The Useless Tree

Culture, Tradition, Politics

    Ian Buruma has a piece in yesterday’s Guardian: "Culture is no excuse for China denying its people democracy."  It is short, so cannot delve very deeply into the various facets of this topic.  But he does make some points that are worth thinking about:

Now it is true that countries have their own histories, peculiar
circumstances and cultures and that too much preaching can smack of the
old missionary zeal to assume that all the things we cherish at home
should be universally adopted. But culture, in the sense of custom and
tradition, is often nothing but an excuse for political arrangements.
Democrats from countries such as China, Pakistan or Burma do not accuse
the West of imposing its values. Only authoritarians do.
….
One reason why Taiwan is such a tricky problem for the Chinese
government is precisely its politics. If Chinese culture demands
authoritarian politics, or what Ambassador Wu would call ‘Chinese
democracy’, then what about Taiwan? Are the Taiwanese any less Chinese?

     I generally agree with that first idea, that "culture," or the invocation of cultural uniqueness, is often simply an "excuse for political arrangements."  To argue that China should not attempt free and fair national elections because of certain economic or social conditions (i.e. it is too poor or insufficiently educated, or some such) might be defensible (though I would not, myself, defend such propositions).  But to argue that China should not attempt free and fair national elections because something called "Chinese culture" does not enable or permit it, is just sloppy thinking.

    First of all, we have to recognize that "Chinese culture" is obviously a changeable, and now rapidly changing, formation.  It is not now what it was in, say, 1800, nor 1900, nor, even, 1950. 

      In 1975, the notion of "Chinese rock and roll," for example, would have been preposterous.  Rock and roll was a "Western" cultural product; "Chinese" people did not perform or practice it; the two were wholly separate and alien.  Who today would defend such a position?   It is simply an empirical fact, whatever our valuation of it, that rock and roll and been made into a Chinese cultural practice.  Conservative Chinese commentators may not like that, they may complain about the debasement of Chinese youth and the temptations of "Western" culture.  Ironically, American cultural conservatives have the same complaints as their conservative Chinese counterparts (notice how some now refer to John McCain as "Juan McCain" to disparage the cultural and political influences of Latin American on the US).  But all them, in China and the US, are only denying a powerful fact of globalized (post)modern life: all cultures now are hybrid combinations of various elements drawn from many different sources.

    It has been that way for longer than many might want to admit.  Think of "Chinese culture" in the twentieth century.  The May 4th reformers, those who argued that only a thorough embrace of science and democracy, which they understood as "Western" creations, could "save China," are they now to be seen as traitors who sold out traditional "Chinese culture"?  Or how about Mao?  Didn’t he rely on a "Western" ideology to create a revolutionary political movement.   He wasn’t terribly keen on traditional notions of "Chinese culture," either.  Indeed, we could argue that authoritarianism in China, in its modern guise at least, has been founded precisely on a rejection of "Chinese culture."  How, then, can we say that "Chinese culture" is its cause?

    I know, I know: "culture" is a big and interpretable category and there are ways in which "tradition" is authoritarian.   Nonetheless, it seems to me that the burden of proof is on those who want to make the "culture denies democracy" argument.  One of my commenters on another thread, the estimable Zoomzan, makes the opposite case.

    Even the briefest consideration of "tradition" underscores Buruma’s point that "culture" is an "excuse for political arrangements."  Read Han Fei Tzu’s critique of Confucius and you will notice two things.  First, his utter disdain for the moralism and naivete of "The Master."   And, second, his belief, pace Confucius, of the absolute need for clear laws and harsh punishments.  Han distinguishes himself from Confucius and Confucians in these ways.  He sees their avoidance of law and punishment as fundamental weaknesses and failures.  Of course, when we read The Analects and Mencius, we see that Han is right: Confucians did not want to rely on law and punishment; they believed exemplary moral leadership would suffice to bring order and peace to the world.

     The point is that before the Han dynasty, during which these very different views of the world were stitched together to make a state ideology, which view was "Chinese"?  If both were, then "Chinese culture" encompasses politically contradictory elements.  Or, we could say, that the Han synthesis was skewed more in the Legalist direction and, thus, distorted "Chinese culture" for its own political purposes.  Or, we could also say, that "Chinese culture" has always been capacious and contradictory, holding elements that might promote democracy (think of Mencius) and elements that promote authoritarianism, so that no one particular political outcome is culturally determined (I like that interpretation best). 

    Bottom line: when we think about "Chinese culture" for more than five minutes we can see that it is not inevitably politically authoritarian.  Democrats, as well as tyrants, can find support in its vast and rich contours.

    Finally, the Taiwan point is also well taken by Buruma.  I like the way he formulates it: if Chinese authoritarians want to say that Chinese culture makes democracy impossible or inappropriate for "Chinese" society, then they are implicitly suggesting that Taiwan is not really "Chinese," since its democracy is obviously well rooted and healthy and functional.  And that is not at all what they want to say.  But to contend that Taiwan is "Chinese" then opens the door to the opposite implication: that Chinese culture can develop in such a way as to support and nurture democracy.  And would the authoritarians want to admit that Taiwan is a more mature Chinese society than the PRC?  That Taiwan is the image of the PRC’s future?

    It’s hard out there for an authoritarian.  When they make facile culturalist arguments they open themselves up to democratic critique.  They may just have to give it up and admit that it’s not really about culture at all, it’s just about politics and their desire to hold on to power.

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38 responses to “Culture, Tradition, Politics”

