Category: Unit IV. Reform And Opening

#408 Rising Nationalism in the 1990s and 2000s

4/19/2018

Today will be our the last session of or “normal” course content before we shift to working on the research project. As a result, we will dedicate most of the period to open discussion. I have prepared a video to start us off and would like to start by looking at Tang Jie as an individual, but beyond that I hope you will feel free to redirect the discussion in whatever way makes sense to you.

Tang Jie's 6-minute video from 2008:

Tang Jie

How is the Tang Jie that appears in Osnos’ profile similar or different from what you might imagine the person to be like who created the video we have seen together?
Does Tang Jie seem like the kind of person who you might have a close friendship with either if you had gotten to know him in China or if he were a student here at Hotchkiss? Why or why not?
What do you think motivated him to produce the video?

Who are the “angry youth” (fenqing 愤青)?

What values do they see themselves holding? What values do others see them as holding?
How would you evaluate their actions in protesting Western media and other companies?

Analyze some of the comparisons made in the piece:

China : Tibet :: America : Cherokee
America : Kent State shootings :: China : “June 4th”
America, China, and India: “You eat bread, you drink coffee. All of these are not brought by democracy. Indian guys have democracy, and some African countries have democracy, but they can’t feed their own people. Chinese people have begun to think, One part is the good life, another is democracy. If democracy can really give you the good life, that’s good. But, without democracy, if we can still have the good life why should we choose democracy?” (Liu Yang quoted in Osnos).

Further questions:

How were the 1989 demonstrations like or unlike those in 1999, 2008? One point to consider is the transition from democracy to nationalism as key words of the movement.
Examine the tension between “reform and opening” on one side and the growing sense of national pride on the other. Are these two impulses ultimately compatible? Why or why not?
Reflect—perhaps one last time—on the “century of humiliation” (bainian guochi 百年国耻) and the way it informs nationalist sentiment in contemporary China.

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#406 and #407 Migrant workers

4/13/2018

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Passing notes:

Place your name on the top-right of your piece of paper. Take 2 minutes to respond to the following prompt: "What was your initial reaction to hearing about the lives profiled by Chang and Liao?"
Pass the paper to the person to your right. Respond to the statement for 1 minute.
Pass the paper one more time to the person to your right. Respond to the statement for 2 minutes. At the end of these two minutes return the paper to the person whose name is on the paper.

Background:

By the numbers:
- 50% of world’s mobile phones produced in Guangdong province, and most of them not by Guangdongers
- 70% of migrant workers are employed in eastern areas; two-thirds work in large- or medium-sized cities. Half move between different provinces (largest flow from Sichuan to Guangdong).
- The number of rural Chinese working away from home is now almost 160 million, or 12% of the country's population.
- Once a year, nearly the entire migrant population returns home for Chinese New Year. This is the largest mass movement of people on the planet. Journey can be long and conditions are crowded (unimaginably so for many who have not experienced it)

Source: The Economist (February 2012).

Why do people leave their homes?
- Push factors:
  - Few opportunities for education or work available in rural areas.
  - Poverty (sometimes extreme poverty).
- Pull factors:
  - Low-wage factory jobs are still significantly more income than can be earned at home.
  - Excitement of urban life.
  - Promise of social mobility.
Hukou (户口 household registration system) grants rights to compulsory education, healthcare, and modest welfare and pension support. Only allowed to receive those rights in the place one is registered.
- Student-aged children without the proper hukou or the wealth to pay penalties (to public schools) or tuition (to private schools) are systematically denied an education. This traps them in a cycle of migrant work and poverty.
  - Even if they can get access to education, must sit the gaokao (高考 college entrance examination) in home province if they hope to attend public university (vast majority of colleges in China are public)
- Children receive hukou based on their parents’ hukou. Even if they are born in Beijing, they might have a rural or provincial hukou if that was the legal status of their parents.
- Hukou is credited with maintaining social stability and ensuring that major Chinese cities are not ringed with the kind of informal housing settlements found in other developing countries.
Cultural impact:
- Terms like “floating population” (liudong renkou 流动人口)—most recently, “low-end population” (diduan renkou 低端人口)—and have become a cultural trope, represented in major films, for example Fan Bingbing’s Lost in Beijing (Pingguo 苹果)
- Sharp socio-cultural divides between “locals” (dangdi ren 当地人) and “outsiders” (waidi ren 外地人). Legal discrimination can bleed into discrimination can have economic (jobs), social (housing), and even personal (dating) consequences

