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Black and White Cat (BWC) took the time to compare an original English language article in the New York Times entitled “Beijing Puts on a Happy Face for Games, without Wrinkles” and a translation/redaction of the article by Beijing Evening News (zh). (h/t to China Bystander, China Law Blog, many others). BWC author Rob then translated back the Chinese article and compared against the original. In summary, according to Rob, this is what happened:

However, caveats aside, one overwhelming fact remains: every single statement that could possibly be seen as negative - and there’s quite a lot - has been expunged from the [translated] article, and almost every nuanced phrase that carries any neg4tive connotations has been turned into one of unqualified praise. In some instances, this can simply be error (as with my own unfortunate mistakes). But genuine errors cannot always be in one direction. The New York Times article expresses admiration for some aspects of [the city's] preparations, disapproval of other aspects and also a slightly disoriented mixture of the two. There is no way the [translated] article could in any way be said to have remotely reflected this. And it cannot be called a summary if it does not actually summarize the original.

It should go without saying that similar examples of misrepresentation can be found in European and American reports.

The non-keyword parsable visual image of Rob’s post tells much of the story.

Excerpt 1: New York Times in perfect harmony

The main point of the original article was to point out the impression of “unnatural youthfulness” left by the staffing strategy of the Beijing Olympic organizers–relying on volunteers mostly in their 20s. The article makes the point of this being a “carefully stage managed” event, and talks about it as if it were a big Hollywood production or a massive Disneyland in Beijing.

But then the BJ Evening News modified it into a piece praising the youthful vigor of China.  So why did they do this?

• Perhaps the editors of BJ Evening News felt that it was important to help Western reporters not embarrass themselves by inadvertently insulting the Chinese people, the volunteers, and the Olympic organizers with these points.
• Perhaps the editors feel that its counterproductive for the Chinese readers to view Western media as biased and anti-China. Achieving the goals of peaceful, productive integration between China and “the rest of the world” can only be helped by Chinese people having a positive impression of others, and if Chinese people believe others have a positive impression of them.
• Or maybe the boss just wants to avoid difficult phone calls on their mobile phones at inconvenient times from regulators.

But an unintended side-effect of these state-encouraged efforts to shape popular opinion has resulted, according to John Kamm in the Washington Post, in a growing disconnect between how Chinese think “the world” views them and what “the world” actually thinks. The point that Kamm made from the Pew Global Study is right on target: major disconnect between Chinese self-perception and Western perceptions. Smoothing out the rough edges in Western media accounts to present a more positive, respectful, harmonious face, may be one reason why this disconnect exists. But does this disconnect make the difficult task of governing China easier? I’m sure there is plenty of private debate around this issue.

Excerpt 2: So what really happened to all the 40 and 50 year old people?

One of the most interesting points that was eliminated in the translated version was the part about why there were so few middle aged volunteers. Compared to Western Europe and the United States, the experience of one generation to the next in China is much more different. The original article hints at the practice of selecting employees by age, gender, and attractiveness which is more common in China (and many other parts of the world) than in the US (where it is illegal). And its possible that the competitive selection process favored younger applicants because English-language proficiency was a factor. So maybe the “front-office” volunteers were young but the “back-office” volunteers (hidden from view) were middle-aged. Not sure why the issue of generational differences is so sensitive (actually I have some theories).  But I believe that this issue is one of the factors that Westerners interested in China really need to spend time to understand: generational differences in attitudes, beliefs, and experiences. I’ll put it out there: In general, I feel more comfortable doing business with someone in the early 30s, than someone in their late 40s in China. The world of the generations born in the 80s and 90s is much more open, global, and (dare I say) Western…then the world of those born in the 50s and early 60s. Yesterday’s Red Guards are today’s beautiful Olympic cheerleaders. It seems that it was impossible for Western visitors to Beijing to even glimpse any of that complexity of generational differences, at least during the Olympics.

Thank you Rob for highlighting this example. Here were my two key takeaways:

• Always be on the lookout for differences in perception between you and your partner in China. Dig beneath the surface of what is said and done to understand what might be more fundamental differences in worldview.
• Understand how fast China is changing and how diverse people’s opinions, attitudes, and behavior are…from a generational basis.

I hope to strive for, as Paul Denlinger of ChinaVortex says, “one level deeper” in my own personal understanding of these issues. Interested in your thoughts and comments too after you read the original post.

UPDATE 9/1:

Tim Johnson, McClatchy Beijing bureau chief and blogger at China Rises, provides another example of Xinhua polishing his story.  He includes the redacted story and his original so you can make a side-by-side comparison. The effect, according to Tim, is as follows:

This serves several purposes for Xinhua and its readers. For masses of readers, it makes them think that foreign journalists are completely admiring of modern China and have nothing negative to say. A slightly more discerning reader may think foreigner reporters are saps. They know that China has warts, and may wonder why the foreign journalists don’t see them.

Only very savvy readers know that Xinhua guts the negative from stories.

I guess with all the “polishing” and creative editing, Chinese people who can’t read English really don’t know what to believe when they read the official media.

I have some UpTake U.S. colleagues who are going to visit the UpTake Beijing R&D team in September. They asked me for some hotel recommendations. I will probably just introduce them to Winser Zhao (Twitter) of SinoHotelReservation who has helped me in the past and provided some other recommendations on Chaoyang vs. Zhongguancun Hotels. But I thought I’d share my experience with one hotel.

The Jade Palace Hotel (also known as Cuigong Hotel) is one of the most well known hotels in Zhongguancun (中关村). It’s easy to arrange meetups with people because everyone knows where it is. In short, this is a great hotel option for entrepreneurs and people working in information technology who need to visit Haidian (海淀).

