This study is a rhetorical analysis of the protests that occurred along the international leg of the 2008 Beijing Olympic torch relay. This study aimed to identify the rhetorical strategies employed by the agitators that were demonstrated along the torch relay. There were two agitative groups: The movement and the counter-movement. The movement began at the start of the torch relay and the counter-movement began demonstrating one week later. There were a number of protest groups in the movement including human rights activists, media rights activists, and environmentalists. However, there was only one distinct group in the counter-movement, pro-China supporters. The movement agitated the Chinese government and their nation's government. To establish the rhetorical strategies and tactics utilized by the two agitative groups and the control groups, this study analyzed the artifact through the model of the rhetoric of agitation and control created by Bowers, Ochs, and Jensen (1993) and symbolic interaction. This study . found that the Chinese government (the control) created the counter-movement to suppress and provide a counter-persuasion to the movement. To achieve this rhetorical strategy the control fully co-opted the rhetorical strategies of the movement. This study also, found that the governments to which the agitators belonged to completely denied the demands of the agitators in order to maintain healthy relations with China.

A society without any conflicts or disputes is not equal to a harmonious society, but should establish a rational and effective diversified system of conflict resolution. This research tries to study group interest conflicts, their causes, mediation processes and the ways of their resolution in urban communities (Shanghai as an example) in China. Two main research objects are: First, to analyze the characteristics and differences of conflict resolution styles in various modes of state-society relationship in different societies; and to analyze the characteristics and differences of group conflicts that are related with governmental interests in the present transforming China. Second, to investigate the way civil mediation organizations use to reconcile and resolve group interest conflicts, especially those between residents and the government; and to study the interaction among these three parties, the different strategies of each party and the limitations of their action. Based on relevant theories and Blake and Mouton's (1964) Managerial Grid of self-report five-style conflict resolution, this study tries to explain the changing relationship between the state and social organizations through conflict mediation and resolution by "Lin Yue Mediation Workroom". It argues that the state-society relationship in contemporary China is neither state-centered nor society-centered, but a state-led social pluralism. Drawing on research, observation, detailed case of group conflict, a lot of open-ended in-depth interviews, and official documentaries in the Shanghai community, it reveals that group conflict and its resolution are influenced by the government in the contemporary Chinese city. State power infiltrated the process of conflict mediation and resolution. In the transforming China, as the state now is facing heavy social conflicts and has limited ability to resolve all of them, it gives power to social organizations and let them working independently on managing conflicts, but still with quite strong control and restrictions on those organizations, no matter in financial or policy aspect. Meanwhile, social organizations are also seeking ways to maximize their own interest and to create more developing chances during the interaction with the state. The new mode of civil mediation workroom (run as GONGO), acting as a bridge and conflict buffer zone between the government and society, though still quite dependent on the government, has led the state to make adjustment of its relationship with the society by conflict resolution. / In nowadays' rapidly developing China, the transformative interaction between the state and plural social organizations could improve the way and outcome of conflict resolution, making harmonious community possible! IV / In the contemporary transforming era of China, how conflict resolution affects the way a state is governed? / 胡潔人. / Adviser: Chan Kim Man. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 72-10, Section: A, page: . / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (p.189-210). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. [Ann Arbor, MI] : ProQuest Information and Learning, [201-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstracts in Chinese and English. / Hu Jieren.