Despite reports, Chinese hope Olympic guest love their “house”
By Teresa Shen
It was a special moment, to see Li Ning touch the fire to the majestic torch. The flames spiraled swiftly up and burst into fiery orange, strong and determined. An estimated 15% of the world population watched this, a historic moment that lit the hearts of many people.
The Beijing Olympics is in full swing now, whether or not one likes the idea of China hosting it. Soon, with a flourishing Chinese brush, the closing ceremony will draw a hopefully spectacular period to this world party. It is sometimes hard to believe that so much hard work, training, time, money, excitement and genuine feeling can be put into a short 16 days. But then, it is like my mom hosting a Christmas party for friends. She busied herself senseless scrubbing the floors, cleaning the whole house, and making tons of food with the sole wish to make her guests happy. When they left, my family and I ended up eating leftovers for a week. But the guests loved our house, just as the Chinese hope their foreign guests love their “house”. It seems that the uncontrollable flow of tourists has been unhindered by the negative portrait the main media paints of China.
For more than a week, I have not slept a full night. I set three alarms before I sleep, on my watch, my cell phone, and my clock to get up at a scheduled time and watch the games live on CCTV. Everyone seems to get a cheer in these Games. The Chinese home crowd loves to thunder out their approval. Every athlete on the field, even one who might snatch away the gold from a favored Chinese athlete, receives energetic applause. After all, these are the Olympics, and the host should be gracious.
However, despite the spirit of the Games demonstrated by Olympics volunteers, athletes, and most Chinese people and tourists, the mainstream Western media continues their negative reports. Many criticisms seems quite strained, even amusing. I was confused by the news of 300 Bibles being confiscated from Americans who tried to bring them into China. What would they have done with these Bibles? Sell them? Or did they truly think that China needed those 300 Bibles, when the country prints more than 8 million a year? The mainstream media cries for religious freedom in China. Maybe I was dreaming that my family and I worshipped in a Beijing church, stampeded for chocolate eggs on Easter in a Beijing garden, and saw Bibles on sale at Beijing bookstores? I did not receive a bullet in my head for being a Christian. Whatever the Bible bringers wanted to do, they have the obligation to respect the law of any country they are entering, even if it feels idiotic. Sulking in the airport despite being asked to leave is quite embarrassing behavior. One side note, I have never tasted a dog penis, or seen one on a plate in China. CNN really likes to go to some weird, rare restaurants and put it all over their article.
So far, there were surprisingly few protests in Beijing, except for isolated incidents involving mainly tourists. I fail to realize what vandalizing a Novotel Peace Hotel room in Beijing, then running away without paying the bill, will do for the development of religious freedom. Unless having this freedom means I can walk into the Shawnee Inn and start splashing paint on the walls? Little groups of protests have been organized in Beijing, with the mainstream media drooling after them. It was no wonder that the demonstrators were detained immediately, since none of the protests were in the protest zones! Although I love the right to protest, in many countries demonstrators must stay within a restricted area. My parents protested in England against the Chinese Government’s handling of the Tiananmen incident in 1989. It was a very cold morning and my dad stepped outside the protest zone to warm himself under the sun. He was promptly handcuffed by British police, dragged away, and thrown into a cell without food or water. Because my mom wanted to stay with him, she also spent many hours crying for coffee in a separate cell. After their release, the press was not interested in hearing my parents’ story. It seems strange that now the media races after the illegal protestors, encouraging their infringement of law with positive reports. Luckily, most of the Chinese public seems unperturbed by protestors, intent on just celebrating the hard-won Games. One response from an old Chinese lady to a protestor in the Tiananmen Square was to fan him. She probably couldn’t understand a word the protestor was yelling. Seeing how hot it was outside, she started fanning him in sympathy. Maybe if the protestors are really concerned about human rights and freedom for China’s people, they should start shouting their slogans in Chinese? How else would the message be understood?