It is a good 4 star hotel: standard rooms are generally clean (ask for non-smoking), deluxe rooms are very nicely appointed, sound-insulation and air-conditioning is up to Western hotel standards. Prices tend to be reasonable especially compared to Chaoyang District (朝阳区).

Basic Information on Jade Palace Hotel (Cuigong Hotel, 翠宫饭店)

Website:http://www.jadepalace.com.cn/

Address:
76 Zhichun Road; Haidian District, Beijing, P.R CHINA 100086
北京海淀区知春路76号 (100086)

Phone Number:
Tel:86 10 6262 8888
Fax:86 10 6263 8255

Nearest Metro:
Zhichunlu Station(知春路), Line 13

Hotel Location:

Here’s a handy map showing the local area that I got from the Microsoft Research Asia site:

click to see larger image

Elliott’s Review of Hotel:

Pros:

• Well known. Easy to tell taxi-driver where it is. Easy to arrange meetings with other people.
• Close to Beijing Subway Line 13. Short walk to the station. Great in case you need to get somewhere and the roads are totally congested.
• Close to Microsoft Research Asia and other offices.
• Rooms are nicely appointed, at a Marriott or Hilton level. Air-conditioning is similar to Western hotels. Sound insulation is similar to Western hotels.
• They have no-smoking rooms.
• Amenities, including a nice swimming pool in the basement. They also have a bar that stays open late, a KTV lounge (which I have not gone to), and a small bowling alley (which I have not seen operational)
• There is a McDonalds (which I have not eaten at) diagonally across the street from the hotel.

Cons:

• Staff speaks English at the level of a typical 4 star Chinese hotel. Not at the same level of more expensive Western hotels like JW Marriott, St. Regis.
• Breakfast is super expensive for what you get, around RMB120 last time I went.
• Drinks in lounge are expensive, similar to high-end Western hotels. So it is more expensive to have meetings in the lounge than to go to a Starbucks or other meeting place.
• Internet is extra charge, typical for higher end hotels but most lower end hotels give it to you for free
• Location: great for Zhongguancun, far for meetings in Chaoyang, Guomao, or CBD. Also, it seems that most expats and many returnees live on the east side of Beijing, so if you spend the weekend in Beijing and have an active social life, you may find yourself shuttling back and forth to Chaoyang, which can cost 60-90 RMB each time (I’m not sure about this, approximate)
• I personally misremember the name of the hotel. It is not Jade Garden Hotel Zhongguancun, its Jade Palace!

Other Hotels to consider:

• Park Plaza Hotel (formerly Tianhong Plaza Hotel) - same quality, very near line 13 subway.
• Shangri-La Hotel - not as convenient location, I have not been there
• Yanshan Hotel - I have not been there
• Beijing Friendship Hotel - I have not been there
• Sariz Hotel - WARNING: site has a malware warning in Google at this time! I have not been there, but recommended by Winser Zhao at SinoHotelReservation.
• Ease Hotel - BUDGET OPTION - I stayed here, but I don’t recommend it unless you are both on a budget and need to be in this exact location. (Gene and Clive, this is the one I mentioned where I left with bug bites. But maybe that was just my room, because Min had another room and didn’t get any bites at all).
• Xiamen Commercial Hotel - BUDGET OPTION - I have walked by this hotel. It is very near the Line 13 subway, Microsoft Research Asia, and the Jade Palace. It is about half the price of the Jade Palace.
• I have some other recommendations from Winser on this post about Zhongguancun Hotels and Chaoyang Hotels.

Jade Palace Hotel photos

This is the exterior front photo of the Jade Palace hotel, standing on Zhongguancun Dong Lu (Zhongguancun East Road).

Jade Palace photos - photo of the lobby looking in from the street.

Jade Palace photos - Photo of the meeting place and cafe with very expensive drinks (typical price of Western hotels). Lots of people smoking here too. They have a small non-smoking section in the back.

Jade Palace Hotel photos - photo of the lounge looking down from the lobby.

Jade Palace photos - photos of the guest rooms. This is a standard room on the 6th floor, facing away from the main street. The deluxe rooms are more nicely appointed. Carpet has some cigarette or other stains, but room was generally clean.

Jade Palace bathroom photos - size of bathrooms is pretty standard for a Marriott, Hilton, or standard 4 star Western hotel.

Jade Palace hotel photos - photo of Bank of China ATM. There is an ATM in the lobby.

Jade Palace hotel photos - photo of bar entrance and interior

Jade Palace hotel photos - Looking out the 6th floor front window, you can see the Zhongguancun Dong Lu and Zhichun Lu intersection. The McDonalds is visible with the only red sign in the picture, right at the intersection. This is the northwest corner of the intersection, and the hotel is on the southeast corner of the intersection.

Jade Palace hotel photos - this is a photo from the McDonalds, looking southeast toward the Jade Palace hotel. You can see the entire building here.

McDonalds Zhichun Lu

I never waste a meal at McDonalds when I go to China. I love Chinese food and the Chinese food in China is generally better, more interesting, more regionally varied, and cheaper than in the US. But some may miss Western food, and McDonalds is definitely cheaper than the Jade Palace breakfast buffet. Maybe my colleagues can take a rest from Chinese food if they must at the McDonalds!

From The Independent’s slideshow of Olympic photographs.

Now that the Olympics are over, the foreign media and China observers are all quick to speculate about what will happen in the post-Olympic era.

Here’s a brief sampling of what’s being addressed:

- The economy: While many foreign companies are concerned about a possible downturn, Chinese officials point out that Beijing’s economy only accounts for a very small part of the overall boom. However, maintaining the epic pace that marked the Olympics will be a harder job for the Chinese government. Check out this video from Reuters for an analysis from a Beijing-based economist.