  1. isha Avatar
    isha

    Sam’s conclusion: “It’s not really about culture at all, it’s just about politics and their desire to hold on to power”… How true! Sam, you hit nail right in the head. If Hus and Wens don’t hold on to their power and steer the Chinese ship through the Terra Incognita, namely, changing an ex-semi-colonial continental country from an agrarian to industrial country, somebody else will, at least Ian Buruma and Norman Podhoretz and their armies would gladly fill the gap. For them, if it is too late to prevent it from happening, at least they would like to delay it.
    Democracy is nothing but another game for the empire builders. If it is not clear enough to the Chinese in the 1980s, after so many color revolutions, the dim witted Chinese could at least learn an expensive lesson now. As to culture excuse, let’s me assure you, with a very some amount of western brain washed or western money brought Chinese, it is just some lime excuse to keep the western preachers from performing the same over-used ritual. It used to be gunboat and Bible, now it is aircraft carrier battle group and democracy. It sounds attractive for a while, but after so many repetitions…well… it is just doesn’t sell well…
    Well, there is a genuine culture thing here: due to the oriental mentality, a host has an obligation to be agreeable as much as possible, so next time an Chinese start to use the culture excuse again, he or she might just want you to be off his or her back while murmuring to himself “Laowai just don’t get it…” or “don’t pull the same trick on me again…”.
    I guess the moral of the story is: in talking about democracy to an third world country and not talking about the West’s last 500 years’ colonialism, imperialism, Zionism and NOW (globalization ), it is just “too simple, too naïve.” Chinese know where they are coming from: when the British pushing opium and bible to China in the 19th century, China’s GDP was the highest in the world. After China lost the empire to the then Anglo world order, China was the beggar of the world. After Ottoman Empire was brought down by the joint effort of Zionism and Anglo Empire, Middle Easterners are still the beggar of the world. But according the time honored Anglo tradition, the down trodden should always take the blame because of the aggressive backward culture. Therefore, the yellow perils of the yesteryear and clash of civilization of today are just slogans of internal mobilization and democracy, regime change, nation building (burning down a village to save it) are just for external consumption and tactical implementation. There is nothing new under the sun.
    Don’t mention Taiwan to mainland Chinese. For us, it is either comical tragedy or tragically comedy. We know the strings of these puppets, DDP and KMT, are pulling from Washington or Tokyo. For 90% of the Chinese, there is but only one priority concerning Taiwan: national unification and territorial integrity at whatever price. The rest are just trivial.
    For the benefit of those who don’t know the color of Ian and his buddy: Civilization warriors and Master of the World and the universal and beyond…:
    His Toughness Problem—and Ours
    By Ian Buruma
    Norman Podhoretz
    World War IV: The Long Struggle Against Islamofascism
    by Norman Podhoretz
    Doubleday, 230 pp., $24.95
    1.
    Not so long before the war in Iraq was launched, I was the only European at an American dinner party in Brussels. My fellow guests were a motley group of youngish diplomats, think-tank pundits, ex-spooks, and journalists, most of whom had established reputations as promoters of neoconservatism. Many topics were discussed, but two stand out in my memory: French wines and the “projection of force.” Despite the praise for fine French wines, “the Europeans” were rather sneered at, as namby-pamby, frivolous, anti-Semitic appeasers, too far gone in spineless pacifism and political decadence to share America’s burden of projecting force to make the world safe for democracy. They spoke with great confidence about military matters, of which…

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  2. isha Avatar
    isha

    In case I misunderstood Ian:
    ( Oh,why I am feeling so sad for the Empire and its muscles : the decent, hard working, and reliable mid-west farm boys … at least according to the old saying, there IS comfort for the oppressed, this, too, will pass… just think an empire without external brain… )
    Embracing the Empire ( and the Empire’s war for the benefit of the money changers, my note )
    by Ian Buruma
    Ian BurumaBernard Kouchner, France’s new foreign minister, has a long and distinguished record as an advocate of intervention in countries where human rights are abused. As a co-founder of Doctors Without Borders, he stated that “we were establishing the moral right to interfere inside someone else’s country.” Saddam Hussein’s mass murder of Iraqi citizens is why he supported the war in Iraq. One should always be careful about attributing motives to other people’s views. But Kouchner himself has often said that the murder of his Russian-Jewish grandparents in Auschwitz inspired his humanitarian interventionism.
    One may or may not agree with Kouchner’s policies, but his motives are surely impeccable. The fact that many prominent Jewish intellectuals in Europe and the United States – often, like Kouchner, with a leftist past – are sympathetic to the idea of using American armed force to further the cause of human rights and democracy in the world, may derive from the same wellspring. Any force is justified to avoid another Shoah, and those who shirk their duty to support such force are regarded as no better than collaborators with evil.
    If we were less haunted by memories of appeasing the Nazi regime, and of the ensuing genocide, people might not be as concerned about human rights as they are. And by no means do all those who work to protect the rights of others invoke the horrors of the Third Reich to justify Anglo-American armed intervention.
    But the term “Islamofascism” was not coined for nothing. It invites us to see a big part of the Islamic world as a natural extension of Nazism. Saddam Hussein, who was hardly an Islamist, and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who is, are often described as natural successors to Adolf Hitler. And European weakness, not to mention the “treason” of its liberal scribes, paving the way to an Islamist conquest of Europe (“Eurabia”) is seen as a ghastly echo of the appeasement of the Nazi threat.
    Revolutionary Islamism is undoubtedly dangerous and bloody. Yet analogies with the Third Reich, although highly effective as a way to denounce people with whose views one disagrees, are usually false. No Islamist armies are about to march into Europe – indeed, most victims of Revolutionary Islamism live in the Middle East, not in Europe – and Ahmadinejad, his nasty rhetoric notwithstanding, does not have a fraction of Hitler’s power.
    The refusal of many Muslims to integrate into Western societies, as well as high levels of unemployment and ready access to revolutionary propaganda, can easily explode in acts of violence. But the prospect of an “Islamized” Europe is also remote. We are not living a replay of 1938.
    So why the high alarm about European appeasement, especially among the neo-conservatives? Why the easy equation of Islamism with Nazism? Israel is often mentioned as a reason. But Israel can mean different things to different people. To certain evangelical Christians, it is the holy site of the Second Coming of the Messiah. To many Jews, it is the one state that will always offer refuge. To neo-conservative ideologues, it is the democratic oasis in a desert of tyrannies.
    Defending Israel against its Islamic enemies may indeed be a factor in the existential alarmism that underlies the present “war on terror.” A nuclear-armed Iran would certainly make Israel feel more vulnerable. But it is probably overstated as an explanation. Kouchner did not advocate Western intervention in Bosnia or Kosovo because of Israel. If concern for Israel played a part in Paul Wolfowitz’s advocacy of war in Iraq, it was probably a minor one. Both men were motivated by common concerns for human rights and democracy, as well as perhaps by geopolitical considerations.
    Still, Islamist rhetoric, adopted by Ahmedinejad among others, is deliberately designed to stir up memories of the Shoah. So perhaps the existential fear of some Western intellectuals is easier to explain than their remarkable, sometimes fawning trust in the US government to save the world by force.
    The explanation of this mysterious trust may lie elsewhere. Many neo-cons emerged from a leftist past, in which a belief in revolution from above was commonplace: “people’s democracies” yesterday, “liberal democracies” today. Among Jews and other minorities, another historical memory may also play a part: the protection of the imperial state. Austrian and Hungarian Jews were among the most fiercely loyal subjects of the Austro-Hungarian Emperor, because he shielded them from the violent nationalism of the majority populations. Polish and Russian Jews, at least at the beginning of the communist era, were often loyal subjects of the communist state, because it promised (falsely, as it turned out) to protect them against the violence of anti-Semitic nationalists.
    If it were really true that the fundamental existence of our democratic Western world were about to be destroyed by an Islamist revolution, it would only make sense to seek protection in the full force of the US informal empire. But if one sees our current problems in less apocalyptic terms, then another kind of trahison des clercs comes into view: the blind cheering on of a sometimes foolish military power embarked on unnecessary wars that cost more lives than they were intended to save.