While the mainstream media competes to find skeletons in China’s closet, our wonderful athletes compete for the gold. Michael Phelps has cut through the water for those record-breaking eight gold medals. Track and Field competitions are in full motion. The tough, suspenseful swings and leaps of the gymnastics battle have finally ended with a beautiful gold for Shawn Johnson. She deserved this one, and her friendly smile towards everyone was quite touching. Whatever age the young Chinese gymnasts are, they also deserved their share in the glory with their amazing performance. Personally, I do think some have features looking too young to be that of sixteen year olds. As of now, there is not enough evidence to prove it. Overall, after all the years of preparation, the Olympics are coming to a blissful end. Many countries’ leaders have gone to China. Many tourists have cheered in the stadiums and wandered around the real Beijing. Many Chinese people have fulfilled their hopes to host a grand world party and welcome friends of across the globe. Hopefully, this can be the beginning of understanding between cultures, and more constructive dialogue in areas like human rights and environmentalism. Already, positive changes are happening in China. Despite the media barrage about the smog in Beijing, the Chinese Government had implemented a $17 billion plan to lessen pollution way before the Olympics. Though it does not seem to have worked yet, the effort is sincere. Labor laws guaranteeing overtime pay and a social security program have been passed. Much more will come, but at the pace China can adjust to. Change cannot, and should not, be forced.
As more people see and feel other cultures, they will become less daunted by the differences that often lead to fear and condemnation. For those who have been following the Olympics, enjoy the last few days of the splendid party!
The author is a 17 year old Chinese American (ABC) high school student in the US who studied in the US and China intermittently. She is a published bilingual (English and Chinese) novelist and a student columnist for the local newspaper in the US which published this article recently.
Mainstream Western media stages “Blemishing China Marathon”
By James Shen
Synopsis
Ignoring outpouring hospitality of the Chinese people, Mainstream Western media has waged a negative campaign against China recently to punish the country’s failure to comply with Western requests at the Beijing Olympics. This article examines the roots of the mainstream Western media’s anger towards China, exposes its hypocrisies and double standards, and advocates the development of a positive-spirited media system that is built on the basis of upholding Chinese public welfare and interests.
Full text
If you google “China” or “Olympics” on any given day in recent months, with the exception of the few weeks China was stricken by deadly earthquakes, you will be overwhelmed by the shower of negative coverage from the mainstream Western media against China and its hosting of 2008 Beijing Olympics.
For months leading up to the Beijing Games, China has been put under the Western microscope with accusations and complaints against the country and its government sweeping across all terrains, from big political issues such as Tibet, human rights, protest rights, press and religious freedom; to social problems including air pollution, government relocation of Beijing residents; to conspiracy stories about special visual effects of the opening ceremony and ultra performance of Chinese athletes; and to more trivial displeasures about losing a pair of expensive sunglasses, difficulties to access Olympic Green, English standard of volunteers, and over-eagerness of residents to help the foreigner visitors. The list goes on and on.
As if that is not enough, an NBC correspondent went on a live TV hunt for Chinese foods in Beijing. Let’s take a look at what she found: giant scorpions, lizards, silk worms, seahorses, iguana tails and dung beetles. Other Western reporters also cited rabbit head, pig brain and animal penis. Being a native of Beijing with 20 plus years of living there and a food lover myself, I have little knowledge where to look for these exotic things, not to mention ever eating them. Come on, China has a civilization of 5,000 years – Western reporters can’t be seriously thinking about portraying the Chinese as barbaric aboriginals or man-eating cannibals, right?
In fact, Dave Barry of Miami Herald admitted to a blog “beijingboyce.com” that “The Chinese people I saw all seemed to be buying things like lamb kebabs and fruit. On the other hand, the people gathered around the centipedes and scorpions on a stick were, in almost every case, tourists or American TV reporters doing fun features on weird Chinese food…. The Chinese don’t eat scorpions. They feed their scorpions to TV reporters. I would not be surprised to learn that the Chinese word for scorpion is “TV reporter food.”