- The environment: Although Beijing won high marks for its pollution controls and clear blue skies during the Games, the environment is likely to take second place behind economic growth…again. Beijingers, at least, support continuing the restrictions on motorists and making a more environmentally-friendly city, but the government will be slowly beginning lifting the regulations starting on Thursday.

- Human rights: Despite the high-profile sentences of two elderly women to labor re-education after they applied for protest permits, one Italian expatriate living in Beijing wanted to show the world that it was possible to protest. It wasn’t. The United States sent in a strongly-worded statement to the Chinese goverment about human rights; China’s response from a Foreign Ministry spokesman creatively invokes Abraham Lincoln. The ongoing discussion and debate on China’s human rights record is sure to continue.

In the immediate future, one beneficiary of the Olympics is the Paralympics–with the passion for spectator sports fairly undiminished, tickets for events have been going quickly. One loser? Olympic souvenir collectors, the value of official souvenirs is falling rapidly.

Fiona Lee is a freelance writer/marketer/blogger based in Beijing. She blogs at quirkyBeijing.

Photo originally found on Mop here.

“Add fuel?” “Let’s go?” “Olé! Olé! Olé?” “Come on?” One of the quirkier news stories that has come out of the Beijing Olympics is how to translate the ubiquitous Chinese cheer 加油 (jiāyóu). The New York Times Rings blog wrote about the various contexts that 加油 has been used–ranging from the current usage during the Olympics to the Wenchuan earthquake–and sparking a vibrant comment thread where no one seemed to be able to agree. Even the Chinese news agency Xinhua got into the act, covering the foreign media’s struggles to translate the phrase properly. And an intrepid blogger took it further–why bother stopping at English when you can say 加油 in languages from Luxembourgish to Prussian?

China Daily also examined how China might need new cheers and compared China’s cheering to the organized South Korean effort. Is the simple 加油 really that boring?  (Aug. 23 Update)  The Australian certainly thinks so.

In case you haven’t gotten the hang of it yet, here’s a video on how to cheer the Chinese way from the hilariously straight-faced Two Chinese Characters.

How would you translate 加油? I’ve always had a fondness for “good luck” myself.

–

On a related note, the Wall Street Journal writes about a government program called Heart-to-Heart that assigned local Beijing schools to cheer for visiting countries. While Huajiadi Experimental Primary School was thrilled to be picked as one of the cheerleading schools, they were understandably less thrilled when they were assigned to cheer for a traditional archenemy: Japan. Nonetheless, in the spirit of international amity, the school made the best of it. One terrific line at the end of the article makes the point that children might “[associate] Japan with cartoons, not history.”

Ironically, the program was first begun by the Japanese during the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano.

One has to wonder how the school assigned to France, China’s newest international nemesis, felt.

Fiona Lee is a freelance writer/marketer/blogger based in Beijing. She blogs at quirkyBeijing.

Sky Canaves, lead blogger of Wall Street Journal’s China Journal blog, highlights the ingenious solution to the lack of food options at the Olympic Green. Too bad the solution results in an exploding lunch box! (h/t Shanghaiist, China Herald) According to her post:

Due to the lack of cooking facilities, a hot meal can be hard to find. So here’s an ingenious solution: a self-heating box of “spicy chicken” for 20 yuan ($3). Among the Games venues around Beijing, we’ve only seen this offered at the Olympic Green, where the staff have got the instant meal-making process down to a science.

Actually the meal looks pretty tasty compared to MacDonalds to me. But then again I prefer the Air China Cathay Pacific Chinese food to the (coach class) United Airlines American food.

Video courtesy of WallStreetJournal. Direct link to the video here.

I think Sky Canaves deserves combat pay for blogging in these conditions.  When she is not busy exploding lunchboxes, she is interviewing Olympic Gold Medalists like Nastia Liukin.

My friend, who is obsessed with lunchboxes and lunchbox recipes, probably didn’t think she would see something like this!

I noticed an interesting comment posted by mtlyorel in Elliott’s recent post about David Brooks:

Neither Brooks or other commentators let alone career China-bashers i.e. Fallows - understand fully the concept of collectivism in China. For starters, collectivism needs semantic qualification. Collectivism is really a concept that exists in all cultures, and certainly one can say the same thing about Japan and Korea. Collectivism in the Asian context in this instance really means a unified desire to reach one goal. This ’spirit’ has little to do with ethnic or cultural homogeneity which is what the commentators and Brooks himself fail to understand.

Simply, it is a desire to achieve successfully a common goal. The Chinese people are most similar in character to Americans. (If you don’t believe me, google for academic references on this topic.) There is no one ‘Chinese’ as there is no one ‘American’ or ‘French’. The misconception is that China is one monolithic and homogeneous entity. It isn’t. It is like a melting pot of cultures and ethnicities that are taught - just like all Americans - to have one single Chinese identity. In this case of course, through the directive and propaganda of the CCP.

The emphases are mine, and to me, the statements I emphasized were interesting enough to compel me to separate my response into its own post:

Might I suggest that the “collectivism” in China is not so much about a “a unified desire to reach one goal” but rather a “shared ideology of lost glory and historical victimization?”

Along the lines of comparing the Chinese to Americans, I do believe there certainly exist interesting parallels, but at the same time I feel there might be a qualitative disconnect between the two here. We can argue that the unifying American “identity” surrounds that ever-cliched “American Dream.” However, what is the “story” that the unifying Chinese “identity” is built upon? If the Americans have their “American Dream,” what do the Chinese have? Could we suggest it might be “Chinese Victim-hood?”

