Front Burner - Will a 'Free Tibet' die with the Dalai Lama?

Episode Date: July 10, 2025

The Dalai Lama has spent almost his entire adult life as a refugee from his homeland of Tibet. Fleeing Chinese persecution in the 1950s, he has built a nation in exile, striving to preserve Tibetan culture as not just the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism, but as a global ambassador for his people's cause.But he knows a transition is coming. On his 90th birthday this week, the Dalai Lama announced plans for how his successor will be chosen after his death. Since that successor will be a child, that means years of power vacuum that China is almost certain to capitalize on, including attempting to name a rival Dalai Lama of their own.Mujib Mashal is the South Asia bureau chief with the New York Times. He explains what's at stake for the people of Tibet — and Asian geopolitics more broadly — in the coming power struggle when the Dalai Lama passes on.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

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Hi everyone, I'm Jamie Poisson. Earlier this week, the Dalai Lama turned 90 years old. That's a milestone birthday for anybody. But it was a particularly significant one for the Dalai Lama and the community of Tibetans that he leads because he announced plans for how his successor will be chosen. The Dalai Lama is not just the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism, he's also a political leader

and a global ambassador. Since fleeing Chinese persecution in the 1950s, he's built and led a Tibetan nation in exile, while also traveling the world and advocating for Tibetan sovereignty. He's also been an important political counterbalance to Chinese influence, particularly by the United States. But that can't last forever. According to tradition, the Dalai Lama is to be succeeded by his reincarnation, so the search for that successor can only begin after he dies. That means two things. First, an extended period of having no Dalai Lama at all. And second, the chance of disputes over who the true successor actually is, with China already saying that

they get to pick. And that has the potential to unravel everything the current Dalai Lama has spent his life filming. Majib Mashal is the South Asia bureau chief at the New York Times. He's been following the story very closely. And he recently did some reporting from Dharamshala, where the Tibetan government in exile is based. Majeeb, thank you so much for coming onto the show. It's a pleasure. Thanks for having me. So as part of these 90th birthday celebrations, the Dalai Lama announced this week that his

successor will be picked in the traditional way after his death. I am affirming that the institution of the Dalai Lama will continue, he said, saying the trust he founded has the sole authority to recognize the future reincarnation. I wonder if you could take me through how that process actually works. What is it going to be like? So, over the past decade or so, the Dalai Lama had said he would lay out kind of clear instructions for how his reincarnation would work in these extraordinary circumstances where China has been waiting for the opportunity of a vacuum.

Over the years, he had suggested that he may change the traditional methods, that he may find a successor to pass on his spiritual powers to in his lifetime, or that could even be a woman, you know, and then he had also said that his reincarnation would come from a free country, which is sort of, you know, would cut off China. So he'd made all these suggestions over the years, but then he said, okay, on my 90th birthday, I will lay out clear instructions for how this happens. So we were all watching for his 98th birthday to see you know what kind of instructions he has and then on his birthday he actually reinforced the traditional method as opposed to you know any out-of-the-box ideas. And the

way the traditional method works is that after a Dalai Lama passes away, he kind of leaves clues and then there are search committees of monks that would go across Tibet and look for a baby that was born after the Dalai Lama's death that had those signs. And then that baby would be identified and it would be brought to a monastery and given education and raised until you reach maturity. And then that person would take on of education of the next one will be a long period of 10, 15 years even more for GAP. And am I right to say that this is how it's been done for centuries?