Granted, China is not completely innocent from many of the aforementioned allegations and criticisms, but it is neither an evil host which deserves no credit at all. As the world’s fastest growing economy and one of the world’s most ancient civilizations, there has got to be something positive to report on.
You can be easily frustrated, however, if you are looking to read something more positive or, at the least, constructive about the country and its hospitable people. Sure, there is always the official Xinhua News or China Daily one can read for a change, but any praise from self-proclaimed independent and objective mainstream Western media is surprisingly hard to come by.
Meanwhile, for average Westerners, it is hard not to be misled by the drowning negative coverage on China. A homemaker in the US told reporters that she does not want to “legitimize the Chinese government” by supporting the Beijing Olympics.” Didn’t President Bush just open a bigger US Embassy there? What are we talking about here exactly? I am as puzzled as an Atlanta man who demanded an online answer for not seeing Russian tanks there.
As much as I disagree with President George W. Bush on many things, I have to applaud his recent TV interview in Beijing with NBC in which he stressed that the US and China as two very different countries and cultures are bound to have agreements and disagreements on a range of things, but it is important to have a constructive relationship which will help each other communicate disagreements.
Wow, how I wish that he had possessed this wisdom before starting the Iraq war – lives of estimated 1.2 million Iraqis and 5,000 US soldiers could have been saved.
Should the 2008 Olympics be awarded to Beijing in the first place?
Although the closing ceremony of the Beijing Olympic Games is coming up in a matter of few days, the arguments surrounding if IOC had made a mistake in letting China host the 2008 Olympics and if China had fulfilled its relevant promises seem to have just started.
Why pick a heavily-polluted country that is dictated by “free market Stalinists” which suppresses human rights, religion and press? China broke its promises to IOC for all of these areas, charges the mainstream Western media.
However, according to the IOC, its mission is “to build a peaceful and better world in the Olympic Spirit which requires mutual understanding with a spirit of friendship, solidarity and fair play - Olympic Spirit strives to inspire and motivate the youth of the world to be the best they can be through educational and entertaining interactive challenges. Olympic Spirit seeks to instill and develop the values and ideals of Olympism in those who visit and to promote tolerance and understanding in these increasingly troubled time in which we live, to make our world a more peaceful place.“
Does China deserve to be awarded the hosting right of Olympics? Apparently, the Chinese people said a loud “yes”. The whole world witnessed how much grass-root support China got from its people when it applied for and won the hosting right of the event.
As a country with more than one fifth of the world’s population – should it not be given a chance to host one of the many games? With 1.3 billion people not represented, can any Olympic Games truly promote its mission of “building a peaceful and better world with mutual understanding”? That is why the IOC made its decision and it is undoubtedly a correct one.
By comparison, I have serious doubts if the mainstream Western media truly understands and honors the spirit of Olympics – questioning China’s legitimacy to host such an international event only gives away its arrogance, self-righteousness, entitlement and cultural supremacy in international affairs.
If the mainstream Western media is still the true believer of human rights and continues to uphold the universal belief that “all men are created equal”, it should acknowledge the birthright of any country including China, for hosting the Olympic Games.
While China needs improvements in many areas as every other country on this earth does, the changes and progresses made by the country in the past 30 years are unmatched in the its own history, which can not be hidden from view by the mainstream Western media.
China should not be forced to make any concessions or promises to any interest groups in order to be “bestowed” the hosting right of Olympics, thanks to the downfall of colonialism and imperialism! The country’s pursuit of reform in all domestic political and social-economic fronts, including but not limited to human rights and freedoms of its people, can and should only be driven by desires of its own people, rather than being imposed on by external forces.
In addition to disputing China’s hosting rights, the mainstream Western media also has aired many conspiracies about China’s intention for hosting the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Show of power? Self-interiority? Promoting China’s development path to replace the US model? Bla, bla, bla….
We all are humans and predictably we all want similar things in life at the end of the day. Splendid displays, inflated egos or decorated ideologies can not replace people’s basic needs for food, clothing, shelter and healthcare.
