The Fall of Lady Liberty and Chai Ling's Revenge

Years ago when I first saw the documentary "The Gate of Heavenly Peace" at Boston's Museum of Fine Arts, my impression of Chai Ling was mixed. From what the former student leader said in her controversial interview (available in both Chinese and English) with an American journalist, it was certainly appalling that she expected the deaths of many fellow students to serve the 1989 movement's purposes. On the other hand, she looked genuinely grief-stricken by the prospect of bloodshed, and I couldn't help but feel sympathy toward her as well. After all, she was only 23 years old, a young woman who had grown up in China's "revolutionary heroism" culture. In such a culture, there's nothing out of place with what she expressed, that only the blood of innocent people can awake and enlighten more people. It is from a Western perspective that such an idea is simply unacceptable.

What I'm saying is, more of the blame should be placed on the revolutionary education she grew up with, rather than her naivety of believing in it. Who was not once young and naïve? I happen to also think Wang Dan has a point that no matter what Chai Ling had said, she did stay in the Square with other students until the last minute, and her action was more important than her words. (For the record, "The Gate of Heavenly Peace" also truthfully reported this fact.)

Reading excerpts of the newly published Tiananmen Moon (h/t The China Beat) by Philip Cunningham, the very journalist who interviewed Chai Ling 20 years ago, made me feel that Chai Ling might have been more innocent than some have thought. Although her idea of using bloodshed to arouse people was hardly a moral one, she appeared to be sincere and serious about the student movement and was indignant toward some other selfish power-thirsty student leaders. As such, I'd like to believe the young Chai Ling twenty years ago was a humanly imperfect idealist, as young activists are. If she sometimes took herself too importantly, it was largely because of the situation: being young and the leader of a mass movement can carry anyone away.

Today Chai Ling has become an American businesswoman. She is 43 years old, certainly no longer naïve, and apparently has done well financially. Now with the wealth she has gained in the democracy of America, she starts a new fight, only this time her target is not a totalitarian government but a critical part of democracy: an independent, nonprofit film maker who dared to express criticism toward both the Chinese government, and some student leaders, however slight of the latter.

Whatever legal reasons Chai Ling has been deploying, "defamation" or "infringing trademark," the drunkard's heart is not in the cup: the real nature of Chai Ling's lawsuit against Long Bow the firm maker seems more personal, as many internet articles have pointed out. From a societal point of view, this lawsuit is a big regression in Chai Ling's political ideal. From a personal point of view, her motivation is explicable yet the action is totally unwise.

If it is excusable that Chai Ling didn't have a concrete idea of democracy when she was leading that democracy movement two decades ago, shouldn't one expect her to have gained a lot more understanding now, after living in the West for all these years? Or so I'd thought.

It might be helpful to reflect here on a historical case that bears some remarkable similarity: the so-called Times v. Sullivan case in the 1960s, on which the Supreme Court's decision "revolutionized libel law in America." Here's a description of the case from the US supreme court media website:

"Decided together with Abernathy v. Sullivan, this case concerns a full-page ad in the New York Times which alleged that the arrest of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. for perjury in Alabama was part of a campaign to destroy King's efforts to integrate public facilities and encourage blacks to vote. L. B. Sullivan, the Montgomery city commissioner, filed a libel action against the newspaper and four black ministers who were listed as endorsers of the ad, claiming that the allegations against the Montgomery police defamed him personally. Under Alabama law, Sullivan did not have to prove that he had been harmed; and a defense claiming that the ad was truthful was unavailable since the ad contained factual errors. Sullivan won a $500,000 judgment."

At the time, the NY Times was having financial problems, and being charged with this astronomical amount of money put it in the danger of bankruptcy. The paper appealed to the Supreme Court, and "the Court believed it was important for the survival of democracy in the United States that the press be allowed to aggressively report on public matters without excessive fear of being sued for libel." [1] The charge was dismissed. Because of the Supreme Court's wise decision, today we still have the NY Times to read.

Note that this Court decision was made in 1964, and helped establish the precedence to protect the press from similar liability lawsuits. Now it is 45 years later. If Chai Ling had any idea about the meaning of First Amendment, or the meaning of a free press, would she have sued Long Bow? On the societal level, surely she doesn't wish American democracy go backward to what it was before 1964? On the personal level, did she ever worry about others' suspicions of her motives?

In any case, it is certainly another mistake Chai Ling is making, hurting both others and herself, but this time it can no longer be explained away by innocence. How on earth could a woman as smart as she is think she could re-glorify her name through such a lawsuit? From what I can see, Long Bow's on-line appeal has gained extensive support from American academics, the English media, and internet readers (including me), while the appeal written by Chai Ling's ex-husband in her name collected a few signatures hardly reaching beyond the circle of old comrades, some of whom managed to be vague. For example Wang Juntao says in a straddle-the-fence way that he's friends with both sides and he understands and supports both. Go figure.

