OTF China Watch

[Bored Of Education]

It's the world's biggest human rights abuser, there are no trade embargos with China (as far as I can see), no mass boycotting of goods made there, no threats of invasion from any other countries, no question of enforced regime change and no shipping democracy there.

Is this because It's the second biggest economy in the world?

Anyway, it is time OTF turned its attention away from small fry like Venuzuela and North Korea and onto the vanguard of totalitarian capitalism

[Anton Gramscescu]

OTF China Watch

I have to say, China doesn't *feel* totalitarian. When you're wallking around on the streets, it feels remarkably familiar and western. People speak to you quite openly about more or less any subject (except government) - the communist party doesn't try to politicise all aspects of existence the way a true totalitarian regime does. The party doesn;t seem nearly as present on a street level basis as it does in, say Vietnam.

It's also not exactly capitalist, either. Most of the really large employers are still state enterprises, and state banks continue to divert large amounts of capital to loss-making state enterprises.

Of course, at the same time, they are execting thousands of prisoners every year and are pretty ruthless about stamping on overt signs of dissent. But if you're an average joe, minding your own business and "not getting involved", I'd imagine the experience of being a middle-class officeworker in Shanghai and London is much more similar than you'd think.

[Bored Of Education]

OTF China Watch

Cheers, AG. Apart from making sure it isn't a nil thread, you contributed what I forgot to ask for which is for personal experiences of China.

As much as I can dislike what the government is doing as a whole and the rest of the world's double standards to wards it, my criticisms of it are on the same level as other people's towards Cuba.

How long did you spend there?

[Chairman Zhao]

OTF China Watch

Being Australian Chinese and having at least been in the country for two years, I can see the 'mainlanders' are still quite scarred. There is still quite a high amount of resentment towards the Japanese and sometimes even foreigners. History is strongly valued in China and they feel quite peeved off generally with anything Japanese. Any young nationalist patriotic Chinese seeing this thread will get automatically furious, they'll not doubt point out that the Japanese has gotten away with war crimes and yada yada.

Just saying you should have named the thread 'OTF Chinese Government Watch' as for the majority of people in China there's still that Confucian family country mentality. They see any thing against China as against them, but it's a total different story if it's against the government.

[ursus arctos]

OTF China Watch

You make some excellent points that are often completely ignored by "Westerners" unfamiliar with Chinese history or culture.

The importance of the very long historical time horizon that colours the world view of many Chinese cannot be underestimated, and yet it often is by observers more used to the oftimes ahistorical views now current in much of the "West". There is also a definite concept of Chinese exceptionalism that is redolent of its American equivalent (and susceptible to all of the same abuses).

Welcome 112505, your perspective will be most valuable here.

[Anton Gramscescu]

OTF China Watch

112505 wrote:

There is still quite a high amount of resentment towards the Japanese and sometimes even foreigners.

Although, that said, I find Chinese people much more welcoming to foreigners than the Japanese. They don't get up and move when you sit down next to them on public transport, for instance.

Just saying you should have named the thread 'OTF Chinese Government Watch' as for the majority of people in China there's still that Confucian family country mentality. They see any thing against China as against them, but it's a total different story if it's against the government.

It's a good point, I think. "China" is a civilization as much as it is a nation state. It's quite different from other nation-states in that way - the country has adopte nation-state trappings to survive in the modern world, but the mental conception is that China is a civilization, or a "people" as opposed to a state (it's one of the reasons they have such difficulty dealing with non-Han minorities).

Welcome, 112505. Can I ask what the name signifies?

Bored: I've been there three times in the last five years, for stints of between three and nine days. Plus a couple of days in Guangzhou 25 years ago, which barely counts (but was useful in the sense that I remember the place when everyone got around on bicycles and you could count the number of private cars on one hand.)

[Ball Comrade]

OTF China Watch

Although it's often puerile, China Smack offers a window on the 'ordinary Chinese perspective' that I find quite fascinating. And which certainly isn't available in more totalitarian countries.

[E10 Rifle]

OTF China Watch

The upsurge in industrial militancy and general labour activism in China in recent years does seem genuinely interesting and genuinely hopeful, mind. In a Europe/US in the late 19th-century kind of way.

[Anton Gramscescu]

OTF China Watch

Don't bet on it. I get the impression Chinese authorities are very happy to see strikes at factories owned by foreign companies (Honda for instance); less so Chinese companies. Such industrial militancy as is permitted seems to some extent to be about foreign policy (see 110525' post).