For hundreds of years, the Chinese people have craved for a peaceful environment where they can focus on making a better living for themselves rather than laboring for self-serving emperors or greedy foreign opium traders. They have been quite successful in the past three decades and now they simply wanted to party and celebrate with the world through Beijing Olympics. Is that so hard to understand?
Why is the mainstream Western media so angry with China?
In his recent article “Are the Media Being too Mean to China?” published on slate.com, Prof. Tim Wu of Columbia University wrote that “China’s idea of what makes for a better Olympics for foreign consumption—tightened security and cleaning up marginal elements—is exactly what makes Western reporters crazy.”
While Prof. Wu’s observation only touched on one of the surface symptoms that irritated the mainstream Western media, it does shed some light on the current tension. What he described is in fact a cultural difference in how the Chinese and the Western people receive and entertain their guests. But the root of problem is the ethnocentric mindset of the Western reporters to the cultural differences and their entitlement that things should only be done in their ways.
Similar examples are abundant, whether it is about different ways under which Chinese and Western athletes are trained or about how they differ in keeping their personal appearance or etiquettes. I am particularly disappointed with Prof. Wu’s comments that “China doesn’t have the manners and grace of the richer countries, even if it has increasing economic and political clout.”
While making noises during eating is a taboo in many Western cultures, being openly confrontational in social interactions is a sin in many Asian cultures. These are simply cultural differences that should not be judged as superior or inferior, or we risk entering the boundaries of cultural supremacy.
Unfortunately, it is this arrogant mindset that has led the mainstream Western media to judge China by its own culturally biased standards and self-centered expectations. It is not a surprise they drew the conclusion that China broke its promises for hosting Olympics, an allegation China has denied.
What followed was an irrational unleash of anger by the mainstream Western media towards China in an attempt to force the country into the direction the Western media desired to see. The collective media assault on China, however, is more based on self-interests and ethnocentrism, rather than fairness, objectivity and independence which the mainstream Western media often preach.
Let he who is without sin cast the first stone!
A recent issue of Newsweek carried an article, “Rise of the Sea Turtles”, that found “Westernized Chinese people” tend to be more resentful to the West. Although I wasn’t particularly impressed with its analysis of the root causes, the article does provide us with a good pointer to an emerging trend.
I can probably qualify as one of the “Westernized Chinese people” the article was referring to, although I prefer to identify myself as a Chinese American after becoming a naturalized US citizen for many years.
I think it is unfair and simplistic to conclude that the “Westernized Chinese people” are more resentful to the West, because the situation is far more complicated than portrayed. The resentments, in fact, are not the towards the West in its entirety but more targeted at the double standard and intolerant attitudes often adopted by the mainstream Western media and Western governments towards China and other non-Western countries. “Westernized Chinese people” tend to be elites who are educated in the West and their advanced training and intellect make them independent thinkers. They are sensitive towards the hypocrisies of the mainstream Western media which scrutinizes China with one set standards while closing its eyes to the same problems at home.
No one person or one country is perfect and the Bible tells us that everyone is a sinner. If we (Americans) can allow ourselves make mistakes and accept skeletons in our own closets, why should we dissect other countries under our tinted lenses and punish them for not satisfying the standards that even ourselves often can not meet?
We should pursue “constructive dialogues” rather than endless “regime changes” by using force - ironically both strategies were supported by President George W. Bush. I salute his newly-found wisdom which helped him reach a peaceful resolution with the North Koreans and hopefully the same can be done with the Iranians.
If we desire international solidarity against terrorism, why is the mainstream Western media always so reluctant to condemn those who terrorize China? Read its coverage of recent terrorist attacks in Xinjiang and you know what I am talking about.
If the mainstream Western media wants to be the role model for its Chinese peers, why does it conveniently distort facts, use phony pictures and brush away people who have different opinions and deny their right to have their voices heard? A Chinese American confronted a CNN journalist a few months ago in LA when she and many other pro-China protestors were denied chances to be interviewed, the journalist responded harshly - “don’t tell me how to do my business!”