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  3. isha Avatar
    isha

    Another piece of Ian Buruma… this time… on China… with his 2008 good wishes… ( Why I smells foxy? What is your guess, would Master Buruma spare a dame for the Chinese people stuck in Guangzhou, or would he rather sending them some more snow storm , if it is within Master Ian Buruma’s power??? As the old saying goes, beware what you are wishing for….Dream, dreaming on, Master Buruma… that is your priviledge…Isha)
    The Year of the “China Model”
    by Ian Buruma
    Ian BurumaIt will be China’s year in 2008. The Olympic Games – no doubt perfectly organized, without a protester, homeless person, religious dissenter, or any other kind of spoilsport in sight – will probably bolster China’s global prestige. While the American economy gets dragged down further in a swamp of bad property debts, China will continue to boom. Exciting new buildings, designed by the world’s most famous architects, will make Beijing and Shanghai look like models of twenty-first century modernity. More Chinese will be featured in annual lists of the world’s richest people. And Chinese artists will command prices at international art auctions that others can only dream of.
    To come back from near destitution and bloody tyranny in one generation is a great feat, and China should be saluted for it. But China’s success story is also the most serious challenge that liberal democracy has faced since fascism in the 1930’s.
    This is not because China poses a great military threat – war with the United States, or even Japan, is only a fantasy in the minds of a few ultra-nationalist cranks and paranoiacs. It is in the realm of ideas that China’s political-economic model, regardless of its environmental consequences, is scoring victories and looking like an attractive alternative to liberal democratic capitalism.
    And it is a real alternative. Contrary to what some pundits say, Chinese capitalism is not like nineteenth-century European capitalism. True, the European working class, not to mention women, did not have voting rights 200 years ago. But even during the most ruthless phases of Western capitalism, civil society in Europe and the US was made up of a huge network of organizations independent of the state – churches, clubs, parties, societies, and associations that were available to all social classes.
    In China, by contrast, while individuals have regained many personal freedoms since the death of Maoism, they are not free to organize anything that is not controlled by the Communist Party. Despite communism’s ideological bankruptcy, China has not changed in this regard.
    The China Model is sometimes described in traditional terms, as though modern Chinese politics were an updated version of Confucianism. But a society where the elite’s pursuit of money is elevated above all other human endeavors is a far cry from any kind of Confucianism that may have existed in the past.
    Still, it’s hard to argue with success. If anything has been laid to rest by China’s rising wealth, it is the comforting idea that capitalism, and the growth of a prosperous bourgeoisie, will inevitably lead to liberal democracy. On the contrary, it is precisely the middle class, bought off by promises of ever-greater material gains, that hopes to conserve the current political order. It may be a Faustian bargain – prosperity in exchange for political obedience – but so far it has worked.
    The China Model is attractive not only to the country’s new coastal elites, but has global appeal. African dictators – indeed, dictators everywhere – who walk the plush red carpets laid out for them in Beijing love it. For the model is non-Western, and the Chinese do not preach to others about democracy. It is also a source of vast amounts of money, much of which will end up in the tyrants’ pockets. By proving that authoritarianism can be successful, China is an example to autocrats everywhere, from Moscow to Dubai, from Islamabad to Khartoum.
    China’s appeal is growing in the Western world as well. Businessmen, media moguls, and architects all flock there. Could there be a better place to do business, build stadiums and skyscrapers, or sell information technology and media networks than a country without independent trade unions or any form of organized protest that could lower profits? Meanwhile, concern for human or civic rights is denigrated as outmoded, or an arrogant expression of Western imperialism.
    There is, however, a fly in the ointment. No economy keeps growing at the same pace forever. Crises occur. What if the bargain struck between the Chinese middle classes and the one-party state were to fall apart, owing to a pause, or even a setback, in the race for material wealth?
    This has happened before. The closest thing, in some ways, to the China Model is nineteenth-century Germany, with its industrial strength, its cultivated but politically neutered middle class, and its tendency toward aggressive nationalism. Nationalism became lethal when the economy crashed, and social unrest threatened to upset the political order.
    The same thing could happen in China, where national pride constantly teeters on the edge of belligerence towards Japan, Taiwan, and ultimately the West. Aggressive Chinese nationalism could turn lethal, too, if its economy were to falter.
    This would not be in anyone’s interest, so we should wish China well in 2008, while sparing a thought for all the dissidents, democrats, and free spirits languishing in labor camps and prisons. We should hope that they will live to see the day when the Chinese, too, will be a free people. It might be a distant dream, but dreaming is what New Year’s is all about.

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  4. Sam Avatar
    Sam

    Two things:
    First, what is your point on Buruma? Yes, he is critical of China. But he also obviously takes it seriously and understands its current rise and power as real and significant. Indeed, he uses China, at one point, to turn the critique back on the West:
    “Still, it’s hard to argue with success. If anything has been laid to rest by China’s rising wealth, it is the comforting idea that capitalism, and the growth of a prosperous bourgeoisie, will inevitably lead to liberal democracy.”
    Also, I don’t take him as a neo-con…
    But all of that is besides the point. I can cite passages of one of his articles without agreeing with all of that he says everywhere. I’m sure I do disagree with him on some points. There is really no need for a comprehensive take down of him, however, if we are not demanding ideological purity of one sort or another. I do not expect such purity.
    Secondly, your invocation of imperialism and Chinese victimization raises a question: is it possible for an American to advance an argument critical of China without being tagged as an “imperialist”? Or is any utterance by an American that involves China by necessity imperialistic, since it emerges from the political-cultural milieu of the imperial power? Are all arguments about the possibilities for democracy in China made by an American by definition imperialistic? Or are only arguments that agree with the nationalist narrative of the Party free of such an ideological taint? What are your criteria for what can be legitimately argued by a person from one culture about another? Or is such interchange hopelessly and eternally reflective of political interest?

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  5. chris Avatar
    chris

    On the Taiwan point.
    This is why mainland media relentlessly try to
    convince people that taiwan democracy is
    very Bad. To a large extent, this strategy works.
    Ask a Chinese about his/her opinon on taiwan
    polictics, someone will even tell you that, if anything,
    a “dysfunctional” democary in taiwan precisly proves that it can not
    work in a Chinese culture.

