China and its Discontents

In the interim we had the Mao years, which, politically speaking, were kind of like being strapped in the passenger seat of a stolen Lexus at 3:00 a.m. with your good friend Gary Busey at the wheel huffing paint and sucking down his third bottle of Goldschläger.

This is an exhortation to please read Jottings from the Granite Studio, the blog of Jeremiah Jenne, who is the academic dean and teaches Chinese history at IES Beijing, the study-abroad program I attended last fall.

Today was a gloriously sunny day in Santa Cruz, California. We took the dogs down to the beach to get a run in and then stopped for ice cream down at Marianne’s. That is also an exhortation to try out the combination of Horchata and Mexican Chocolate ice cream. The two together must be divine inspiration.

China has some of the strangest development patterns in the world. The inner city is always the most desirable place to live. The migrant poor live in exurbs. Suburban tract homes are reserved as second or third homes for millionaires.

Driving through Chengdu a while ago on the way to the airport, I saw it all. There were miles of cranes. New apartment buildings not two years old that already looked shabby. The ubiquitous white tile. Ads for European style villas. Walls topped with shards of glass and cameras protected barren concrete apartments. (why?) The apparently new campus of the Southwest University for Nationalities stood alone. (the university was quite a sight – every building identical, all in red brick) On one corner of the campus, a field of yellow bok choy grew behind a small hut. Had this been the lone example in China were the local government had been unable to appropriate the land? Had eminent domain failed? The city has paved vast new roads, empty on either side, the sidewalks lined with perfectly groomed trees painted white around the base to show that they have already been trimmed. Even in this no-man’s land, special sidewalk tiles for the blind have been laid.

The development seemed to get more intense the closer we got to the airport. The temporary walls surrounding construction projects were lined with a continuously repeating poster of the airport of the future: gleaming new terminals, the roofs undulating naturalistically as the ocean waves so very far away from this inland city. The only terminal thus completed was packed with businessmen and the rising upper middle class. A few foreigners stood idly gawking at the bustle. As our plane took off, smoky haze slowly obscured my view.

I’ve seen many similar developments in Beijing – the subway lines that extend to yet-to-be-developed areas, the construction, the strange frontier where urban and rural collide. But Beijing seems almost mature and developed compared to what I saw in Chengdu. Beijing is only one side of the story; there is always somewhere else in China that is undergoing a more fantastic rebirth of construction. Nature no longer exists; it’s as if China is one big construction lot.

Travelling through Sichuan made me realize I still had old copy lying around from previous travels that I had never published. The next couple of posts will be those. Here’s the first. Reflections on Chengdu and Emei Shan will follow.

In Xinjiang, cultural politics mixes with oil politics. Every time the Chinese government squashes Uyghur expressions of independence or solidarity, the West reacts with outrage. ‘The people of Xinjiang (and by extension, Tibet) must have rights of self-determination,’ they shout. The West fails to recognize China’s priorities. China’s desire to foist a nationalist identity on Uyghurs and create a unified China is a secondary concern; it only exists so that they can extract as much oil as they can from Xinjiang.

Karamay is Xinjiang’s oil capital. 15 years ago, it was a patch of the Gobi Desert. Now it is a city of 290,000. It has cost billions of yuan to build – a river was even diverted from the mountains to make it livable. Just recently, a billion yuan was spent to build a major park downtown, featuring a spectacular water and laser light show at night.

Surrounding Karamay for a hundred kilometers are oil fields. You can drive along the highway next to the Taklamakan Desert and never stop seeing them; oil derricks stretch beyond the horizon. It was the first oil field discovered and tapped in post-revolutionary China, and the fourth largest, after those in the Northeast and in the East China Sea. 6.3 million tons of oil flows out of Karamay every year. In the US, you would expect an endeavor like this to be built by private enterprise. But this of course is China, and the Karamay oilfield is owned by the state-run China Petroleum.

Karamay isn’t just one of China’s biggest oilfields – it’s also a major conduit for oil and natural gas to and from Kazakhstan and the rest of the Central Asian “stans”. In this regard, the pipeline is the most important resource in Xinjiang. Even if all the oil dried up today, the city would still exist because of this connection. China could actually be drilling more oil in Karamay, but it’s harder and deeper to get to. They don’t need to spend the capital to invest in more expensive technologies, however, because the oil in Kazakhstan is simply cheaper.

Xinjiang is known for its “one white, two blacks”: cotton, coal, and oil. Of lesser geopolitical importance is its “one red”: tomatoes exported to Italy. Although the vast wind fields, solar power plants and hydropower dams are impressive, they are not as significant, because they are only used to supply energy to Xinjiang itself. Oil and coal, however, power the rest of China.

