Positive Outlook?

A Call for Hong Kong to Clean the Air

By BETTINA WASSENER

HONG KONG — Top business leaders in Asia’s financial hub are sounding a bit like environmental activists these days, taking a stand against the persistently unhealthy levels of air pollution gripping this city.

“I ran a half-marathon recently, and I was coughing,” William Fung, managing director of one of Hong Kong’s largest firms, the giant trading company Li & Fung.

“Hong Kong has to do as much as it can to clean up the local environment,” he said at its earnings news conference last week. So far, he added, the government has been “too timid on almost every move they have made.”

Mr. Fung’s remarks reflected a growing frustration here with the perpetually poor air quality and the commercial implications for a city that prides itself on being one of Asia’s most forward-looking centers of international finance.

Mr. Fung made his comments two days after pollution levels had streaked past the upper 500-point end of a government index, more than doubling the previous record of 202, set in 2008. The authorities warned people to avoid outdoor activities, and many schools canceled sports activities.

Pollution levels have since subsided. On Wednesday, the index registered about 60, although even that is classified as high. The levels of March 22, however, thrust the issue into the public eye at home and abroad, and raised pressure on the authorities to do more to contain homegrown pollution.

The Clean Air Network and Civic Exchange, a public policy group, say that the air breathed by Hong Kong’s seven million residents is three times more polluted than New York’s and more than twice as bad as London’s. And when one applies the standards of the World Health Organization, Hong Kong’s air is healthy only 41 days a year, they say.

For Hong Kong, pollution is not just about poor visibility and canceled school athletics. Many analysts and business people say the failure to push ahead on controlling emissions also risks tarnishing Hong Kong’s reputation of being one of Asia’s most advanced cities.

“If Hong Kong is to maintain its status as a world city, it has to show it is adopting standards of the highest order including in managing its own pollution,” said Richard Vuylsteke, president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong, which has long been vocal on the issue. “There are a lot of smart people in this town, so you have to ask yourself: How come this has not been addressed more so far? It’s a matter of political will and public support.”

The interest by business leaders is giving activists new hope that some action finally may be taken.

“In my opinion, it’s an opening salvo for business to advocate visibly, even loudly, for more aggressive air cleanup measures,” said Joanne Ooi, chief executive of the Clean Air Network, a nongovernmental organization set up last July.

Not all of Hong Kong’s pollution is generated by local traffic or power stations. Much blows in from factories in the neighboring mainland Chinese province of Guangdong, where many of China’s exports are manufactured, and from vessels moving cargo through one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes. A sandstorm sweeping in from the mainland aggravated the situation March 22.

But environmental campaigners like the Clean Air Network estimate that more than half the time, the bad air quality here can be attributed to local sources, rather than to fumes from across the Chinese border.

“If half the pollution you can see here in Hong Kong is Hong Kong-generated, then there is a great deal that can be done domestically to reduce pollution,” said Jonathan Slone, chief executive of CLSA, a brokerage firm based in Hong Kong, echoing Mr. Fung’s comments. “Air pollution needs to be a top fiscal policy.”

Hong Kong’s government has pledged to “leave no stone unturned” to achieve better air quality and said in an e-mailed statement Wednesday that it was also working with Guangdong on reducing emissions in the Pearl River Delta region. Still, environmentalists argue that a current review that aims to improve official air quality objectives is not ambitious enough.

In a twist, Hong Kong risks being put to shame by mainland China, many of whose cities suffer even worse air quality but which has been pushing ahead with fairly aggressive efforts to clean up its environmental act.

Mainland China, estimates CLSA, is earmarking more than $450 billion for environmental protection and cleanup in the five years from 2011 to 2015 — more than double what was spent during the previous five-year period.

Hong Kong’s proximity to China ensures that it will remain a crucial business location even if Singapore is a constant rival for the title of top Asian financial center, and has a greener and more family-friendly environment.

But studies show that environmental issues play an important role in businesses’ ability to attract and retain top staff, and that they need to be taken seriously.

A survey conducted in 2008 by the American Chamber of Commerce found that about 40 percent of companies in Hong Kong had experienced difficulty recruiting professionals to come and work in the city. Many more said they knew of people who had turned down job opportunities here or were thinking of leaving because of the environment.

Similarly, a 2006 study by the recruitment firm Hudson found that Hong Kong companies often had to offer potential overseas employees much higher salary packages as a direct result of pollution.