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  6. isha Avatar
    isha

    We can agree to disagree on whether he is a neo-con.
    My point on Buruma is that he has been advocating the clash of civilization rather than the dialogue of civilizations. He and his circle will never have to perform active duties to face the danger, but he is performing the other task, the justification of the state violence. But because he and his buddies have the power to influence public opinion and through it, influence the formulating of policy, he can do real harm. Just turn on the TV to see it. (the actually using of the muscle of the empire).
    If Buruma is such a humanist as to care about the welfare of the Chinese, then why could he so steadfastly ignore the plight of the Palestine’s and ignore the evils of global Zionism ? (Just because he personally benefited from the system?) People there are dying every day in front of your eyes like the drop of the flies, silently, with no name, no recognition, and yet he is pitying these poor oppressed Chinese (an abstract concept to him at most ) who is he trying to kid?
    Secondly, on my “your invocation of imperialism and Chinese victimization” and the possibility of cross cultural interchange.
    A. The Victimization process is a material fact, not just a fiction for emotional outlets or political manipulation . As a student of development, you must extremely familiar with the late development of Ireland, that is,comparing with other Western European countries. The colonialization process deprived the Irish people the opportunities to accumulate the initial capital to industrialize. And the under the dog eat dog Darwinian international system at that stage, under industrlization means continuous underdevelopment. Under military occupation, domestic industry can’t be developed. Chinese industrialization has to be extremely brutal toward its own people (the scene in Guangzhou) before of the exploitation from Britain and Japan, in particularly. Chinese learned from its own history (are we so stupid we have to be brainwashed by the Party, actually, comparing with the brainwashing machine of the media here, PRC system can at best be termed “primitive” in terms of manipulation of information) that the first and foremost prerequisite of national development is the ability to defend its own national territory and independence in formatting national policy (which means the right to learn from your own mistakes). These new cons hate China because they can’t manipulate China as easier as in the other countries.
    B. As an intellectual one can criticise any country or culture. But, my person line is drawn on here: As long as one don’t advocate the use of the state power, especially the use of military power , to implement one’s agenda, it is legitimate and should be accused of imperialistic but friendly interchange. It is not true for a lot of opinion makers now, be it “left” or “right”. (Sometimes, they are the same bunches, right, in terms of new cons).
    Isha

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  7. isha Avatar
    isha

    should NOT be accused of imperialistic but OF friendly interchange.
    Sorry… Isha

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  8. Justsomeguy Avatar
    Justsomeguy

    While I think much of what Isha says goes too far, there is kernel of truth buried within it. But more importantly, I think one should ask whether democracy is even desirable for China, culture or no culture. While it would be fundamentally dishonest, I don’t think it would be a bad thing if someone were to argue that the sort of 24/7 coverage of Brittany Speares/Anna Nicole Smith/random-rich-white-trash-blonde-bombshell-in-crisis were culturally unacceptable for America or other places and did their best to discourage people from partaking in it because of that. Sure, the media can cover that 24/7, but I think it is to the detriment of the American people. I think the same can be said of democracy, well, in much of the world.

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  9. isha Avatar
    isha

    On the Taiwan point.
    This is why mainland media relentlessly try to
    convince people that taiwan democracy is
    very Bad. To a large extent, this strategy works.
    Ask a Chinese about his/her opinon on taiwan
    polictics, someone will even tell you that, if anything,
    a “dysfunctional” democary in taiwan precisly proves that it can not

    work in a Chinese culture.

    Two more points on Taiwan democracy:
    1. Taiwan independent movement has its roots in U.K., U.S. and Japan;
    2. DDP was developed first in U.S.;
    3. I have many Taiwanese friends here, both mainlanders and ” Taiwanese”, so I can get both sides of the story. And KMT legislator personally told me that U.S. was finanacially support DDP even they are developing military alliance with KMT, an hedge tactics which is also very good in terms of pressuring KMT to follow its will.
    4. Chinese democracy have to be developed after the national unification, not before that. Otherwise, Chinese would be divided and conquered just as before. Look at Kenya!

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  10. Sam Avatar
    Sam

    First, what we agree on: yes, I absolutely accept the point about the use of state power. I was against the Iraq war from the start. And I would reject an American use of force against China (which strikes me as highly, highly unlikely in any event.)
    Here’s a question: at what point does historical victimization end? Mao said “the Chinese people have stood up” in 1949. China is now a powerful country; it is the fastest growing sector of the world economy; it has transformed itself is all sorts of ways (though not so much politically).Many students want to learn Chinese, and I encourage them . There really isn’t a question about its ability to defend its national territory, is there?
    At what point, then, does historical victimization become merely a historical footnote as opposed to a reason invoked in contemporary debates? Yes, Ireland was victimized by the UK but people in the Republic of Ireland don’t bandy that victimization about all that much these days – save, perhaps for arguments in the pubs. They don’t seem to worry about territorial threats from the hated British. Instead, they seem quite comfortable with surrendering sovereignty to the EU and hoping for better results in the World Cup. They seem to be over their victimization. So much so, that the problems in the North have settled down in recent years as people there look to the comfort of the South. I suspect democratic politics has something to do with it…
    I know: China isn’t Ireland. But at what point will the Chinese victimization narrative dissipate?

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  11. isha Avatar
    isha

    Justsomeguy:
    I am a devoted admirer of America’s Republican virtues. When I visited New England and see the documents from the prigames, there is resolution to forbid the celebration Christmas. Now these “sort of 24/7 coverage of Brittany Speares/Anna Nicole Smith/random-rich-white-trash-blonde-bombshell-in-crisis ” are classicial ” bread and circus” practiced by the Rome empire. They have nothing to be with independence of the press( which Sam accused of China as lacking, with I agree but …). After all,they are all controlled by several families, each with their own commerical and political and phisophicial agendas.
    Isha

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  12. Sam Avatar
    Sam

    If you do not believe that Taiwanese democracy is genuine and indigenous, and that it is now deeply inscribed in a distinct Taiwanese national identity, then you fundamentally misunderstand Taiwan. And if many people in the PRC share that misunderstanding, I fear many people – which would be “Chinese” people, by your definition – will die if the PRC attacks. Should Chinese kill Chinese to undo what imperialism has wrought?