Too many China scholars view China’s insistence on the territorial integrity of Xinjiang as culturally or historically based, as if the Chinese would “lose face” if the barbarians in the West seceded and overturned their tributary relationship. This is mistaken. Opposition to Uyghur independence is not primarily a matter of nationalism, the unification of all minzu (nationalities or ethnicities) under common citizenship, and certainly not about pride. It’s all about oil.

Francis Fukuyama once again reaffirms why he is one of the most serious foreign policy intellectuals today, crystallizing in a few sentences what most other China commentators have missed or failed to express so eloquently:

The hardest thing for any political observer to predict is the moral element. All social revolutions are driven by intense anger over injured dignity, an anger that is sometimes crystallized by a single incident or image that mobilizes previously disorganized individuals and binds them into a community. We can quote statistics on education or job growth, or dig into our knowledge of a society’s history and culture, and yet completely miss the way that social consciousness is swiftly evolving through a myriad of text messages, shared videos or simple conversations.

If Yajun’s post at Jottings from the Granite Studio was an introduction into the Chinese mindset and the functional barriers to political change, then Fukuyama’s post is the perfect combination American realist/idealist take on the Jasmine Revolution, focusing on China’s middle class. The middle class is definitely the right frame with which to analyze future political instability in China. If change does come, it will be at the hands of a large number of increasingly comfortable but not wealthy Chinese. This is especially true given that, as Fukuyama notes, the unemployment rate among college graduates in China is one of the highest in the world.

UPDATE: I’m rather surprised that my previous post on the Jasmine Revolution published in the Trinity Tripod is now leading New York Times coverage when you google “Jasmine Revolution”.

Published in the Trinity Tripod.

Over 60 years ago, Chiang Kai-shek envisioned China as a bustling economic and political power, albeit controlled by his own totalitarian state. Today, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has reshaped China from a rural, fractured, feudal society into a bustling economic and political power, albeit controlled by totalitarian government. Does this sound familiar? The CCP couldn’t have carried out Chiang’s vision better than Chiang himself. And now, with Taiwan functioning as a democracy, some in China want to follow their lead. Several weeks ago, members of an overseas Chinese-language website, Boxun, called for China’s very own “Jasmine Revolution,” a take on the more successful uprising in Tunisia. I say more successful because the Chinese “revolution” has so far been a dud.

The idea was for sympathizers of democracy to gather in designated public areas in major cities every Sunday, and then peacefully take a “stroll,” thwarting the police from figuring out who was a protestor and who was merely a tourist. Things didn’t go as planned. The first Sunday, Jon Huntsman, U.S. Ambassador to China and soon-to-be Republican presidential candidate, “strolled” into the Wangfujing shopping street in Beijing with his family, pretending not to know that there was anything political going on. A video of Huntsman caught in the act was later used by hyper-nationalists to prove a point about the U.S. meddling in Chinese affairs. The second Sunday was even worse. In Beijing, the meeting place was blocked off; police (uniformed and in plainclothes) outnumbered civilians at a ratio of 10-to-1; and some foreign journalists were harassed, taken to police precincts, and even beaten. This past Sunday was much of the same.

It might be tempting to draw comparisons between the Middle East protests and China, but to do so would be ignoring quite a number of differences. At the end of the day, the majority of Chinese citizens are satisfied with their government. If democracy was suddenly instituted in China, there’s no doubt the CCP would win by a landslide. Under CCP rule, economic development has changed peoples’ lives immeasurably. The Chinese wife of a friend of mine has this anecdote: “My mom could only afford a small piece of sugar for lunch during the Great Famine in 1960, but her daughter traveled in three continents before she turned 25.” Who would forsake a party with those results? Furthermore, most Chinese people haven’t even heard of the protests; the “revolution” mainly received news on websites that are blocked in China.

There are still many Chinese people who hold grievances against the government; but to date, there has not been an incident that unifies the farmers and students, or factory workers and professionals, reaching across socioeconomic strata to create the only force that can create political change in China. Even the Tiananmen protests 20 years ago never reached rural areas. Those fighting for political reform in China will have to wait a little while longer. Don’t lose hope.

Celebrating the Spring Festival and Chinese New Year in Beijing has blown me away. The fireworks. The spectacle. The food. It’s nearly overwhelming. For the past five days, Beijing has been constantly rumbling with the sound of fireworks. New Year’s Eve, the city felt like a warzone. Every storefront was closed, so it was dark. China is just dirty and poor enough in some areas that you could almost imagine it to be a war-torn country. One of my friends remarked, “I’ve become so desensitized to the noise. If someone WERE to attack China, New Year’s would be the best time to do it. No one would pay any attention.”