And ECA International, which advises companies on posting staff abroad, said in a report last week that “air pollution continued to be the dominant factor that makes Hong Kong a harder location for international assignees to adapt to.”
This, said Lee Quane, regional director for ECA, could affect Hong Kong’s “competitive edge with other countries in the region.”

To be sure, the current economic backdrop means that “clean air is certainly not a key issue on job seekers’ minds right now,” said James Carss, general manager of the Hong Kong office of Hudson, whose 2006 survey was conducted well before the global financial crisis.

But, propelled by growing local concern, the issue is likely to reemerge as the recruitment market gains traction.

“Give it another year, and pollution will be top of the agenda again,” Mr. Carss said.

New York Times April 1, 2010

Sides of the Same Coin?

This editorial appeared in the South China Morning Post, March 25, 2010; page A14.

There is absolutely no reason why Barack Obama and Wen Jiabao should not be friends. They’re practically the same politician.

Both men practice an enlightened post-partisan rule. Obama’s post-partisan politics has rapidly come to resemble Wen’s unchecked party authority. Both Obama and Wen are willing to doggedly push their party’s agenda in the name of prosperity and social stability.

Both men are considered good with people – Obama was nicknamed “No-drama Obama” and Wen is referred to domestically as “Grandpa Wen.” Both politicians publicly stress their personable qualities to overcome opposition to their policy positions.

Both men sit atop a vast party structure, yet reserve power for a small group over which they have significant influence. Interestingly, Obama’s Democratic party and Wen’s Chinese Communist Party have been in the news for making favorable deals to co-opt their allies into preserving party line.

Both men see themselves as reformers. Their deep sense of personal correctness makes Obama and Wen tireless in their chosen quests, no matter how many of their constituents oppose them. Obama like Wen, frequently redirects attention toward his lofty goals and away from the processes by which he enacts reform. Spokesman Robert Gibbs derided complaints Obama’s administration was using harsh tactics to pass its health care reform saying “There are I’m sure those that are going to want to make this about the legislative process rather than the heart-wrenching stories of people.”

Both men are eager to appear accessible to the general public. Just last month, Wen gave two hours of his time to chat with Chinese Internet users, although questions were screened and sensitive topics rigorously avoided. Just last week, Obama gave Fox News host Bret Baier 19 minutes to talk about the upcoming health care vote, repeatedly reminding the host not to interrupt him.

Both men share a common vision for the role of their government’s various institutions. Under the strong hand of the executive, Wen and Obama allow the legislature the time to digest proposals before the voting bodies are expected to approve them. Both recently concluded important legislative sessions where their policies were confirmed by delegates they control.

Barack Obama and Wen Jiabao have a lot in common. Yet, the similarities between each man’s style of governance are troubling. It is downright eerie to see the leader of a republic that prides itself on the separation of powers resemble the leader of an authoritarian Communist state. Apparently Obama’s visit to China last year made a bigger impression on him than we all thought.

Open Media?

What follows is an article leaked to the New York Times giving specific examples of Chinese state censorship of the media.  The list of censored items shows the lengths state censors will go in controlling the messages its citizens hear and the image it projects internationally.

What Chinese Censors Don’t Want You to Know

A set of Chinese government censorship guidelines recently leaked to the Internet provides a rare and intimate window into the thinking of propaganda officials. The list of prohibitions issued to editors ranges from the extremely broad, such as the injunction against “negative news,” to the bizarrely specific, such as the ban on the blooming of a particular flower in southern China.

Following are excerpts from media guidelines that the Communist Party propaganda department and the government Bureau of Internet Affairs, conveyed to top editors before this month’s annual sessions of the National People’s Congress and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference.

The sessions are often referred to here as “the two meetings.” Such internal guidelines are typically circulated weekly, and the list issued before this year’s sessions was described as considerably lengthier than the norm.

A portion was posted on the Internet, and independently confirmed and translated by the Beijing bureau of The New York Times. Annotations by The Times are in brackets.

1. For news on the electoral law during the two meetings, only use articles from Xinhua News Agency and People’s Daily. [Xinhua is the government’s official news agency, and People’s Daily is the official newspaper of the Communist Party.]

2. Do not report on news of people from all walks of life demanding that officials make financial disclosures. [Recently issued party guidelines requiring officials to declare their assets have been widely criticized as weak and ineffective against corruption.]