I wonder if Chai Ling really doesn't see the reality that, while she has succeeded in financially hurting Long Bow, an accompanying consequence is a further deterioration of her own name. And, does anyone notice that her language against Long Bow sound awfully familiar? In 1989, the then-government of China named the student movement a "counter-revolutionary riot," one of the worst crimes at the time. Of course, no one (except some soldiers) believed it. Now Chai Ling calls Long Bow the Communist sympathizer, one of the most hated names in America. Does she really think people with their own eyes and minds would buy that accusation? As an example, this is how the New Yorker commented:

"For the record, to anyone with knowledge of the film, the notion that it is sympathetic to the Chinese government is laughable. But, whatever happens with the suit, it’s hard to imagine a more acute measure of how far the student movement has faded into memory."

In this way Chai Ling not only does disservice to herself but also to the overseas Chinese democracy movement, damage that her million-dollar pledge won’t repair.

But what makes a once brave democracy fighter sink so low as to use the same means of propaganda she had suffered under to attack her foes now? I'm really puzzled. This is the final stroke that manages to erase whatever sympathy I had for her. In the end, her loss might be bigger than Long Bow's. I'm not talking about money.

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[1] The Evolution of American Investigative Journalism by James L.Aucoin

Another Reader's Vertigo

Note: In response to the post "The Vertigo of Foreign-born Chinese," reader aliaeb left the following thought-provoking comment. I'm posting it in its own right because cultural identity is such an important issue, across cultures and worth further discussion. – Xujun

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aliaeb said...

By now, this is an old discussion, but I've only just gotten to it. American politics and post-colonial orientalism set aside (these are topics I might not be very good at discussing), I find the issue of cultural/national identity an utterly confounding, endlessly engaging one. As the inconclusive questions posed at the end of Drifting Leaf's letter imply, there is no answer to the "who am I" of a migrating world citizen born of immigrants. Consider, for one, the excellent and inconclusive novels written by so many Chinese authors who now live abroad or in exile in Paris, Berlin, London and the United States (高行健,趙振開,馬建,哈金). These authors all explore issues of cultural identity, memory and loss, but none say anything affirmative with regard to these issues. I myself am an American with a very mixed European background (which is very typical, right?). I think I've failed, however, at fully identifying with any one cultural heritage, including that of American nationalism. I have studied Chinese language, history and culture for a quarter of my life now, and live abroad in Taiwan with no definite plans to return home. Additionally, my partner is from Hong Kong, and I feel very strongly inclined to start speaking Cantonese in addition to Mandarin. I worry, though, about who I will become. My partner doesn't celebrate any holidays, and I worry about my future children being bereft of either a Christmas or a Chinese New Year. If they are born in Hong Kong, will they be Chinese? Will I be called an expatriate or an immigrant? Are our Children destined to be even more confused than we are with regard to their identities? These are important questions to ask, as world citizens are growing ever more mobile, and our understandings of ourselves ever more complex. I apologize for leaving such a long comment so late in the game, but these are questions I ask myself every single day, and it was a relief and a strange satisfaction to read such a thoughtful letter by someone dealing with the same confusion.

Do I Still Love China?

Last week, Singapore reader Drifting Leaf asked how I see myself. If you read her letter, you will see this question was about cultural identity. She says:

When I see old CCTV/HK/Taiwan TV programs, it brings me back to my childhood. I’m not sure how far I should identify with or support China though. I love classical Chinese culture but the present China/government has quite a negative image.

And:

When we watched the 2008 Olympics, we were uncertain whether we should feel proud of China or not because we are foreign citizens and am not sure if we can lay claim to Chineseness. I believe you still love China despite all its political problems.

Her questions took me through some soul-searching. I moved to the US as an adult and I've been living here for 21 years; my American-born daughter has turned 20 this year. I'm used to the way of life in New England: to pull weeds and plant flowers in the summer garden, or to have five months of winter solitude in a snow-besieged colonial house. Looking back, I seldom thought of the question "What am I?" except that when I visited China in recent years I often felt like a foreigner. Occasionally I had to provide information on my ethnic background ("American Chinese" or "Asian American") when filling out forms, however I don't consider ethnic background the same thing as cultural identity.

In short, I've never really suffered the anxiety of identity loss. Drifting Leaf's questions made me wonder why.

A couple of weeks ago during a library presentation on my book, someone in the audience asked if I'd like to move back to China. Without thinking I replied, "No, my home is here now."

