Where to for China?

By S.P.SETH

Without discounting China’s impressive economic growth, starting with the opening of its economy in the eighties, it has also done a good job of projecting itself as an alternative model to the faltering Western world with its economic malaise. But China’s alternative model is not what it is made out to be. To understand this, one needs to go back to the eighties when it all began under Deng Xiaoping.

Soon after Deng initiated economic opening, he had to contend with the ideological opposition of the Left-wing in the CPC worried about ‘spiritual pollution’ from the ‘tainted’ Western economic model of economic growth. He did prevail. But he wasn’t all that prepared for an incipient democracy movement making the death of the axed General Secretary Hu Yaobang as a rallying point. This students-led movement, inspired also by the Soviet leader Gorbachev’s perestroika, was emerging to challenge the system as well as the practice of communism in China, and favoring a democratic polity. And we all know what happened to this democratic movement with its brutal suppression by the army in June 1989.

One main lesson communist China’s leadership learnt from the collapse of the Soviet Union was not to go for the Gorbachev-style perestroika, as this would be the end of the Party’s monopoly power. When the Soviet leader visited China in 1989 in the midst of students’ movement for democratic reforms, Deng Xiaoping had apparently already made up his mind to crush the democracy movement as it was expanding its constituency to include other segments of the society and beyond the capital, Beijing. After the brutal crackdown in June 1989, China faced strong international condemnation and selective sanctions, imposed on the country by a number of countries.

Deng was not deterred and, after a brief hiatus, he sought to rally the Party around his policy of economic growth and China’s modernization. And he was successful in this. At the political level, however, he was determined to uphold the Leninist political system of the Party wielding all the power. He came to the conclusion that as long as China was in a growth mode with opportunities for employment in the country’s industrial economy, the communist regime will be able to maintain momentum and a measure of legitimacy. Besides, as economic growth picked up, it created an aspirational middle class with stake in the system. After Deng died, his successors have broadly followed the same guiding philosophy of stepping up economic growth, with the Party controlling political power.

However, the country’s political and social situation is getting more complex. The sectoral economic and social imbalances in the country have created serious distortions. The disproportionate emphasis on industrial economy has hit the agricultural sector, resulting in millions of rural workers migrating to cities in search of jobs. As a result the rural sector has lost many of its young and able-bodied people to the cities, thus hurting its economy as well as its social landscape.

In the cities, they either have very little or no access to local facilities because of original residency. Their wages are low (though this is changing gradually because of increased labor demand) and there have been reports of employers withholding wages and, at times, not paying at all. Since the employers are politically well connected, the workers don’t have access to legal processes. In any case, the legal system is subject to political interference and/or manipulation. At the same time, rural workers are blamed by the locals for rising crime in the cities.

Indeed, the rural sector has been subsidizing industrial growth in a number of ways. First: its labor force, working on industrial and construction sites, have been paid low wages. Second: the prices of rural produce have remained depressed to keep the industrial scene competitive. Three: the farming communities have been subject to local taxes and imposts at the whim of the party committees because they lack necessary muscle at the central level. Fourth: rural land on urban periphery has been acquired arbitrarily for industrial and construction sites.

In rural areas, which still have the most population in China, people are doing it very tough. They have been virtually left out of the country’s industrial economy, controlled and dictated by the rich and the powerful operating in a symbiotic relationship. The resultant economic distortions are widening economic and social chasm between the urban and rural sectors, and fostering severe regional imbalances with the coastal hub hogging the economic limelight. There is an obscene wealth gap between the rich and the poor, which keeps growing. The worsening environmental pollution is choking China’s cities and affecting its river systems.

Underlying all this is a corrupt system that pervades from the local levels to the highest organs of the state and the Party. It is not that the Party leadership is not cognizant of the endemic corruption that pervades the system. Indeed, President Hu Jintao only recently highlighted the danger from widespread corruption for the Party, and emphasized the need for drastic action. But the funny thing is that despite all these exhortations at the highest level, the corruption keeps on spreading its net wider and wider.

Since anyone and everyone in the Party is involved, nobody wants to bell the cat for fear of being ensnared in a serious nationwide crackdown on corruption. Therefore, the Party leadership makes routine exhortations about the danger of corruption to calm down people’s jittery nerves. But exhortations are not action and people’s cynicism is growing.

While the President talks of tackling corruption, Premier Wen Jiaobao talks of political reform and creating a responsive democratic system. Again, nothing happens and dissidents and activists keep on being rounded up. Sometimes, between the President and the Premier, China’s politics looks like a Judy and Punch show without any serious intent to deal with the two main issues that China faces. Which is: corruption and the need for a responsive and transparent political system answerable to the people.

