Addendum
This article is something that I think everyone should read. Keep in mind that its author is the same woman who just published the deeply critical Socialism is Great! (the title is meant to be ironic).
I especially think this part is worthwhile:
Today’s schoolchildren [in China] enjoy far more sophisticated sports than throwing hand grenades [a school "sport" during the Cultural Revolution]. They know a lot more about the outside world. I wonder if Western children know as much about China? And if they did, would there be still be the same fear? Maybe the Olympics will bring us closer.
art on 18 Aug 2008 at 5:56 pm #
Thought provoking, as you say. You know better than the rest of us how many Chinese people are learning English and how surprised they are to encounter a foreigner who speaks Chinese. When we travel, we expect people to speak English – we’ve all seen Ugly Americans get annoyed when they can’t find an English speaker; when the Chinese are at home, they do not expect travelers to know Chinese. What does that say?
Mayline on 18 Aug 2008 at 9:37 pm #
I think this is an interesting statement “I can understand how China’s undemocratic political system and lack of transparency make the West uneasy, especially when matched with the country’s rise, much of the fear is generated by ignorance.” Fear is in most situations driven by ignorance, but in this situation it’s an ignorance that is maintained by the West probably not wanting to know, but also in China’s institutionalized lack of transparency. She raises a great point though, that things have come a far way from where they were. A friend of mine who just visited his relatives in rural China said that things were surprisingly well and that everybody was generally pretty happy. This conflicts pretty heavily with my notion of China, but I readily admit I’m a product of American media.
Administrator on 19 Aug 2008 at 4:40 am #
You make a good point, but I don’t think we can blame much of Western ignorance on China’s lack of political transparency. Generally, what bothers me about the whole China discourse in the West is that what the Chinese people actually want tends to be either ignored or approached as though it’s irrelevant (the “we know better than they do what’s best for them” mentality).
But if you actually want to know what Chinese people think about things, generally speaking, there’s very little about the Chinese political system that prevents that. For instance, respectable opinion polling shows that the Chinese government’s approval rating is much higher than the US’s. I can’t find a link at the moment, but I recall it being somewhere around 80%. If Westerners want to know what Chinese people think about things, even controversial topics, they can simply ask. Sometime before 2009, the number Chinese websites online will surpass the number of English ones online; and that’s not even mentioning the websites like Anti-CNN that are created by Chinese people specifically for the purpose of explaining their opinions and actions to Westerners.
Admittedly, it’s much easier to remain ignorant, especially if you don’t already speak Chinese. However, I don’t think we should sacrifice the hope of mutual understanding at the altar of convenience. People should learn Chinese. The Chinese are learning English.
Hmm. I’m going to make a new post out of this, but better worded. Hold on.