We teach every citizen in the West to respect laws and regulations, yet the mainstream Western media participated in cheering the illegal protests and vandalism in Beijing.
Personally I had a painful experience demonstrating on London streets in 1989. It was cold in that morning and I stepped out of the picketing line for a few minutes to get some desperately-needed sunshine. I was subsequently handcuffed by force and arrested by the London police. When my petite wife disputed their action, she was also handcuffed and arrested. We were locked into separate cells for hours with no food and water, not to mention access to a phone and legal advice. We were only released after the demonstration organizer intervened and after being forced to sign the British equivalent of confession statements.
If being out of the picket line for some sun is a crime that deserves to be handcuffed and thrown into jail in London, why should the Chinese be criticized for expelling illegal protestors in Beijing who purposely climb lamp-posts, buildings and advertising billboards to display unauthorized banners?
Why should an American “pastor”, who proudly vandalized the two Beijing hotel rooms and then cowardly sneaked away, be cheered as a “righteous protestor” by the mainstream Western media?
If a Chinese protestor goes to the 2012 London Olympics to protest against the British suppression of Northern Ireland and hang banners on the Big Ben – can he or she count on the mainstream Western media for for the same “heroic” coverage? Should we also question the right of London for hosting Olympics and its commitment for press freedom if its police arrests the protestor?
Food for thought - “Don’t do unto others what you don’t wish to do unto yourself” (Confucius) and “let he who is without sin cast the first stone!” (Jesus, John 8:1-11, Matthew 7:12)
Is Western-styled press freedom what China needs?
A highly-respected US scholar once told me that the Western media is founded on the spirit of challenging authorities and it is the media’s job to be cynical, vigilant, critical, defiant and negative.
I am a strong believer of the fundamental principles on which the US political system is founded. Besides many merits of the system, media stands out as an indispensable component designed to supervise, on behalf of the public, the three branches of the federal government. This is almost a perfect setup except three potential flaws – firstly, there is no mechanism in place for the supervision of the media itself; secondly, there are serious conflicts of interests between the two contradictory roles of media both as a representative of public interests and, at the same time, as self-serving profit-making enterprises; and thirdly founding media on the basis of cynicism and negativity has its own social costs.
For media to fulfill its role to supervise the government, it needs to serve public interests, rather than its own interests. It needs to be unbiased, objective and independent.
Nonetheless, it is well-known that the mainstream Western media has long blended its role for public welfare with relentless pursuit of ego, power and profits. As the world enters the information age, the mainstream Western media has become a new rising superpower with ever-increasing influence on domestic and international politics, economy, social structure, value systems and people’s everyday life.
Does Americans really have as much freedom as the mainstream media would like us to believe? As the mainstream Western media pursue freedoms in other countries, Americans are losing so many freedoms that once made them so proud.
In the past few decades, America has experienced a string of serious challenges and setbacks including the breakdown of family/social structure and value systems, falling religious influence and freedom, popular abuse and dependence of narcotics and prescription drugs, rising violence across the country, escalating racial tension and police brutality, widening gap between the rich and the poor, dropping standard of literacy and basic education, failing healthcare system that denies coverage of 23 million Americans, and a tendency of resolving international disputes with “regime change” by military force rather than diplomacy, violations of on constitutional civil and human rights under the cover of anti-terrorism, to name just a few.
Our children can no longer walk to the school bus by themselves for fear of drug pushers and child snatchers on the way. By the time they arrive in their schools, metal detectors await for them in some inner city schools. They have to leave their bags in lockers and no colored drinks are allowed for fear of bombs. Their teachers are not allowed to mention any religion or teach morals in schools. Even “Christmas trees” must not be called “Christmas trees” but “family trees”. They have to go through evacuation drills often to remain vigilant because school shootings are spreading. Now people are even more scared because a school district in Texas took the lead to allow teachers carrying guns to the classroom. But can we trust the teachers? Do we have to outsource our teachers from India or China one day?