So, what role does Chinese culture play in my daily life in America then? Perhaps the answer lies in a corner of my garden (and yes, that's where my blog hearder comes from):

This is what my husband Bob (that's him in the picture, watering the garden) and I call our "Chinese wall." After we moved to our current home in the summer of 1998, the two of us spent three years of summer weekends building this garden wall with our own hands. Its style was modeled from the gardens of Sichuan, and the patterns of the reticulated windows were taken from the Ming Dynasty garden book <园冶>, which I found in a bookstore in Boston's Chinatown. The inscribed characters on the maroon wooden board above the moon gate are "思蜀", meaning "long for Shu," where "Shu" is the ancient name for Sichuan.

Readers who are familiar with the Three Kingdoms period (220-280 AD) might be able to see this inscription makes a reverse use of the classical allusion "乐不思蜀" – "here is too enjoyable to long for Shu." After the Shu Kingdom was conquered by Wei, the brainless last King of Shu, Liu Chan, was taken to Wei Kingdom's capital Luoyang. During a banquet with Shu dancers performing, all the captured Shu officials began to weep, only Liu Chan giggled as usual. The King of Wei asked him, "Don't you long for Shu?" "Here is so enjoyable, I don't long for Shu," Liu Chan replied. Thus, "too enjoyable to long for Shu" became an adage admonishing those forgetting their roots.

The inscription in my garden, however, is not an admonishment. It reflects my sentiment in a way of "reverse allusion" (i.e.,反其意而用之): whenever I see a Sichuan style garden, I'm emotional – thus the painstaking effort at building the garden wall shown above with the moon gate and the inscribed board. I had never gardened in China, yet in New England I became a diligent gardener. This emotional reaction is rooted in my upbringing in Sichuan, not much different from Drifting Leaf's nostalgic sentiment when she sees traditional Chinese programs on TV.

I'm also fond of Japanese and English gardens, and have tried to make a corner with each style in my yard. However I long for "Shu" more than anything else, and only that part of the garden has sentimental value, thus deeper meaning, to me.

This is to say, the cultural elements from one's upbringing are always there, in the chemistry of your blood, no matter which corner of the world you land in, no matter what you call yourself. That, to me, is cultural identity. It is quite independent from political stance or nationality, as my friend Chiew-Siah pointed out.

I can't help but mention again Ha Jin's latest book, "A Free Life," which is regarded as the author's most autobiographic novel. Anyone who has read it can't possibly miss the protagonist's (thus likely the author's) grudge against China and laud for America, which was why such a boring book was – quite amusingly – hailed by a NYT book reviewer as "a serious [American] patriotic novel" badly needed at a time of Americans' serious protests against the invasion of Iraq.

Ha Jin's book actually provides a good example of "乐不思蜀" – "here is too enjoyable to long for Shu." Its political attitude is not really a surprise given that Ha Jin left China shortly after its most painful time, and his departure to the New World has fixed that old impression in a freeze-frame. Apparently he has been unable to update his view of China as the country updates itself. Despite the political grudge that confused the author, who in turn was confusing politics and cultural identity in his novel, as a realistic writer Ha Jin, perhaps involuntarily, illustrated the independence of the two: while the protagonist is determined to cut ties with anything Chinese, he involuntarily thinks in a Chinese way and applies the traditional Chinese value system in handling business, family and relationships.

Here is another little interlude: recently a library invited several of us to talk about our books. Among the speakers, another woman and I were Chinese. The order of speech was by last name alphabetically; as such I was the first to speak. In introducing my background, I mentioned how all schools were closed and books burned during the Cultural Revolution. When it was the turn for the other Chinese woman, who was originally from Hong Kong, she talked about the Chinese tradition of respecting teachers and books. "Even in mainland China, the CCP only chose the most diligent students as its members," she said. I sort of expected her to acknowledge the practice in the Cultural Revolution as an exception, but she didn't touch anything like that. I wondered if the two of us, each presenting a different aspect of China, had confused the audience. As if she had read my mind, when we were all finished and about to leave, she said to me out of the blue, "You have to talk positive to young readers." Her book was a young-adult novel. Though disagreeing, I nodded understanding.

One could say both she and I share a cultural identity: the Chinese culture. But she had her upbringing in Hong Kong. I'm pretty sure that, had she also experienced the Cultural Revolution, she would have talked quite differently that night. This is to say, the culture that one identifies with is more closely related to personal experiences than ethnicity.

