaspora
On 12 May 2001, Tibetans aged 18 and over from New York to New Delhi took part in locally organized pollings for the first-ever elected Tibetan prime minister. The first round generated excitement and high turnout, especially in India and Nepal. After preliminary counting, local election commissions in 25 countries of the Tibetan diaspora sent their ballots to be tallied by the Central Election Commission in Dharamsala as observers from independent NGOs watched. The runoff, held August 20, pitted the India-based Samdhong Rinpoche against Juchen Thupten, who had held the premiership under the old system. Rinpoche won overwhelmingly with almost 85 percent (representing about 29,000 votes).
The parliamentary election was nonpartisan, and the system used was proportional representation based on the religious sects and regions of Tibet. The election law rules out parties on the grounds that, at this point in its freedom struggle, Tibet cannot afford formal partisan divisions. (The Indian government’s quiet opposition to parties among the Tibetans also plays a role.) Another unique feature of the political system requires that exiled Tibetans pay Rangzen Lakhdeb (“voluntary [End Page 126] freedom tax”) in order to vote. The average is US$90 annually per person in developed countries and US$2 in India and Nepal. Collectively, these modest fees make up slightly more than a fifth of the exile government’s shoe-string annual administrative budget.
Another crucial issue for the Tibetan people and their government in exile is the succession to the fourteenth Dalai Lama. He has insisted that “If I passed away, the Tibetan people would want a Dalai Lama. But I have made clear that the next Dalai Lama will be born in a free country. I think the Tibetans will accept that—and they won’t accept a boy chosen by the Chinese.” 9 For the absolute majority of Tibetans inside and outside Tibet, the Dalai Lama’s word on the issue of his succession is final. According to Tibetan Buddhist tradition, such is the prerogative of the Dalai Lama. Since the next Lama must carry on his mission, if one dies in exile the reborn Lama should pick up where his predecessor left off. Thus the Dalai Lama’s decision that his successor will be born in a “free country” (where Buddhism is practiced) means that unless Tibet becomes “free” (whether as a sovereign state or a region within in China that is “autonomous” in more than name) the Dalai Lama will be born outside Tibet.
Whether the Dalai Lama is born in exile or inside Tibet, there is a problem. Historically, the period between the Dalai Lama’s death and his successor’s maturity 18 years later has been tense and intrigue-ridden. When a Dalai Lama dies, a regent takes over until maturity. Regents seeking to hang on to power have caused trouble in the past, most recently (and severely) after the death of the thirteenth Dalai Lama in the mid-1930s. To forestall this, the charter calls for parliament, in consultation with the SJC, to elect a regency council. This is better than the old practice, but an even wiser alternative might be to make the regency exclusively responsible for seeking and selecting the Dalai Lama while the elected prime minister handles day-to-day executive functions. Separating the regency from executive power will lessen the conflict of interests and serve as a strong disincentive for power struggles. Also, the actions of the regency and the search for the Dalai Lama will no doubt be made somewhat more transparent and accountable to parliament and public through periodic public announcements and other means. In these ways, the succession of the Dalai Lama is to be understood as a historically specific problem, remedied by the exile governments’ implementation of democratic policies and institutions.
The literacy rate among Tibetans born in exile (and therefore 44 years [End Page 127] of age or younger) is 78 percent. Since 1988, 237 scholars or students from the Tibetan community in exile have come to the United States on Fulbright grants and scholarships. More than 95 percent have returned to hold posts in the exile government. 10 Their influence is only likely to grow, and with it the importance of democratic ideas for the future of Tibet. The German-based Friedrich Naumann Stiftung provides comparatively major funding for democracy-related activities and organizations; the U.S.-based National Endowment for Democracy also funds a few activities in the Tibetan community in exile. There is a dawning realization among many exiled Tibetan leaders that democracy attracts talented and educated young people and also provides a unifying mechanism amid the regional and sectarian diversity of Tibetans. Importantly, there is near-unanimity among Tibetans that feudalism, theocracy, patrimonialism, and nepotism all work against the prospect of a free Tibet.
After the Dalai Lama
Based on these facts and observations, the Tibetan government in exile’s commitment to democracy seems irreversible. But enormous challenges remain. There is a Buddhist saying that, “one who is born has to die.” The present Dalai Lama is a figure of enormous moral authority nearly the world over. When the time comes for him to leave the scene, it will be seen whether the democratic institutions and convictions that he and his fellow Tibetan exiles have fostered will be enough to sustain the Tibetan national movement.