Premier Wen Jiabao seems to have perfected his act of being the nation’s kindly grandpa who emerges at a time of major catastrophe to calm people’s nerves and assure them that everything will be all right and the culprits will be apprehended and punished. He recently appeared in this role after the collision of two bullet trains that killed at least 39 people and injured more than 200. But this routine is also wearing thin.

He started with apologizing for taking some time to appear for the occasion due to his 11-day illness. But it didn’t cut much ice with many people when pictures soon appeared on the internet showing him in perfect health at functions during the period of his presumed illness. Which doesn’t say much for the top leadership of the country.

The Chinese oligarchy’s standard approach to dealing with unrest in the country is to beef up its internal security apparatus, now at $90 billion. Despite this, it is not succeeding entirely. It is estimated that, so far this year, there have been 180,000 riots in the country. The one area where the state is finding it really hard is the internet, notwithstanding all the firewalls and other gadgets and programs to control and censor it.

The Chinese site, Sina Weibo, (like the Twitter) has given a new meaning to news and views. With about 200 million Chinese using it, this has also allowed other forms of media to push their boundaries. For instance, even the state broadcaster ignored the warnings about not reporting on the train collision disaster.

Its news anchor made a searing, on air, commentary on the state of affairs in the country, without making it explicitly political.

He reportedly said: “ Can we live in apartments that that do not fall down? Can the roads we drive on in our cities not collapse? Can we travel in safe trains? And if there is a major accident, can we not be in a hurry to bury the trains? Can we afford the people a basic sense of security?”

And, he added, “China, please slow down. If you are too fast, you may leave the souls of your people behind.” This says it all.

May be it is time for the world romanticizing about China to slow down too and get a better grip on the reality of that country.

Australia’s China conundrum

By Sushil Seth

With Australia’s economic fortunes linked to China’s economic growth, Beijing presumes that it has earned the right to hector Canberra on the state of its economy. And to add insult to injury, a junior diplomat at the Chinese embassy did the hectoring by telling a business forum that Australia’s “dual speed and patchwork economy” needed fixing with Chinese help.

In a wide-ranging critique, Mr Ouyang Cheng reportedly advised Australia to deal with “infrastructure bottleneck and shortage of skilled labor”. He maintained that China’s strengths in these areas could be utilized to “help accelerate Australia’s economic development.”

He cautioned that “Australia’s dual speed [basically the growing mining sector, and the depressed manufacturing and other economic activities) and patchwork economy would not only hurt its own economic development but also influence China and Australia’s long-term economic co-operation.”

These problems are “… also limiting China’s investment in Australia.” And he sought a new mechanism to engage Australia on economic and trade issues to “solve the difficulties of the Chinese enterprises in Australia during their projects application and operation.”

China feels that Australia discriminates when it comes to Chinese investment proposals.

Basically, China’s wants a bigger, if not decisive, say in the way it would like to deploy its capital and labor (if and when needed) in Australia. This will enable it to coordinate demand and supply of the commodities it imports from Australia, and curb their price hikes.

In a larger sense, China would very much like to integrate Australia’s economy in a supportive role to China’s economic requirements.

The flexing of China’s economic muscles is on par with Beijing’s approach to international relations evident in Asia-Pacific region and as far away as Africa and Latin America.

It is using its economic leverage to corner resources for China’s economic development by linking the resources sector of these countries to its economic growth and creating their dependence on China. And once tied in, these economies have very little leeway to chart an independent course.

With Australia, these are early stages but the trend is quite clear. Indeed, there is enough disquiet in Australia to warrant a Senate inquiry into the question of foreign investments, particularly in agricultural land where China has made some forays to mine in farm lands.

Australia’s relations with China are rather tricky. At one level, China is its largest trading partner, with two-way trade topping $100 billion last year, much of it in Australia’s favor.

At another level, Canberra regards China as a strategic threat. Which is leading it to further expand its defense ties with the United States.

It is also moving much of its navy and air force to the north and west of the country where its minerals and energy resources are concentrated and it is more vulnerable. Without naming the potential threat from China, it is taking necessary steps to secure its northern approaches.

Australia has committed to a major program of modernizing and updating its military hardware.

Obviously, Canberra wouldn’t expect to face this threat on its own but by being part of a joint and/or coordinated force with the United States and, possibly, Japan.

As Greg Sheridan, foreign editor of The Australian, writes, “Moving more of our navy and air force to the north and north-west, and inviting a much bigger US military presence there, makes eminent strategic sense.”

But the question is: how will Canberra strike a balance between its primary economic relationship with Beijing and its security partnership with the United States? This is Australia’s China conundrum.

Professor Hugh White of the Australian National University favors Australia playing a bridging role by persuading both US and China to a shared and cooperative leadership in the region. In which case, Australia will not need to choose between them and might live happily thereafter.

He has argued that, “China needs to be persuaded that it, too, should settle for a shared leadership in Asia, a continued strong role for the US and growing roles for Japan and India.”