That said, there is labour market pressure on a lot of those factories. Wages and working conditions seem to be moving upwards quite quickly because the younger generation sinmply doesn't show as much interest in making sacrifices as the previous generation. A delayed effect of having a nation of only children, perhaps.

[Bored Of Education]

OTF China Watch

Just saying you should have named the thread 'OTF Chinese Government Watch'

Yes, possibly. In the OTF tradition, I was thinking that I should perhaps call it "OTF Hu Jintao Watch" but then I thought that, technically, it is the Party etc.

To be honest, it is as much about UK and US' attitudes as the interesting insights into China

[George]

OTF China Watch

There's been increasing murmurings recently about foreign owned manufacturing relocating to other SE Asian countries with cheaper labour (Vietnam for instance) because of rising costs in China. But it's just talk at the moment. Chinese per capita GDP is around $6-7,000.

And in response to 112505, criticism of the Chinese government by westerners or negative articles in the press can give rise to very defensive internet led nationalism. Witness the Google pullout a few months ago.

[Chairman Zhao]

OTF China Watch

Toto Gramsciddu wrote:

112505 wrote:

There is still quite a high amount of resentment towards the Japanese and sometimes even foreigners.

Although, that said, I find Chinese people much more welcoming to foreigners than the Japanese. They don't get up and move when you sit down next to them on public transport, for instance.

Just saying you should have named the thread 'OTF Chinese Government Watch' as for the majority of people in China there's still that Confucian family country mentality. They see any thing against China as against them, but it's a total different story if it's against the government.

It's a good point, I think. "China" is a civilization as much as it is a nation state. It's quite different from other nation-states in that way - the country has adopte nation-state trappings to survive in the modern world, but the mental conception is that China is a civilization, or a "people" as opposed to a state (it's one of the reasons they have such difficulty dealing with non-Han minorities).

Welcome, 112505. Can I ask what the name signifies?

Bored: I've been there three times in the last five years, for stints of between three and nine days. Plus a couple of days in Guangzhou 25 years ago, which barely counts (but was useful in the sense that I remember the place when everyone got around on bicycles and you could count the number of private cars on one hand.)

It's certainly true that Chinese are very welcoming to foreigners. They will try to be hospitable as much as they can. In fact I'd go to say that Chinese are nicer to foreigners than to their compatriots. This might seem like a contradiction to what I said before but I was merely pointing out a certain point of view.

I agree with you on that China is a civilization and not a nation state for the people. This is why the view of Taiwan being part of China is strongly held.

112505 was my student number at school. My grandfather was a senior colonel in the PLA during the Sino-Japanese war so of course I there is a bit of bias for the mainland people from me.

Yes, George that is certainly true. I have the theory that the Chinese government could be using nationalism in order to counter the rising middle class. Ideas around the place and such isn't good for such a government so why not just make everyone bloody patriotic.In the last two years, since the Tibet incident there's been quite a surge of nationalist thinking.

[ooh aah]

OTF China Watch

People speak to you quite openly about more or less any subject (except government)

Even this is not strictly true. Many of my students (I teach adults) will openly criticise the government. Every day at our school there is an open class that all students can attend about whatever topic the teacher has chosen. There will often be 40 or more people there, and I’ve often heard students criticise the government and party, complain about government corruption, censorship, and talk about the benefits of democracy. The party seems perfectly happy to tolerate such complaints, as it recognises that the vast majority of these people will do nothing about it. Just like in western countries, most people are just armchair critics.

Where the line is firmly drawn is when such complaints transmit into actual action against the party (and I would say voicing grievances online would be considered pro-active, in a way that complaining in public is not, presumably because it can be read by a much wider audience). And of course in ‘problem’ areas such as Xinjiang and Tibet there is far less freedom.

The Chinese attitude to foreigners is a curious one. They are generally very patriotic, and are very keen for foreigners to leave with a positive view of China. As a result most Chinese people would be absolutely mortified if a traveller was robbed, and so China is generally much safer than most other countries They are very proud of their history and culture, but at the same time they have an inferiority complex, and usually refer to China as a developing country. They generally don’t take criticism of China well when it comes from a foreigner, but then that’s true of most Brits and Americans. Chinese people are generally pretty ignorant about the outside world (recently I showed some students a map of the world and not only could they not find USA and Canada, but it also took them 30 seconds to find China. Bearing in mind these were educated middle class adults. I simply cannot imagine this happening anywhere else). This means they are quite curious when they see foreigners, to the extent that in some of the provincial cities they will stare at you, which takes a bit of getting used to. They will also insist on joining you and buying you drinks if you’re in a restaurant, which can get annoying. I still get this even in certain parts of Beijing. On the downside this ignorance of the outside world means they are often guilty of the crassest cultural stereotypes that can be very jarring to liberal minded westerners. (Slightly hypocritical of me given the number of stereotypes in this post). As a general rule they don’t like black people, and as mentioned in the posts above, a lot of people here hate the Japanese.

