The endless ideological wars against China

[justanobserver]

I agree.

I think the CCP is using Hong Kong as a testing ground, in order to see how an "urban population" of Chinese people are ultimately affected by the free media.

You guys sure are devious

 

[no_name]

^^^ Taiwan also serves as a mirror in that respect. In this case you get to study multiparty and what happen when you have green-blue issues.

It does shows that education and awareness of the bigger world is important for making informed decisions.

Though fighting in the parliament is quite ugly and shameful to watch. The US also had parliament fights in the early years after founding.

 

[Akasa]

Unlike any other previous rising power, China has never taken any expansionist steps. We are the first power to present a peaceful doctrine, such as the Peaceful Development doctrine. Our foreign policy is the first to promise that China will develop peacefully and treat everyone equally with respect.

 

[Chinese-Dragon]

^^^ Taiwan also serves as a mirror in that respect. In this case you get to study multiparty and what happen when you have green-blue issues.

It does shows that education and awareness of the bigger world is important for making informed decisions.

Exactly right.

Taiwan might actually be a better example, since Taiwan has a true multi-party democracy (which Hong Kong has never had).

If China starts minor political reforms in the next decade or so, they will have a lot of good information to base their decisions on, by looking at Hong Kong and Taiwan.

 

[siegecrossbow]

^^^ Taiwan also serves as a mirror in that respect. In this case you get to study multiparty and what happen when you have green-blue issues.

It does shows that education and awareness of the bigger world is important for making informed decisions.

Though fighting in the parliament is quite ugly and shameful to watch. The US also had parliament fights in the early years after founding.

Mr. Sumner almost lost his life this way.

Unlike any other previous rising power, China has never taken any expansionist steps. We are the first power to present a peaceful doctrine, such as the Peaceful Development doctrine. Our foreign policy is the first to promise that China will develop peacefully and treat everyone equally with respect.

They will treat us as a threat regardless.

 

[gambit]

Now that the troll has been banned, thanks to our mod, shall we go back to the original discussion?

I think that free speech should be implemented in China. When I say free speech I don't mean irresponsible yellow journalism but the rights of the people to information. Acts such as blocking foreign websites and filtering sensitive words is tantamount to self-castration in the ongoing "ideological war" between the East and the West. Most Chinese people could tell whether some one truly cares about China or are just manipulating them as a part of a greater scheme.

Then there is no reason for censorship at all. Free speech mean exactly that -- the freedom to express oneself in any way. It is up to society to decide which venues, situations, and consequences that deserve punitive responses. The more the state deem deserving of punitive responses, the more paternalistic it appears and oppressive the regime becomes. So either we have the faith that the people will sort out for themselves on what is 'yellow journalism' versus what is responsible fact reporting, or we endow the state the power to regulate this particular aspect of life.

 

[siegecrossbow]

Then there is no reason for censorship at all. Free speech mean exactly that -- the freedom to express oneself in any way. It is up to society to decide which venues, situations, and consequences that deserve punitive responses. The more the state deem deserving of punitive responses, the more paternalistic it appears and oppressive the regime becomes. So either we have the faith that the people will sort out for themselves on what is 'yellow journalism' versus what is responsible fact reporting, or we endow the state the power to regulate this particular aspect of life.

What about "shouting fire in a theater full of people" and "clear and present danger"?

 

[gambit]

What about "shouting fire in a theater full of people" and "clear and present danger"?

That is why I said venues, situations, and consequences. Who cares if you yell 'Fire' in a theater filled or 'crowded' with things other than people? We considered this situation to be offensive and devised a punitive response to the situation. Same for national security threats. The difference is that 'national security threats' can be widely interpretive and whose consequences can be much further down the road -- time wise. The state is responsible for national security. The reasoning therefore is that any threat to national security constitute the same threat to the state. So the state take steps to devise punitive responses to any threat to itself, from legitimate criticisms to armed insurrections.

 

[CardSharp]

That is why I said venues, situations, and consequences. Who cares if you yell 'Fire' in a theater filled or 'crowded' with things other than people? We considered this situation to be offensive and devised a punitive response to the situation. Same for national security threats. The difference is that 'national security threats' can be widely interpretive and whose consequences can be much further down the road -- time wise. The state is responsible for national security. The reasoning therefore is that any threat to national security constitute the same threat to the state. So the state take steps to devise punitive responses to any threat to itself, from legitimate criticisms to armed insurrections.

You'll find no one here is against free-speech but as you say free speech need in society their proper 'venues, situations, and consequences'. China isn't up to the full task yet. It started from slogans and propaganda posters and needs time to develop a mature culture of freedom of speech. It'll get there in its own time.