He apparently seems to realize the odds against this. Because, alternatively, he suggests that Australia might “like New Zealand, simply rely on neutrality and remoteness to keep us clear of Asia’s turmoil, and hope they keep away from us.”

But Professor White’s neutrality option doesn’t have many takers in Australia.

The US, of course, is pretty confident that Australia will be on its side. Australia is US’s military ally, and is taking steps to further expand strategic cooperation with the United States against the backdrop of a rising threat from China.

In other words, China will have to reckon with the reality of Australia not only siding with the US in case of a military confrontation between US and China but also actively contributing to meet all eventualities.

Australia is, of course, not being explicit about this, and hoping that the necessity to choose might not arise. But it is like an ostrich burying its head in sand.

Apart from the general contest for leadership between China and the US, there are regional flashpoints like Taiwan, Korea, and the one now emerging over the South China Sea. China is seeking to edge out its regional neighbors, like Vietnam and the Philippines, from competing sovereignty claims to island chains.

The Philippines has even invoked its alliance with the US to deal with Chinese encroachments into waters and islands claimed by it.

China knows that Australia is a US ally. But Beijing hopes to use its economic leverage through trade and investment to dent its alliance with the United States. However, if Australia were to opt for neutrality, China would be unlikely to take its claim seriously considering its vast network of strategic links with the United States.

China’s growing economic interests in Australia will give it a convenient handle to interfere in Australia’s affairs. Ouyang Cheng’s stern lecture to Australia requiring it to fix its economic malaise is a precursor of things to come..

In this sense, Australia’s economic fortune through its China connection might not be a blessing in the medium and long term. But, in the meantime, let us make the most of it.

China’s “Happy Blossoms”

By S.P.SETH

The Communist Party of China has coined and promoted many slogans from Mao Zedong’s time to the present day.

A slogan-driven regime treats its people simultaneously as morons and a dangerous rabble.

Mao said that China’s people were “poor and blank” and one could write beautiful things on a blank sheet of paper.

In other words, Mao wanted to write his own script on this blank sheet of paper after he prevailed in China’s civil war in 1949.

And at times this new script needed to be rendered into easy slogans to follow the supreme leader.

This practice still continues, though not on the same scale. Hu Jintao’s “harmonious society” slogan is a case in point.

Like previous Party slogans, this too is intended to hide a harsh reality. It tends to paper over the reality of multiple contradictions enveloping China, leading to growing social unrest in the country.

A slogan is and was also a diversion when things were not going right.

Hu Jintao’s “harmonious society”, for instance, is increasingly acrimonious.

This is evident from the harsh treatment of dissidents and protesters.

The government is worried about a potential popular upsurge against the CPC’s rule on the lines of similar movements in Arab countries against their corrupt and venal rulers.

Even as China’s oligarchs are trying to clamp down on a potential rebellion by targeting artists, human rights activists and others championing democracy, they worry about slowdown of China’s economy, and its social, economic and political consequences.

In the absence a popular electoral mandate, China’s rulers have sought to cultivate a measure of legitimacy by: (1) rapid economic growth in the hope that some of it will trickle down to the masses; and (2) make China into a powerful nation and thereby channel some of their energies into national pride.

Regarding the first: China’s economy is starting to slow down; while inflation, asset bubbles, structural imbalances, urban-rural divide, and the growing gaps in income are creating severe social problems.

China’s rulers are, therefore, worried that their main claim to legitimacy--- economic growth and social stability--- is witling down.

Since high economic growth is no longer sustainable, the Party needs a new slogan to divert people’s attention. The “harmonious society” is therefore, making a detour to become a “happy” society.

It started with Premier Wen Jiabao’s speech at this year’s National People’s Congress defining the Party’s goal to make prosperity more “balanced”.

The media and propaganda channels took it from there and started a happiness campaign.

As Keith Richburg reported from Beijing in the Washington Post, “On the May Day holiday in Beijing 17 giant screens and thousands of small televisions on buses and subways and in office buildings showed ‘happy testimonials’ from workers.”

And: “Beijing Television ran a series of short films called ‘Happy Blossoms’ documenting the apparently contented lives of teachers, factory workers and others.”

Not to be left behind, the local and regional governments are said to be “drawing up happiness indexes and competing with one another for the title of ‘China’s happiest city’”.

In other words, “to get rich is glorious” is becoming outdated (at least for the aspirational class, as they cannot reach there), replaced by “happiness”.

And the happiest people apparently are low paid teachers, factory workers and the like.

But if the Party is trying to hoodwink the masses with this new “happiness” mantra, while the rich and mega rich are getting richer, they might have another thing coming.

Therefore, the slowing economy has serious social and economic portents, which no amount of “happiness” sloganeering is likely to abate.