Nothing is a given: The Tibetan national movement and its government in exile could lose their legitimacy and staying power after the fourteenth Dalai Lama. Perhaps a secular, democratically elected leader might arise to help guide Tibetans politically while the next Dalai Lama fulfills a spiritual role and symbolizes Tibetan unity. Such a state of things might strike the very balance that exiled Tibetans need: maintaining Buddhist traditions and Tibetan identity while embracing the possibilities offered by a vigorous democracy and a vibrant civil society.
Alternatively, if Tibetans now in exile were someday to return to Tibet, they would face a Herculean task. Whatever deal is struck between Beijing and Dharamsala will have huge implications. If the best-case scenario comes about and Tibet receives full independence, the future government in Lhasa will have a free hand. If it is a confederal arrangement of the “one country, two systems” sort, then Hong Kong and Macao may serve as precedents. In the latter event, the Chinese government will wield major influence; with its branches in every village of Tibet, the local Communist Party could offer a formidable opposition: There will be no democratization in Tibet proper unless [End Page 128] and until the Communists’ one-party control is overcome. Over the past decades, Beijing has been systematically populating the valleys and larger towns of Tibet with ethnic-Chinese migrants; the native-Tibetan nomads and peasants are thinly scattered over high plateaus, making communication, networking, and mobilization an uphill battle. And will the conservative Buddhist monastic community accept secular democracy?
However, one can also think of three formidable reasons that democracy might catch on in Tibet. First, Tibetans are likely to want neither one-party Communist rule nor a return to the old feudal ways, leaving democracy as the most likely alternative. Second, if the Dalai Lama uses his personal charisma, spiritual authority, and political legitimacy to advocate democracy when back in Tibet, as he has done publicly and repeatedly while in exile, then certainly a majority will follow his lead. Third, modern educated Tibetans of the diaspora will bring their exiles’ experience of democracy with them when they return home, which should be a potent factor in favor of democracy.
In the early 1950s, the Dalai Lama and Tibet’s ruling class were hard-pressed to defend their country’s grossly unequal feudal system not only practically but also on the level of ideas. They scrambled to introduce land reform and other changes. Fifty years later, with the relative democratization of the exile government, the Dalai Lama is on firm ideological ground because he and his people have begun to institutionalize equality and freedom. China continues to mouth these words, but has yet to implement them in Tibet. Moreover, by devising detailed schemes of democratic governance for his exile community of Tibetans headquartered in Dharamsala, and by sagely recusing himself from any political post, the Dalai Lama has embraced a way of leading human beings far superior either to the system that produced him or to the Communist regime that currently oppresses his homeland.
Lobsang Sangay is a doctoral candidate at Harvard Law School and an editorial consultant for Radio Free Asia. An earlier version of this essay was presented at an April 2002 Harvard University conference on “The Cold War and Its Legacy in Tibet: Great-Power Politics and Regional Security.”
Notes
I wish to thank Mark Kramer for permission to publish this shorter version of my original essay. I am grateful also to Dawa Norbu, Laura Zimmerman, Tsering Wangmo, Susan Pharr, and my wife, Kesang Yangdon, for their comments. Any errors in this article are mine alone.
1. For example, the education ministry runs 87 schools with 30,000 students in India, Nepal, and Bhutan. Similarly, the finance ministry has 21 business units in India, Nepal, Australia, and the United States, with a budget of approximately US$8 million. The health department runs more than 100 clinics where both allopathic and traditional Tibetan medicine are practiced. The home (interior) department administers 54 settlements, and the department of religion looks after more than 200 monasteries and nunneries with more than 20,000 monks and nuns. His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet (Dharamsala, India: Tibetan Department of Information and International Relations, 2002). [End Page 129]
2. Author’s interview with the Dalai Lama, Dharamsala, India, 23 November 2000.
3. Author’s interview with Gyakpon Kesang Damdul, Dharamsala, India, 11 November 2000.
4. A.A. Shiromany, ed., The Spirit of Tibet: Universal Heritage—Selected Speeches and Writings of H.H. the Dalai Lama XIV (New Delhi: Tibetan Parliamentary and Policy Research Center, 1995), 156-62.
5. A.A. Shiromany, ed., Spirit of Tibet, 163-74.
6. A.A. Shiromany, ed., Spirit of Tibet, 127-29.
7. Author’s interview with former prime minister Juchen Thupten, Dharamsala, India, 17 July 2002.
8. A.A. Shiromany, The Political Philosophy of H.H. the XIV Dalai Lama (New Delhi: Tibetan Parliamentary and Policy Research Center and Friedrich Naumann Stiftung, 1998), 276-86.
9. Jonathan Mirsky, “The Dalai Lama on Succession and on the CIA,” New York Review of Books, 10 June 1999.
10. Author’s interview with Director Tenzin Chodak of the Tibet Fund, 16 April 2002.
