In 1995, in response to the Dalai Lama’s choice of Gendun Choekyi Nyima as the Eleventh Panchen Lama, the Chinese government abducted the child and his family and made a replacement choice of another child, Gyaincain Norbu. The event was interpreted as an attempt by Beijing to control religious freedom and further suppress human rights in an apparent return to the Cultural Revolution goal of eliminating the so-called four olds in Tibet.

• Dalai Lama. Freedom in Exile: The Autobiography of the Dalai Lama. New York: HarperCollins, 1990. Autobiography begins with the Dalai Lama’s childhood and concludes with his acceptance of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989. Includes testimony of Tibet’s suffering under Chinese rule.
• Goldstein, Melvyn C. The Snow Lion and the Dragon: China, Tibet, and the Dalai Lama. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997. Provides a historical outline of Tibet-China relations and the problems surrounding modern-day Tibet.
• Hilton, Isabel. The Search for the Panchen Lama. New York: W. W. Norton, 2000. Explains the political intricacies surrounding the search for the Eleventh Panchen Lama, while offering an extensive history of Tibetan Buddhism’s struggle with China.
• Sautman, Barry, and June Teufel Dreyer, eds. Contemporary Tibet: Politics, Development, and Society in a Disputed Region. Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 2006. Collection of essays provides historical background and a general framework to examine Tibet’s present situation in world politics, China’s relationship with the West, and Tibet’s prospects for the future.

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