On the second point of nationalist pride as an exercise in legitimacy: the CPC has worked on it by highlighting China’s humiliation in the past by European colonial powers, and Japan. At times, it has been taken to a controlled feverish pitch, especially against Japan.

Against this backdrop of rage, China has told the world that (1) it will not be messed with any more and; (2) that it might be time to right the wrongs of the past.

This is what lies behind Beijing’s claim to a big chunk of the Asia-Pacific region (as its area of influence) and its seas; even though China’s wrath is being visited on its neighbors who have equally legitimate sovereign claims on some of these islands and sea around them.

Take the recent case of Chinese naval boats sabotaging Vietnam’s oil exploration activity in its maritime area, which China regards as its own.

Vietnam has accused China of creating confrontation in the South China Sea and thus escalating regional tensions.

According to the Vietnamese account, three Chinese boats deliberately severed their survey ship’s cable in Vietnamese waters by sailing through the area.

Vietnam has maintained that its navy “will do everything necessary “ to protect the country’s sovereignty.

China, on the other hand, maintains that the actions of its vessels were “completely” justified.

It has warned Vietnam against “creating new incidents”.

The US is said to be “concerned” about growing tensions between China and its neighbors.

Lately, China has indulged in some expansive military rhetoric.

Last year, there were statements from some generals about the need to protect China’s far-flung economic and political interests.

This year, General Liu Yuan, son of Mao Zedong’s one-time anointed heir Liu Shaoqi who was virtually hounded to death in the Cultural Revolution, has penned an essay glorifying war.

He has reportedly written, “Military culture is the oldest and most important wisdom of humanity.”

He adds, “Without war, where would grand unity come from? Without force, how could fusion of the nation, the race, the culture, the south and the north be achieved?”

This kind of ideology glorifying military culture and war is frightening--to say the least.

And this should also worry the Party that has always maintained that it alone commands the gun, and not the other way around.

Another general, Luo Yuan, has reportedly suggested punishing the United States by dumping US bonds; while Major General Zu Chenghu wants China to ditch its “no first strike “ commitment for the use of nuclear weapons.

As the transition to power of the new leadership in 2012 draws near, China is in a bit of a muddle.

There is an ideological tussle---inevitably involving power struggle--- going on between the “left” and “right” of the Party---the former evoking Mao and the latter urging further economic liberalization and political reform within the Party.

General Liu, who is the political commissar of the logistics department, is hitching his wagon to the “left’s” caravan by turning the clock back to the fifties with a call to: “Let’s start again.”

Is there an element in this of redeeming his father, who had become the enemy number one in Mao’s slogan of “Bombard the Headquarters”, that started the Cultural Revolution in 1966?

If so, even as China faces increasing social instability, the CPC too might be enteringa power struggle akin to a new cultural revolution.

It is unlikely to have the same intensity without the “helmsman”.

In other words, the ghost of the “helmsman” is no substitute for the real Mao.

But, as the proverb goes, China is living in interesting times.

US policy focus shifting to Asia-Pacific

By Sushil Seth

The US preoccupation with the war on terror and military engagement in Afghanistan and Iraq over the last decade has distracted it from its focus on the Asia-Pacific region.

This may be changing.

The main reason is that China is making waves in the region, causing disquiet among its Asian neighbors. This was evident last year over a whole range of regional issues.

The Obama administration, when it came to power, was hoping to create a peaceful partnership with China. There were a series of high-level visits to China with that objective in mind.

Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, was there thanking China for continuing to buy US bonds.

She announced that human rights issues wouldn’t be allowed to derail US-China relations.

Premier Wen Jiabao, on the other hand, worried about China’s investments in US treasury notes in the light of economic recession in that country.

And when President Obama visited China, Beijing didn’t seem to regard it as anything special.

China appeared to regard all these special gestures by the new Obama administration as a sign of US weakness, and hence an opportunity to advance its own ambitions.

It reminded one of the Nikita Khrushchev’s Soviet Union when it sought to push its global agenda by underestimating the young President Kennedy, who took power in 1961.

When the Soviet Union installed missiles in the US backyard, it led to the Cuban missile crisis in 1962, the first nightmarish case of a possible nuclear Armageddon.

Which is not to suggest that China might be tempted to do something equally dangerous and outrageous.

The point is that the US is starting to have a rethink about its Asia-Pacific policy in the wake of China’s determination to push its own regional agenda. The response to US overtures for a peaceful partnership has been rebuffed.

The time has, therefore, come to consider that China is more interested in a hegemonic role, seeking to edge out the US, if possible.

China is not a partner but a serious challenger and a threat.

Australia, a US ally, spelled out the Chinese threat to the region in its 2009 defense white paper.

It is reinvigorating its defense ties with the United States and Japan, and starting an annual strategic dialogue with South Korea.