Furthermore, can we argue that Americans are more driven by a shared dream whereas the Chinese are more driven by a shared fear of their past, a past consistently characterized as the world’s oldest and once-mightiest civilization squandered away and raped by outsiders? Is there a qualitative difference between people yearning for what they never had and people struggling to regain what they perceive as something they lost?

Without straying too far from the above propositions, how does “collectivism” and “individualism” fit into this? If we accept the American Dream as the basis for the unifying identity of Americans, would we have to examine if this identity is merely the collective coincidence of individual dreams and aspirations set in a land perceived to offer the opportunities for their realization? Would we, then, need to ask ourselves if the unifying “Chinese Victim-hood” is something that all Chinese individually and coincidentally ascribe to or if it was instilled in them, systematically, by the very “directive and propaganda of the CCP” that mtlyorel presumes?

Nothing hard and fast here, just questions to prompt discussion. What are your thoughts?

Guest post from Shanghai-based Xiaodi Zhang, product management executive at eBay and co-founder of HopStix, a new China travel review site for sharing about food and travel. Also posted on the HopStix blog as “He’s Not Superman After All.” She also left a super-insightful comment on my earlier post about the Online Evisceration of David Brooks and was inspired to write this post.

By now, everyone knows Liu Xiang, China’s favorite Olympian, pulled out of the Olympics. In noticeable pain, he limped off the field yesterday after a false start in the 110 meter qualifying round and ended his Olympic career in the most anti-climatic fashion. His departure left an entire nation in shock.

Even the CCTV journalist was in tears

The live broadcast from the stadium was interrupted when the CCTV journalist had to pause in mid-sentence, turn her head and compose herself. Mind you, this is not NBC and Bob Costas. This came from the most regulated network in the world, where journalists are trained to speak only what’s on the teleprompter. Her breakdown demonstrated just how emotional this moment represented to Chinese everywhere. Pictures of audience members and Olympic volunteers in tears have been flooding the internet, and people can’t stop debating about his sudden departure. Some people feel cheated and angry, but most people are overwhelmed with disappointment. When I saw my cousin last night, I asked her if she cried. She replied yes, and then started crying again, set off by my question.

Difference between Tyson Gay and Liu Xiang

With all due respect to Tyson Gay and his fans, but I have a feeling that no one shed a tear in the US when he didn’t make it to the 100 meter finals two days earlier. To Americans, Tyson Gay’s win or loss was ultimately his own. His performance did not represent glory or defeat for an entire nation.

In China, however, one athlete’s Achilles injury is felt by an entire nation. To understand why Chinese would respond this strongly, just go back to the moment when Liu Xiang won the gold medal four years ago.

Liu Xiang’s Athens medal was framed as a victory for the Chinese race

After the race, he proudly announced to the world that “It is a proud moment not only for China but for Asia and all people who share the same yellow skin color…. I think we Chinese can unleash a yellow tornado on the world.” (more Liu Xiang quotes here) Even to him, the medal was not merely a personal accomplishment. Rather, his gold medal was a national achievement, even one for an entire continent and an entire race.

The fact that Liu Xiang comes from China’s “me” generation, a product of the one-child policy, and grew up during a time of unparalleled prosperity, western influence and individualism, reflects how deeply entrenched the ideals of national pride and national unity are in China. For most Westerners, it might be hard to comprehend how a young, cocky hurdler can also be so nationalistic.

Where does this deep well of nationalism and pride come from? History.

Understanding it will require a brief detour to China’s history, but it will unlock the mystery of how a country of 1.3 billion people can stand united in face of foreign criticism (Olympic protests) and internal disaster (Sichuan earthquake).

China as we see it today at the Olympics has been deeply shaped by a collective sense of pride, shame and accomplishment rooted in its history. National pride comes from China’s rich history (inventing paper, gunpowder, movable type, AND the compass, which were all on display at the Opening Ceremony), shame at its failure to stop foreign oppression during the first half of the twentieth century, and accomplishment at how far the country has come during the second half.

When Mao Zedong came into power, he famously declared “Today, the Chinese people have finally stood up!” But Chinese knew that the country had not really stood up and would not be able to stand up for another forty years.

So, when China finally re-opened its doors to the world in 1978 and re-entered the world stage in the Olympics in 1984, the Olympic Games became a barometer for China’s growth. Each four years brought new gold medals, new glories, new hope, and renewed sense of national pride. China could finally “stand up”. But many athletes have come and gone before Liu Xiang.

Why has Liu Xiang meant so much to the Chinese?

The answer is clear. Liu Xiang did not medal in ping-pong or men’s gymnastics. Liu Xiang medaled in Track & Field, an arena that China never even hoped to be competitive in. By accomplishing what seemed to most as the impossible, Liu Xiang captured the national imagination and brought a new sense of hope and possibility to China. He represented “new” China, China’s future, China’s Olympics. The possibility that he could repeat the feat in China’s Olympics, on Chinese soil, became what everyone fervently anticipated in the Beijing Games.

After my cousin grabbed some tissues and sat back down on the couch, I asked her why it was so emotional for her. She sighed, “I was really looking forward to it. One minute, I heard the race was about to start, and then he pulled out so suddenly”. She also added, choking up some more, “we shouldn’t blame him. We knew it would be hard for him to win again, but we just wanted to see him run.”

Photo courtesy of bbs2008.163.com and ChinaSMACK. More photos of reactions at ChinaSMACK.