Of course many of my observations are coloured by the fact that I am an outsider looking in. My Chinese is really shit, so conversations of this nature are tainted by the fact that they are taking place in English with educated, middle class people, and the fact that they are learning English often means they are more culturally aware than the average person on the street, and perhaps tell me what they think I want to hear.

[The Bean Counter]

OTF China Watch

I challenge anyone here to name one East Asian country where people don't hate the Japanese...
And sorry, having been to both countries, I will not in a million years accept that China is a bigger human rights abuser than North Korea. Entering China from North Korea actually, genuinely, does feel like coming back into the free world.
Good thread though so far.
I have a few Chinese friends, and generally they don't like their government, but can get defensive when foreigners criticise their government, or anything else about the country. Even when, in some cases, the foreigner's criticisms are exactly the same as ones they've already expressed. I've noticed this a lot in Korea too. Whether it is because of a persecution complex, that construes an attack on any Korean (or Chinese) target as an attack on Korea (or China) itself, or is basically patriotism, to be found in a greater or lesser extent in all countries, I'm not sure. Probably a bit of both.
Overall, my understanding is that, whatever grievances Chinese people have about their government, as long as they have stability and a decent living standard, democratic freedoms are not so important. Maybe 112505, or any other China-based readers, feel differently?

[Anton Gramscescu]

OTF China Watch

Those are interesting observations, ooh aah (where are you, exactly?). You made me think about my contacts there, and it's true that there is no fear about voicing opinions about what the government *should* do in the future - there's no problem saying "X should be a priority instead of Y". But I've never heard anyone talk about this in past tense - as in, "wow, the government really should have done X instead of Y". I have always interpreted this as a fear of being seen as critical, but maybe the future-orientation of the language implies a critique of present policy? It could be a cultural/linguistic thing, what do you think?

Henry: do the Thais dislike the Japanese? They were never invaded.

[The Bean Counter]

OTF China Watch

Don't know, actually. Never been to Thailand. Maybe someone else has a better idea than me?

[Chairman Zhao]

OTF China Watch

Fairly sure that Thailand does not constitute as East Asia.

The only East Asian 'country' that does not hate the Japanese would be the Taiwanese, of course with most of their 80+ population being able to speak the language and generally some even identifying themselves to be Japanese it's a no brainer.

Korea is one where the resentment towards the Japanese people is waning. I'm studying Korean as a language at the moment and it seems to me only the older Koreans dislike the Japanese. The younger ones embrace Japanese culture and most of them learn the language for high school exams.

EDIT: I'm only talking about the native Taiwanese not the later migrants (wai sheng ren) who were mainly KMT sponsored types. They probably don't like the Japanese much either.

[Furtho]

OTF China Watch

112505 wrote:

Fairly sure that Thailand does not constitute as East Asia.

It doesn't, no.

[The Bean Counter]

OTF China Watch

Anti-Japanese sentiment in Korea is waning, I think. Amongst young people, it tends to exist mainly in the abstract. For example they will denounce the Japanese position over Dokdo (Takeshima for those of you outside Korea) and occasionally link it to all kinds of historical wrongs. But they study Japanese, visit Japan on holiday, listen to Japanese singers, eat Japanese food and drink... in short, their behaviour is certainly not anti-Japanese.
Is the same true of young Chinese, do you know?

[Chairman Zhao]

OTF China Watch

henry wrote:

Anti-Japanese sentiment in Korea is waning, I think. Amongst young people, it tends to exist mainly in the abstract. For example they will denounce the Japanese position over Dokdo (Takeshima for those of you outside Korea) and occasionally link it to all kinds of historical wrongs. But they study Japanese, visit Japan on holiday, listen to Japanese singers, eat Japanese food and drink... in short, their behaviour is certainly not anti-Japanese.
Is the same true of young Chinese, do you know?