As an American citizen, nothing is more valuable than my voting right. But even that has depreciated. Why? Because the mainstream media is not doing its job of dissemination of objective information. Instead it confuses me with a constant stream of selectively edited, distorted and manipulated information in order to advance its own preferences, agendas and commercial interests.
Let’s take a look at the tainted media pictures of presidential candidates. John Edwards is a wife cheater, but that has been kept from the public until now; Hilliary is a liar who believes she is entitled to be the President and her husband Bill is hostile to the mainstream press; John McCain is a patriot but a war monger who knows nothing about economy; and finally Obama, alas, is actually a celebrity, radical of racial politics, Muslim (not that there is anything wrong with it) and “Anti-Christ”! For God’s sake, stop harassing me with all this sensational talk designed to boost ratings and I want to vote for Paris Hilton, but unfortunately she is not on the ballot. So my pathetic one vote looks quite useless, well, at least for now.
Moving back to topic of Beijing Olympics. A Western journalist was quick to point out his disagreement with the slogan, “One World One Dream”, which is meant by the host nation to stress the commonalities all peoples share. Nevertheless, this reporter chose to emphasize the different values he has from the Chinese host.
Fine, let’s talk about the differences. If the mainstream Western media can acknowledge that peoples on this earth are different and that there are vast differences between them in the geographic landscapes, population structures, social-economic hierarchy, cultural values, beliefs, religions and ideologies, it should not be difficult to appreciate that their political, legal and media systems also need to differ from each other to accommodate for the specific needs of each country. It is dangerous to assume the systems of the West are somehow superior which can be transplanted to other countries.
Does China need a Western-style media system? I doubt it. While fundamental Western media principles of cynicism, defiance, negativity and confrontation may or may not work well in the Western cultures, they most-definitely will not be successful in the Chinese cultural environment which values hierarchy, harmony, benevolence and tolerance among people.
However, it is the Chinese people who should decide eventually what political, economic and media systems are the ones they need. I have faith that with five thousand years of civilization, China has the wisdom to draw from the strengths of the West, avoid its fundamental flaws and ultimately develop a positive-spirited media system with Chinese characteristics that is built on the basis of upholding public welfare and interests.
Final conclusion
By blemishing a hospitable nation, which worked hard and sacrificed dearly to be a good host, mainstream Western media only exposed the self-interest and ethnocentric facets of itself to the whole world. Such irrational and frantic behaviors will only serve to bolster more media scrutiny by the Chinese government, further alienate the Chinese people and erase any remaining credibility and relevance of the mainstream Western media in the post-Olympic China.
I love the motto of Beijing Olympics - “One World One Dream” - the dream of the Olympic Spirit under which all peoples of the world will be united with mutual understanding, friendship, solidarity, fair play and tolerance to build a peaceful and better world together.
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James Shen is a US-based independent business analyst supporting multinational companies that seek cohesive growth in China. He is a native of Beijing and a naturalized U.S. citizen. He studied in the UK in the 1980s and has lived in the US in the past 19 years.
Chination Report Exclusive (www.chinationreport.com)
In the next 20 years China will rise to a significant international power militarily, economically, politically and culturally. On this topic, there exists ample analysis based on hard facts, statistics and widely accepted assumptions such as future growth rate of GDP and military spending. According to Justin Lin Yifu, chief economist-designate of the World Bank, China’s economy could be 2.5 times that of the US by 2030. He compares the Chinese economy in 2000 with that of Japan in 1960. Japan’s economy continued high growth for 30 more years before the economy peaked. With an 8% projected annual growth rate, by 2030, the Chinese per capita GDP may reach half that of Americans and China’s total GDP 2.5 times that of America. This seems to be the most optimistic forecast for the Chinese economy. “The Economist” predicts China to replace USA as the country with the highest GDP/PPP by 2020. By then, the Chinese economy could possibly constitute as much as 20% of the world’s total GDP.