UPDATE 8/20 from Elliott:

China Digital Times shared Xiaodi’s account and also highlighted a New York Times article that talks about the commercial implications of Liu Xiang’s withdrawal. China Herald also asked the provocative question “What killed Liu Xiang’s Olympics ambitions?” Fons Tuinstra quotes his first coach as reported by the Telegraph:

I am saddened by Liu Xiang’s exit,” Mr Gu said at his office in Shanghai. “I think it is because of the intense training. If he had been more relaxed the injury might not have been so bad.
“I have experienced in the past the great pressure that government officials exert on the athletes as well as the coach, and that they demand a gold medal, otherwise it is meaningless. Liu Xiang is still a young boy and he has been put under a bit too much expectation.”

UPDATE 2 8/20 from Elliott:

Marketwatch Olympic Blog by Bill Bishop suggests that things may not be as they appear:

I watched his withdrawal live and felt very bad for him. He looked to be in real pain. But after talking to some of my Beijinger friends over the last 24 hours, I am half-convinced the more is more to this story. All my friends believe this was set up by the track team and its affiliated management company that helps manage (and takes a cut of) the business side of their athletes’ lives.

The conspiratorial thinking goes that Liu and the team knew he was not in good enough form to beat Cuba’s Dayron Robles, and so it was better to not race than to lose. Both are humiliating, though an injury is more sympathetic and face-saving than a loss, and, importantly, might maintain some of Liu’s attractiveness to marketers. Part of the “evidence” is that the team held a news conference within 30 minutes of the withdrawal, making it looked like it was prepared in advance.

UPDATE 8/21 from Elliott:

WSJ China Journal shares that sponsors are kicking into action to put the best spin on the situation:

In terms of advertisements, Nike was quick to respond with full page ads in domestic papers…The translation, from a version of the ad running in today’s English-language China Daily:

Love Competition
Love risking your pride
Love winning it back
Love giving it everything you’ve got
Love the glory
Love the pain
Love sport even when it breaks your heart

Photo courtesy of Beijing News and Andrew Lih (fuzheado)

Chinese basketball fans are elated over the China men’s team 59-55 victory over Germany. Looks like the triple play of Yao Ming, Yi Jianlian, and Sun Yue are keeping China in the running for a basketball medal. Meanwhile, off the courts Chinese are getting a kick out of the Google logo that gets into the Olympic spirit of things by depicting a dragon dunking on a mouse.

While we realize the mouse could just be a nod to the current Year of the Rat, some Chinese are gloating a bit by drawing comparisons between the “very cute” rodent and the German team, while another cheekily asks if there isn’t actually more of a likeness to Spaniards.

But before anyone goes up in arms against Google’s artistic team, it should be noted that the logo has changed almost daily since the games started, and this particular one was up well before the China victory. And a quick glance below at some of the previous logos will show you that they are, in fact, rotating through each of the Chinese zodiac animals, and not taking stabs at anyone in particular. Maybe this will help those over at Toytown trying to guess what will be the next logo — parrots, raccoons, and kangaroos, while amusing, don’t exactly play a big role in Chinese astrology. Has anyone seen a rooster, snake, or rabbit yet?

UPDATE: Here comes the rabbit, only the rooster left

UPDATE (8.22.08):  Another tiger makes an appearance, no love for the rooster?

UPDATE (8.23.08): The twelve animal zodiac is finally complete.

UPDATE (8.25.08): In honor of the Olympics coming to a close, here are the opening and closing logos.  Congratulations to all the athletes who participated in the Beijing 2008 Summer Games!

Think the games are confined to the Bird’s Nest and the Water Cube? Well think again, outside of China the Olympics might be confined to your TV set or your computer screen, but not so here in Beijing. Let’s move out into the streets.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on which side of the fence you stand upon), even miles away from the Olympic Green, the Games are still very much a part of life for Beijingers.

Want proof? 16 pictures — will that do?

Beijing Subway: Olympic Mania

Yours truly’s second home (a mobile one at that), the Beijing Subway, has been successfully brainwashed into Olympic Mode. In many a Subway station, you see this:

The whole thing gets scarier when you approach the station at platform level: Actually, it gets scariest at busy stations, where whole crowds assemble and watch the Games. Sudden yelps of sheer joy (or, if it’s a soccer game, shouts of sheer anger), are suddenly here and there. It’s no rocket science, we guess…Above Underground LevelWant to escape the underground world for a bit non-Olympic Beijing? Above ground, it’s just as Olympic as underground:
  Even outside major corporations and even government buildings, the atmosphere is still very much Beijing 2008 Outside Central Beijing Outside central Beijing, the slogans still have it that this is one heckuvan Olympics City. Unfortunately, I couldn’t exactly pull of the trick of shooting photos while driving, so I’ll leave you with just one pic I took when the car was pretty much still: This is in Huairou, about 40 to 50 miles northeast of central Beijing. Even here, though, Beijing is still in Olympic fever. One More Thing Yes, your eyes are not deceiving you. That’s the back of a ticket to the Olympic Games!

Last week, on August 11, New York Times Op-Ed columnist David Brooks published his essay “Harmony and the Dream” (NYT login required) and inadvertently created a perfect case study of how a journalist parachuting into China can get eviscerated by the blogosphere in less than 7 days.

Of course, its easy to criticize and hard to come up with simple, written expressions of complex, underlying reality that help people have a more informed opinion. I don’t claim to have an answer. But then again, I’m not a NYT columnist like Brooks who has significant influence over American popular opinion. Many Americans already see China in a mirror dimly, and other Americans do not see through the one-way mirror at all. Instead of helping people see, Brooks is filling the field of vision with a misleading image of “collectivism” that just isn’t true…potentially for ideologically-motivated aims.

I’ve abstracted Brooks argument and highlighted his online evisceration by: James Fallows, Imagethief, PekingDuck commenters, Language Log, John Pomfret, Kevin Donovan at Blurring Borders, and Dan Harris (but not really an evisceration) at China Law Blog.