Now, do I still love China despite all its political problems? This depends on what one means by the term "China." When I think of China, what comes to mind are familiar shade of trees, fragrance of flowers, shape of landscape, smell of Sichuan cuisine, peculiar expressions of the Chinese language and intimate faces of relatives and friends. Those, I love. I care. Thinking of them makes me emotional. Thus, China is not an abstract concept to me.

This is also to say, I no longer have an abstract love of China, especially when the name means the state. And that's okay with me. When I was a child, we were taught from the first grade on to "Love the Party, love the people, love the motherland," as if the three were one thing. I had taken the concept of the three abstract and unconditional "loves" as granted, until the Cultural Revolution and my "insert" into the countryside disillusioned me and made me realize how those abstract concepts compromised individuals. In the early 1980s, there was a popular saying among those who were actively seeking migration abroad: "I love the motherland, but the motherland does not love me." (This background might also help to understand the grudge in Ha Jin's aforementioned novel.) I suspect Drifting Leaf's situation now is quite similar to those people's then.

Since my youth in the countryside I've grown averse to abstract political concepts. Having lived in two opposite countries has taught me many things, one of which is it's often less wrong to go for the particular rather than the abstract. The world is being destroyed by abstract concepts and exclusive ideologies. But this is the topic of another long post so I won't keep ranting here, but I, too, would like to cite the Beijing Olympics as an example: I enjoyed very much watching the Olympics, not because it lifted China's international image, but because the performance was superb. On the other hand, I still hold the opinion that the huge government spending on the Games could have found a better use in improving conditions for the Chinese population still in poverty.

So, unlike many "angry youths," I don't unconditionally advocate nationalism, though it had also once been my position in my youth, and I still respect the many great nationalists in China's history. But I will not let nationalism stand in the way of my issuing a critical opinion as a honest writer.

Before I end this piece, let me say a few more words about the style of my garden. Isn't a Chinese garden wall absurd, or 不伦不类, as a companion to a New England Colonial house? Coincidentally, I find answers from a book I'm reading titled Has Man a Future? The book is a transcript of conversations between "The Last Confucian" Liang Shuming and Chicago University professor Guy Alitto. In the Foreword written by Prof. Alitto, he mentions that when he interviewed Mr. Liang in 1980, Liang often talked with assent about Buddhism and Daoism, and also praised Christianity and some parts of Marxism. At first Alitto found it hard to understand: how could one be a Confucian and Buddhist at the same time? How can one identify with both Christianity and Marxism? Eventually he realized that, to be able to fuse many seemly conflicting thought schools, is a distinctive characteristic of traditional Chinese intellectuals. An excellent observation.

Cultural Identity: Perspective from a Malaysian Chinese

Note: Chiew-Siah Tei, the author of Little Hut of Leaping Fishes, is a Malaysian Chinese living in Scotland. We met and became friends during Hong Kong's Literary Festival in March. The following is her response to Drifting Leaf's letter regarding the issue of cultural identity, see yesterday's post "The Vertigo of Foreign-born Chinese." Comments are welcome. (And thank you, Chiew-Siah!) – Xujun

Dear Xujun,

I read your Singaporean reader's letter with much thoughts. Confusion of one's identity is a common issue among persons who live outside their cultural roots, be they Chinese, South Asians, Africans and the like, especially for those who are not first-generations. History has determined our fates. It is impossible to go back in time and amend, but there's time to understand, and with that to accept the unchangeable facts. By acceptance, I don't mean we should defy our cultural roots, but recognise and inherit the culture, while at the same time, acknowledge the country we were born and grew up in to be our homes.

As a fourth-generation Chinese from Malaysia, I can understand how she (I'm under the impression that that's a lady) feels. I myself was once confused, too. After all these years, I've come to realise that, over my adolescent years, I had never doubted my identity as a Malaysian and Chinese, and that I was part of the multi-cultural society, and Malaysia was my home. Here in Malaysia we have a unique Malaysian Chinese culture, which I embrace. Some might say the language, the cultural practices, the food, etc, are no longer authentic, but then, this is the authentic Malaysian Chinese culture! My confusion, however, came later during my university years and after entering society, when I became aware of the racial inequalities, and even became a victim of the unjust policies. It's the politics and the politicians that have confused us, not the country or the culture, and that is part of the reasons of your reader's confusion, as she mentioned of her disappointment at the Singaporean leader.

Today, here in Scotland, I can loudly declare that I am Malaysian; there's no doubt about it. I follow news from home and am closely in touch with friends in Malaysia who are fighting against political and social injustice, giving them support as much as I can, as well as trying to do my part through my writing. This way, I don't feel detached from the country - I would if I were to moan and completely alienate myself from it. I see Scotland is the place I work in, where I can acquire certain degree of freedom, which I will be never be able to enjoy in my own country.