Simultaneous to its economic growth, today China is building up its military at a rapid pace and its military spending is expected to catch up with that of the US by 2030. With the world’s biggest one party system, biggest army and a military striving for modernization, China’s rise in military power often casts suspicion abroad and draws sharp criticism from the US and its western allies. China’s motivation behind its desire for a strong military is often subject to heated debate. For the Chinese, it is a lesson learnt from the country’s war-ridden past and subsequent downfall beginning from the end of Qing Dynasty. The unresolved Taiwan-China issue with US’s commitment to Taiwan’s defense is another motivation for China to achieve and maintain a strong military position. There is little doubt that America is still by far the strongest military power from every aspect, but I am sure it is understood by all parties at stake that any military intervention into China’s guarded borders and interests would bring devastating and far-reaching consequences.
Although history proves that the formation of any world power is always accompanied by the presence of a strong military, in today’s global and transparent world, any voluntary exercise of military power in the form of war will actually diminish the chance of China becoming a real world superpower. As China becomes more aware of its own limits and what it has to lose on the world political stage, China will become more willing to engage in dialogue and diplomacy, less willing to deploy troops for any military cause other than self-defense. Therefore, I truly believe and hope that China is building a military power so strong that it actually never has to use it. Mao said that “Politics is war without bloodshed, while war is politics with bloodshed.” The Chinese word “peace” or “Ping An” is actually made of two parts: “Ping” is balance while “An” is safety. Safety is achieved when the world is balanced. China understands this and has repeatedly emphasized that its rise will be peaceful without causing any military threat to other countries. But in the meantime, it believes that “peace” can only be achieved when the powers are balanced. From the Chinese point of view, this explains why building a strong Chinese military will give China and the region a balance against the super military power from the US, projected strategically from all US bases in the Far East, surrounding China’s borders.
If a strong GDP provides the foundation and means for China to become a world superpower and a strong military provides the security for the power to sustain itself. Both conditions are necessary but not sufficient. What remains is for China to build common interests with the world community so that its power can project beyond its borders and become truly influential on world matters. The importance of common interests to a superpower and its capability to build alliances is as cement is to a brick building. Countries are made of people. People are together because of shared values, shared potential opportunities and prosperity. For China to become a recognized world superpower, numbers in GDP and military spending are far from enough. It will and can only be achieved through further political transparency - to gain trust and accumulation of international goodwill - to gain respect through free trade, economic aid, cultural exchange and skillful diplomacy.
China’s biggest challenge and potential crisis is its lack of natural resources. Crisis, as explained in its Chinese expression “Wei Ji”, means “danger” and “opportunity”. This challenge has been creating a huge opportunity for China to make political friends, build economic ties and an equally huge opportunity for resource-rich countries to enjoy a similar economic boom. According to Xinhua News, trade between Brazil and China increased 42.55% in 2007 versus 2006, reaching $23.3 billion. Powered by the 1.3 billion Chinese consumers’ appetite for meat, China’s lack in agricultural land and water supply makes Brazil an ideal partner in supplying soybeans. As explained by Chinese Ambassador to Brazil, Mr. Chen Duqing, in an NPR news interview, the Chinese and Brazilian economies are “mutually complementary” and that with China as a partner Brazil will reduce its dependence on the U.S. market. According to the same article in NPR news, “Growing Trade Ties China to Latin America” by Julie McCarth, “In the broader frame, the U.S. market share in Brazil has declined the past five years as China’s has surged… The United States’ focus on the war in Iraq made it possible for newcomer China to begin to eclipse the United States in its traditional sphere of influence.”
