Three Reasons Arab Wave Won’t Reach China

This article first appeared in the Christian Science Monitor on March 2:

The West is guilty of wishful thinking when it excitedly imagines people-powered revolt in the Arab world spreading to China. There is dissatisfaction in China. But Tiananmen Square is not poised to become a Tahrir Square anytime soon. Here’s why.

In the past week or so, a lot of Western press has been given over to the question, “Is China the next Egypt?” Why this question is receiving so much attention puzzles me. Perhaps it’s just wishful thinking: We’d like to see every country under authoritarian rule become more democratic. But looking at China today, even if I squint really hard, I don’t see a government at risk of being toppled by mass protests soon.

This is not to say that Chinese people are uniformly happy, or even satisfied, with their government. There are the poor who aren’t participating in China’s skyrocketing prosperity; there are the powerless who see their lands seized from them by those more powerful and better connected; there are the college-educated who can’t find jobs commensurate with their skills and expectations; there are the activists who have been silenced (sometimes brutally), placed under house arrest, or imprisoned by the state. And, there’s the sort of culture of official corruption where a hit-and-run driver can taunt his pursuers by shouting, “Go ahead, sue me if you dare. My dad is Li Gang!” (the deputy director of Baoding City’s public security bureau).

There is dissatisfaction in China. But Tiananmen Square is not poised to become a Tahrir Square anytime soon. Here are a few reasons why.

First, and most obvious, under the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) China has enjoyed 30 years of uninterrupted economic development. GDP has grown at an average annual rate of nearly 10 percent for the past two and half decades. Children live much better than their parents, who, in turn, live much better than their parents. Pundits may point to the fact that Egypt’s GDP has experienced solid growth in recent years as well. But growth there has been half that of China; and more telling is the percentage of Egyptians still living under the poverty line, a whopping 20 percent, compared to China’s 3 percent.

Wisely, too, the Chinese government has dedicated much of its new wealth to building up the country’s infrastructure. By pouring money and resources into the road and highway system, subway lines, high-speed rail, power grids, telecommunications, schools and education, and water supplies, for example, the CCP has sought to improve China’s standard of living. In these projects, Chinese people find some tangible signs of a government that is giving back to the country. In Egypt, the popular perception was that former President Hosni Mubarak used the country’s growing prosperity mostly simply to enrich himself, his family, and his cronies.

Second, that China in 2011 is now counted among the world’s great powers, economically and politically, is a source of great pride among the Chinese people (consider the opening ceremonies of the 2008 Olympics). Remember, this is a country that just over 30 years ago viewed itself – and was viewed by much of the world – as backward. The people’s deep pride in witnessing their country’s triumphant return to the global stage cannot be underestimated; it’s a pride that serves to bolster the legitimacy of the current government, since the CCP, after all, has been the guiding hand responsible for shaping China’s emergence as a 21st-century superpower.

Third, China is ruled by a party whose leadership changes at least every ten years. In 2002, President Hu Jintao succeeded Jiang Zemin as party leader; in 2012 Xi Jinping is expected to succeed Mr. Hu for the two five-year terms allowed by the Constitution. In Egypt, under Mubarak, the government was embodied in the person of one “strongman” – for a full 30 years. The grievances of the Egyptian people could find a ready target in this one man; he was a natural focal point for their disaffection.

In China there is no similar focal point, in part because CCP leadership is routinely changing faces, and in part because within the leadership there are differences of opinion (which often make their way into the press) – over foreign relations, the domestic economy, the rule of law, environmental stewardship, the rise of nationalism, and Internet freedom, for instance. That there exist differences within the party helps to mitigate the intensity of people’s opposition to one-party rule.

At the Feb. 19 meeting with high-level government officials Hu, according to Xinhua News, “acknowledged that despite China’s remarkable social and economic development and growth in its overall national strength, the country is ‘still in a stage where many conflicts are likely to arise. There are still many problems in social management.’” Xinhua paraphrased him as further saying, “The government should speed up the development of various social sectors by developing education as a priority, promoting employment, reasonably adjusting income distribution, and perfecting the social security system that covers urban and rural residents.”