3. Do not report the editor of Southern Weekend being named among the 10 most influential people by a foreign institution. [Southern Weekend is a weekly newspaper based in Guangzhou that often runs afoul of government censors.]

4. Do not feature news articles on the diary of a bureau director. News must not carry photos of related figures or contents relating to individuals’ private matters from human flesh searches and the like. [A tobacco bureau official in the region of Guangxi was arrested on suspicion of corruption after a diary he allegedly wrote was published on the Internet, describing trysts with mistresses, drunken bouts and bribes. “Human flesh search” is shorthand for the phenomenon of Chinese Web users collaborating en masse to hunt down information on people or other matters.]

5. No negative news allowed on the front pages of newspapers or the headline news sections of Web sites.

6. In articles on the two meetings, do not use wording such as “thundering person,” “thundering proposal” or “thundering delegate.” Do not use the concept of “thundering” to define contents of the two meetings. [Thunder has become a trendy Chinese slang term to describe something shockingly ridiculous or embarrassing.]

7. Delete news related to the youtan poluo flower. [Buddhist lore says this rare and auspicious flower blooms once every 3,000 years. Reports that a nun at a temple in southern China found a cluster of the tiny flowers under her washing machine set off a recent stir in the press. Chinese officials are concerned about the spread of superstition.]

8. For the “poisonous cowpea incident” in Hainan, only use news articles from the Xinhua News Agency, People’s Daily and the official Hainan media. [Cowpeas from Hainan Province were found to be contaminated with a toxic pesticide, setting off criticism about why the cowpeas were sold to other provinces.]

9. Do not feature news reports on major incidents in Beijing during the two meetings, including “staffer at Xidan Books Building hacks manager to death” or “accident at Shunyi car showroom, one man dies.” Do not highlight the timing of these events.

10. During the two meetings, do not feature or sensationalize news about petitioners.

11. Do not report on the hunger strike by Ai Weiwei and other artists. [There was no hunger strike, but Beijing artists are protesting being forced to relocate their studios without fair compensation.]

12. Do not sensationalize or feature reports on the joint editorial of 13 newspapers advocating reform of the household registration system. [The March 1 editorial said the system unfairly restricted the right of Chinese citizens to seek a better life outside their hometowns.]

13. During the two meetings, exercise caution in releasing negative news from all regions. Do not sensationalize or feature news articles that will create a major impact.

14. Do not feature news items about the mass promotion of 89 cadres in Handan city. [The promotions took place at a time when the government was ostensibly streamlining operations.]

15. Do not report on cases of detention center inmates dying during sleep.

16. Do not report on the news of the Inner Mongolian female prosecutor who drove a luxury vehicle and who was reinstated after resigning.

17. Do not hype or feature news of Li Changjiang and Meng Xuenong resurfacing at the two meetings. [Mr. Li was ousted as head of quality control in 2008 after a scandal involving tainted baby milk powder that killed six and sickened 300,000 children. Mr. Meng resigned as governor of Shanxi Province after 267 people died in an iron ore mine disaster. Both have since assumed new posts.]

New York Times

Last Glimmer?

When I was young, my family lived on the southern shore of Lake Ontario. I’ve seen bigger waters since then, but I never forgot watching the sun set behind the Toronto skyline. As a child, I was convinced that no other sunset will be like the I saw, so I always watched for that one last moment before the sun disappeared.

As an adult, living in Hong Kong, the impulse to watch for the last of something is still a keen sense for me. Having spent the last half century scrambling to develop and reinvent itself, Hong Kong is rushing to replace itself. This change is most apparent and poignant during Chinese New Year because of its universal observation and deep cultural roots. Whether celebrating with family or friends, this year’s grand holiday made me think I was seeing something my children would not.

The week before the Chinese New Year, I chatted with one of my clients about my plans for the holiday and how I might visit Macau. He recommended the trip, saying if you really want to see the traditional festivities, you have to leave Hong Kong. He explained, Chinese New Year in Hong Kong is boring; all we do is go to each others’ houses and eat. In Macau, he said, I could see fireworks, which were outlawed in 1967 by Hong Kong’s colonial government fearing they would be used in terrorist attacks.

The next day, the conversation repeated. When I told a friend about an invitation I had to eat poon choi, the traditional communal feast dish, at a village in Yuen Long, he reacted with a mixture of surprise and amicable resentment. Raised in Hong Kong, my friend told me he had only eaten poon choi once at an ex-girlfriend’s house.