It’s been a lot of fun, but I think I’m ready to get back into my normal routine and schedule now.

It was a rather interesting flight from Beijing to SF yesterday. First, we were stuck on the tarmac for three hours because Beijing was too windy. Yes, too windy. I was seated in between a woman from Shanghai, and another from rural Hubei province. The conversation was quite interesting, given the regional pronunciation differences. Mandarin speakers from Shanghai change every zh and sh sound (the sound in jump and ship respectively) into simple z and s consonant sounds. This can be confusing, since Mandarin makes ample use of all four sounds, and the tonal nature of the language and relatively small number of consonant-vowel combinations (far fewer than in English) mean that more words are saddled onto half as many sounds.

The woman on my right had a very strong rural accent, even more difficult to piece together than the Shanghai accent. She didn’t know how to write pinyin or English to fill out her customs and entry form, so I helped to fill it out for her. She was seeing her two grandsons (4, and 8 years old) for the first time. Her son had left in 1994. She told me he played badminton. I assume professionally, but I’m not sure what money can be made from that in the US (in China, badminton sponsorships are commonplace). One of the questions on the entry form asked for an estimate of the value of all things on her person. I asked, “100 kuai, 200 kuai?” 200 kuai. All she had with her was $30 worth of clothing and a piece of paper with her son’s address and phone number. We were separated into two different lines during the customs process – I hope customs was able to get in touch with her son.

Traveling halfway around the world is a strange experience – your night becomes day and day becomes night. Added to that was my lack of sleep for the past two days; I couldn’t tell which way was up. Strange then, that I went to bed in San Francisco only to naturally wake up at 7 AM. I heard a rather strange sound for Saturday at 7: chants and songs. Outside was a line of marchers stretching down for half a mile. I decided it was a good day for a morning run; I was also curious about the marchers. It turned out to be for the Coronation of the Virgin Mary – they were walking from here to the Mission, on a 9-hour march.

Running on the path next to Colma Creek, I realized why running suddenly seemed so much easier: my lungs were no longer wheezing from the pollution. I took a loop around town, running from El Camino to Orange Park, walking to Ponderosa, and then running the rest of the way to Orange Library, through Alta Loma back to El Camino. The run got me thinking about some of the differences between here and what I would have seen on the same run in Beijing. Here is what surprised me, in no particular order:

• Dogs higher than a foot.
• Asian-looking people who don’t respond to me in Mandarin.
• Parks that are empty at 7:30. Also, no old people practicing Taiqi, playing classical instruments, crooning into a microphone, or line-dancing to pop songs.
• Public art installations at Orange Park. A couple new ones including two giant insect wings painted blue and a strange sheet of steel.
• Birds on electric wires.
• Canadian geese resting on a grassy field.
• Empty streets.
• Quiet.
• Suburbia that is not reserved for the wealthy and wasn’t built within the last year.
• People with tans.

I was really touched when my homestay parents asked me over dinner, “Who do you think is America’s best friend? China?” I responded, thinking in terms of real-politik allies, “No, probably not.” But they said, “America is China’s best friend. Japanese students don’t come to China and live with Chinese families. They live together in dorms. The Koreans don’t come to China and live with Chinese families. They live out on their own. Only Americans do. They’re unique. More Americans understand China than in any other country, and more Chinese understand America than in any other country; more students study in each other’s country than in any others. That is why we are best friends.”

Also something that I had forgotten: they mentioned that George Bush Sr. had served as ambassador to China in the early 1970’s under Ford (he wasn’t actually ambassador at the time, because the US still recognized Taiwan, but was the official envoy, and acted like an ambassador). Furthermore, they said Bush Jr. was in China during this time, biking around Beijing taking pictures. For some reason, this really surprised me, simply because the perspective you would have as a foreigner in Beijing prior to the Reform and Opening Up would be somewhat unique, as there were really no foreigners in China prior to that time.

At some function (it’s unclear in what capacity), my homestay father got to know John Tsu, who he described as Bush Sr.’s “Chinese teacher” (he was chairman of the Asian-Pacific Affairs Committee in the White House). I thought that was an interesting connection as well.

Over an official lunch in late February, a top South Korean diplomat confidently told the American ambassador, Kathleen Stephens, that the fall would come “two to three years” after the death of Kim Jong-il, the country’s ailing leader, Ms. Stephens later cabled Washington. A new, younger generation of Chinese leaders “would be comfortable with a reunited Korea controlled by Seoul and anchored to the United States in a benign alliance,” the diplomat, Chun Yung-woo, predicted.

