Efficient Airports Just May Be Enough

Happy belated New Year!

I have been back in the States for a little over a week and I still get a little thrill that I can access my blog without logging into a VPN. Leaving China 8000 miles away has given me some time to gain some perspective on the last five months there, but that perspective will have to wait until a later blog post.

I’ve been wanting to write for the past few weeks about an op-ed piece Thomas Friedman wrote in the New York Times last month, but alas, grading final exams left me little time to do much blogging.  However, now as I hang out in suburbia with my parents, I have plenty of time to indulge my random musings.  

On December 23, 2008, Thomas Friedman wrote “Time to Reboot America” in The New York Times.  The gist of the piece (and I am oversimplifying somewhat, but not all that much from what was actually written) was that China can build extremely efficient airports and train stations, but the U.S. still has freedom of speech, and thus we can still assert our leadership in this new century.  It’s true that China has censorship and America does not, at least not to the same extent.  America has great raw materials to make this country a leader again, but we’re squandering those resources by letting our education system, scientific research, and infrastructure atrophy.  However, there’s something missing in the logic of Friedman’s piece.  

China may have censorship, but there is also something else at work in China that portends more disparities between the US and China aside from mobile phone service and airport efficiency.   After spending a semester in the classroom with Chinese university students, I am beginning to better understand quotes included in these articles from everyday Chinese people. There was a recent article about love blooming in the relief camps in Sichuan province in the aftermath of last May’s devastating earthquake titled “Romance and Recovery in Quake Area.”  Part of the article discussed the slow speed of recovery and there was a quote from a farmer in one of the villages destroyed by the earthquake in which he expressed his understanding that the government had other problems to focus on, thus explaining the slow response to rebuilding the earthquake-ravaged areas.  The farmer, He Yifu said, “The government pays attention to those living on the side of the road, not those far away.  But I understand the government has its own difficulties.”  

If I had read this article six months ago and come across this quote, I would have been outraged that a Chinese citizen whose town had been completely destroyed in an earthquake and who was living in a makeshift tent village was okay with the government’s slow response to his plight and millions of others like him.  However, I think I better understand where this sentiment comes from. There is a real concern among many Chinese people about the government’s image and a belief that the government knows best. One group of students in my Zhuhai class was writing a letter to the editor about the handling of Yang Jia’s case, the man who stabbed six policemen in Shanghai after previously being arrested and allegedly beaten for riding an unlicensed bicycle.  Yang was then sentenced and executed in November 2008 for his actions, even though questions arose about the circumstances surrounding his treatment by the police and the fairness of his trial.  My students’ main point was not about the mishandling of the case or any unanswered questions, but how this episode affected the Chinese government’s image and how the government needed to take steps to repair its image. Forget about Yang Jia’s family and the possibility of injustice being perpetrated, my students deemed that the top priority ought to be repairing the image of the Chinese government.

While the recent economic troubles afflicting China may challenge this conventional and received wisdom of Chinese people like my students, there are plenty of Chinese people who are quick to forgive the government and blame external factors for their woes. Even with the recent economic trouble, many people are quick to blame the U.S. for China’s problems, which may be partly true, but it is the Chinese government’s responsibility to navigate this downturn at home. Perhaps as my students realize how difficult it is going to be for them to get jobs or internships,, they will begin to include the government as one of the parties responsible for their misfortunes, instead of being so concerned about not tarnishing the government’s image.  Yet, until that moment comes, the large percentage of the Chinese population willing to go to bat for their government, along with its efficient airports and mobile phone service, may be a far more powerful force helping China to take the 21st century away from am America with its open and innovative culture, but inability to pull its people together to rise above these short-term troubles.