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  13. isha Avatar
    isha

    “the Republic of Ireland don’t bandy that victimization about all that much these days”
    1. How about IRA, which only desisted from their business several years ago and after U.K. agrees to be civlized.
    2. English first invaded Scotland and then incoporate them into their invading enterprises.Then they do the same to the Irish to a smaller extent. Then they do the same things in various subcontinental indians groups…
    2. “But at what point will the Chinese victimization narrative dissipate?”
    Simple… afternational unification with Taiwan…because it is the legacy of Japanese imperial conquest and is still under foreign military protection… and then China is become a fully independent country.
    Isha

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  14. isha Avatar
    isha

    “a distinct Taiwanese national identity” is so easily to be manufacturer. When the first British missionary translate Bible to Minnang dialect, they already has this in mind.
    Question
    ”
    Should Chinese kill Chinese to undo what imperialism has wrought? ”
    Answer:
    Should Lonclon kill Americans( remember Sharman’s March to the Sea and Atlanta ) in order to preserve the Union?
    That is called civil war. in terms of legal status, China is in the state of civil war, just people across the straits are too polite to recognize this simple fact.
    Just imagine what will happen to the U.S. if Lincoln just let the South ( which are certainly democraticially elected ) go.

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  15. Sam Avatar
    Sam

    It’s sad to see how nationalism, which imperialism bequeathed you, takes you away from Confucianism and Taoism.
    Tao Te Ching, 31:
    It is because arms are instruments of ill omen, and there are Things that detest them, that the one who has the way does not abide by their use.
    The gentleman gives precedence to the left when at home, but to the right when he goes to war.
    Arms are instruments of ill omen, not the instruments of the gentleman.
    When one is compelled to use them, it is best to do so without relish.
    There is no glory in victory, and so to glorify it despite this is to exult in the killing of men.
    One who exults in the killing of men will never have his way in the empire.
    On occasions of rejoicing precedence is given to the left;
    On occasions of mourning precedence is given to the right.
    A lieutenants place is on the left;
    The general’s place is on the right.
    This means that it is mourning rites that are observed.
    When great numbers of people are killed, one should weep over them with sorrow.
    When victorious in war, one should observe the rites of mourning.
    Lau translation
    Yes, you will relish in the killing of men, just as Americans killed their own, and Chinese killed their own, but:
    One who exults in the killing of men will never have his way in the empire.
    Too bad. Such thinking suggests that China has lost Way.

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  16. Justsomeguy Avatar
    Justsomeguy

    I think that “free press” like “free market” tends to lead to a consolidation of power and obscure the very values they claim to represent. Likewise, I think a system founded on the conflicting ideals of “liberty” and “equality” is bound to be devoid of harmony. The state is failing to set a moral agenda in America, so what can you expect when power is consolidated but for that power to be perverted towards the ends of those few individuals? And how can we expect the state to set a moral agenda when it relies on the uncultivated masses of people to provide it? It is the duty of the cultured man to try and set a moral agenda in their society, but in a society where everyone is theoretically given equal voice, but “equality of voice” is balanced by the dominance of the dollar, what can you expect but disaster? Giving the uneducated an equal voice to the educated is foolish, and giving power to wealthy merchants is even more foolish. Of the two, I think I’d take the uneducated because at least they are well-intentioned.

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  17. Sam Avatar
    Sam

    Guy,
    Your post brings out certain Confucian themes: the desire for the wise to rule and the disdain of money. I wonder, however, if equality is now so firmly established, not just in American life but virtually everywhere (it is, after all, central to the Marxist ideology that continues to shape Chinese political life in the PRC)that it cannot be reversed. Rather, Confucianism, if it is to be relevant to modern conditions, must adapt to equality, it cannot simply reject it.
    Thanks for commenting.

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  18. Cao Lie Qiao Avatar
    Cao Lie Qiao

    Secondly, your invocation of imperialism and Chinese victimization raises a question: is it possible for an American to advance an argument critical of China without being tagged as an “imperialist”?
    It depends on your argument.
    Or is any utterance by an American that involves China by necessity imperialistic, since it emerges from the political-cultural milieu of the imperial power?
    No.
    Are all arguments about the possibilities for democracy in China made by an American by definition imperialistic?
    Yes, because American democracy is a weapon used to subdue America’s enemies.
    Or are only arguments that agree with the nationalist narrative of the Party free of such an ideological taint?
    No.
    What are your criteria for what can be legitimately argued by a person from one culture about another?
    Any argument about the ends (good governance, for example) rather than the means (democracy) to achieve that end.
    Or is such interchange hopelessly and eternally reflective of political interest?
    No.

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  19. Justsomeguy Avatar
    Justsomeguy

    I think that stating that an idea is firmly established in the mind of many people should be kept separate from whether that idea is, in-and-of-itself, a good idea. Biblical Creationism and Intelligent Design are firmly established in America, but I think that America’s scientists and educators would be doing the American public a great disservice to decide that adaptation to this paradigm was the most sensible course. Your talk here, to me, seems rather like asking someone whether they’ve stopped beating their wife — you are already assuming that liberal democracy is the right and best course so the question is whether China can go down that road. Clearly the Taiwanese example shows us that China can go down that road, but the question is: should China go down that road? I’m not pining for a return to the past so much as I am questioning how the future ought be approached using the wisdom of the past.

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  20. isha Avatar
    isha

    “It’s sad to see how nationalism, which imperialism bequeathed you, takes you away from Confucianism and Taoism.”
    “Too bad. Such thinking suggests that China has lost Way.”
    Sam:
    I totally agree with you on this. From the 5.4 movement, China has been playing the Western game. From nationalism, Marxism, globalization, WTO… you name it. Mao said it well that we has been good students but later found out that the Masters always beat up their students in the new game. Before the downfall of the Manchu empire, China was not a nation. Nation state system was imposed on China through the strength of arm. I personally believe that the Chinese nationalism was really established during the anti-Japanese war. Only through that existential experience, the Chinese from difference provinces established their common fate and sense of purpose. The logic of the nation state system and the social Darwinism behind it are against the WAY. If the physical survival as a culture can’t be secured by the WAY, then what is the use of WAY? Taoism talks about some nation and less population. It is certainly not the case for China; therefore I question its relavency in the Chinese governance.
    Once China is in the nation state system, one can’t escape its inner logic. After all, it is not “All under heaven” anymore, China is only one piece in this great game and has to follow its rule.
    Sad, it is very sad indeed.
    BTW,
    Can anybody entertain my imagination what would have happened to the U.S. if Lincoln’s north just let the South go peacefully?
    Wouldn’t the European powers, British and the French, play the North and South against each other? U.S. would never have been thoroughly industrialized. (U.S.continental industrilization really have happened after the Civil War). European banking families would have had a far easier time to control U.S. economy and South would be a giant Mexico and the North might be a humble neighbor of Canada, not the other way around.
    Now just imagine what would happen to China if mainland just let the Taiwan go peacefully … it is hard to imagine… I am sure it would be far bloodier than finishing the unfinished civil war.
    All the talk about the Taiwan democracy can’t be separated from the context of the continuous Chinese civil war and the potential foreign military intervention.