This is very much true for the Chinese as well. Many Beijingers will point out that it's mainly the Shanghainese who are the 'hanjian' Japanophiles but in fact all of them enjoy Japanese culture. Japanese culture is quite popular in China and only second to the Korean wave. You can find Japanese cuisine in every commercial center in Beijing and it's always packed from my experience. In these places Japanese and Korean goods are proudly tagged with higher prices as it's really hip and hop for youngsters to dress like pop idols.

The elderly address these young kiddos with the term (chongyangmeiwai) basically xenophilia. Where the younger generations couldn't give two shits about the 5000 years of history and just want to fit in. Hence their lack of knowledge what the Japanese really did. This is discounting a gradually getting smaller minority super nationalistic Chinese youth.

I'd have to agree, I really lose my patience dealing with the past 80s generation in China living in urban areas. They are really naive and generally have poor social skills from what I have encountered. I'm about to go into rant mode now I'll stop here, too many stereotypes and too much generalization from me. It's just impossible to really explain things about China, too big.

[Bored Of Education]

OTF China Watch

having been to both countries, I will not in a million years accept that China is a bigger human rights abuser than North Korea.

I base human rights abuses first and foremost on capital punishment and, as far as you can tell, China is far beyond NK on this.

On the other hand, I would be genuinely interested in what the differences were in your opinion

[ooh aah]

OTF China Watch

And sorry, having been to both countries, I will not in a million years accept that China is a bigger human rights abuser than North Korea. Entering China from North Korea actually, genuinely, does feel like coming back into the free world.

That must be due to sheer weight of numbers. Percentage wise N Korea must be the world leader on this score.

AG, I'm in Beijing. Interesting point about the linguistics, it's certainly plausible. We teach 'should have' to upper intermediate students, so people below that level probably wouldn't be able to express themselves in that way. And like I said my grasp of Chinese is such that I simply could not have such a conversation in Chinese, which would give me greater insight. One thing I've noticed is that higher level students are definitely more vocal in their criticisms as obviously they have the vocabulary to express themselves more clearly. Also people in their late 20's and 30's tend to be the most critical. The university students couldn't care less. Most criticism are about the present and future (censorship of the press for example) but I've occassionaly heard criticisms of the cultural revolution. Tiananmen Sq is very much something everyone likes to sweep under the carpet though. I can't imagine there's much reflection of recent Chinese history either in schools and there certainly isn't in the media.

[Chairman Zhao]

OTF China Watch

Capital punishment is seen as pretty fair in Chinese culture, historically bad people deserved to die in China. If you ask any Chinese about capital punishment in China, they'll think it's fairly normal. This could just be lack of education but they think it's a fair deal that really bad people die instead of rot in prison.

If somehow anyone can dig the per capita executions of the DPRK up, I'm pretty sure on a big assumption that it will likely be higher than the PRC's. China is a big country with a big population. In terms of execution rates Singapore is higher. I'd also like to remind you that capital punishment is equal in all the East Asian states. The argument of capital punishment is wrong or not is a ethical question and we'll be entering a gray area.

EDIT:

Oooh Ahhh, may I inquire what part of Beijing you teach in?

You can see quite a bit of reflection of recent Chinese history if you watch local TV. Enormous amount of generic dramas about revolutionary times. They are of course incredibly biased. Also there was a controversial drama called "Zou Xiang Gong He" (Towards the Republic) aired on CCTV a few years ago that portrayed Li Hong Zhang as a hero, going against communist historians.

Of course things like the Ti'anmen Square or six four as the locals folk call it is rarely mentioned. Most people remember the cultural revolution with things such as 'liang piao' (grain tickets?) and the four pests or just not having enough to eat. I really haven't met any old people talking about many people dying but have heard of anti-counter revolutionary activity and such.

[ursus arctos]

OTF China Watch

I wouldn't trust any purported North Korean figures, and even if they somehow emerged, they wouldn't include people who died in forced labour, let alone starvation.

Amnesty had Saudi Arabia as the highest per capita based on 2007 data.

[Bored Of Education]

OTF China Watch

As China's and North Korea's figures on capital punishment are secret, it is difficult to compare the two in per capital terms or otherwise.

It was a bit specious perhaps of me to state China's position so absolutely. Let's say that China's human rights abuses are massive and certainly comparable to Cuba, North Korea etc and yet, like Saudi Arabia, it is treated much more favourably not only by the US but the "Western World" in general