Your reader has no reason not to be proud of the cultural displays at the opening of the Beijing Olympics - in fact I was in tears watching the ceremony. I, like her, a Chinese, recognise our root culture that was once, and still is, a splendour.

My thoughts might be quite different from most people, but I think after all these years, I have grown to see things more clearer. I hope your reader will be clear of her doubts. Accept and understand, these are the two things I wish to stress. In fact, writing my first book has helped me to understand the history and learned to accept it.

Regards,
Chiew-Siah

The Vertigo of Foreign-born Chinese

Note: Yesterday I received a letter from a Singapore reader, who raised an important question about the sense of cultural identity for foreign-born Chinese. Her description of Singapore also surprised me a bit. I'm posting the letter below with permission. Whether you've had similar experiences (as a foreign-born member of some culture) or not, please feel free to chip in for a discussion. We'd love to hear your take on the issue. – Xujun

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Hello, Ms. Eberlein,

I read the post about “China’s image abroad, a preschooler’s perspective” and was shocked by it. However, I am not sure if I should be concerned by China’s image abroad or not. I have very mixed and contradictory feelings about the country.

When I am overseas I am sometimes mistaken for a Chinese national but I am actually Singaporean Chinese. My family migrated to Singapore sometime in the earlier half of the 20^th century during one of the most turbulent periods of China’s history. I believe that my grandparents probably thought of themselves as Chinese, not Singaporeans but later developments in the mainland made it impossible to return. My parents and I are born in Singapore. Unlike the rest of my family, I have never been to China.

Reading your entries, I feel that you still care very much about your homeland though you are an American citizen. May I know how you see yourself? For overseas Chinese whose family did not undergo the Communist period and is unfamiliar with life under the CCP, mainland China is quite incomprehensible. Singapore is not a Chinese country but it does have a 华人社会 of its own because over 75% of the population is of Chinese descent. However, with the influence of British colonialism and other local cultures, the local Chinese culture has evolved quite differently from say, Hong Kong which is 90+% Chinese. We use English in our daily lives, are very westernized and are quite weak in our command of Chinese. Most of us are from Southern China and speak southern dialects at home (my parents cannot understand each other because they speak different dialects so they speak mostly putonghua).

The government has banned all Chinese regional languages in the mass media in the hope of encouraging us to speak putonghua for business purposes. Since there was a lot of regional rivalry between different groups of Chinese in the past, this does have an effect of uniting the local Chinese community but I feel we are slowly losing our identities.

When I was growing up in 80s Singapore, the country was becoming a first world country and there was a sense of optimism and hope in the air. I literally witnessed tall buildings going up and I feel that there was a real sense of togetherness in those days amongst all Singaporeans. Since we were a brand new nation with a heterogeneous population composed of immigrants, the government tried very hard in schools to instill a sense of national identity. I believe that a Singaporean identity would have coalesced naturally but as I grew older, I realize that government policies have consistently led to its erosion.

I feel totally alienated from Singapore nowadays and so do many Singaporeans. As you may know, Singapore has a one-party rule system. As an ordinary Singaporean, I have no say in the way Singapore is run. The wealth gap is growing, we have no labor laws that protect employees and no social safety net. The people who run this country are paid high salaries but the economy is going down the drain. As a result stress levels are ever-increasing and growing numbers of Singaporeans are migrating. Singapore society is becoming increasingly more fragmented and true Singaporean culture is allowed no room to grow.

As such, I’m considering migrating overseas.

If I do succeed in becoming say, a New Zealand citizen, what should I call myself? A Singaporean New Zealander, Chinese New Zealander or just plain New Zealander??? Although I have never been to China, I’m quite attached to Chinese culture/customs (I can read/write Mandarin though not very well) but China itself will be quite alien to me if I go there. I can see myself going there to visit my ancestral hometowns or for travel but not actually working/living there. So my links to my ancestral land are quite problematic yet I am unwilling to let go of my Chinese identity totally for nostalgic reasons because I was brought up celebrating Chinese festivals and customs and they are a part of me. When I see old CCTV/HK/Taiwan TV programs, it brings me back to my childhood. I’m not sure how far I should identify with or support China though. I love classical Chinese culture but the present China/government has quite a negative image.

So what am I? Someone totally adrift without any homeland, roots or culture? If I do go to a new country as an adult, I think I am too old to ever assimilate totally. Especially since I am a visible minority who looks Chinese.

Sorry for such a long letter but I liked your blog entries and can see that you are a thoughtful and intelligent person and wanted to hear your opinion about foreign-born Chinese. I am too embarrassed to discuss this with my best friend though she is aware that I hope to migrate. I have talked to many foreign-born Chinese from all over the world and a lot of us are quite confused about our identities. When we watched the 2008 Olympics, we were uncertain whether we should feel proud of China or not because we are foreign citizens and am not sure if we can lay claim to Chineseness. I believe you still love China despite all its political problems.