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  21. isha Avatar
    isha

    “Yes, you will relish in the killing of men, just as Americans killed their own, and Chinese killed their own, but:
    One who exults in the killing of men will never have his way in the empire”
    Response: “Relish in the killing” … it is a rhetoric statement and can be unfair if it is read out of context of imperial legacy, nogoing civil war and direct foreign support and intervention. It is just like asking the Palestines factions: ” you must be relishing killing your fellow palestines” without even mentioning the existence of Israel and the fact that they are sending arms and money to one of the factions.

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  22. Sam Avatar
    Sam

    Guy and Cao,
    Thanks for the comments; they are interesting and helpful.
    First, Cao: why is the ends/means distinction the best basis here? Let’s say I agree on the ends – say, “Socialism.” Can’t I then disagree with means, such as the “Great Leap Forward”? I would say I could because, even though I could be accused of speaking from the external position of the imperialist (or at least from inside the imperialists socio-political space-time), it is reasonable, it seems to me, to contend that the “Great Leap Forward” was a horrible experience for millions and millions of Chinese people and, therefore, from the point of view of Chinese people, was wrong. We could, of course, then fall into an argument over whether the “Great Leap Forward” was a means or an end, which strikes me as irresolvable. But I think I can say, from my external position, that it was bad and wrong for China. Just as you can say that slavery was bad and wrong for the United States. No?
    Second, Guy, let’s remove the normative assertion (that democracy is right for China) for a moment. I would argue that, as an empirical fact, whatever our normative valuation of it, it is true that the current PRC government legitimizes its rule in terms of democracy and equality. Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought puts for a argument – handily summarized by Mao as the “People’s Democratic Dictatorship” – that the dictatorship of the Communist Party, in the name of the proletariat and peasants, is legitimate and right precisely because it is more genuinely democratic than “bourgeois democracy.” And it is better precisely because it serves the interests of a broader range of people, thus living up to a higher standard of egalitarianism. There really no disagreement, at the outset, that democracy and equality are the standards of political legitimacy and effectiveness, the only difference comes over how those goals are achieved – i.e. whether, in the end, dictatorship really is more democratic than democracy.

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  23. Sam Avatar
    Sam

    Isha,
    On the US Civil War: of course we cannot know what would have happened. To put forth a scenario of division and disaster as a rationalization for war against Taiwan is just that, a rationalization.
    Also, Chinese power is not affected at all by the current state of political division between the mainland and Taiwan. In the past 103 years (1895-2008) a mainland-based government has effectively ruled the island of Taiwan for only four years (1945-1949). Yes, that was the result of imperialism. But in terms of tangible power resources it has meant very little to the PRC, especially since 1979. Economic reform and growth in China in the past 29 years has obviously created a materially and militarily stronger China. Taiwan is economically connected to the mainland, and that connection has deepened even as it has pushed away politically from the PRC more and more. But if there were no unification of the two for the next hundred years, how would that materially injure China? I really don’t care about the comparison to 19th century US, which strikes me as inapt in any case. How would China be hurt, materially, if there were no unification?
    I, too, believe that US policy toward Palestine has been bad for a long time. But China is not Palestine and Taiwan is not Israel. These historical analogies simply provide rationalizations for killing people when there is really no good reason to kill them. Why kill Taiwanese and Chinese on Taiwan if China can very well prosper without such killing?

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  24. Cao Lie Qiao Avatar
    Cao Lie Qiao

    Any discussion of the means by Americans would imply that Americans know more about what is right for China than the Chinese themselves.
    Would Chinese advice to Americans to end their profligate ways be seen as anything other than meddling and unamerican?

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  25. Sam Avatar
    Sam

    But why would Americans be less meddling when talking about Chinese ends? It would seem to me that suggesting what the goals of a political system or country should be is just as meddling as talk about means. What’s the difference?
    Ultimately, I am one who believes that foreign suggestions of how the US should carry out its domestic or foreign policies is perfectly acceptable. Good ideas have no nation. Nationalistic rejection of ideas from non-nationals is petty defensiveness. That goes for both ends and means. When Mao used to say that socialism would overcome capitalism, it didn’t really bother me on nationalist terms. There were, then, Americans who said the same thing. Rather, I think we should evaluate such ideas on non-nationalistic grounds. When the French said that it was wrong to invade Iraq – they were right! I believed so at the time and continue to believe so now. Americans who rejected that point, merely because it was made by foreigners, have been proven wrong. And they have deeply hurt the country as a result. If Chinese have good ideas for how the US can improve its energy efficiency or whatever, I say bring it on. Some such ideas might be absolutely right for the US, others may not. Their source as Chinese or French or whatever does not matter. And if it does matter we doom ourselves to ignorant isolation.

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  26. isha Avatar
    isha

    Sam:
    Thanks for your comment. It gives me a chance to understand your position fully.
    1. From Taiwan:
    MND declines to comment on U.S. aircraft carrier in Taiwan Strait
    ROC Central News Agency
    2007-11-30 18:51:39
    Taipei, Nov. 30 (CNA) Ministry of National Defense (MND) spokesman Maj. Gen. Yu Sy-tue declined Friday to comment on the reported passage through the Taiwan Strait of a U.S. aircraft carrier en route to Japan last week after it was denied entry to Hong Kong.
    According to a foreign wire report, the USS Kitty Hawk and eight accompanying ships were denied entry to Hong Kong by the Chinese authorities.
    The ships then headed for Japan on a route that took them through the Taiwan Strait.
    Taiwanese military officers who spoke on condition of anonymity noted that Taiwan’s sea territory is limited to 12 nautical miles off the coast and that further out is considered the high seas.
    Taiwan respects the right of any foreign vessel to sail through the Taiwan Strait as long as they are on the high seas and pose no threat to Taiwan, they noted
    and

    http://www.wsws.org/articles/2007/dec2007/china-d10.shtml

    “especially since 1979. Economic reform and growth in China in the past 29 years has obviously created a materially and militarily stronger China”… It also has changed China from a energy exporting country to a energy importing country. Under the current arrangement, China’s sealine is under the PROTECTION of U.S. sea power, and China, as a way to pay protection money, forking out milions of containers to exchange for $ 1.4 trillion IOUs ( paper, nada ) and paper rate is declining each.( the fiat money, you know better the money printing is nada ) That is the current arrangements. I hope the current snow storm will give many Chinese a wake up call as to whether such a arrangment is really good for China. Whether it is worthwhile to exchange these millions and millions migrant workers’ blood and sweat into worthless free printing dollars ( just look at the ongoing Fed rate cutting… the print machine is working on full gear…)
    What is the base of these printing machine??? Why are Chinese , Saudis, Japanese are accepting them? Sam, you know it better than me. It is not gold, it is even the petroleum dollar… it is the 12 aircraft carrier groups that can freely petrol the TAIWAN STRAIT as if it is their front or back doors…
    That is the current situation and arrange and Wall Street and Washington want to last forever and forever…
    “But if there were no unification of the two for the next hundred years, how would that materially injure China? ”
    And Sam suggest 100 years…
    I am not so sure… prediction is difficult, especially when it is about future… is that Mark Twain?
    Isha