During a recent visit to Japan, Prime Minister Julia Gillard told the Japan National Press Club, “The region is in strategic flux, where changing power relativities are playing out against a background of historical mistrust and conflict.”

She emphasized, “Stability and security depend on the integral role of the US and on developing the right regional architecture to encourage co-operation on security challenges…”

She couldn’t have been clearer about the new destabilizing element in the region.

Canberra, therefore, has a challenge of its own to reconcile its strategic alliance with the United States and its primary economic relationship with China.

Beijing is not terribly happy over Australia’s security alliance with the United States, but is resigned to it.

As a sop to China, the Gillard government has agreed to the visits of Chinese navy ships.

But the central strategic tenet of Australia’s policy, its military alliance with the United States, remains with the goal of meeting a future Chinese military threat.

Japan and South Korea feel similarly threatened.

At the same time, other regional countries are busy developing their own options.

None of them believe China’s routine assertion that it is not a hegemonic power.

In the US, there is increasing realization that they should wrap up their military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq to face the most serious challenge from a very assertive and, sometime, angry China.

The killing of Osama bin Laden is likely to hasten this process.

In a wide-ranging article on the Obama administration’s foreign policy in the New Yorker, Ryan Lizza writes, “ One of [Thomas] Donilon’s [national security adviser] overriding beliefs, which Obama adopted as his own, was that America needed to rebuild its reputation, extricate itself from the Middle East and Afghanistan, and turn its attention toward Asia and China’s unchecked influence in the region.”

Similarly, Kurt Campbell, assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, has said, “ We’ve been on a little bit of a Middle East detour over the course of the last ten years.”

But, “… our future will be dominated utterly and fundamentally by developments in Asia and the Pacific region.”

This is not to suggest that the US and China are on a confrontation course in the short term.

Indeed, the two countries are periodically engaged in strategic and economic dialogue at high levels, designed to manage their often-prickly relationship.

And in this, China’s poor human rights record is emerging as a difficult issue.

A case in point is the recent strategic and economic dialogue between the two countries in Washington where China’s crackdown on dissidents and other human rights issues was prominently highlighted by the US side.

Indeed, a recent interview by Hillary Clinton to the Atlantic Monthly was released during the 2-day talks.

In this interview, Clinton labeled China’s human rights record as “deplorable.”

She also said, “They’re worried [about the Arab Spring of revolution], and are trying to stop history, which is a fool’s errand.”

Considering that she had earlier said, during her China visit, that human rights wouldn’t be allowed to derail Sino-US relations, this is quite a turn around in US attitude to China’s violation of human rights.

The two-day talks with the Chinese side, according to the Guardian, ended with “worsening relations over censorship and crackdowns on dissidents.”

The US appears quite serious on censorship and human rights violation by China, and is allocating funds on developing technology to overcome internet censorship.

It is interesting that among many words and subjects banned by Chinese censors, Hillary Clinton has joined the honored ranks.

According to the Guardian, Chinese internet censors “recently blocked search results for ‘Hillary Clinton’ after a speech championing internet freedom.”

China is paranoid about a “jasmine revolution” type popular uprising, which it believes has been encouraged by the United States all over the Middle East.

And it fears that the United States is up to no good with its advocacy of human rights in China.

Only a paranoid and insecure regime can conjure up such fears and conspiracies.

Therefore, it will always be difficult to create a partnership for peace with China’s oligarchs looking for phantoms everywhere.

Since they want to quarantine China from the prevalent revolutionary virus, their record on human rights is going to get worse.

Combined with their hegemonic designs on the Asia-Pacific region, the United States will have a difficult time managing relations with China.

Precisely because of this, the US needs to give grater attention to China’s so-called “peaceful rise”

Will China go the way of the Soviet Union?

Will China go the way of the Soviet Union?

