Jan 29, 2011

China & America's New "Sputnick Moment"

Saturday, January 29, 2011
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A Los Angeles Times article discusses a comment by President Obama in his State of the Union speech where he said that Americans face a "Sputnik moment," essentially meaning a major challenge from another foreign superpower. In 1947, Russia beat the United States in the space race  by being the first country to launch a satellite named Sputnick into orbit around earth. Russia's initial victory prompted the U.S. to move much faster in the race to explore space.

Obama's statement was intended to motivate Americans to rise to the economic challenges posed by China's rapidly expanding economy which challenges U.S. economic dominance of recent history. China became the world's second largest economy last year and is starting to assert its economic power more while the American economy, though still the largest, is lagging in growth.

Although probably not intended by Obama to be a comparison of the U.S. relationship with Russia and the current U.S./China relationship, any such comparison is probably a poor one. The U.S./Russia relationship during the Cold War was openly adversarial and confrontational, with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev saying "We will bury you." China, on the other hand, seems to be much more interested in cooperation with the U.S., as stated by President Hu Jintao during his recent American visit.

While President Obama may try to use China's economic rise as a tool to motivate (or scare) Americans, into believing that China is about to overtake the United States, most Chinese people don't seem to agree. From talking with Chinese people, the vast majority seem to recognize that the U.S. is still a much bigger economic power than China. They also seem to realize that China is still technologically behind the U.S. as well as some other nations and still needs to make significant improvements to be more competitive. For example Hu Xingdou, an economics professor at Beijing Institute of Technology is quoted as saying "Our system lacks creativity" . . . "The U.S. is a private sector. It will stimulate innovation. We may be temporarily ahead of America in the areas Obama mentioned, but to truly surpass the U.S., we have to reform our system."

While looking up a link for the term Sputnick for this post, I found out that sputnik means "co-traveler", "traveling companion." The rise of China does not necessarily have to mean the all of the United States. Although the U.S. and China will be competitors in some ways, they could also be co-travelers.

Jan 28, 2011

China's Mega City in Doubt?

Friday, January 28, 2011
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A few days ago I posted about plans in southern China to build the world's biggest megacity by merging 9 existing cities, including some already pretty large one such as Shenzhen and Guangzhou. It has since been reported that there is some doubt about exactly how serious these plans are. Apparently some government officials in the province of Guangdong have denied the plans to create the world's largest metropolis.

Instead, the Guangdong provincial government says it intends to promote further development within 3 economic circles, each of which includes 3 cities. I have also heard rumors that the Chinese government may ultimately want to merge Hong Kong (香港) with the neighboring city of Shenzhen. There is already a great deal of economic interdependence between these cities so this is not impossible although if it happens, it will likely be sometime after 2047 (since China promised to let Hong Kong remain self-governing for 50 years after its handover from Great Britain in 1997) . Regardless of of these stories is more accurate, it seems clear that there are at least plans to massively increase development in the region. Whether one megacity or 3 (or 4 including Hong Kong) neighboring (but somewhat smaller) megacities, growth in this region of China is guaranteed to be substantial.

Jan 26, 2011

China 3rd Top Tourist Destination

Wednesday, January 26, 2011
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China is now the 3rd most visited country according to the UN World Tourism Organization. China had about 56 million tourists in 2010 and overtook Spain for the 3rd highest position. The top destination was France with 79 million visitors, with the United States following with 61 million. The rankings for 2010 and 2009 can be found here.
Tourist destinations such as the Great Wall (长城), the ancient Terracotta Warriors (兵马俑; bīngmǎ yǒng) in Xi'an, and the Shaolin Monastery (少林寺; Shàolín Sì), the home of Chinese kung fu (功夫; gōngfu) continue to attract increasing numbers of visitors. The 2010 Shanghai World Expo also brought a large number of foreign visitors. In addition, China's many modern major cities provide foreign visitors with a plethora of entertainment, shopping, as well as sightseeing opportunities.
Hong Kong harbor
While the biggest number of international visitors have chosen to travel mostly to European countries in recent years, that trend may be changing a bit as China and other Asian destinations (Malaysia, Hong Kong, Thailand, etc.) are becoming more popular. The growth rate for international tourism in Asia for 2010 was 13% while Europe experienced only 3% growth.