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  27. Sam Avatar
    Sam

    Isha,
    Something happened to your last comment – it came up in my editing box but is not coming up on the blog. I will try to figure it out. [Fixed now!]
    In the meantime, I think your reference was to Yogi Berra, not Mark Twain.
    More seriously, do you really think the US is going to try to challenge China in its sea lanes? Has the US dared to directly challenge a great power in the past 60 years? Is Chinese military power really that weak and getting weaker? Your fear is the mirror image of American conservatives who worry about Chinese military build-up. If we cannot break out of these sorts of mutual misperceptions – which are neatly captured by the concept of the “security dilemma – we will likely create self-fulfilling prophecies.

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  28. Justsomeguy Avatar
    Justsomeguy

    Thanks for the response and the blog,
    That could be the problem, on that issue I tend to side with Mao. I see the conflict between liberty and equality as being irresolvable, so I think to be honest with ourselves we are forced to pick one. Given that choice, I think that equality is the better choice, and furthermore, I think that equality is the stand that the PRC is trying to take, granted less than it used to. I think in order to ensure relative equality (it will always be something of a bell-curve, the idea is to have as narrow a bell-curve as possible) there needs to be a strong man (or party) at the center holding it together. Personally, I think that maintaining a pretense of “democracy” while doing this is lying through one’s teeth, but given the past two elections in America, I’m not sure that it is anything more than a pretense in a bourgeois democracy either. Not just the last two elections either, though they were particularly absurd, look at how much money flows into US elections and tell me that the votes of citizens carry a weight equal to that of dollar. So that begs the question: is what is being sold better than what is already available?

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  29. isha Avatar
    isha

    1.
    “I really don’t care about the comparison to 19th century US, which strikes me as inapt in any case.”
    Questions: Why is so? Since Zhu Rongji once used the comparison in the U.S. in answering a question concerning Taiwan. James Lilly laughed over it and brushed it aside in a conference, but really didn’t explain for the audience why it is so. Would you mind elaborate why it is such an inapt comparison?
    2.
    “Also, Chinese power is not affected at all by the current state of political division between the mainland and Taiwan.”
    I respectfully disagree.
    Here is the reason:
    News from Taiwan Times
    US carrier sailed through Taiwan Strait
    SNUB FALLOUT: The US aircraft carrier and its support vessels returned to Japan via the Taiwan Strait after Beijing blocked the ships from entering Hong Kong waters
    By Charles Snyder
    STAFF REPORTER IN WASHINGTON, WITH AGENCIES
    Saturday, Dec 01, 2007, Page 1
    http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2007/12/01/2003390613
    http://www.wsws.org/articles/2007/dec2007/china-d10.shtml
    It is very expensive to maintain these ships. Why are not Americans crying foul when they are providing the public goods for free to the Chinese by patrolling Taiwan Straits?
    The answer might be as simply as $ 1.4 trillion dollars. China foots the bill. James Fallows understand the arrangement the best in his recent Atlantic article
    http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200801/fallows-chinese-dollars
    Why these stupid Chinese in Beijing are accumulating these IOUs, which they are paying with millions of containers of real goods, the blood and sweat of the millions of very migrant workers stranded in Gangzhou, especially when the floodgate of the dollar printing press are opened with full speed by Federal Reserves again, again and again to flood the world with dollars. In case somebody forgets, all these digits, all these paper or electric money are created out of air, like magicians pulling the rabbits out of the hat. Then why are these stupid, dimwitted Chinese, Japanese and otherness, these Saudis and Dudai people are accumulating these bubbles as if they really can eat them and drink them or use them as toilet papers? The reason?
    12 aircraft carrier group patrolling the sea. If you want to pass, if you want to conduct the business of buying and selling, pay your dues. And Chinese due is current estimated roughly as 1.4 trillion dollar.
    Satisfying for the world? Satisfying for the Chinese? Satisfying for the MD? Satisfying for Europeans? Again, it all depends upon who are you asking.
    For Americans (correct me if you disagree) of course, each and every person within the territory is directly or indirectly benefiting from the new tributary system. Of course, the degree of the benefit is very different. Long story.
    There are large vested interests groups in China, the new elite that are very satisfied by the current arrangement. They are prosperous under the current arrangement. For the migrant workers that are contributing the muscles for the NOW, they don’t see an alternative.
    Can the system last? No, since the WAY of HEAVEN is CHANGE. A fiat reserve money system that are not based on gold, not even based on petrol, but only on the physical threat is hardly a balanced arrangement, especially when the Money Changers are printing more, more and more like mad hatter.
    Why it is harming the Chinese when U.S. aircraft carrier is securing the Taiwan de facto independence and “democracy”. The answer is that the success of the current system created its own imbalance. China has turned from an energy exporting country into an importing country. Even though China are not controlling oversea reserves and only a passive buyers from the N.Y. and London speculative market, the buying power in itself has already made China a “threat”. Even the effort to buy the energy to keep the tribute system running is regarded with sinister motives. (Sudan’s Darfur and all the Olympic boycott noises). When both the Chinese and Americans are complaining, each pointing the other as cheating, then Taiwan would serve the Empire as it was originally intentioned: an unsinkable aircraft carrier.
    “But if there were no unification of the two for the next hundred years, how would that materially injure China?”
    If we read history, rarely a man made arrangement will last 100 years, notwithstanding the theorization of these neo-cons. I just don’t see how the situation in Taiwan will last even for 10 or 20 years. Of course, your guess is just as good as mine.