By S.P.SETH

China’s ruling oligarchs are afraid of their own shadow. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be engaged in a harsh crackdown of the country’s dissidents who simply want the political system opened up.
These dissidents and human rights activists are the mirror that reflects China’s reality. And what the rulers see is not at all pretty. Indeed, it is downright ugly. Hence, they want to smash the very mirror that reflects this ugliness.
Take the case of Ai Weiwei, China’s famous artist. He has disappeared since he was arrested on April 4 as he tried to board a plane to Hong Kong. His family has no information about his whereabouts.
The Chinese authorities are now defaming him by filtering out cooked up information about fathering an illicit child, pornography, tax evasion and so on. His real “crime” is that he spoke in favor of reforming the country’s political system.
In a recent newspaper article, the celebrated writer Salman Rushdie says, “These accusations [about Ai] are not credible to those who know him. It seems that the Chinese regime, irritated by the outspokenness of its most celebrated art export, whose renown has protected him up to now, has decided to silence him in the most brutal fashion.”
Rushdie then goes on to list some other prominent Chinese writers and artists who have been silenced by the Chinese authorities with long prison sentences or have simply disappeared.
Comparing such disappearances with what happened in the Soviet Union, Rushdie opines: “We needed the samizdat truth tellers to reveal the ugliness of the Soviet Union. The government of China has become the world’s biggest threat to freedom of speech, and so we need Ai Weiwei, Liao Yiwu and Liu Xiaobo.”
This is precisely why the Chinese regime wants them behind bars, so that they won’t reveal the ugly truth.
But just as the Soviet Union failed to crush the spirit of its dissidents and writers that significantly contributed to its collapse, China’s communist oligarchy might also be headed in that direction.
A country of China’s size and population can’t sustain a top-heavy political system of monopoly power, more so in this age of information explosion--despite the regime’s concentrated efforts to censor, control and suppress “undesirable” information and political views.
China has drawn wrong lessons from the collapse of the Soviet Union. Its rulers believe that the Soviet Union collapsed because of Mikhail Gorbachev’s perestroika (political restructuring), leading to the erosion of the Communist Party’s power.
And they seem determined not to let it happen in China. The Tiananmen massacre in 1989 was a forewarning to China’s people that a challenge to the Party’s political monopoly will not be tolerated, even if it meant killing people.
In other words, the Party’s monopoly power is a prerequisite for perceived social stability and economic growth.
And Deng Xiaoping’s successors are following his script quite faithfully.
Indeed, they have come to fear that the country’s dissidents, activists, human rights champions, and democracy promoters might become the vanguard of China’s own “jasmine” revolution on the lines of Tunisia and elsewhere in the Middle East.
At some deeper level, they are afraid of their own people, despite all the propaganda that the Party and the people are one.
Indeed, the ongoing crackdown on dissidents has been widened to include those Chinese Christians who refuse to conform to officially-approved religious practice.
On top of it all, the Tibetans in China are once again being rounded up after some monks in a monastery have fallen foul of the authorities.
There are so many blemishes in the mirror that China’s oligarchs are starting to see phantoms everywhere.
The Soviet Union is the only large communist country that might offer some explanation for this phenomenon.
Contrary to the belief among China’s leaders, the Soviet Union didn’t suddenly collapse because of perestroika. It collapsed largely because the system hollowed out from inside---starved of the oxygen of life for a political system.
After Brezhnev, his successors died one after the other in reality as well as metaphorically.
And by the time Gorbachev came to rescue the system, the state and the system had already reached a terminal point.
In a collegium of a handful of top leaders (with the Party Standing Committee at the top of the pyramid) deciding the nation’s destiny without any reference to people, a limited political gene pool is bound to lose its vitality and renewal.
This is also true of many of China’s economic corporations run by the sons and daughters of the Party leaders at different levels.
There is an incestuous connection between China’s politics and economy, which doesn’t bode well for the country in the medium and long term.
It is true that China’s economic growth is a plus point.
But it is misdirected and unbalanced favoring industry over agriculture.
As Lester Brown recently wrote in the Washington Post, “As old deserts [in China] grow, as new ones form and as more and more irrigation wells go dry, Beijing is losing a long battle to feed its growing population on its own.”
He adds: “Enter the United States---by far the world’s largest grain exporter. It exports about 90 million tonnes of grain annually, although China requires 80 million tonnes of grain each year to meet just one-fifth of its needs.”
The point to make is that China’s economic growth has its limits creating sectoral imbalances within manufacturing as well as between manufacturing and agriculture, a widening rural-urban divide, inflationary pressures, real estate bubbles, misallocation of resources, top heavy control of the economy, lack of co-ordination, environmental damage (some of its major rivers are polluted) and so on.
On top of it all, the rampant corruption in the country is further skewing an already difficult situation.
No wonder, China’s oligarchs are afraid that the Middle Eastern contagion of popular upsurge might catch on and reach China too.
Since China’s ruling dictatorship has no other way of dealing with its critics and people but to use the sledgehammer, even this approach is unlikely to work over a period of time, as all the dictators in the Middle East are finding out to their cost.