Precisely, this has been the traditional method that you know, done for centuries, yeah. Were you surprised this week that he said that he was kind of sticking with this traditional method? There was an element of surprise simply because the Dalai Lama had floated all these out of the box ideas, right? I mean, subsequently as we've spoken to people, they're like, well, you know, it would have been very difficult for him to change such a rooted tradition. So any possibility of something out of the box was very slim. He just he's very good at kind of keeping China on his toes. And he floated all these ideas over the years to test the limits of what he could get away with his own kind of orthodoxy. And because he's been a modernizing figure in kind of the tradition of Dalai Lama,

he's changed a lot of things. And this was one other area he was trying to test the waters and sort of see how far he can push things. But ultimately, the fact that he stuck to tradition did not surprise a lot of people who walked in closely, but it kind of suggested that there was a limit to his modernizing efforts. You mentioned earlier that he had floated the idea before of his successor not being born in a free country, but he didn't say that on his 90th birthday. And could you just tell me why that was significant? Yes, so in the past, he had repeated this principle

that my successor will be born in a free country. And that everybody read as a sign that as long as Tibet is controlled by China, he does not consider the Tibet a free country. So he's signaling that his successor would come from the diaspora, from this refugee population of roughly 140,000, 150,000 people, about half of them in India, in these sort of refugee settlements, and then the rest of them spread out around dozens of countries around the world. So he had repeated this principle that my

successor will come from a free country. But on his birthday, in this statement that he read in a video message to a conference of monks, he didn't repeat that part. And many of the analysts we spoke to who watched closely, they saw in that a potential all-glove branch to sort of China, that maybe in what remains of his life, he hasn't given up on the possibility of a negotiated deal with China. That although he's 90, a return home has evaded him for what 60 65 years but he he knows that if he dies as a refugee it's not just a

complication for his nation it is also a complication for the Chinese government what is the Communist Party going to do with six million Tibetans who will be furious about the fact that they were denied an opportunity to see their spiritual leader in their lifetime? Right? So, so, so, so, so a lot of people saw the fact that that phrase was missing in his statement as a potential signal to China that, hey, I'm still open to negotiations. And we know that there are back channels. It's just that those back channels have not brought any closer to a deal. But the fact that that

phrase was missing was seen as a signal to China that he's still open to negotiations and to a possibility of return home before the end of his life. The Chinese government has come out and said that they will essentially be naming their own Dalai Lama after his death. A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson responded, saying China practices a policy of freedom of religious belief and has the right to approve the Dalai Lama's successor as a legacy from imperial times. Of course, this Dalai Lama, he said like his camp

will be responsible for naming his successor. And just what is at stake here in that potential dispute over his successor and how could that play out? Yeah, so the Chinese government has said that they are the only authority to kind of, you know, recognize the Dalai Lama. And there is a blueprint for the Chinese government in kind of disputing authorities of Tibetan Buddhism. I believe in the late 80s when the second highest figure of Tibetan Buddhism, the Panchen Lama died,

the Dalai Lama recognized the boy as the next Panchen Lama. But that boy disappeared. And then the Chinese government in his stead sort of pushed another monk and recognized another monk as a Panchen Lama. And that monk recently met Xi Jinping and sort of reaffirmed his support for the Chinese Communist Party. So if they've done that with the second highest position of Tibetan Buddhism, there are every

signs that they're waiting to do the same thing with the Dalai Lama, the position of the Dalai Lama. China's state essentially is a by now seven decades long fight for autonomy, for freedom to practice traditions and cultures and Tibetan language. We seeking genuine autonomy, not seeking independence. Because from the beginning, the Chinese Communist Party has been trying to unite this huge nation around the Shuan Party and do away with the kind of diversity that the Tibetans want to hold on to.

The Dalai Lama met with China's new communist rulers traveling to Beijing to see Chairman Mao Zedong. Mao said to him that, quote, religion is poison. And they've been very systematic in releasing signs of Tibetan culture and traditions. You've all probably seen reports of the boarding schools that they've created to put Tibetan children through to train them in Chinese sort of language and traditions and erase You know the traditional education and in your cultural and tradition training that they would get Mandarin not Tibetan is taught as the main language in schools

Versions of Tibetan culture are in accordance with the rules Religious traditions centuries old are regulated by the officially atheist state. And the Chinese government sees an opportunity that if they can dispute the highest spiritual position that holds together the sense of identity they can finally push through their project. Music

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as it's now called in China, is known as the roof of the world, a place of mountains and monasteries, popular with Chinese tourists. Though international tourists are restricted and foreign journalists can't travel freely to the region. Do you have a sense of like how they might respond to a Dalai Lama chosen by China? There are clear signs that they would be furious. In recent years, around 2008, there were these protests of self-immolation even by monks in Tibet.

