If you ask me what I would want for China 20 years in the future. In short, I hope our seciety will be highly harmonious. Being harmonious definitely includes high level of equality and freedom.
I think there are as many Chinese people who care about equality, freedom and democracy as Americans. But we also understand that different countries are reading the different pages of development. Equality, freedom and democracy definitely needs to be achieved someday, but without social stability and economic prosperity, they could only be something in the air. Simply put, is today's China able to afford the massive cost of American style election?
A lot of Chinese people do complain about the government's policies and its corruption, but they also have confidence in the government coz it is really trying to reform as Wen Jia bao said early this year in front of the press. Can anybody name a government in any other developing countries who has done a better job in terms of the consistency of policy-making and the efficiency of policy-implementation in the past 20 years? No, not India. No, not East European countries. No, definitly not Ukraine. And do Chinese people have the right to believe in their own government?
When westerners are talking about freedom in China, have they ever considered China's freedom of development? When they are talking about the equality in China, have they ever taken the structure and process of development into account? When they are talking about democracy, would they accept some other form of democracy different than their norms?
I just read an ariticle on The Wall Street Journal published on May 13, "As Rich-Poor Gap Widens in the U.S., Class Mobility Stalls". I am a college freshman studying with a lot of white kids who live in their American suburban bubble. They don't know how and why their black counterparts living in downtown NYC are being trapped in their dismaying environment and could never possibly get out.
I feel extremely frustrated when I talked about China with a lot of my American classmates. They hardly know anything about China beyond "It's a communist country". Not to mention if China is "communisim" or not, I feel that they obviously need to know more, which can not be read in New York Times. However, I was surprised by their ignorance and assertiveness when I started to explain the historical and cultural context of China. I believe individual experiences vary. There must be American kids who have a more comprehensive grasp of the knowledge about China.
I am not trying to start an endless comparison here. There is simply no foundation to compare the whatever aspects of the two countries coz China has a 4 times larger population than America does and America has a I-Don't-Know-how-much-larger economy than China does. So let us try to understand each other first! LW just took a constructive step!
piyeye
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I dont expect any sort of western democracy in 20 years. I dont believe we can benefit from it in the short term.
What I want to change is the income gap. We need social stability and economic prosperity. Not voting and protesting.
By the way, nice idea. You are really trying to understand China not just critic.
Ming
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I hope in 20 years' time:
When my daughters will be planning to send my grandchildren to a university, they will be able to include at least 2 Chinese universities in their top 5 choices.
When my daughters want to book a short flight in a Space Shuttle, it will be a Chinese made Space Shuttle.
China will lead in eliminating ethnocentrism and the misconception about 'Orientalism', 'Occidentalism' and 'Clash of Civilization' which tend only to divide the world rather than unite it. It's naive to categorize people based on races and it's equally naive without any degree of applicability to do so under the banner of Western, Confucian or Islamic civilizations.
Beyond jihadis which tend to see the West as something less than human or the US imperialism which fails to recognize the poor and the underprivileged are also human too and do have a right to live their lives in dignity, China will be able to foster a global identity that is built upon accommodation instead of division. No more misguided global policies which emphasize merely on greed to wrest control of the world's resources nor protectionism which benefits only the capitalist world order.
I also hope that in 20 years’ time, the hypocritical slogan ‘Fight Against Terrorism’ will be replaced by ‘Fight Against World Poverty’. And we will longer be busy ‘Exporting Democracy’ but ‘Exporting Equality’.
Am I hoping too much?
China Doll
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A democratic, religious and united country with a parliament like that of UK, a president like that of US.
Chinese, especially Han Chinese need a religion. Be it Buddhism, Daoism or Christianity, only religion can fill up the vacuum left by the disillusion of communism.
Democracy is inevitable for China. I feel a bit ambivalent to wish China could have a parliament of UK and a president of US for these two are different democratic establishments. The reason is that 1) I like the democratic atmosphere and the gentlemanship of UK parliament; 2) I like the conservative view and the toughness of US president towards the enemies or rivalries of their country.
A united China should have no "special autonomous" areas. There should be no discrimination towards ethnic minorities, nor special treatment for them since that could be a discrimination towards Han Chinese.
Bing [bitterblogger@gmail.com]
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