That is a bold prediction – and the Guardian (here and here) is much more direct than the New York Times in claiming this. I agree with Stephen Walt that in regards to China and North Korea, the embassy cables are much more of a wash than they are portrayed as (what an ambassador says to another ambassador is not necessarily the discussion the Politburo Standing Committee is having). Even assuming Kim Jong-eun or the military cabal is somehow incapable of successfully negotiating the power transfer, there would need to be some pretty astounding diplomacy for China to be comfortable with a unified Korea. The entire idea behind supporting a divided peninsula from China’s perspective is that, regardless of how odious the North Korean regime is (and it is a serious headache to China), any unbalancing of the status quo will ultimately hurt China’s interests. Any US or NATO military presence above the DMZ and the floods of North Korean refugees, as the article notes, would be untenable. But that’s not all.

An ascendant, unified Korea could not be a benign ally of the US, according to certain Chinese viewpoints. Already, China is boxed in on all sides by countries closely-partnered with the US: South Korea (of course), Japan, the Philippines, Indonesia, Australia, and India. Unification means a great deal psychologically. A unified Korea would have subtle, but greatly-expanded persuasive powers on the international stage. I hope that, as the Guardian suggests, younger leaders are no longer concerned about this, and want to work with both Korea and the US in a mutually beneficial manner. But that’s not a given.

The goal, then, is to make unification in China’s interest. China might not be able to prevent it – the regime might slide so quickly as to be unsalvageable (and China certainly is never going to war over North Korea again). But the US and Korea should want China to recognize the unified state on its own terms. Not consulting the Chinese would harm our relations with them on all fronts. Incentives for Chinese investment in Korea would help – so would significantly paring back American military presence on the peninsula. (Why, in a post-North Korean world, would we even need military bases there? Is war with China a realistic threat in this day and age? And besides, we always have Japan) We could even couple some of the things China wants with some of our own priorities (on trade, fiscal policy, climate change, energy policy, you name it). I have a feeling that this is not a zero-sum negotiation in which China and the US negotiate, tit-for-tat. Instead, an outcome in which both sides are satisfied can only be positive.

I’m having a hard time imagining how painful the reunification process would be. The North Korean state, if it did merge with the South, would probably go down in flames. The state is already a wreck with food shortages and the like, but without even minimal state assistance many more would probably starve. The military would suddenly be a loose cannon – and the nuclear material currently lying around Yongbyon would be up for grabs. Of course, South Korea and the United States have certainly drawn up coordinated response plans to rush into the vacuum when needed, and have practiced plenty of military scenarios (the current exercise with the two countries’ navies being conducted right now included). But it still boggles the mind.

Meaning to get to this for a while.

How big is the rift between China and the US?

Administration officials speak of an alarming loss of trust and confidence between China and the United States over the past two years, forcing them to scale back hopes of working with the Chinese on major challenges like climate change, nuclear nonproliferation and a new global economic order.

And David Shambaugh calls China “an increasingly narrow-minded, self-interested, truculent, hyper-nationalist and powerful country.” Ouch.

You can see this especially in Obama’s latest trip to Asia and his support for elevating India to the Security Council. This article was published before the trip and the midterm elections, and I definitely feel like some of the fear-mongering associated with the election has tempered slightly in the past few weeks. For a while, Blue Dogs and Tea Partiers alike were really shredding our precious guanxi (if there is one Chinese word you should know, it should be guanxi, or relationship). But the political system has now let out some steam.

There’s not much more analysis I can add that isn’t already covered excellently in the article (see below), only to say that we should neither disparage China’s (and our) growing calcification nor try to take an even harder-line to our relationship. This is simply a natural, and predictable reaction by the American public (and in reaction to them, Congress) to rather distressing bilateral economic policy conducted by both countries over the past decade.

To round out, here’s an especially pertinent section of analysis:

Political factors at home have contributed to the administration’s tougher posture.With the economy sputtering and unemployment high, Beijing has become an all-purpose target. In this Congressional election season, candidates in at least 30 races are demonizing China as a threat to American jobs.

At a time of partisan paralysis in Congress, anger over China’s currency has been one of the few areas of bipartisan agreement, culminating in the House’s overwhelming vote in September to threaten China with tariffs on its exports if Beijing did not let its currency, the renminbi, appreciate.

The trouble is that China’s own domestic forces may cause it to dig in its heels. With the Communist Party embarking on a transfer of leadership from President Hu Jintao to his anointed successor, Xi Jinping, the leadership is wary of changes that could hobble China’s growth.