Due to huge economic growth in China over the past few decades, there is now a significant portion of China's 1.3 billion population (although certain still a small minority of that huge total) that can afford to travel internationally. Appropriately, while more people are likely to continue to visit China, more Chinese people will be likely to be visit other countries in the near future as well.
 

Jan 25, 2011

Lang Lang Insults America?

Tuesday, January 25, 2011
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A Los Angeles Times article reports that some American and Chinese conservatives are claiming that a song played by pianist Lang Lang (郎朗; Láng Lǎng) at a White House dinner for president Hu Jintao was intended as an insult to the United States. Lang Lang, however, claims he chose to play the song because its one of his favorites and for the beauty of its melody.

The song, My Motherland (我的祖国; Wǒde Zǔguó) was used in a 1956 Chinese movie called Battle on Shangganling Mountain. The movie was about the Battle of Triangle Hill in the Korean War, during which Chinese troops ultimately triumph against the Americans. The American led UN forces wanted to capture a location calld Triangle Hill near the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) which was occupied by the Chinese Army. Despite several attempts, American and South Korean forces were unable to capture the hill despite their superior artillery and aircraft. The Chinese suffered 11,500 casualties, but repeatedly refused to give up. While few Americans are aware of it, there was Chinese fear that the U.S. might try to invade China from Korea. This battle was therefore an important victory for the Chinese Army and a source of nationalistic pride in the young People's Republic of China, which established itself only 6 years earlier and was trying to rebuild China after a century of foreign interference and revolution.

My Motherland  is, as the title suggests, a patriotic song about the beauty of China. Reading through the lyrics, its hard to see what the alleged insult is, but if you look carefully, there's one small line that mentions "wolves" (the American army?) invading to be repelled by people with "hunting rifles." Here's two verses, including the controversial lyric line:
This is my heoric motherland
The place where I grew up
In this stretch of ancient land
There is youthful vigour found everywhere

Great mountains, great rivers and an amazing land
Every road is broad and wide
When the friends come, fine drink is offered
But if the wolves come
What greets them are the hunting rifles
Here's a videoclip from the movie where the song is played - of course, its in Chinese so most Americans won't understand the lyrics let alone catch the vague alleged anti-American reference. 

It seems very unlikely that Lang Lang would harbor, much less publicly express, any anti-American sentiments since he is a resident of both the U.S. and China currently living in New York and has achieved critical acclaim and commercial success in the United States. His performance didn't include any lyrics since he's a pianist and its possible that he wasn't even aware of the vague lyric line's alleged interpretation and, in a statement, Lang Lang said that he wanted to:
"bridge cultures together through the beauty and inspiration of music … America and China are my two homes. I am most grateful to the United States for providing me with such wonderful opportunities, both in my musical studies and for furthering my career."
Apparently, there are people on both sides (U.S. and China) that, rather than bridging cultures and improving relations, are insistent on maintaining divisions. Its a shame that music is used for such purposes, especially if that's not the intent of the performer.
 

Jan 24, 2011

China's Future Mega City

Monday, January 24, 2011
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China has more big cities than any other country in the world. However, in recent years, nothing is ever big enough in China. So it shouldn't come as too much of a surprise that China intends to create the world's biggest mega city. According to The Telegraph, the plan is to combine 9 cities in the Pearl River Delta region of southern China into a yet-to-be-named mega city of about 42 million. Existing cities to be included in the project include several already major cities (Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Zhuhai) near Hong Kong. The region is the main manufacturing area of China and the nine cities combined contribute about 10% of China's economy.
The mega city will require huge infrastructure projects over the next 6 years to integrate transportation, energy, and telecommunications throughout the region which are predicted to cost 2 trillion yuan (U.S. $260 billion).

