Chinese officials concerned about rural unrest

That's the key point of Mark McDonald's piece in the International Herald Tribune summarizing comments from Chen Guangcheng, the activist who escaped house arrest last month and subsequently was permitted to leave China for the United States, where he is studying law at New York University.  The headline for McDonald's piece summarizes it nicely, "Activist Says Chinese Officials 'Terribly Afraid' of Rural Unrest."  Here's a quote from Guangcheng's interview with Ian Johnson of the NYT Beijing bureau:

People abroad look at China's human rights situation and they mainly see the situation of better-known people.  But they don't know about all the violations of ordinary people.  But they'd on't now about all the violations of ordinary people. ... People abroad look at China's human rights situation and they mainly see the situation of better-known people.  But they don't know about all the violations of ordinary people.

Guangcheng goes on to  elaborate on the "huge number of the disabled in China, or the women who are bullied and abused, or the orphans in China," saying that "officials are so afraid--because they know the true extend of the problem.  They are terribly afraid of people organizing."

Based on Guangcheng's other comments, it appears that "ordinary people" refers mostly to rural Chinese.

[The situation is] very delicate in the countryside right now.  This is why they constantly resort to detentions and so on.  They don't even try to find an excuse, they just do it--they are that scared. 

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There is nothing the leaders can do.  There is a saying in China that if you are not correct, how can you correct others?  Their sons and daughters have moved overseas and they are working in China all by themselves. ... But they are very clear that if it continues like this they are going to be devastated.   

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People [abroad] often just focus on elite in China's cities.  If they do, they will completely misunderstand modern-day China.  The most important cases over the past year come from the countryside.  Westerners like to train local officials, to improve their understanding of the law.  But when there's been an improvement, it's not because of improving the quality of officials; it's because the ordinary people grasp the law and push. ... [T]he decisive pressure for change is at the grassroots level.  

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