Drifting leaf

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Postscript: After reading the letter, I asked about Singapore's political censorship. Drifting Leaf answered:

"In Singapore, there are 3 big taboos: race, religion and politics that no one dares to talk about.

"The internet in Singapore is also censored somewhat but not as comprehensively and severely as in China.

"Local political humor site. The website is run by a Singaporean couple who migrated to New York.

http://www.talkingcock.com/html/index.php

"Singapore has gotten into rows with China a couple of times by the way. Once, it was over our unofficial diplomatic relations with Taiwan. Plus, we are too close to the US.

http://asianfanatics.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=40996&mode=linear

http://www.talkingcock.com/html/article.php?sid=1536 "

Book Review: Global Shanghai, 1850-2010

Global Shanghai, 1850-2010
by Jeffrey Wasserstrom

BlogCritics, book review by Xujun Eberlein, published: May 08, 2009

1.

Shanghai is not just a city; it is a breathing creature with multiple spirits – depending on who's talking about it. Under the classy pen of Wang Anyi, one of the foremost novelists in contemporary China, Shanghai with its mundane gossipy longtang ("an immerse blanket of darkness") possesses the soft Yin of a refined female. In the Chinese textbooks I grew up reading, on the other hand, Shanghai appears to have the vigorous Yang of a revolutionary male, charging valiantly at the frontline against imperialism and feudalism. As if those images are not contrast enough, now Jeffrey Wasserstrom, a professor of history and China specialist, describes another Shanghai through Westerners' eyes in his informative and thought-provoking new book, Global Shanghai, 1850-2010.

Unusual for a historical discourse, the book takes the structure of a photo album, collecting snapshots every quarter century over a period of 160 years. Such a structure has the benefit of tracing a clear, though rough, contour of the city's trajectory. The focus is on Shanghai's early "globalization" (long before this term was created) and current re-globalization, that is, how Shanghai became a cosmopolitan city and where it is going as one.

A cosmopolitan city – what a celebrated label! Surely neither the Chinese nor Westerners have any objection against it. Yet within its historical connotation lies the water-and-fire contradiction in the ways different sides view and feel about it. Even today, reflecting on this history risks bringing out hasty jingoism from all sorts of people. Given the existence of such divergent perspectives, it is Wasserstrom's unswerving and non-judgmental treatment of the subject that interests me the most about the book.

The disparity begins with Shanghai's birth as an urban center. China's official view is that this occurred in 1291, while Westerners think of it as 1843 – the year the city opened to foreign trade. That's a gap of 552 years, not a trivial one, yet each view has its own basis as Wasserstrom eloquently presents. It is, again, more a perspective gap than a technical one, and the foreigners' view certainly goes with the definition of a "cosmopolitan city."

Starting from there, Shanghai's globalization history is full of large and small conflicts, at times bloody, and viewed differently by various parties. Was Shanghai's transforming into an international "treaty port" in November 1843 a national humiliation (a consequence of China's failure in the Opium war), or a turning point toward commercial prosperity and the advancement of civilization? In 1875, was the killing of a British interpreter named Margary by local Chinese in Yunnan a heroic anti-imperialist action as assessed in Chinese publications, or a senseless murder resulting from xenophobia, as viewed by the "Shanghailanders" (Britons and Americans residing in Shanghai)? In 1900, did the Boxer Rebels' siege of the foreign legations in Beijing cause significant setback in Shanghai's technological development? In 1925, was the blood-shedding May 30^th movement – strikes and demonstrations against foreign-run factories in Shanghai – a national struggle, or an isolated assertion of rights by the local citizens? And what can be said about the leading roles of cosmopolitan nationalists, foreign-educated Chinese who were anything but parochial or xenophobic, in that movement? Was the 1950 the dawn "from a nightmare of oppression" as Song Qingling put it, or a beginning point for the "multiple Shanghais collapsing into a solitary entity" as memoirist Lynn Pan experienced?

(Before going further into the later chapters, I must clarify that the above questions are not addressed by the author directly. Instead, taking an interesting stance, the author sides with neither the Chinese nor the Westerners. In other words, he displays more interest in factual accounts rather than interpretations. He lays out facts and different perspectives, and teases out interesting details, while leaving the conclusions to the reader. As such, another reader might see a totally different set of questions raised.)