China’s white paper on defense
By Sushil Seth

China’s new white paper on defense makes the usual points that its defense policy is “defensive in nature”, and that it “will never seek hegemony, nor will it adopt the approach of military expansion now or in the future, no matter how its economy develops.”
But this doesn’t square with its assertion lately of a fairly outright, even outrageous, twenty-first century Monroe doctrine.
For instance, its assertion of sovereignty over the South China Sea, ignoring earlier promises of a peaceful dialogue amid competing claims to some of the island chains by its neighbors, was hardly a defensive exercise.
By declaring territories and seas as its sovereign domain and then backing it up with the projection of force and/or diplomatic coercion, is not exactly defensive. It is provocative and aggressive.
And to keep on harping that “China will never seek hegemony” frankly becomes dangerously tedious.
At the same time, a double-digit increase in military expenditure of nearly 13 per cent (on top of similar increases in the past) to estimated $92 billions, doesn’t inspire confidence in China’s “peaceful rise”.
China concedes that the situation in Asia-Pacific region is generally stable but worries about the regional flash points, like the Korean peninsula.
It is important to realize that the instability in Korea is due to the dangerous antics of China’s neighbor and ally, North Korea, for two reasons.
First: Pyongyang’s nuclear policy has introduced a highly combustible element in a regional environment still unresolved since the 1950s Korean War.
Second: to compound it further, North Korea is continuing its policy of dangerous brinkmanship against South Korea.
This is not to suggest that China’s is encouraging Pyongyang on this course.
However, it is not effectively using its considerable leverage with North Korea by way of its political and economic dependence on China.
And unless this is done as part of a strategic consensus between regional powers, including the United States, Korean peninsula will continue to be a dangerous flash point.
The white paper also identifies Tibet, Xinjiang and Taiwan as challenges because of “separatism”. The first two are self-inflicted.
The unrest in Tibet and Xinjiang arises from China’s harsh policies to obliterate the ethnic and cultural identity of these regions.
It is doing this by changing the ethnic mix in these regions by settling a large number of Han Chinese in these regions.
And it is disallowing or curtailing their language, religious beliefs and practices.
At the same time, Beijing has turned upside down the economies of these regions, with local people denied new economic opportunities.
In other words, China can’t blame the local people for fighting against injustice; even when the odds are so heavily stacked against them
The situation in Taiwan is entirely different. Taiwan is a sovereign state and has sought to forge its destiny as a democratic political entity.
And it has managed to continue on this course despite threats from the mainland, including the targeting of 1000 or more missiles at Taiwan.
China’s insistence that Taiwan is part of China is indeed at the root of all the problems between the two countries. Once China accepts the reality of Taiwan’s separate existence, there will be enormous scope for development of relations on both sides of the Taiwan Strait.
An encouraging feature in the white paper, particularly after the discord of last year due to China’s aggressive regional posture, is that Beijing is undertaking to pursue a policy of greater military dialogue with the United States.
Senior Colonel Geng Yansheng reportedly said at a news conference: “China attaches importance to its military relationship with the United States…The Chinese military is now taking steps to advance exchanges with the US military this year.”
The relations with the United States had taken a dive after its decision to sell weapons to Taiwan. Beijing retaliated by suspending military exchanges with the United States.
The relationship deteriorated further over a whole range of issues last year; including the US-South Korean joint naval exercises in the Yellow Sea.
The problem is that China has come to regard the Asia-Pacific region and its waters as either its sovereign territory or sphere of influence.
Therefore, it is not happy with the United States continuing to assert its political, economic and strategic interests in the region along with its allies.
With China so keen to assert its regional primacy, the US’ determination to maintain a strong commitment to the region, doesn’t square well with Beijing’s ambitions.
This is what Colonel Geng Yansheng apparently meant when he reportedly said at a news conference that “there is no denying that in developing military relations [with the U.S] we still face difficulties and challenges.”
Indeed they do because the United States is not likely to make it easy for China to create a new Middle Kingdom in Asia-Pacific.
Beijing has to realize that a cooperative relationship between the United States and China is a prerequisite for regional stability and prosperity.
The problem, though, is that China has come to believe that the United States is a declining power.
At the same time, they also believe that China is a rising superpower and there should be no compromising on this goal.
Beijing might entertain tactical shifts to better advance their ultimate goal but without losing sight of it.
If that were the case, the US-China relationship is unlikely to enter a cooperative phase except for China’s tactical reasons.
China might be over-reaching itself in seeking to edge out the United States from Asia-Pacific.
It has tremendous internal problems and contradictions. The way it is engaged in rooting out dissidence—the most prominent recent example being the detention of the famous artist, Ai Weiwei—and censoring all access and reference to the Middle Eastern popular uprisings, is indicative of the fragility of the regime.
Beijing might, therefore, be well advised to spend more energy on political reforms at home than crafting an expansive defense policy to assert its dominance.

