Religious freedom advocates and human rights organizations frequently critique China’s restrictions on religious rights. This has come into stark relief with China’s treatment of the Uighurs and other Muslim ethnic minorities, as well as its policy requiring state control of religious activities. Government suppression and state control, however, are not the only options for the authoritarian regime. For tens of millions of Protestant Christians, the Chinese government has pursued a different, more nuanced, and unexpected path—containment.
In Authoritarian Containment, Marie-Eve Reny explores why the Chinese government has chosen to informally contain certain religious organizations instead of repressing or co-opting them, especially because religion has a history of undermining authoritarian rule. Her thesis is that “public security bureaus tolerate [unregistered Protestant] churches to contain the influence of informal Protestantism in urban China” (p. 6). Toleration is an authoritarian bargain, where the price is that the church cannot resist the regime with its limited freedom. Such an approach fits with the growing scholarship on the role of bounded tolerance in authoritarian resilience.
Throughout the book, Reny painstakingly documents the unofficial deal that public security bureaus have struck with Protestant house churches in urban China. Her analysis suggests that local security officials will allow the house churches to operate on two conditions: they must refrain from threatening the regime in Beijing and must provide information to the bureaus. In return, the house churches are free to operate as unofficial religious organizations. As a result, containment becomes a tool, not for freedom, but for maintenance of the authoritarian order. House churches are given just enough freedom to keep them loyal to the ultimate goals of the government.
As Reny describes, the deal between the public security bureaus and the house churches stems not from the central party, but rather is fashioned from the bottom up—at the local level. The bargain is based on rational choices by both government officials and church leaders, allowing them to achieve their primary goals. For the security bureaus, containment requires much less cost and energy than repression, and it maintains political stability. In fact, the arrangement assures that churches will not become too political. For the house churches, they receive a level of existence, safety, and autonomy that they cannot achieve by either being politically opposed to the government or being thoroughly co-opted by becoming a government-sanctioned religious organization. The gray area of containment benefits both parties, but ultimately, as Reny explores, it is an authoritarian strategy used by the local government to maintain efficient oversight and compliance.
Authoritarian Containment is an excellent work of social science. The theoretical approach is carefully developed, and Reny has completed extensive fieldwork with largely invisible Chinese house churches. She describes her approach as “immersion” (p. 21), and this is evident in the data and analyses. She conducted more than 100 interviews in nine Chinese cities, paring these with an enormous amount of other qualitative data. The book’s argument is clearly developed and well supported by documentary and interview evidence. Along the way, Authoritarian Containment ably tells the stories of how the church leaders think about their role in Chinese society, their relationship with public security bureaus, and their religious commitments. Reny also provides evidence that her theory travels. She ends the book by examining two non-Christian cases. She provides convincing, though more limited, evidence of authoritarian governments using containment strategies to appease the Muslim Brotherhood in 1970s Egypt and the jihadi Salafists in Jordan.
Although Reny’s book is insightful regarding the relationship between the underground house church movement and the Chinese government, the book could have done more to draw broader implications. Authoritarian Containment does a bit to connect the findings to the maintenance of authoritarian regimes, particularly their relationship to civil society groups. Yet, these links disappear throughout much of the book.
Although churches and religious leaders are the focal point, there is also surprisingly little theoretical connection to the role of religious organizations and religious leaders in politics, both in and out of authoritarian regimes. The scope of prior work suggests that religion is ambivalent, siding with authoritarianism, democracy, populism, human rights, and everywhere in between. In other contexts, clergy often have much less political influence in practice than many expect because of personal and congregational constraints. Exploring how and why clergy might be able to shape rational bargains in unregistered house churches could help scholars of religion and politics better understand the role of religious elites. It appears that church leaders are willing to forego broader interests if their status is threatened. Such an implication is likely to have broad application.
Related, the book assumes rationality by both religious and government actors. For example, it finishes by suggesting that societal actors strategically maximize their survival (p. 139). Rationality is certainly a component of how we understand religious advocacy, but like other social actors, religious groups frequently take myopic or other-worldly positions. Why has rationality developed in these contexts, and why does it persist? It would be particularly helpful to know whether religious actors are supported by their congregations in these rational choice decisions or whether there are scenarios that spark resistance or defection.
Finally, the Chinese containment strategy that Reny highlights is unlikely to last in perpetuity. Unregistered Christian groups are growing quickly in urban China. Containment permits this spread, but the government is likely to become increasingly concerned as the political power of these groups grows. (This scenario also plays out in Reny’s case of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt.) This is a tenuous bargain for the Chinese government, which has led to periods of repression, even since the publication of Reny’s book. Some of these implications are hinted at, though they are not thoroughly examined. Such critiques are minor and will be useful avenues for future research.
Authoritarian Containment is an impressive, immersive study of the informal bargain that local authoritarian leaders in China strike with unregistered religious groups. Reny’s work is clearly argued and meticulously researched, and it helps make sense of authoritarian tolerance and religious capitulation in China. I hope the book spawns more studies that build on its theories and findings.