Thus globalization, as shown in Shanghai's early history, is not a harmless concept or process. It is a struggle between different sets of interests. Had Shanghai not been located by both the South China Sea and the Yangtze River, convenient for transportation into, and out of, China, it would not have attracted the foreign businessmen as early as the 1840s. Globalization at that time was about capitalist expansion and colonialism. The invasive nature of it inevitably resulted in the local people's resistance, thus the constant clashes.

Every coin has two sides. Globalization, then as now, isn't purely evil either. I was surprised to learn from this book that Shen Pao, one of the oldest and most prominent Chinese newspapers, was created by a Briton in 1872. The paper's historical significance is summarized in Baidu.com (the leading Chinese search engine for websites and a cultural discussion forum) as: "In Shen Pao's 78 years of history, it recorded from late Qing Dynasty through ROC all sorts of political, military, economic, cultural and societal information, whose very high historical value resulted in the name 'the encyclopedia of modern history." Furthermore, "Shen Pao's layout was divided into sections of news, commentary, art and ads, which laid out the foundation for the 4-section base structure of modern Chinese newspapers."

Another significant thing brought in by the early globalization was Western architecture. While the old Shanghailanders are long gone, their architecture remains. In fact today it is often cited by foreign residents that, one major attraction of Shanghai is the many old buildings designed by the Britons, French, Americans, etc. Together (and in contrast) with the traditional Chinese longtang, Shanghai is a modern city that preserves an enjoyable diversity in style and "the texture of daily life" (as journalist James Fellows put it), a feature making Shanghai distinct from, say, modern Beijing.

2.

A major problem with globalization is that it forces the uniform development from the "advanced" economy's point of view, regardless the hugely varying conditions and cultures in the so-called "backward" nations and places. Ironically though, in Shanghai's case it was the de-globalization that was to deprive Shanghai of much of its diversity.

As we read on in Global Shanghai, Wasserstrom's chapters for 1950 and 1975 depicted a history more familiar to my generation of Chinese. The foreigners were driven out in early 1950s. Here, the Chinese were supposed to feel elated, having been librated from imperialist oppression. While the latter part was true (as China became a closed country for more than two decades), people also experienced the gradual singularization of the once multiple Shanghais. The uniformity reached its extreme in late 1960s when "All mountains and rivers are a vast red," as a then-slogan read. During the Cultural Revolution, Shanghai again played a leading role: it was the first to set up the "Revolutionary Committee" that replaced the city government, and it became the nation's adjunct political center.

“The empire, long divided, must unite; long united, must divide. Thus it has ever been.” So goes the opening of the Chinese classic Three Kingdoms. After President Nixon's visit in 1972, Shanghai was one of the first cities in China that allowed Western tourists. Gradually China reopened to the outside world, and here comes the re-globalization. In the area east of the Huangpu river, Pudong is now built up in a modernized, futuristic style, with its famous high-speed meglev being the envy of other developing countries. Meanwhile, Puxi, west of the Huangpu, keeps its traditional charm. Shanghai is divided: old Shanghai residents love Puxi nostalgically, and Chinese newcomers with no connection to Shanghai's past prefer Pudong. When I visited Shanghai this February, I was amazed by how dissimilar the two sides look. Yet they co-exist in peace, their differences adding only the attractiveness of diversity.

Still, Shanghai's change is not without irony, and Wasserstrom borrows a line from a book about post-socialist Budapest to describe this aptly: "The boredom of the socialist cities is gone, but so is their safety." No period is perfect.

Meanwhile, foreigners swarm in. According to the Chinese Wikipedia, at the end of 1843, the year Shanghai was established as a treaty port, there were only 25 foreign residents – English missionaries and businessmen registered with the British Consulate. Now the number has exceeded 100,000, the largest among all Chinese cities. A 2004 statistic shows that Americans made up 13.4% of the foreign workforce in Shanghai. In internet discussions, many foreigners even enthusiastically joined the once Chinese-patented oral fight, "Is Shanghai better or is Beijing?"

But Chinese media and academic publications still grumble about how few foreigners there are. It's only 0.67% of Shanghai's total population, too much lower than the 5% world average of big cities, they say. They might have a point, since "Shanghai's natural destiny is to be a global city." The Shanghai government has explicitly stated that, during the 11^th "Five-Year Plan" (2006-2010), enhancing international competence is the city's main development line. One hundred and sixty six years after the treaty port opened, globalization is no longer a foreign imposition; it has become the Chinese government's own pursuit.

On the other hand, a writer friend and Shanghai native views that as only the city leaders' pursuit of official career achievements, for which the common residents feel little relevance. "Shanghai's internalization has been a natural process because of its geography, and it does not have much to do with any local man-made effort," the friend said. From 1843 to 2009, Shanghai has opened, closed, reopened and is poised to embrace the outside. Wasserstrom’s book, by chronicling this evolution, shows Shanghai in its natural light, from which I again see Shanghai as a living, breathing, sometimes bruised, creature.