For those who didn’t see his article already, Brooks thesis (abstracted generously because of the NYT login wall) is as follows:

The world can be divided in many ways — rich and poor, democratic and authoritarian — but one of the most striking is the divide between the societies with an individualist mentality and the ones with a collectivist mentality.

This is a divide that goes deeper than economics into the way people perceive the world. …

You can create a global continuum with the most individualistic societies — like the United States or Britain — on one end, and the most collectivist societies — like China or Japan — on the other. …

But what happens if collectivist societies snap out of their economic stagnation? What happens if collectivist societies, especially those in Asia, rise economically and come to rival the West? A new sort of global conversation develops.

The opening ceremony in Beijing was a statement in that conversation. It was part of China’s assertion that development doesn’t come only through Western, liberal means, but also through Eastern and collective ones.

The ceremony drew from China’s long history, but surely the most striking features were the images of thousands of Chinese moving as one — drumming as one, dancing as one, sprinting on precise formations without ever stumbling or colliding. We’ve seen displays of mass conformity before, but this was collectivism of the present — a high-tech vision of the harmonious society performed in the context of China’s miraculous growth.

James Fallows’ Response

James Fallows, who has a much more complete and nuanced view of China, responded in a beautiful fashion (h/t ThomasCrampton, Peking Duck, Imagethief, Transpacifica):

This is the kind of thing you can say only if you have not the slightest inkling of how completely different a billion-plus people can be from one another. Beijingers from Shanghainese, Guangdong entrepreneurs from farmers in Sichuan, Tibetans from Taiwanese, people who remember the Cultural Revolution from those who don’t, people who remember the famines of the Great Leap Forward from people who’ve always had enough. The guy across the street from his brother. His daughter from his wife. People hanging on in big state enterprises from those starting small firms. People who stayed in the villages from those who came to the city for jobs. Christians from Buddhists. Hu Jintao from Jiang Zemin, Olympic weightlifters from Olympic tennis players, Yao Ming from Liu Xiang, Wen Jiabao from Edison Chen — and while we’re at it, Filipinos from Koreans, Japanese from Chinese, Malaysian Chinese from Malaysian Malays. Lee Kuan Yew from Kim Jong Il. People from Jakarta from people in Seoul. Hey, they’re all “Asians”. …

But the very most obvious thing about today’s China is how internally varied and contradictory it is, how many opposite things various of its people want, how likely-to-be-false any generalization is. Anyone who can look at today’s China and not see the powerful individual personalities and traits and dramas is someone more interested in fitting a theory to the current place he is passing through than in learning about that place.

Say it again, brother!

Boy, does this ring true. From my experience, Chinese people themselves love to talk about regional differences, North from South, Beijingers from Shanghainese, Beijing college students from the provinces vs. Beijing college students from Beijing, Dongbei people who call Beijingers “Southerners”, Guangzhou people who call Fujian people “Northerners,” unique characteristics of Sichuan people, Wenzhou people, Henan people, etc. etc.

Even more important I believe is talk about temporal differences: people who were sent down to the countryside in the Cultural Revolution vs those who didn’t, people who went to college after 1978 vs. those who didn’t, families before the one child policy vs. those started afterwards, people born in the 1970s vs. 1960s, people born in the 1980s vs. 1970s, 1980s people born after 1985 vs those born before, the 1990s generation vs the 1980s generation…on and on.

So where’s the “collectivism” here? Maybe the incredible diversity, individualism, regionalism, and at times chauvinism is what causes the rhetoric of harmonious society to be pushed down by the CCP on this bubbling stew of society.

Imagethief’s Response

Brooks use of the Opening Ceremony’s precision Fou drummers and Movable Type dancers in defense of his thesis is extremely sloppy, according to Imagethief. He writes:

In semi-defense of Brooks, I don’t think an inclination to collectivism at a social level excludes personal individuality or even sub-cultural differences.

Still, I think Fallows is right to take Brooks to task on this one*. I think using the Olympic opening ceremony to draw large conclusions about Chinese society is a dangerous game. Better to use it to draw large conclusions about the government’s obsession with micromanagement of propaganda.

After all, if the performers were part of a People’s Liberation Army performing troupe that performed with military precision, then they behaved as all militaries are designed to do! And maybe it was just a big performance, not something that justifies Brooks drawing broad, sweeping conclusions. Imagethief:

After all, isn’t it possible that you put 10,000 people on a stadium field simply because it looks cool and any smaller group of performers (or single, lip-synching, apple-cheeked nine-year-olds) is dwarfed?

I think back on many high school and college marching band performances I’ve witnessed in the individualistic old US of A. In fact, considering the military antecedents of marching bands, and Fallows’ remark about PLA performers, the cross-cultural phenomenon of large-scale military choreography and precision seems to be the archetype here.

I also think NBC did American viewers a disservice not highlighting which of the performers were part of the military (assuming they knew), and using that as part of the explanation of why they were so good.

Peking Duck and its discontented commenters:

Peking Duck’s post also yielded an interesting comment thread with 15 comments. Here’s one insightful comment from Old Tales Retold:

What frustrates me isn’t just the old cultural stereotypes about “collectivist” versus “individualist” societies, but any lack of real thought on what collective values China supposedly has beyond obedience to the government.

Surely, northeastern workers’ revival on Maoist class rhetoric (arguably “collectivist”) is a source of tension between the State and the People. Does this fit Brooks’ model of a smoothly functioning machine? And surely some of China’s “individualist” traits make things pretty easy for the government and business?

No question societies are bound together by common values. What are those values? How are they being expressed? Is there an implicit bargain between the people and the government? That political monopoly will be accepted in return for growing personal liberties and economic opportunity? Lets talk about that instead of “collectivism.”

