Tuesday, January 11, 2005
since i waste nearly 3 hours a day commuting, i apparently have more time according to hc. i don't quite understand how he gets higher marks than me. but maybe if i keep reading and trying to improve myself on the subway, it will all become clear to me.
i finished reading china wakes by pulitzer winners nicholas kristof and sheryl wudunn, a husband wife team at the ny times. they discuss several interesting topics including tianemenn, communism etc.
one interesting point is although china hasn't had an emperor since the collaspe of qing, the leader of which party was in power (mao, etc) essentially behaved like an emperor. this ties into dynastic cycles, in which ever dynasty had its rise and fall. the fall of a dynasty occured when the dynasty lost the mandate of heaven. a sign of this lost of mandate often corresponded with civil uprising, natural disaters, etc.
kristof points out that the government owned chinese media often denied earthquakes, in my opinion SARS because they did not want to appear to lose the mandate of heaven in the eyes of the public. which reminds me to the iraqi minister of information who denied that american troops were in baghdad...
i finished reading china wakes by pulitzer winners nicholas kristof and sheryl wudunn, a husband wife team at the ny times. they discuss several interesting topics including tianemenn, communism etc.
one interesting point is although china hasn't had an emperor since the collaspe of qing, the leader of which party was in power (mao, etc) essentially behaved like an emperor. this ties into dynastic cycles, in which ever dynasty had its rise and fall. the fall of a dynasty occured when the dynasty lost the mandate of heaven. a sign of this lost of mandate often corresponded with civil uprising, natural disaters, etc.
kristof points out that the government owned chinese media often denied earthquakes, in my opinion SARS because they did not want to appear to lose the mandate of heaven in the eyes of the public. which reminds me to the iraqi minister of information who denied that american troops were in baghdad...
# posted by epn : 9:30 PM
Comments:
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1. I think the Chinese government downplayed the effects of SARS also because:
- Chinese people have a historical tendency to lie just to save "face" (or appearing that they still have the mandate of heaven). It's by no means a new phenomenon.
- Although high in raw numbers, the percentage of mainland China SARS was not too high.
2. Did they talk about Culture Revolution? Tianenmen is nothing compared to Culture Revolution, where 10 million innocents died and a whole generation became "uneducated" for absolutely no reason. I feel that one cannot accurately analyze contemporary China without an in-depth understanding of Culture Revolution, which unlike Tianenmen, really touched the lives of every Chinese person. Further, Modern China is economically controlled by 40-somethings, the generation that came out of Culture Revolution.
I'm not dismissing the book. I mean I haven't even read it! :) I just feel that the West is analyzing the wrong things, if its goal is to take economic advantage of China. Tianenmen really didn't make much dent in Chinese thought/practice/moral standards, but Culture Revolution sure did.
~ esquif
- Chinese people have a historical tendency to lie just to save "face" (or appearing that they still have the mandate of heaven). It's by no means a new phenomenon.
- Although high in raw numbers, the percentage of mainland China SARS was not too high.
2. Did they talk about Culture Revolution? Tianenmen is nothing compared to Culture Revolution, where 10 million innocents died and a whole generation became "uneducated" for absolutely no reason. I feel that one cannot accurately analyze contemporary China without an in-depth understanding of Culture Revolution, which unlike Tianenmen, really touched the lives of every Chinese person. Further, Modern China is economically controlled by 40-somethings, the generation that came out of Culture Revolution.
I'm not dismissing the book. I mean I haven't even read it! :) I just feel that the West is analyzing the wrong things, if its goal is to take economic advantage of China. Tianenmen really didn't make much dent in Chinese thought/practice/moral standards, but Culture Revolution sure did.
~ esquif
# posted by 
: 2:25 AM, January 13, 2005
: 2:25 AM, January 13, 2005
I sure hope they talked about the Revolution. I mean, it literally changed Chinese society. My parents were caught right in the middle of it. I think they got the crappy end of the deal though, being sent off to do peasant work (instead of to school) at the height of the cultural revolution. I wonder what China would be like if it hadn't taken place.
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