I spent the actual holiday dutifully attending dinners with my wife’s extended family, perfecting my refrain – yes, I like it, but I’ve already eaten too much. The pre-packaged family dinners were in contrast with the first village dinner I attended with a friend I met through my dragon boat team. A train, a taxi and a short walk brought us to the village of Shan Pui and the lifelong residence of Thomas Lam’s mother. Grandma Lam had, in fact, moved only once in her life when the family built her a new house a hundred meters down the road. A short walk away, however, sat the family home where my friend and his siblings we born: a fact which his older sister corroborated by pointing out the event’s exact location.

Lam – his chosen English name – led the visitors and younger family members on a nostalgic tour of the village and surrounding country, regrettably punctuated by a young woman falling into the murkiest of waters, stepping off of a ferry that would have made Charon feel at home. Previously, Lam told us, the lion dance would have been performed by kids from the village, not by the professionals who did their best to park their delivery truck out of view.

A week after the official end of the holiday, I attended a much larger village dinner, hosted by one of my uncles, who happens to be the village elder. My aunt’s two tables were crowded with friends and relatives seated on cheap plastic stools. We shared our meal accompanied by traditional Cantonese ballads warbled by an aging village trio. Once the bowls were emptied, the crowd of a few hundred quickly dissipated, and a younger cousin led us away from the family’s tables to see her new Wii. Later that night as I walked back to the train station, only the singers remained in the courtyard, indifferent to the fact that the cleaning crew was their only audience.

Earlier that morning, I asked the 13-year-old students in my journalism class to write a news article about an important event from their Chinese New Year holiday. Some students traveled to Malaysia or the mainland and one wrote about getting in a car accident on their way back from Japan. Of those not traveling, some wrote about the lai see they received, comparing hauls like thieves or trick-or-treaters. A few others wrote about visiting relatives and eating meals together.

Their stories the students wrote reflect the lack of any unified definition of what it means to celebrate the Chinese New Year. Traditionally, the Spring Festival was a time for fireworks, village dinners and family reunions. This year’s Chinese New Year resembled the festival of old, only atomized. Feasts in the village courtyard are now dinners catered by fast food chains. The noise of song and cymbal has been replaced by karaoke tracks and mercenary lions. The way people celebrate Hong Kong’s high holiday is changing, as are the people who celebrate it.

Yet, some things remain. At almost every event I attended this Chinese New Year, someone snuck in fireworks. In Shan Pui, some of the visitors kids giddily worshiped at the altar of gunpowder, while in my uncle’s village, a few adults let loose a string of fireworks. Even the village on the hillside across from my apartment set off a few. Those fireworks may not have been the brightest, but the last flashes and lingering clouds reminded me of summers watching sunsets all the same.

Affordable Housing?

The face of Hong Kong is changing, but are we only changing the face the rest of the world sees?  Outwardly, we expand our Disneyland, we develop luxury housing, and we build expensive rail links to Guangzhou’s suburbs.  It seems the face we show our visitors looks better every time they visit

But how about the face we see everyday here at home?  We carry on in our daily routines, bearing our hardships as we must, but some hardships are growing.  Our young couples struggle to find affordable housing, our youth compete with each other for limited opportunities and our infrastructure ages underneath us.

The question is, where are our priorities?  We brand ourselves Asia’s World City in order to attract businesses and tourists, but what do we do for those of us who already live here, those of us who have grown up here and wish to see our children do the same?

The government’s response to the yesterday’s tragic events in Hung Hom was to say that they would inspect all buildings of similar age.  Rather than getting residents out of aging and potentially dangerous buildings and into new affordable flats, the government has chosen a lengthy process of inspections – inspections like the one conducted just this month on 45 Ma Tau Wai Road.  When calls were made last October for a resumption of the Housing Ownership Scheme (HOS), the Transportation and Housing Secretary said that is was “a big move,” and the Chief Executive said housing was “still affordable.”

It is time our government turned its attention back to the people who live here and their needs.  It is time for the people of Hong Kong to come before the people who visit Hong Kong.  It is high time for the Chief Executive to renew the government’s commitment to providing safe, affordable housing for all of Hong Kong’s residents.

This may not be the face with which we brand ourselves to the world, but it is the face the people of Ma Tau Wai Road need to see.