A post-Dalai Lama blueprint for Tibet

By Sushil Seth
The Dalai Lama recently announced that he would be relinquishing his political role as head of the Tibetan government-in-exile based in the Indian hill town of Dharamsala.
The Dalai Lama is the spiritual and political head of the Tibetan people. While he will still continue to be the spiritual leader, a new elected prime minister will soon take over the political role.
Obviously, the Dalai Lama is conscious of his mortality and is taking steps to split the two roles to ensure that the struggle for Tibetan identity doesn’t live and die with him.
This move will upset China, even though Beijing might ignore it on surface.
The next step probably will be the anointment of a new Dalai Lama, who will take over as his successor.
The formality of finding one after his death in the traditional way might have to be dispensed with because Tibet is under Chinese rule
Indeed, Beijing is waiting for the Dalai Lama to die, enabling them to find a new one to fit into their mould.
The Dalai Lama is acutely aware of this, which explains why he would be keen to make arrangements for his political and spiritual succession.
This is important because his successors, both in their political and spiritual roles, will carry his enormous moral authority.
China obviously hopes that with the passing away of the Dalai Lama in the not-too-distant future, the Tibetan issue will fade away and eventually disappear.
They believe that as China continues to grow in power, the Tibetan cause will have fewer and fewer supporters among the comity of nations for fear of offending China.
And it will help when the Dalai Lama is no longer on the scene.
His charisma, charm and sincerity have kept the Tibetan issue alive and kicking.
China, therefore, believes that Tibet will lose whatever appeal it might still have with people all over the world when the Dalai Lama is not around.
Which is shortsighted. Indeed the Dalai Lama has sought, over the years, to resolve the issue of Tibet’s status peacefully by seeking autonomy, not independence.
Through many hours of fitful talks over the years between his representatives and China, his demand has been for internal autonomy with Beijing in control of its foreign and defense affairs.
With internal autonomy, Tibetans should be able to maintain their ethnic and cultural identity.
Which is not too much to ask, and Beijing shouldn’t have problem with it.
But it does.
First: they don’t trust the Dalai Lama as he seeks some political and cultural space for his people without challenging China’s sovereignty.
Beijing simply wants submission with the right to define and regulate how the Tibetans should and would live within their own territory. This is precisely what they are doing now.
Because the Dalai Lama seeks better terms for his people, he is denounced as a ‘wolf in sheep’s clothing’.
Therefore, China has never been serious about talks with the Dalai Lama’s representatives to resolve the Tibetan issue.
Indeed, a solution on the basis of genuine autonomy will be a lasting one with the imprimatur of the Dalai Lama’s moral authority and acceptable to the Tibetan people.
But China is not concerned with the moral and popular dimensions of the Tibetan cause. They have been busy all these years to cut at the roots of such considerations.
For instance, they have sliced and spliced Tibet, with parts of it joined to the neighboring Han-dominated provinces. Thus, Tibet proper is now a shrunken area.
Its population of 6 million is now scattered around, to reduce the Tibetan potential to create ‘trouble’.
What is left of Tibet is now mixed up with the Han Chinese, settled there in large numbers with incentives.
In this way, the Tibetans will soon become a minority in their own geographical space, if it hasn’t already happened.
As it is, there are severe restrictions on their cultural space to limit the learning of their language, practicing their religion and observance of their traditions.
It is hoped that, over time, they will cease to be a distinct entity except for ceremonial purposes when the state wants to exhibit them as part of China’s “harmonious” society.
The character of Tibet’s economy has changed so drastically that, short of assimilation, they will remain marginalized to live a miserable existence.
They are now subject to so much surveillance, both electronic and through the massive presence of security forces, that they live in fear.
China’s leadership tends to resort to over-kill, both figuratively and metaphorically, when they fear rupture of their so-called “harmonious” society.
And they have an aversion to peaceful dialogue to sort out national issues.
They fear that such an approach will open a Pandora’s box of unresolved issues with their people.
Which explains their paranoia of the people’s revolution in the Middle East overtaking China, if people were exposed to the news from that part of the world.
Tibet has been at the receiving end of this paranoia for many years.
China’s oligarchs believe that if they decide that a problem doesn’t and shouldn’t exist, it bloody well will be swept away by the brute use of power.
But with Tibet, the unrest continues to erupt in big or small ways despite all the repression in that region. It keeps coming back to haunt China.
As Pico Iyer has quoted the Dalai Lama in his article for the New York Review of Books: “Manpower, military power, monetary power, that is already there in China.”
What is lacking, though, “is moral power, moral authority”.
And without that, at a deeper level there is a big vacuum. And that is where the old Tibetan Buddhist traditions could help.
But try telling this to the Chinese leadership, especially associating it with the Dalai Lama.
China’s leaders are drunk with power. They have no time for morality and tranquility.
Tibet for them is just a sideshow.
But they don’t realize that sideshows too can occupy centre stage when the central authority is weakened, as happened so often in Chinese history.
The replacement of the Dalai Lama’s political power by a secular democratic government will become a legitimate organ of channeling Tibetan identity both among the exiled Tibetans and those at home.
And once, he has also designated his spiritual successor, the struggle for Tibetan autonomy will be set for the post-Dalai Lama period.
On surface, China might prefer to ignore it.
But arrangements for institutional succession are important for Tibet, especially when they carry the Dalai Lama’s imprimatur.