One goal of the project is to spread industry, jobs and public services more evenly across the region. Another is to regain competitive advantage from other growing urban areas around the major cities of Beijing and Shanghai.

The massive changes that have taken place in China over the past 30 years may be best illustrated by the growth of Chinese cities as huge numbers of Chinese migrants have moved to the cities from the countryside. In the late 1970s, China initiated an economic reform program, establishing special economic zones in different areas in order to attract investment and stimulate business. Several of the earliest special economic zones were located in the Pearl River Delta area. Since then, other major cities and surrounding regions have also experienced rapid economic growth and corresponding population increases from rural migration. It is estimated that by 2020, China will have several city zones with populations of 50 to 100 million in addition to even more "small" city areas with populations from 10 to 25 million.

While there is no avoiding the continuing urbanization trend in China since poor rural residents will keep seeking greater opportunity and fortune in the cities, hopefully Chinese government planners will consider the many consequences that will result. Some of these consequences will likely change the basic structure of Chinese society which has always been based on extremely close family connections. In modern urban environments, family ties tend to be looser and ironically, in many ways, people tend to become more isolated from each other. While change and growth are inevitable and often positive, its important to consider what might be lost in the process.
 


  • Author: David Moser

Jan 22, 2011

China's Economic Miracle

Saturday, January 22, 2011
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China's rise to its current position as one of the world's biggest economic powers is not actually new. China was one of the most advanced societies and richest economies for much of the last 2000+ years. However, in the latter part of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), a variety of factors (natural disasters, internal rebellions, Western imperialism, Japanese invasion, etc.) led to economic decline and chaos. This ultimately resulted in a revolution that ended the Imperial China and the founding of the Republic of China in 1911. 

The new Republic was challenged by disorganization, corruption, Japanese invasion, World War II and civil war with the newly formed Communist Party of China. The Communists ultimately won and established the People's Republic of China in 1949. Although the new government, led by Mao Zedong (毛泽东), initially improved China's economy, several of Mao's plans (including the Great Leap forward and the Cultural Revolution) resulted in a severe economic decline.

After Mao's death, in 1978 Deng Xiaoping began a series of reforms that gradually changed China's strict command economy into more of a free-market system. These reforms resulted in huge economic growth over the past 3 decades and have vastly improved the overall standard of living in China. Over the past 30 years, China's economy has grown at about 10% a year.

The rapid economic growth has spurred many changes - most importantly, over 250 million people have been brought out of abject poverty. Although with its huge 1.3 billion population, there are still many poor Chinese, there is also a growing middle class possibly exceeding the entire population of the United States. At the end of the 1970s, China was one of the poorest countries in the world, but it is now the world's 2nd largest economy and may overtake the United States with the next two decades.

Of course, it remains to be seen how long China can maintain such rapid economic growth, but assuming political stability remains, its likely that growth will continue although eventually at a somewhat slower rate.


Jan 19, 2011

Wednesday, January 19, 2011
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The Chinese film industry has been growing dramatically in recent years although it is still quite small for a country with the world's second biggest economy and largest population. In 2010, box office income in China increased by 64% to reach U.S. $1.5 billion.