What is clear is that the six million people who live in Tibet have been, a large number of them have been denied an opportunity to see their spiritual leader. They've clung to hope that, you know, at some point this exile will end and the Adhaya Rama will call home, but as it becomes clearer that they may not get to see their spiritual leader in their lifetime. And not only that, the Chinese government will kind of hijack the process after him. What we're hearing, and there's very little that comes out of Tibet, simply because of how firm Chinese control is there. What we're hearing is the connection to the spiritual authorities such that

any Chinese effort to play with that will create quite a volatile situation and quite the anger and fury. So the analysts we speak to say life after Dalai Lama might not be so easy for the Chinese government also because controlling millions of people who whose identity has been erased and then in a moment where they lose sort of their binding spiritual figure as well will be quite a difficult task. And on the Dalai Lama side, of course, he's spent all of these decades building this government in exile, right? This democratic government in exile.

In 1959, the Dalai Lama fled into exile in India with thousands of other Tibetans after a failed uprising against Chinese rule. They took control of Tibet. And we talked about that gap that will take place, right, before the naming of his successor and the raising of his successor. Is what he has built robust enough to provide the kind of continuity and stability that would be needed in that kind of time? So the institutions that he's built may end up being a huge part of his legacy. So traditionally the Dalai Lama would hold both political power and spiritual authority. What he did in the early months of becoming a refugee, he turned, he saw sort of the survival of his refugee nation in this idea of democracy that had fascinated him for a long time.

He had visited India as the young monk many times and he had sort of been charmed by the open debate in India's republic, this new republic. Terspur in the northeast of India has become known all over the world. For it was here that India received the Dalai Lama after his flight from Tibet. India offered the god-king of Buddhism a safe refuge from the communist Chinese. So as soon as he came to exile and he became a refugee, he started this project of devolving his political power to democratic institutions. So he set up this little democracy in the Himalayas in this place called Dar-e-Kamshala. He started a little parliament from a first meeting that this

parliament had under a tree to now it is a 45-member parliament with a beautiful building and chambers and discussions. The parliament has members from the refugee settlements around India, but also as far as North America and Europe. The members come meet twice a year, once at the beginning of the year to approve a budget and then once at the end of the year to oversee the report to the government. This government in exile that he created, the institutions he created, they do service delivery, they run clinics in refugee settlements, they run schools, they do music training, but they see the big mission of their work as maintaining

and preserving Tibetan culture and traditions that are being erased in China. In 2011, after decades of kind of gradually devolving his political power, he completely retired his political role. And since 2011, Tibetan refugees have been directly electing a president, right? So every five years they have a vote and so the hope is that he foresaw that in a moment of transition his spiritual authority is likely going to be disputed. The political power is also vested in that one man as a spiritual leader as well. So he has tried to at least create some distance and entrench

his political powers in institutions that hopefully can survive after him in that moment of vacuum and can actually continue some of the work in the moment of vacuum. Like I would say democratic system, terms four years, five years, and then new election, Terms, four years, five years, and then new election. And sick people sort of support. I think that's the best system, best system. Otherwise too much long, long period. But the trouble is that just the same way that China is going to most likely dispute his spiritual successor. It will use the moment of vacuum to undermine and to try to quash the institutions as well. Because the key supporters of this

government exile India for giving it a refuge and a home where the institutions run countries like the United States who have provided funding and again this is a shoestring government it runs on like only 35 40 million dollars a year right but China has leverage to pull in that kind of a situation because let's let's remember that the United States has been in negotiations with China to figure out trade deals and economic relationships The same way India has been in negotiations with China to try to figure out a new formula We know for this troubled neighborhood So in a moment of vacuum there is anxiety