Similarly, China’s thirst for natural resources partially explains the huge trade increase between China and Africa. Stephanie Hanson, Managing Editor at World Resources Institute, wrote in a June 2008 article titled “China, Africa and Oil” that “China now ranks as the continent’s second-highest trading partner, behind the United States, and ahead of France and Britain. From 2002 to 2003, trade between China and Africa doubled to $18.5 billion; by 2007, it had reached $73 billion.” Although China’s government relationship to Sudan has been subject to strong criticism, according to the author, “Africa registered 5.8 percent economic growth in 2007, its highest level ever, in part because of Chinese investment. Experts say the roads, bridges, and dams built by Chinese firms are low cost, good quality, and completed in a fraction of the time such projects usually take in Africa. China also contributes peacekeepers to UN missions across Africa, including Liberia and Darfur. It has cancelled $10 billion in bilateral debt from African countries, sends doctors to treat Africans across the continent, and hosts thousands of African workers and students in Chinese universities and training centers.” Few can argue that the amount of efforts has helped China build strong goodwill and strengthen China’s position as an important player in Africa, a continent traditionally strongly tied to Europe and the US.
Back in 1988 when I was studying in Beijing, my Chinese and foreign student colleagues put on a play called “The Campus in 2030.” The play described romantic scenes with a few story lines projected to happen in my university around the year 2030. It was about how young western students studying there tried everything to find a Chinese spouse to marry in order to obtain a Chinese residence card. The play was a laughing topic for us for a long time. As we all remember, the years around 1988 were the prime time when Chinese were doing everything to get a Green Card and eventually citizenship in America. Nobody believed that the reverse was ever going to happen. For most of us, the play was just wishful thinking.
Not any more! 20 years after that play was performed, more and more ordinary Chinese and even foreigners began to see what has become possible for their future, not just in America, but in China. I consider the penetration and adoption level of a language beyond its natural borders a good indication of power influence. When France was once a much stronger world power than it is today, French was widely adopted as a common language for international matters until the British Empire replaced France on the world’s stage. Since then and because of the superpower flag being passed over to another English speaking country – the USA - English has continued to be the predominant international language for over a century. Given that Chinese is such a fundamentally different language from western languages, it might be hard to imagine that one day people from different parts of the world will meet to find themselves speaking Chinese in order to communicate with each other.
Really? I have a Swiss friend who is married to a Mongolian lady with a daughter living in America. Their only common language happens to be Chinese. I admit that this is still rather a rare situation. But certainly more and more Americans and westerners have begun to learn Chinese. Some high schools in America now offer Chinese language classes. In colleges in some Asian countries, Chinese has become the hottest subject to learn. If the future is hard to predict, we can take a look at history. Just like many Western languages trace the roots back to Latin, many Asian languages have roots in ancient Chinese - Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, to name a few. A Chinatown in Chinese is called “Tang People’s Street” all over the world. It is no coincidence that China’s Tang Dynasty happened to be the world’s strongest economy at the time and its cultural influence was so far reaching that today’s overseas Chinese still call themselves the People of Tang. When I visited Hong Kong 15 years ago, Hong Kong people hardly spoke any Mandarin Chinese. As China’s GDP rises, so does the Mandarin skill of Hong Kong people. Today they speak Mandarin just like a mainlander does. Similar situation has been observed in Singapore and some other Asian countries.
Many wonder what can be the long term binding glue between China and its foreign partners, especially its close neighbors. Trading and economic co-dependency absolutely helps. But there are still plenty of issues, disputes and wounds between China and some of its strongest trading partners in the Far East. If the USA and its western allies have been able to stay together behind the ideology of democracy and freedom, what can be that potential higher purpose to bind together a country or region like Japan, Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea, Thailand, Philippines and China? Is there anything beyond oil imports and textile exports? When I finally began to understand the true meaning of the call for a “Harmonious Society” by Mr. Hu Jingtao, I realized that China has found its glue to bring people together. It is not Communism, not western democracy and individualism. Rather, it is the 2500 year old Confucianism, the Confucianism which focuses on human morality and common-good deeds; which honors order and virtue. This philosophy resonates within many Asian societies and elsewhere in the world.
Indeed, old can be new, new can be old. China has created its own path to prosperity and is defining its own message to restore its past glory. When the powers are balanced, economic and social gaps among peoples reduced, I believe the world will become a better place for all.
(Copyright 2008 Chination Report)