Hollywood still dominates the movies in most of the world as illustrated by the fact that Avatar was the biggest grossing film for 2010, taking in $204 million in China. However, there were a number of very successful Chinese films as well, led by Feng Xiaogang's (冯小刚) Aftershock which earned over $100 million. If you can find it with English subtitles, Aftershock (唐山大地震; Tángshān Dàdìzhèn) is well worth watching and is based on the true event of an earthquake with a fictional story about a family that suffered resulting personal aftershocks long after the earthquake ended.
Despite the positive growth in the Chinese film industry, the Chinese government realizes that the rate of growth is not close to equal to overall economic growth. A Washington Post article quotes a Chinese film bureau report stating that "A 10 billion yuan box office ... is still far from the value of a movie world power and is still far from keeping pace with the country's economic growth." The report is also quoted as saying:
"The variety of Chinese movies isn't rich enough. The development of genres still remains at the stage of simple imitation and duplication. It still lacks an improvement in creativity and localization ..." 
Hopefully this realization may further incentivize the Chinese government to take steps to help encourage growth of the Chinese film by reducing piracy and promoting a less restrictive environment for Chinese filmmakers. Despite significant challenges (piracy of movies on DVD and on the Internet, etc.), growth is sure to continue and the China Film Producers Association predicts that the Chinese film industry will become the world's second biggest worth about U.S. $6 billion by 2015. An extreme rate of growth would be needed for this prediction to come true, but its not impossible considering how great China's overall economic growth has been over the past several decades.

Jan 18, 2011

Hu's U.S. Arrival & Boehner's Boner

Tuesday, January 18, 2011
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Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡锦涛) arrived in Washington earlier today to begin 4 days of meetings with President Obama. As mentioned in my post yesterday, understanding cooperation between the United States and China is crucial for both countries.According to this article, "China and the United States are now each other's second largest trading partner. The two-way trade between the two countries is expected to top 380 billion U.S. dollars in 2010. China has been the fastest-growing major export market of the United States for nine consecutive years."

However, political gamesmanship in the U.S. seems to be more important to some American leaders. John Boehner, the Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives declined to attend a dinner for Hu which was intended to be non-partisan. Boehner's refusal to attend the dinner doesn't seem to be based on any specific problems with China, but is more likely a continuation of his extreme political partisanship. Boehner has previously refused White House invitations to state dinners with India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Mexican President Felipe Calderon. 

The Chinese place huge emphasis on the concept of guanxi 关系, which doesn't have a perfect English translation, but is usually translated as "face." Maintaining face is crucial in Chinese society and causing others loss of face is to be avoided at all costs. If the Chinese government hosted a welcome dinner for President Obama, there would be no doubt that every Chinese leader invited would attend because to do otherwise would be considered insulting and cause loss of face to the Chinese government as well as to Obama. Boehner's decision not to attend Hu's state dinner was probably motivated by a desire to cause loss of face to President Obama rather than President Hu or China. In reality, however, the only face lost should be Boehner's own for allowing petty political partisanship to take precedence over international diplomacy.

While China's one-party form of government certainly has its flaws, the United States' highly partisan party system certainly isn't perfect either - especially when party leaders can't even cooperate in attending a welcoming dinner for an important foreign leader.
 

Who is Visiting the USA?

Tuesday, January 18, 2011
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I just read a BBC News article about Hu Jintao's visit to the United States which is described by some as being "[t]he most important top-level United States-China encounter since Deng Xiaoping's historic trip more than 30 years ago."

One of the many things I've learned from living in China is that Chinese people generally know much more about the United States than Americans know about China. For example, all Chinese college students know that the president of the United States is named Obama (some know considerably more than this and are also eager to know what I think about him). 

In contrast, an extremely low percentage of American students know who the president of China is. When I asked in several classes I taught at Belmont University, I don't recollect that even one knew, even after I repeatedly stressed the word "who"in an attempt to give them the answer. To try to inject a little humor, I even played this video which students generally seemed to find funny even though they were too young to realize it was based on the old Who's on First comedy routine by Abbott & Costello which makes it even funnier.


Another thing I've learned while teaching in China is that Chinese college students, have many misconceptions about America. Despite living in a relatively censorship free nation with easy access to information, Americans probably have at least as many misconceptions about China. As China's increasing economic growth continues, its relationship with the U.S. will also become increasingly important and the two biggest economic powers will be increasingly dependent on each other in many ways. One thing Americans could probably do to help improve this relationship is to take at least a little interest in China. If the average American knew as much about China as the average Chinese does about America, that would be a good start.


  • Author: David Moser
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