Endlessly glued to our Hang Seng Index ticker, devastated by even a hint of a fall in property prices and trained to busy ourselves with mundane jobs for vast swaths of our waking hours, many in Hong Kong have lost touch with the big picture.  Honestly, when was the last time you laid down under a tree and looked up at the sky?  How about the last time you looked deeply into the face of someone who is close to death?

That is exactly why you need to check out the Akira Kurosawa festival and exhibit currently running in Taikoo Place.  Commemorating the 100^th anniversary of Kurosawa’s birth and hosted by arts venue Artis Tree, the exhibit contains rare Kurosawa artifacts including scripts, costumes and rare sketches by the director.  During the free screenings, the audience is surrounded by multiple screens creating the feeling of being in the film – or better still, on the set – as the action unfolds.

Watching one of Kurosawa’s movies invites the audience to see the world through Kurosawa’s eyes.  In Kurosawa’s movies, Kurosawa refuses to downplay the grand scale of the conflict his characters face.  As a director, Kurosawa shows us the big picture through the honest depictions of the depth and variety of emotions his characters face, choosing to shield the audience from nothing.  What’s more, Kurosawa’s movies are visually stunning, emphasizing the importance of the natural landscape and his characters’ relationships with it.  Through his insistence on depth of character and showing the importance of the world around us, Kurosawa revived the epic story for modern audiences.

One of Kurosawa’s most memorable scenes comes from 7 Samurai, his classic tale of the men who agree to defend a village against a band of mounted bandits, seeking only the honor of a good deed done and a few rice cakes.  The scene opens with the samurai and their farmer-guide making a dawn raid of the bandits’ camp. A woman wakes up in a bandit’s bed to see the walls of the bandit’s hideout already in flames, but rather than scream, she sits quietly, choosing to doom the bandits and simultaneously telling the audience she was a captive farmer.

The scene culminates with the farmer guide running into the woman at the door of the burning house, where both are frozen in recognition that she was his long-missing wife.  Overcome with shame, the woman runs back into the burning building as it collapses. The brilliance of this actress’ portrayal and the richness of her character’s emotions take no more than a minute or two, yet through this actress, Kurosawa brings the audience aching into face of the farmers’ anguish.

Just as Kurosawa sought to get meaningful efforts from both his cast and crew, so too must the people of Hong Kong seek to make the most of their few minutes of screen time as it were.100 years after his birth, perhaps Kurosawa’s message for Hong Kong is to not look away when life gets tough.

Hong Kong people are notoriously busy, but find an afternoon or evening to watch one of this great master’s works and consider for yourself what part you play in the grand scale of your life and the life of our city.  Who knows; your scene may be the one people talk about for years to come.

Open Court?

The People’s Republic of China is not often thought of as a pioneer in legal systems.  The first 30 years of the PRC was an era of lawless totalitarianism, where an individual or group’s legal standing was subject to capricious political whims.  With the rise of Deng Xiaoping and the beginning of domestic reforms, modest attention was given to the rule of law. As China celebrates the 60^th anniversary of the founding of the PRC, there is cause for cautious optimism regarding China’s legal system.

Long just a political tool for the exclusive private use of the Party, the functionality of Chinese courts remains hindered by systematic problems.  The autonomy of local courts is limited because the courts’ budgets are largely dependent on local officials.  According to Berkeley Law Professor Stanley Lubman, Chinese courts are often encouraged to mediate cases rather than render verdicts and to avoid taking cases which have implications for large portions of the society, like the tainted milk scandal. Particularly glaring is China’s arrests this year of prominent lawyers and legal advocates, including Gao Zhisheng, Xu Zhiyong and Liu Xiaobo.

All is not lost.  Quietly, the PRC is beginning to take some positive steps toward solidifying their legal regime.  Martin Hu, a Shanghai-based attorney suggests the biggest push for legal development has come as result of China’s entry into the WTO, which requires member nations to establish judicial review, transparency, and impartiality before the courts.  The National People’s Congress is also expected to amend electoral law to equalize representation between its rural and urban citizens sometime at the end of this year or early next year. On the local level, Qinghai province has begun a training program for judges and prosecutors with Temple University’s Beasely School of Law.