Pomfret’s China response

John Pomfret also takes Brooks to tasks on three assertions of his argument. I won’t even dig into his 204 comments!

1. Brooks: Precision Opening Ceremony exercises prove “collectivism”. Pomfret: Wrong, David.

I wonder if Brooks has ever seen American marching bands, or line dancing, or visited a high school where the coolest kids are always part of a group - say, the football or basketball teams. I would argue that in many way Americans bow more to the group than the Chinese, which explains why the Chinese party-state has been so intent on forcing conformity.

Good point. I have talked to many technology entrepreneurs who feel that their Chinese employees are a product of an exam-driven education system that creates a highly competitive, non-collaborative dynamic in the workplace. As a result, they need to teach people educated in the Chinese system how to work better in teams, more so than foreign educated people. Is this evidence of collectivism or individualism? Or collectivism with Chinese characteristics?

2. Brooks: Chinese people focus on the collective good first. Pomfret: Wrong, David.

Even more, I wonder if Brooks has ever driven in China (look out for grandma!), or sharpened his elbows in the scrum that forms each time you try to get off an airplane, or tried to get Chinese co-workers to band together. Let’s just say in the decade that I’ve lived in China (over the course of 30 years), I haven’t seen or heard much collectivist impulse except when it was rammed down the throats of ordinary Chinese.

3. Brooks: China’s rise is due to this collectivism which as it becomes successful, issues a major challenge to the West. Pomfret: Wrong again.

And as to Brooks’ point about China’s rise being attributed somehow to collectivist impulses. Wait a second. The most dynamic sector of China’s economy is the private one. It’s a nation of entrepreneurs. It’s a culture of entrepreneurs. Look at Hong Kong, or Sydney, or Main Street Flushing and now Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Chengdu. That’s Chinese and it’s “individualist” up the wazoo.

Maybe this is indeed collectivism with Chinese characteristics…the time-honored tradition of pointing to a deer and calling it a horse (Zhǐ Lù Wéi Mǎ or 指鹿为马).

Blurring Borders response

An excellent post by Kevin Donovan at Blurring Borders concludes that in fact the success of China has been the unleashing of pent-up individualism through economic and social liberalization…the direct opposite of what Brooks is concluding:

In Ted Koppel’s recent miniseries entitled “The People’s Republic of Capitalism,” he interviewed a Western-educated Chinese youth who thought government censorship and repression was acceptable because it was bringing China out of poverty and improving millions of lives. Brooks sees this sentiment, which I believe is widespread, as a collectivist capitalism.

I disagree. I think it is driven by self-interest; it is individualistic. Those suppressed are not supporting the suppression. They don’t think collective harmony for growth is good, like Brooks supposes. The Koppel interview shows citizens who are being personally benefited by markets - the selfishly driven interaction of individuals. The rise of China - an economic phenomenon of GDP growth - comes with increased individualism. My intuition is that while it may masquerade as collectivism (”all of China is benefiting from this system, so suppression of dissent is okay”), it is really individuals seeing themselves benefit and liking it.

Language Log

The above bloggers address the substantive issue of “collectivism” vs. “individualism”. Brooks argument is then completely eviscerated on technical grounds by Language Log who take Brooks to task for his misuse of academic studies in a lengthy post. An example:

Question to Language Log: Is it correct that if you show an American an image of a fish tank, the American will usually describe the biggest fish in the tank and what it is doing, while if you ask a Chinese person to describe a fish tank, the Chinese will usually describe the context in which the fish swim?

Answer: In principle, yes. But first of all, it wasn’t a representative sample of Americans, it was undergraduates in a psychology course at the University of Michigan; and second, it wasn’t Chinese, it was undergraduates in a psychology course at Kyoto University in Japan; and third, it wasn’t a fish tank, it was 10 20-second animated vignettes of underwater scenes; and fourth, the Americans didn’t mention the “focal fish” more often than the Japanese, they mentioned them less often.

So what happened here? Read the Language Log post which seriously calls into question Brooks credibility, at least on this topic.

UPDATE: China Law Blog Response

Dan Harris at China Law Blog also waded into this debate with a less heavy, sports-oriented, but no less gutsy inquiry:

But I feel compelled to discuss one thing I have noticed in watching the Olympics and that is that China’s basketball team does not have a single point guard worth a damn and I have to wonder why.

Is it further evidence of the shortcomings of a planned economy? Does China pull out the great athletes for other sports, leaving only tall people for basketball?

Is it further evidence of a lack of innovation or take-chargedness (I know I am making up this word, but it works) in China? Great point guards have to be willing to innovate and take the heat. Is the coaching so tough that no player is willing to step up?

Seriously, why?

Dan extends this Basketball As China Metaphor by highlighting Will Lewis at Experience Not Logic blog who answered his questions as follows:

I was discussing this with some friends last night. They were telling me that at age 10 kids start to get pulled for sports like basketball. The problem is that an athletic kid with point guard style body type is typically pulled for soccer despite whatever skill and flair they show on the basketball court. …

The planned athletic program seems to have done wonders at producing exceptional individual athletes as seen in shooting, weightlifting, and gymnastics (team gymnastics is not a team sport because it is merely the sum of individual performances). But, like in business, team sports depend less on individual prowess, and more on creativity and chemistry which is all but impossible to select for.

Dan then highlights the fact that in individualistic America, heroes also talk about duty and are modest about their achievements.

And from the song, “Into the Fire,” about the firefighters who went into the Twin Towers after 9/11, we learn about how “duty” plays a role in heroics in the U.S. as well: “It was dark, too dark to see You held me in the light you gave You lay your hand on me Then walked into the darkness of your smoky grave Up the stairs, into the fire Up the stairs, into the fire I need your kiss, but love and duty called you someplace higher Somewhere up the stairs, into the fire”

Like every country, China has kids who go back into schools to save classmates and teachers [Fan Pao Pao] who run away.