And in an Internet chat directly with the people this week, Premier Wen Jiabao, in the words of Xinhua, “laid out three planks of government policy essential to maintaining stability: closing income gaps; equal benefits and opportunities for rural residents; and eradicating corruption.”

This isn’t Mubarak’s government. This is a government that realizes what it is expected to do to maintain the support of its people – and its own legitimacy.

China’s Drought: It’s Our Problem Too

China’s drought is bad, the worst in at least 60 years. Roughly 12.5 million acres of winter wheat crop have been damaged. And a United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) alert reported last week that 2.57 million people and 2.79 million livestock are suffering from shortage of drinking water.

 

 

 

 

The mood in China is not upbeat, as forecasters are predicting that the drought may well continue into the late spring-early summer months–threatening the summer wheat crop. And though the Chinese might have a reasonable amount of wheat stockpiled, no analyst I’ve read pretends to know with certainty how deep the stock goes or how long, in the face of unyielding drought, it can sustain the needs of the population. What we do know is that the prospect of a China running low on water and wheat is not pretty–for anyone.

China is the largest wheat-producing (and wheat-consuming) country in the world. Wheat shortage there means not only that prices in China will rise, but also that prices on the international market will go up.

Some pundits have already argued that the recent unrest in Tunisia and Egypt was prompted in part by surging food costs. Global wheat prices jumped 77% in 2010 (a spike that continues unabated into 2011). If China is forced to turn to the international wheat market, how steep will global prices rise? Will China’s demand resulting shortages elsewhere? And will shortages and steeper prices, in turn, lead to social and political unrest in other spots of the world?

Other pundits remind us that if the current Chinese wheat harvest is a bust, China will likely look to the U.S. market for imports. How will Chinese import demand affect wheat supply and prices here? And will this demand contribute to growing inflation in the U.S.?

Inflationary pressures in China are already high. The present drought only exacerbates these pressures. The anxiety of the Beijing government is palpable. President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao have made personal visits to the stricken areas calling for “all-out efforts to combat drought” and committing $1billion to fight the devastation. They’ve made television appearances assuring the people that the government has abundant stockpiled wheat and is taking all possible measures to maintain the balance between supply and demand of the grain. What Hu and Wen, of course, know is that droughts and famines have made for restive populations in China’s past–they’ve even toppled governments (the Taiping and Boxer rebellions of the 19th and earlier 20th century are still fresh in their minds and Huang Chao’s rebellion at the end of the Tang dynasty (618-907) has a place in their high school history texts).

So, the Beijing government continues to fire the cloud-seeding chemical silver iodide into the atmosphere to encourage more snowfall (to little effect, however, according to reports in the China Daily and the Global Times).

It’s begun digging 1350 emergency wells, constructing irrigation facilities, and planning water-diversion projects in the major wheat-growing provinces affected by the drought.

 

 

 

 

And it’s handing out $334 million in emergency relief aid to farmers.

Such measures by the Chinese government are intended principally to ease the burden on the Chinese people and to ensure social and political stability. But, given the global repercussions of a severe wheat shortage in China (or, indeed, anywhere in the world, as events in Tunisia and Egypt have suggested), Beijing’s aggressive efforts to deal with the crisis should be welcome by all.

Confucius: It’s His Birthday and He’s Back, Sort Of

This post reproduces an op-ed piece from today’s LA Times (October 1) on the so-called revival of Confucianism in China today–especially in government circles.

What Confucius says is useful to China’s rulers

The venerable sage’s teachings have enjoyed a revival in 21st century China because they serve the communist regime well politically.

Confucius, the venerable sage who lived in the 6th century BC, is enjoying a 21st century revival. His rehabilitators? The Chinese Communist Party. Yes, that party, the one celebrating the 61st anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China on Oct. 1. The same party whose chairman, Mao Tse-tung, vilified Confucius’ “stinking corpse” during the Cultural Revolution and ordered the Red Guards to destroy all temples, statues, historical landmarks and texts associated with the sage. But, as China turns 61, the Great Helmsman is out and Confucius, who would have turned 2,561 on Sept. 28, is in.