Documentary selections:

View selections from:

Manufactured Landscapes (from beginning for about 2-3 minutes)
Mardi Gras (5:45-15:15; 20:26-24:10; 35:41-36:11)

As you watch, make notes of what you observe. Note, specifically:

What is similar or different in these scenes than what you might have expected after reading Chang and Liao?
How do the working conditions vary?

Discussion questions:

Revisit your initial reflection in the context of the documentary clips: What stands out to you?
What do you think the goals of the two authors were? For Chang, who is more explicit about her goals, evaluate her decision not to concentrate on the excesses of the factory system but instead to capture the perspective of young migrant women on their own terms.
Before today, what had you heard either about workers in Dongguan, the Pearl River Delta area, or China more generally? Did Chang expand on or challenge any of your preconceptions?
How does gender complicate our understanding of migrant workers? How might the experience of young women be different from that of young men?
Our recent readings on Deng Xiaoping and Zhu Rongji have taken a macro (“big picture”) focus on China’s development. How does that perspective connect to the micro (individual) focus of Chang and Liao?
Is the factory system fair to workers? Why or why not?

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#405 Zhu Rongji: Economic reform in the 1990s

4/10/2018

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Export led growth:

Use the following online tool from MIT (external link) to examine China’s exports to the United States in the following years.

1969 – At the end of the first stage of the Cultural Revolution
1976 – The year Mao died
1983 – A few years into Deng’s reforms
1992 – Deng’s “Southern Tour”
2004
2014 – The last year for which data is available

For each date, make a note of the total amount of exports from China to the United States and the composition of those exports. Then, consider:

How did China’s exports change over these years?
How do these changes reflect the events and trends described by Schell and Delury?

Continued discussion:

At a few points—in our discussions of the Cultural Revolution and the 1980s democracy movement— we have discussed “line struggle.” To what extent was this a factor in “reform and opening” policies? How did Zhu Rongji navigate these changes?
What was the significance of Shanghai to the reform process? (Both Jiang Zemin and Zhu had served there immediately before being tapped for the number 1 and 2 positions, respectively).
What was new about “reform and opening” under Zhu’s economic management? What shifts should we take note of?
President Bill Clinton defending Chinese integration into the global economy in part by suggesting that market liberalization would eventually spill over into political liberalization. Do you see evidence of this process underway from the reading?

Analyzing the impact and interests of foreign investors:

We will watch an 11-minute clip from Frontline: “Is Wal-Mart good for America?” (the clip is called “China’s view of Wal-Mart”) produced in 2004.

As we watch, take notes from the perspective of one of the following roles: (a) U.S. Secretary of Commerce, (b) the Chinese Minister of Commerce, (c) the CEO of Wal-Mart. Pay attention to the pros and cons of Wal-Mart’s involvement in China from your perspective.

In the roundtable that will conclude our class, we will stay with our roles to consider:

Who benefits, and in what ways, from Wal-Mart’s role in China?
Finally, anticipate: How do you think this video would be different if it was filmed today, almost 15 years later?

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#403 and #404 Tian'anmen, historical memory, and oral history

4/6/2018

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The goal over our next two classes is to examine the historical memory of the events of 1989 and to practice preparing for an oral history project—a skill that may prove useful for your course project research.

Timeline/context:

Take a moment and review this timeline (outside web link) prepared by the creators of the Gate of Heavenly Peace documentary. After a few minutes I will ask you to close your computer screen and work together to create a summary of the events (before and during) the 1989 protests. This will be a good time to ask any questions you might have about how the events unfolded.