Much work remains.  Just last month, a teenage driver of an unlicensed taxi cut off one of his fingers as a means to assert his innocence after Shanghai police used a sting involving a civilian ‘fare’ to entrap and subsequently detain him for 12 days.  China Mobile, the world’s largest phone company by subscribers, settled a case brought under the nation’s new anti-monopoly laws by Beijing lawyer Zhou Ze. Zhou, who merely wished to reclaim 1200 yuan for what he alleged were abusive and irrelevant fees.  Following the old script, China Mobile agreed to settle out of court, yet defendant’s council, Xue Junfu, described the payment as a gesture of appreciation for Zhou’s suggestions, clearly attempting to avoid any precedent of settling claims monetarily.  During a recent visit to Shenzhen by the US Commerce secretary, local authorities were singled out for the efforts at stamping out trade in pirated goods, as a means of highlighting its ineffective prevention elsewhere in China. Secretary Locke said a major cause for piracy’s continued role on the Chinese economy is that most cases are handled as administrative rather than criminal matters.

It is nothing new to state how difficult it is to rule China, let alone change to ruling by law.  Yet, this is exactly what must be done for China to realize the social harmony it so ardently professes.  A report issued last month by the US Congressional-Executive Commission on China, aptly stated “what we have seen in China is not the emergence of rule of law but rule by law.”  If the Party wishes to be respected for its society as well as its economy, it must use laws to protect society, rather than simply protect itself.

Civic Space?

The following column was originally published as a letter to the editor in the South China Morning Post, 24 Oct 2009.

On 25^th of October, the West Kowloon Cultural District Authority (WKCDA) will hold the first of three Public Forums to gather public input on the proposed development of the West Kowloon Cultural District (WKCD).

Throughout its modern history, Hong Kong’s purpose has been principally commercial.  In the West Kowloon Cultural District, Hong Kong has the chance to create for itself an engine of cultural and civic growth, capable of shaping Hong Kong’s public life for years to come.  Such culture, along with its supporting institutions, would anchor Hong Kong through the years, giving its public life distinctiveness and vitality.

But this alone is not enough.  As Hong Kong takes concrete steps to develop other forms of culture in addition to its vibrant commercial culture, it is essential that we include civic as well as artistic culture in the plans for the West Kowloon.  In addition to work space, funding and supporting institutions for the creative arts, the WKCDA should set aside funding for research institutions, civic education and forums for public exchange, modeled after the National Endowment for the Arts in the US and the EU’s European Economic and Social Committee.

Civic investment alone can secure a lasting identity for Hong Kong: one that is shaped by the people of Hong Kong and their talents.  By creating avenues for the people of Hong Kong to express and discuss their views on public life as well as art, the WKCD will act as a greenhouse for the ideas which will shape our city in the decades to come.  This is why the WKCDA must expand its plans beyond visual and creative arts to include civic organizations.

Pride of place has always been given to commercial development in Hong Kong, but with the development of the WKCD, Hong Kong can fashion a civic and cultural identity to equal its economic prowess.  The timing, funding and political will are right for Hong Kong  and the WKCDA to act now and establish Hong Kong’s unique position as Asia’s World City.

Peaceful Intentions?

China’s relationship with Taiwan is shaky to the say the least.  Both the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the Kuomintang (KMT) started as allies, first in the fight to end Imperial Chinese rule and then against Japanese occupation.  Not long after WWII ended and civil war ensued, Communist forces routed the KMT republicans, prompting them to flee to Taiwan.  Since 1949, both sides have built their military capacities specifically with the other’s defeat in mind.

In the last 25 years, however, things have changed. Taiwan has transformed itself from a police state into a multi-party democracy, and China has grown from a reclusive communist regime into one of the most important capitalist economies in the world.  With the election of Ma Ying Jeou as the Taiwanese President, diplomatic cross-strait relations have improved remarkably.  Last year’s resumption of direct flights and new trade agreements were heralded as significant progress.

Still, old enmities persist.  The events of 2009 have curtailed the openness of the prior year.  Taiwan suffered a series of typhoons, the botched handling of which cost Ma’s government considerable domestic credibility.  When opposition mayors in the worst-hit counties independently invited the Dalai Lama to visit the displaced, it was a clear attempt to leverage Ma’s need for domestic reimaging against his desire for progress with Beijing.  The result was predictable: Ma welcomed the Dalai Lama and Beijing condemned the visit as separatist action against China (as it does all of the Dalai Lama’s actions). In the weeks following, mainland tour operators decided/were directed to cut Kaohsiung from their itineraries, to which the city of Kaohsiung responded by adding a documentary on the life of exiled Uighur activist Rebiya Kadeer to its annual film festival.