For signs of progress compare this
Stefan Landsberger's Chinese Propaganda Poster Pages

with what is available now in terms of for profit private tabloids and newpapers.

 

[siegecrossbow]

Going off topic for a moment:

I think this poster, in retrospect, has a pretty funny slogan. No explanation needed if you are Chinese:

 

[ChinaRocks]

"Some foreigners with full bellies and nothing better to do engage in finger-pointing at us. First, China does not export revolution; second, it does not export famine and poverty; and third, it does not mess around with you. So what else is there to say?"

China's leaders-in-waiting Xi Jinping

 

[gpit]

China must impose some censorship.

Why? Because the influence of propaganda is often proportional to the resources that are available to a country. Technically, in peace time, without sufficient resources, one will never be able to have an equal footage on the platform of propaganda.

China’s per capita resources is about that of Albania. Thus China is unable to compete in propaganda with those who are richer.

Secondly:

Censorship exists to some extent in all modern countries, including the U.S.A., the U.K., Germany, France, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand.

...

Censorship

Every country censors in way or the other for its own interest. Why shouldn’t China?

One however mustn’t abuse the censorship.

Crying for completely abolishment of censorship is as idiotic/naive as to abolish immunization.

 

[Asian.Century]

China’s Coming Ideological Wars
In the reform era, economic growth reigned supreme. But now, a revival of competing beliefs has polarized Chinese society.

TAISU ZHANG | MARCH 1, 2016, 2:11 PM

CHANGCHUN, CHINA - SEPTEMBER 25: (CHINA OUT) Students dressed in ancient clothes stand in front of the statue of Confucius (551-479 BC), during a ceremony to worship the Chinese philosopher and educator at the Changchun Confucian Temple on September 25, 2005 in Changchun of Jilin Province, China. Various of ceremonies and celebrations are being held in China to mark the upcoming 2,556th anniversary of Confucius's birthday on September 28. During the day, the "2005 Global Joint Confucius Memorial Ceremony" will be held in different Confucian Temples around China and the world. (Photo by China Photos/Getty Images)
For most Chinese, the 1990s were a period of intense material pragmatism. Economic development was the paramount social and political concern, while the various state ideologies that had guided policy during the initial decades of the People’s Republic faded into the background. The severe ideological struggles that had marked the end of both the 1970s and the 1980s had exhausted the population, leaving it more than eager to focus single-mindedly on an unprecedented bevy of economic opportunities.

Now the tide is changing yet again. Chinese society is apparently rediscovering, or at least re-prioritizing, its moral and ideological cravings. Over the past several years, ideological forces and divisions have moved back to the center of Chinese political and social life, and ideological tensions among Chinese elite are now arguably higher than at any point since the immediate aftermath of the 1989 protests. The image of a “post-ideological” China has become increasingly outdated.

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Relatively few observers or policymakers, however, seem to entertain the possibility that Chinese elites are ideological creatures, or even that they may be dealing with an ideological population. This is a remarkable sea change with profound implications for policymaking. Just a decade or two ago, many commentators had trouble accepting that Chinese statesmen — or even educated Chinese — were anything butCommunist ideologues. In the early 2000s, the notion that Chinese elites no longer believed in Communism was still a novel one that sometimes triggered incredulity and backlash. By contrast, anyone today who insists that Communist ideals still hold sway over Chinese policymaking does so at considerable risk to his or her reputation as a serious China hand.

How did the idea of a post-ideological China arise? The charitable — and possibly correct — interpretation for this change is that it simply reflected a general shift in Chinese social attitudes. Chinese political and social discourse turned away from ideologically charged arguments in favor of the kind of flexible pragmatism that the former Chinese leaders Deng Xiaoping and Jiang Zemin regularly advocated. There is also a less charitable interpretation: that China’s economic rise, and particularly its sustained growth during the global economic crisis, generated a sense of vulnerability and, consequently, an alarmist mentality among many Western analysts, who rushed to — and continue to believe in — the conclusion that Chinese policymakers were ruthless and efficient utility maximizers preying upon the softer, more idealistic, and democratically constrained developed world.

Whatever the reason, the stereotype of Chinese pragmatism is probably past its expiration date.