Among Tibetans that that they could be they could be used as a as a part in these negotiations, right? But the support they've had over 60, 70 years that have helped them continue their institutions, that have helped give a home to the Dalai Lama, that support may, right, to China. The CIA actually ran like covert operations supporting the movement through the 50s and 60s, right? And of course, this idea of a more transactional political reality with Donald Trump at the helm, he is a far more kind of transactional president. It's like basically his foreign policy in many ways. Yeah, and we've seen signs that in his calculations,

history and principles and sort of what have been foundations of American foreign policy for a long time may not matter as much that he thinks differently. On the one hand, yes, sort of the Tibetan cause had given the US foreign policy this sort of pressure point to work with, I guess, China of the Tibetan cause, given the US foreign policy, this sort of pressure point to work with, I guess, China over the decades. At a minimal cost, what is $10, $15 million a year for the United States? But on the other hand, one of the first things that the Trump administration did in freezing

international aid, when it froze international aid, that meant several millions of dollars of aid cut to the Tibetan government as well, Tibetan government in exile. So right away, the Tibetan leaders we're talking to were worried and anxious that that wasn't just funding cut. Those were signals that these are different times that you know old principles No longer hold true So so for several months they were in the dark on a funding and then although they've tried to negotiate To regain some of that funding from the United States, but the the alarm Still went through them that that hey

Things are a lot more transactional now. Uh, and the U S is trying to, you know, a strike a more direct deal with China. If anything in that direct deal, you may become a casualty as well. Do we have a sense of kind of where Modi stands here? Like how strongly he might feel about this one way or the other. I know India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi, he congratulated the Dalai Lama on his 90th birthday. Prime Minister said, and I quote, I join 1.4 billion Indians in extending our warmest wishes

to His Holiness, the Dalai Lama on his 90th birthday. He has been an enduring symbol of love, compassion, patience, and moral discipline. It was followed by rebukes from China to kind of stay out of the business of China and Tibet. So for India and Modi is quite complicated as well. On the one hand, it is a matter of principle, this support that they've provided to the Tibetan effort to hold on to the traditions and cultures in the face of a communist party

that wants to erase those. And particularly because there's a huge cultural and emotional tie of Buddhism to India, right? But on the other hand, finding a working formula with China has been a priority for Modi because India is so vulnerable, it shares such a large border with China. There's been a war fought over that border.

More recent years, there have been like deadly skirmishes. China is squeezing India in the neighborhood in places where they're jostling for influence. And India knows that it can only grow its economy if it can figure out some kind of a relationship with China here, some working formula. So in that reality, it is not an easy choice for any Indian government. Especially, I think the fact that this one Dalai Lama has been the continuity all the way back to 1950s since he came, hasn't made things easier that the Indian government could say, well, you know, this happened before me and I can't change things. But once we enter a moment of vacuum, right, when choices are being made

looking to the future. And I think and I think what choice the Indian government makes, does it support a new Dalai Lama selected and found through the methods that the current Dalai Lama has said, or does it kind of seek to improve its relationship with China by either supporting the Chinese choice for Dalai Lama or staying silent, right? Which will also help the Chinese option will be closely watched, but it's not an easy choice for India.

Is it fair for me to say the anxieties around all of this turmoil, one very real concern here is that this could be the end of the Tibetan independence movement, right? Yes, I mean, that is the biggest fear among Tibetans that there have been, I mean Dalai Lama is a human and eventually, you know, he will die just like every other human being does and there have been transitions before. been transitions before. It's just that this is the first transition since this refugee movement

to hold on to traditions and culture in the face of an enormous power of erasure is being tested for the first time and that this disborn on their side has irritated the Chinese for so long that they're very well prepared to use a moment of vacuum. And I think the anxiety is that for two reasons. One, the enormous force against which they're working. And secondly, how central and unifying, glued one figure has been throughout seven decades of exile. What will the loss of him mean in terms of demoralizing those efforts, but also in terms of how China steps in to use that demoralized moment to completely question. Okay.

Um, Lajib, thank you so much for this. This was really fascinating. Thank you. Thank you. All right. That is all for today. I'm Jamie Poisson. Thanks so much for listening and we'll talk to you tomorrow.