Emotional Mobilization of Chinese Veterans: Collective Activism, Flexible Governance and Dispute Resolution

Based on in-depth interviews of Chinese veterans and specifically focusing on the cadets in Shanghai, this article explores the mechanism of emotional mobilization of this highly organized contentious group vis-à-vis other disorganized and dispersive one such as labors and homeowners. It reveals that strong emotional ties with comrades in troops and the despondency brought about by the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) ineffective redress to their demands have rendered Chinese veterans, who see themselves rhetorically glorified and embodying heroic status in the country, protesting for their military identity and military rank recovery for decades. In order to defuse veterans’ grievances, flexible governance, which stresses emotional care and affection by petition social workers, is deployed by the Party-state to settle disputes that beyond law and policy.