Seems like an opportunity to celebrate the common character of heroism in the face of adversity. The questions that China Law Blog asks are far more interesting, and get into questions of the education system, what skills and traits are valued, what failures there are in the parts of the economy that are still centrally controlled (like sports), how does this affect employers and companies, how do foreigners best understand the educational background and worldview of their China-educated employees? These are all great questions. So how do we get influential writers like Brooks to even ask the right questions?

Dissenting views: CommunicateAsia

Here’s an dissenting view from Michael Netzley of CommunicateAsia who claims that Fallows was shifting the terms of the debate: “Fallows simply allows the pendulum to swing the other way, focuses on the individual differences while overlooking cultural patterns, and writes a high-handed criticism.” I disagree with Netzley and think Fallows was just flabbergasted by the conclusion that is so obviously untrue to even a casual observer of China.

So did Brooks come to China just to reinforce his pre-conceived notions?

I’ll end with a comment (#13) from Lindel, a commenter on the Peking Duck post:

His article is blatantly saying there are two kinds of people in the world “Us” and “Them”. “Us” being individualistic freedom loving loyal american white anglo-saxon conservative republicans vs “them” the collective loving disloyal foreign liberal democrats. Vote for McCain in November!

He went to China for the express purpose of writing partisan political commentary to support a viewpoint he already has. It is doubtful that he made any attempt to learn about or appreciate Chinese or Asian history or culture. He was not attempting to expand his own cultural awareness or learn anything that might challenge his own viewpoint.

The sole purpose of his article and writing from china is to give a false sense that he is writing from authority of having visited china, but in reality he probably had alread decided on what he would say and went to china merely as a formality or possibly as a paid vacation.

In the US we refer to this as “preaching to the choir” in other words he is just repeating an opinion he already had to share with people who already agree with his opinion. It is not meant to challenge or educate people about a new idea or share a cultural insight.

Others more familiar with asian culture and history see more complexities to the issue he raised and more nuances, but those do not fit within his narrow partisan agenda for influencing the american voters in the upcoming election.

So perhaps, on a short trip to China, all you really can expect is a light seasoning of Chinese society (within walking distance of your 5 star hotel, of course) to flavor the ideologically motivated framing that you came with–a framing that achieves the right political objectives and conveniently delivers the story your readers want to hear. Fly home, and declare victory. Not saying Brooks did this, just a cautionary tale of what might happen inadvertently to a columnist under pressure.

Some parting advice!

James Fallows offers some excellent advice, which I wholeheartedly agree with:

Take a little time and look around, David. The parts that don’t fit what you theorized before arriving are actually the most stimulating.

And that’s what I love about China!

UPDATE 08/20/08:

Roland Soong at ESWN highlights some Chinese netizens’ reactions to the essay (which was translated). I agree with Roland (and our commenter James G) that Chinese reactions is even more interesting than the English-language blogosphere reaction that we covered. See the translations at EastSouthWestNorth. I especially like these comments from Xitek.com (zh):

• Collectivism may be high in China, but it is actually weakest in the collectivist sports such as men’s soccer. Sigh …
• My understanding that the system and the individuals should complement each other. Actually, Chinese individuals are not very high in collective spirit, and therefore the system needs to promote the collectivist spirit. Actually, American individuals are strong in collective spirit, and therefore the system needs to promote the individualistic spirit. I cannot imagine how chaotic the world would be if the the China over-emphasizes individualism. It will become like many places in Africa. Similarly, if America were to carry out the collectivist spirit, the country would not have much dynamism. I feel that collectivism is not too strong in China. Rather it is far from enough. We can see this from the results of the group sports and from our daily lives.
• Without the meeting of American individualism and Japanese collectivism, there would not be digital cameras, plasma television sets, laser discs and so on in the world. China is not collectivist, because it has neither western-style rule of law nor Japanese culture of shame. It is just a collection of loose sand linked by interests. The foreigners are wrong in their views about us. For more than a century, none of their predictions about China have been realized. China is an alien species that foreigners can never understand.
• The Chinese people do not follow collectivism. The minimum requirements for collectivism is discipline and a spontaneous consideration of the group interests. The Chinese people are lacking on both. (Japan is truly collectivist relatively speaking.) The Chinese have the characteristic of “following the crowd.” When they go overseas, they want to join the “mainstream society.” Frankly, they adore power more than rationality. To be kinder, they are super-pragmatic.
• Even the fart from the New York Times smell fragrant.

UPDATE 8/21:

Yihong Ding at Thinking Space shares his post about cultural differences between China and the US in social networking, and how it affects LinkedIn’s opportunity in China. According to Ding:

Philosophically, Chinese style social networking is based on the Doctrine of the Mean (Chinese: 中庸; pinyin: Zhōngyōng). Chinese people believe in that if one tree is higher above all the others, wind will destroy it first (Chinese: 木秀于林，风必摧之; pinyin: mù xiù yú lín，fēng bì cuī zhī). Hence the principle of surviving but also living well is to follow Doctrine of the Mean—be neither too outstanding nor too insignificant. This philosophy is the basis of Chinese social networking. Such a subtle difference actually indicates some fundamental difference between Chinese social networking and western social networking.

This may have some truth, but it certainly seems there are plenty of Chinese born in the 70s, 80s, and 90s who seem to not care about sticking out, at least for a good cause.  Ding essentially supports Brooks point in this context:  that American business people are more individualistic, and Chinese business people are more collectivistic, at least in the use of social networking for business purposes.