Articles discussion:

Discuss Beam, Tatlow, and Wasserstrom:

What strategies do you see employed to suppress the memory of 1989? To what extent have these efforts been successful? Ultimately who do you think will win the “waiting game” that Albert Ho referred to in Beam’s article? Why?
How have the role of intellectuals in Chinese society changed over time? To what extent do you see the movement of 1989 and the non-movement of 2018 reflected in other moments of China’s modern past?

Oral history:

Review selected parts of the “Oral History Project Guidelines” (PDF) prepared by the Minnesota Historical Society, particularly:

question formats on page 7,
oral history interview tips on pages 8-10, and
the attached releases on pages 11-12.

Your task will to be to locate the name of one fairly well-known individual connected to the democracy movement in the late 1980s (it could be a student leader like Wu’er Kaixi or Chai Ling, a worker like Han Dongfeng, a parent like Ding Zilin, a professor like Fang Lizhi or Liu Xiaobo, a Chinese government official like Deng Xiaoping or Zhao Ziyang, an outside observer like U.S. ambassador James Lilley or Canadian journalist Jan Wong). This person needs to have been alive and witnessed something worth discussing during the spring and early summer of 1989, however they might be deceased today.

Conduct some basic research on the person and their experience related to the democracy movement and Tian’anmen/“6-4.”

Based on that research, write out 7-8 questions that you might ask that person. These should be considered “good questions” within the framework outlined by the Minnesota Historical Society. After each question provide 3-4 sentences of carefully-focused background about why you think it is a good question and what you might expect that person to share. For example, if you were to interview Deng Xiaoping, you might ask:

Question: You often spoke of “reform and opening.” Did you see the student and worker demonstrators as reformists promoting a more open China?

Rationale: This question would gently challenge Deng to connect his own rhetoric to those of the students. It would require him to explain the limits of his own concept of “reform” and possibly to draw connections to the experience in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. Reform for Deng had to be ultimately compatible with “democratic centralism.” He feared that the breakdown in authority might lead to conditions not unlike the Cultural Revolution (1966-76) or the challenge to one-party rule that was occurring in the late 1980s in Eastern Europe.

Be sure to cite all of the specific information you describe. For example, if you were to add a line from Wealth and Power saying that Deng lost patience with the students after they showed disrespect to Li Peng during a live televised meeting, you would want to offer Chicago-style citation to that effect.

Due: This short assignment is due before the end of class on Saturday, 4/7. If you need additional time, you may wait until Tuesday 4/10 to submit it, but please keep in mind that you have several pages of reading in Schell and Delury due before class as well.

To submit: follow this link to Canvas.

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#401 Deng Xiaoping: “Black Cat, White Cat”

4/3/2018

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Reflection on unit III:

Unit III feedback

Reflection on unit III:

To what extent has our recent narrative demonstrated the “fall and rise” pattern?
China’s leaders have struggled to allow public grappling with some of the “dark valleys” of this era. Does reflection on history and memory matter? Why or why not?

Introducing Unit IV:

As Schell and Delury suggest, “By the 1980s [Deng Xiaoping] had named his counterrevolution gaige kaifang (改革开放), “reform and opening up.” Deng’s strange hybrid reform combined Vladimir Lenin’s recipe for a disciplined and well-organized state and Milton Friedman’s celebration of free market economics” (261).
Over the next couple of weeks we will examine this transformation of China from the 1980s to the early 2000s.

Interactive background

Slides

Further discussion:

To what extent do you think Deng’s biography (his family background, his time in France and the Soviet Union, his revolutionary credentials, or his experience during the Cultural Revolution) impacted his eventual choices as paramount leader?
How would you summarize the complex relationship between Mao and Deng?
What is the relationship between “reform” and “opening”?
What do you find admirable about Deng’s leadership? Are there any aspects that might give you pause?

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#408 Rising Nationalism in the 1990s and 2000s

#406 and #407 Migrant workers

#405 Zhu Rongji: Economic reform in the 1990s

#403 and #404 Tian'anmen, historical memory, and oral history

#401 Deng Xiaoping: “Black Cat, White Cat”

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