As early as February 2005, the Beijing leadership began endorsing the sage’s teachings again, citing him approvingly in a speech delivered to the National Congress by President Hu Jintao: “Confucius said, ‘Harmony is something to be cherished.’ ” Since then the terms “harmonious society” and “harmonious world” have become mantras of the party leaders and the basis of their domestic and foreign policies. During the opening ceremonies of the 2008 Olympics, the world was greeted not by quotations from Mao’s Little Red Book but by warm homilies from the teachings of Confucius.

What explains this redemption? Confucius gave attention to two overarching matters: what makes for good government, and what makes for a morally good individual. His answers were elegant — and compelling — in their simplicity. Good government rules not by physical force but through moral force. The ideal ruler embodies virtue, which is expressed in his unfailingly benevolent treatment of the people. In turn, the people voluntarily, even eagerly, choose to follow him.

Because government, to be good, requires a good ruler — and good officials — Confucius also characterizes what makes for a good person: someone who possesses a love of learning; strives to achieve benevolence, righteousness, propriety and wisdom; treats others as he would wish to be treated; is trustworthy and loyal as a friend, filial as a son and obedient as a subject; and, reciprocally, is affectionate and caring as a parent or an official.

What in this millenniums-old vision resonates with Beijing today?

With the proclamation “to get rich is glorious,” Deng Xiaoping, China’s paramount leader for two decades beginning in the late 1970s, ushered in the post-Mao era. An ideology of socialist revolution through class warfare gave way to an ideology of getting rich. And, of course, the Chinese — or at least some — have since become very wealthy indeed. But unbridled economic growth has spawned a host of problems: a widening gulf between rich and poor, urban and rural; heightened social tensions; increasing unemployment; rising crime; rampant corruption, especially among government officials and local business leaders; environmental degradation; healthcare and elderly care that is out of the reach of vast numbers of people; and a skyrocketing incidence of public protests (tens of thousands annually).

The Communist Party is neither unaware of nor insensitive to these problems. But it is determined to confront them without surrendering any of its political control or authority; it has shown little inclination to make substantive changes to the prevailing political system or institutions of government.

In the ideology of Confucianism, party leadership has rediscovered a potent language for addressing the challenges China now faces. The teachings of the sage, after all, offer the promise of social harmony. The crux of the Confucian agenda is that individuals, whatever their social or economic status, are to treat their fellow human beings empathetically and with proper respect. A philanthropic, communal spirit imbues humanity, creating a society in which “all within the four seas are brothers.” Here the Beijing leadership sees an opportunity to lessen the wealth gap and ease social tensions — and at little financial cost to the government.

And if official corruption is one of the most serious grievances among the people — frequently capable of sparking social unrest — traditional Confucian teachings again provide authorities with the language to show the people that they are attacking it head-on. The official China Daily observed in 2007: “In traditional Confucianism, the cultivation of personal moral integrity is considered the most basic quality for an honest official. The qualities of uprightness, modesty, hard work, frugality and honesty that President Hu encourages officials to incorporate into their work and lifestyle are exactly the same as the moral integrity of a decent person in traditional culture.”

Confucius promises a government that cares for the people, that makes their well-being its primary concern. This is to govern by virtue. And virtue creates its own legitimacy: paternalistic, affectionate care of the people by the rulers is sure to be reciprocated by the people’s trust and obedience. Hu Jintao’s appropriation of the language of Confucianism not only fills the ideological void left by Marxist-Leninism’s demise but also suggests to the governed that, in seeking to create a harmonious society and a harmonious world, he and other officials take their “Confucian” responsibility of moral leadership to heart. Their expectation is that the people, in turn, will place trust in the government and be obedient to it, with minimal dissent.

China’s government appears determined to address the fissures and tensions born of almost three decades of unrestrained economic development. But it seems equally determined to bring about such change without reforming the prevailing one-party system of governance. The regime in Beijing, eager to keep its power intact, to maintain the political status quo, has chosen, for the time being, to goad the Chinese toward social harmony through traditional ideological and moral exhortations.

Resuscitating the sage today thus serves the party’s political aims. But to conclude that cherry-picking soothing phrases from Confucian writings is the same as a genuine and enduring commitment to the vision of Confucius would be a mistake.

Daniel K. Gardner is a professor of history and the director of the program in East Asian studies at Smith College.

Copyright © 2010, Los Angeles Times