Just when the status quo of saber rattling and petty insults appeared to have regained the upper hand, Ma made another overture, although it may not have looked like one.  Ma admitted to Reuters on 18 Oct that the mainland has tipped the military balance of power in its favor, specifically mentioning the overwhelming number of short range missiles aimed at the island.  While Ma announced Taiwan would continue to purchase military equipment from the US, he said he did not want an arms race.  Heard in the context of Taiwan’s 10% reduction of military personnel over the last 15 years, Ma’s comments seem genuine.

President Ma continued, “If we are to negotiate a peace agreement with the mainland, certainly we expect them to do something about those missiles, either to remove them or dismantle them.”  In the spirit of the SALT agreements between the US and USSR, Ma’s request ought to be viewed as an early step to peaceful reunification.  The argument seems straightforward: if you wish peaceful reconciliation, remove the threat of imminent attack as a gesture of good will.  Some historians believe Ronald Reagan’s demand that ‘Mr. Gorbachev tear down this [the Berlin] Wall’ prompted Soviet leadership to take the kind of specific action needed to build trust.  In much the same way, Beijing should seize the international moral high ground by redeploying the missiles presently aimed at Taiwan.

No major power wants to see the South China Sea become a warzone.  This fact can be powerfully leveraged by the PRC if they would only give the international community cause to see its efforts at peaceful reunification as sincere.  If and when the PRC puts forward an offer for reunification that appears credible to the international community, Taiwan will be under pressure to accept.

If the PRC does wish to reunify Taiwan and the mainland, Beijing would do well to recall the initial overtures between Gorbachev and Reagan, as they began stepping back from the Cold War detente.  In that context, Ma’s comments sound a lot like Ronald Reagan’s, ‘Trust, but verify’.

Media Friendly?

I had the good fortune to improve my Cantonese (the dialect spoken in Hong Kong and Guangdong province) through an excellent local language school.  Cantonese is an especially interesting dialect to study because it has adapted as its speakers spread from mainland China, into Hong Kong and from there, throughout the world, while the cultural core of the language remains grounded in Chinese culture.  I was excited to improve my Cantonese because learning the language is a great way to learn cultural idiosyncrasies.  Although, associations found between words or phrases may be nothing more than coincidence, more often than not, the rules of a language (i.e. its grammar) are reflections of that culture’s distinctive logic.

There is one example of this that is worthwhile to explore briefly as it explains something pertinent about Chinese thinking. Transliterated into English, the phrase reads “Mouh mahn taai.” This fairly common expression has two meanings: woodenly translated, the first is, “I have no questions;” the second is, “I have no problems.”  The irony of this expression is the apparent equivalence of problems and questions.  The double entendre expresses well a part of Confucian conservatism that has been adopted by the Chinese Communist Party; a conservatism that enshrines the status quo and views basic questions, such as ‘Why,’ as problems.

Perhaps an example will help to illustrate this phenomenon.  While covering the civil unrest in Xinjiang, three Hong Kong based reporters were detained and beaten by paramilitary police.  The following day, the local information officer called a press conference to discuss the matter but neglected to notify the networks whose reporters had been involved, saying they contacted only those parties who were concerned with the incident.  The reporters were accused of inciting the rioters and not having proper press passes; claims which they and their networks maintain are wholly false.

Again, as the PRC was preparing for its elaborately choreographed 60^th anniversary parade, a Hong Kong based camera crew began filming from their office balcony, which had a view of the dress rehearsal the night before National Day.  The most curious part of the story is not that police showed up and made them stop filming, but that the police were apparently vigilantly watching so as to notice a camera and its operator at night, on floor which appears from the still images to be at least 20 stories up.

These are not isolated instances of press restrictions.  Despite President Hu Jintao’s recent (09 Oct) reiteration of Beijing’s commitment to unrestricted freedoms for foreign journalists in China, the reality is that all Hong Kong based journalists must apply for a special press pass in order to report in areas of unrest, thereby giving the government a method for screening its foreign coverage.

The problem here is that China is still working out its version of capitalism with Chinese characteristics. The typical freedoms associated with free markets – freedom of the press, judicial independence, open elections – have not yet become a part of Chinese rule, largely because it would threaten the grip the Party has on its painstakingly-crafted domestic image. For the foreseeable future, it appears questions will still be viewed as problematic, and reporters who ask them, as “instigators.”