Whatever the reason, the stereotype of Chinese pragmatism is probably past its expiration date. In China today, the signs of an ideological revival are everywhere. Most visibly, a number of icons, long thought dead, have made prominent and in some cases highly successful resurrections in national political rhetoric. First is long-deceased Party Chairman Mao Zedong’s rehabilitation as arguably the core element of the party’s founding myth and its historical legitimacy. As a number of scholars and commentators have noted, in several recent speeches Chinese President Xi Jinping has enthusiastically embraced Mao not only as the party’s founding father, but also as a symbol of its commitment to nationalism and populism. This marks a significant departure from the subdued and almost reluctant treatment of Mao that Xi’s predecessors, particularly Hu Jintao, seemed to display. Curiously, while Xi’s rhetorical signals drew immediate commentary, their potential policy implications have gone largely unstudied, if not outright dismissed as insignificant.


Mao has not been the only person to receive ideological rehabilitation. Confucius, too, has become an increasingly prominent figure in Chinese political rhetoric. And party leaders have frequently quoted ancient philosophers, including Mencius, Zhuangzi, and Han Fei. Xi himself has repeatedly argued that, “to solve China’s problems … [China needs] to fully make use of the great wisdom accumulated by the Chinese nation over the last 5,000 years.” State support for projects such as the new Confucius Academy in the provincial capital of Guiyang, opened in 2013, lends such rhetoric an element of seriousness that has buoyed neo-Confucian activists. Yet the attempts to breathe new life into ancient Chinese thought has also drawn alarm and disdain in other, more liberal, parts of the Chinese internet, which tend to see Confucian social ethics as backwards and bigoted.

It is easy, and perhaps tempting, to dismiss these initiatives as cynical ideological propaganda by an authoritarian state facing unprecedented socioeconomic and political tension. There is undeniably some truth to this, but it is far too simplistic. In fact, one could just as plausibly argue that the party has played a reactive role, rather than a proactive one: its ideological campaigns to revive figures such as Mao and Confucius reflect intellectual and cultural currents that have rapidly gained force among highly educated Chinese over the past five to seven years. Compared to the depth and momentum of these currents, the party may simply be trying to catch up. Xi himself seemed to admit as much in a famous August 19, 2013 speech, in which he argued that the party was facing a new wave of serious ideological challenges, and needed to issue a more robust response.

The two most significant Chinese intellectual developments since the late 1990s are probably the rise of a powerful “New Left” and the reemergence of a disorganized but increasingly influential neo-Confucian movement. The New Left combines nationalist sentiments — as a January 2010 editorial in the Global Times declared, “we do not want to become a Western intellectual colony” — and widespread dissatisfaction with economic inequality into a potent call for a “reconstruction of socialism,” one that would both reinstate many of the planned economy policies of the 1980s, and further strengthen ideological control over the Internet and media. If one surveyed the current Chinese intellectual world, the most influential figures — and those that enjoy the closest ties to the party leadership — tend to be leftists. This includes the prominent economists Wang Shaoguang and Justin Yifu Lin, the political scientist Cui Zhiyuan, and the philosopher Liu Xiaofeng.

Neo-Confucian figures, on the other hand, generally support both the revival of Confucian ethics such as filial piety and the reinstatement of certain traditional political institutions, particularly the civil service examinations. Although they tend to be less mainstream, the sheer combustibility of the term “Confucianism” in Chinese political and intellectual discourse has nonetheless given them an outsized media presence. Since the late 1990s, calls for a Confucian revival have steadily gained in volume and popularity, evolving from a much-mocked fringe movement to a still-mocked but certainly powerful national trend, particularly at the level of elementary education. For example, Jiang Qing, an early leader of the movement who now runs the well-known Yangming Confucian Academy, has become almost a household name in intellectual circles.

Both developments have their roots in anti-Western nationalism.

Both developments have their roots in anti-Western nationalism. From the early 1980s to the 2000s, democracy, the rule of law, and free market reform were the political lingua franca not merely of most Chinese intellectuals, but also of most business leaders, and even some officials, who paid at least regular lip service — and probably more than that — to these aspirational ideals. During this period, Chinese elites appeared to share the consensus that China should, in a word, Westernize. To a large extent, both the New Left and neo-Confucianism were intellectual backlashes against this consensus, driven partly by perceived incompatibilities between Western thought and Chinese socioeconomic and political realities; partly by frustration at (perceived) Western hostility and ideological discrimination towards China; and partly by the nationalist urges that came naturally with economic takeoff.


More recently, these movements have shown signs of convergence. Neo-Confucianism appears to be latching on to New Leftism, and not without reciprocity from the leftist camp. Several prominent scholars, particularly Sun Yat-sen University’s Gan Yang, now self-identify as both leftist and Confucian. The linchpin of that joint-identity is the strong nationalism shared by both ideological camps, which allows these scholars to argue that resources from “traditional culture” should play a prominent role in the crusade against Western liberalism — if not as a necessary component of national identity, then at least as an ideological alternative to Western intellectual hegemony.