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  30. isha Avatar
    isha

    Sam
    “More seriously, do you really think the US is going to try to challenge China in its sea lanes?”
    If want really understand the Chinese point of view or paranoid, just imagine what would happen if any nation’s aircraft carrier group patrolling the U.S. west coast 12 miles out of Los Ageles, and by the way, selling armament to Hawaii independent movement and guarantee it with navy force.
    The force doesn’t have to be used. It is there, and it is affecting all the business transactions and horse trading, especially the exchange rate and $ 3 billion Chinese investment to Blackstone. (Call it bribe or tribute or whatever terms, Chinese has been doing these things for thousands years. The classical ones is Han dynasty’s tribute of gold, silk and women to Huns. But nothing last forever.)
    More seriously, Sam, you know this fiat money and foreign reserve stuff better than me. My question is (real one, not for rhetorical argument): Why is Fed digging it own grave by they are beneficiary of the system? What they are doing have worldwide implication? Why don’t they even allow Chinese pay their tribute smoothly when all the Fed has to do is to keep a steady supply of dollars?
    Is this guy from Asia Times make any sense to you?
    http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/JB05Dj06.html

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  31. Sam Avatar
    Sam

    Guy,
    Yes, you have reduced the question to its fundamentals: freedom v. equality. My sense, like yours, is that there is no permanent resolution of this tension. Political systems must be designed to handle the tensions between these stably, with some moments of balance but other moments, perhaps many, of trade-offs. The “strong man” solution is problematic because, by coming down too much on the side of equality against freedom it undermines the goal it has set for itself. Political equality is quickly forfeited – ask anyone who comes to disagree with the strong man (Liu Shaoqi, Peng Dehuai, Peng Zhen, etc.). And eventually economic equality may also be sacrificed. This was certainly the case in Latin America and now seems to be happening in the PRC: economic inequality is growing while political freedom remains constrained. In reaching for equality, the strong man produces neither that nor freedom….
    The strong man thing can work for a time (see South Korea and Taiwan) but its time is relatively short (a couple of decades in each of those cases) and then it must give way to greater freedom…or that is what it seems….

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  32. Sam Avatar
    Sam

    Isha,
    On the US Civil War, I do not want to go too far here (my thing is ancient Chinese thought) but the best analysis, to my mind, is Barrington Moore’s in Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy. He scripts it as the clash of two fundamentally antagonistic contradictions (to put it in Maoist terms…) within the US national political economy: agrarian slave South v. industrial commercial North. Accumulating historical forces of modernization in the 19th century meant that these two could not continue to coexist and exploded in bloody war.
    The difference with China and Taiwan is that Taiwan is simply not very important, materially and economically and socially and culturally, to China. The Chinese political economy of the twentieth century, virtually its entire experience of industrial modernization, has not relied on Taiwan much at all. The “unsinkable aircraft carrier” could sink tomorrow and it would make little difference to China’ political economy. Actually, it might hurt a bit because of all that Taiwanese investment in the mainland, but that could quickly be transferred to off-shore offices in Singapore or Hong Kong or Canada or wherever. It hardly matters. So, historically these are very, very different cases. I am sure that will not be enough to dissuade you of the normative similarity you wish to assert (that they are both “civil wars” so they are somehow morally equivalent). But the extent of their historical difference is just so large and so obvious that the burden of proof is on you, to demonstrate how they are sufficiently similar enough to warrant normative equivalence.
    For the rest of the political economy stuff you raise (Fallows, the AT piece, etc.) I will simply say that I have a rather different view on all of this. Globalization creates winners and losers in both China and the US. And US power is also constrained by the forces of globalization. If China did cash in its holdings of US debt, it would push up US interest rates dramatically and force Americans to pay off their credit card bills, which they cannot do. Economic havoc in US markets would ensue….which is why the PRC does not do it, for then China would lose its export markets, etc. In short, the US is not all powerful in this relationship but is bound by interdependencies just as China is. Indeed, I would go farther and say that US power is declining precisely because of globalized economic forces (a good piece in the NYT Magazine a couple of weeks ago started in on this question). Capital is not national, it is truly global. It can discipline, and has disciplined, the US economy as well as others. Remember the liberal welfare state? What happened to that? It had to be cut to make the US more competitive in global markets, increasing economic inequality here…etc.
    Bottom line: US military power, while obviously significant, is useless as a counter to mobile capital (will we bomb the call centers in India to get the jobs back in the US?). At some point, perhaps, American voters will realize how much money they are wasting maintaining a bloated military. Iraq has demonstrated, painfully, the limits of military power: it cannot and will not get Bush what he wants there.
    In the end you are overestimating American power, underestimating Chinese power, and missing the point that the world-economy is not organized on national lines. Capital has no nation.

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  33. isha Avatar
    isha

    Sam,
    Thanks for your thoughtful response and insights.I need to finish some work before responding to your above post.
    Since you are interested in ancient Chinese thoughts, here is some shallow ideas of mine this morning and I will elaborate later:
    Mao is( was ?) a legalist, and his Master is Hanfei zi and his role model was the First Emperor of China. Teng is a Taoist, and his Master is Lao Zi. Mao intentionally left him alive and incorporated him into the government again to pick up the pieces because as a good student of history he knew that his policy wouldn’t last long and his opponent under the leadership of Teng would overturn his policies (Culture Revolution). He was bitterly disappointed but yielded to the reality of governance. Now that the situation is stabilized, by its internal logic, Hu-Wen is trying to return to the Confucian governance.
    Isha

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  34. Justsomeguy Avatar
    Justsomeguy

    Yeah, well, that is what happens when you take the capitalist road . . .

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  35. Peter Avatar
    Peter

    Are all arguments about the possibilities for democracy in China made by an American by definition imperialistic?
    Yes, because American democracy is a weapon used to subdue America’s enemies.
    Democracy might be a weapon, in the sense that Confucius thought virtue was a weapon
    because it would give a virtuous leader legitimacy that his unvirtuous enemies would not have, which would translate into military advantage as he set about reunifying and bringing peace to the empire. Is the above comment an admission that democracy has a certain legitimacy which “America’s enemies” lack? If the CCP really believes that democracy is a poisoned pill that the West is trying to force down China’s throat then why does it continue to call itself a “democratic dictatorship”?

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  36. isha Avatar
    isha

    ” Is the above comment an admission that democracy has a certain legitimacy which “America’s enemies” lack? If the CCP really believes that democracy is a poisoned pill that the West is trying to force down China’s throat then why does it continue to call itself a “democratic dictatorship”? ”
    Iran in 1953 had a democratic government, which happened to decide that they owned their own oil. Everybody knows what happened after that.
    For a ideological weapon to be useful, at least you have to keep up the appearance. When all the world learned their hard lessons, not from preaching, but from the history, these lessons would be hard to forget.

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  37. isha Avatar
    isha

    All the “color revolutions” were very smart ideas, at first. Now that every body knows these tricks and who pulled the strings, it is getting harder and harder to pull off these same tricks again.

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