More about the Chongqing Temple Predicament

Additional details have emerged since my previous post titled "The Predicament of a Buddhist Temple in Chongqing."

It turns out that the people the blogging monk accused of beating him up on April 21st were three officials sent by Chongqing city government to resolve the conflict between the developer and the temple. A report by Southern Metropolitan Weekly titled "Chongqing Hot Spring Temple: Scramble between Commerce and Religion" gives the leading official's name as Yu Baiyan, a director of the Chongqing Committee for Ethnic and Religious Affairs (a department of the city government). Yu claimed that the monk, with monastic name Dingrong, made rude remarks first, then a scuffle occurred. Both men declared injuries.

Interestingly, ten days before the scuffle, it was the same official Yu who told Singapore's Zaobao his version of the real reason for the temple's protest. According to Yu, because the managing abbot, Zhenggang, had a long history of contention with the Beibei district government, the latter wanted to remove Zhenggang from his position. That was what really upset the monks. It was ridiculous to call it a case of the government colluding with a developer, Yu said.

Yu spoke with absolute confidence that he was on the right side. However, he doesn't even have a common netizen's brain. On many websites, readers have been asking "Why should a religious position be appointed by the government?" Right on. If China were still in the Mao era, that would be a wrong question to ask. But 30 years into Reform and Opening, people are expecting more freedom and rights everywhere in the society.

So, whatever the real reasons were behind the Hot Spring Temple's protest, the case has already raised another important issue (in addition to the religious property rights I mentioned in the previous post): the legitimacy of the government's role in controlling religious affairs. If this issue is not resolved, more conflicts will surely ensue. The unenlightened Yu aside, it is time for the Chinese government to adjust its religious policy.

In the current situation, religious personnel are like a daughter-in-law with no husband but having multiple bossy (and sometimes even abusive) mothers-in-law: there's the Committee for Ethnic and Religious Affairs from the government line (市政府民宗委); there's the United Front Work Department from the Party line (市委统战部); there's the Subcommittee for Ethnic and Religious Affairs from the Political Consultative Conference line (政协民宗委); there's also the government-controlled "mass organization" – Buddhist Association (佛协). What a big mess. Do the solitude-seeking monks really need this many mothers-in-law? And, when there is a conflict like this one, none of them help.

Chongqing's Hot Spring Temple isn't the only case of conflict between commercial and spiritual interests. Chinese media reported that on March 20, monks of the famous Famen Temple (法门寺) in Shaanxi Province pushed down a wall built by the developer of a commercial scenic area. The construction named "Famen Cultural Scenic Area" is another government project utilizing important religious cites as attractions for tourists. Once built, the gate ticket price will increase from 25 yuan to 180 yuan, unaffordable by a working class family.

The monks of the Famen Temple said they never liked the idea of being walled into a commercial tourist area that charges high price tickets to visitors, but under the government's coordination, they reluctantly agreed for the temple to be included in the "unified management" of the project. "It was already a big compromise," the managing abbot said. Now that the developer pushed further to have the wall block the temple's driveway, the monks could tolerate it no more. After the wall was toppled by the angry monks, the government mediated and the developer agreed not to rebuild that part of the wall.

Chongqing's Hot Spring Temple will face a similar problem after the luxury spa center opens to the public. The high-priced tickets will certainly diminish the temple's religious activities.

Yesterday I read on monk Dingrong's blog that the government has rejected their proposal to separate the temple from the spa area with a wall. However when I tried to revisit today the monk's blog has been removed. Dingrong (in the picture above) was reportedly a policeman before he became a monk four years ago.

~

I called a friend in Chongqing last week discussing the Hot Spring Temple case. The friend is an intelligent academic who served as a committee member in the Political Consultative Conference (政协) last term. I asked him if there was a way to have 政协 discuss the issues of religious property rights and personnel appointments. He said (with a slightly cynical tone), "You live so far away, and you want to uphold justice here? I admire you for that, but I don't think there's much that can be done."

He told me during his five-year term, he was one of the few committee members who would speak their own minds. For this he became unwelcome in the committee. Before each committee meeting, the leaders in his work unit would forewarn him not to be so disagreeable. Most members are there for the social status. Though 政协 is supposed to be an advisory body to the Party and government, and should consist of different political parties and organizations as well as independent members, today's 政协 members are mostly government officials at various levels. It is now unlikely for a person who doesn't have any administrative position to become a 政协 member. This reminded me what a doctor friend (who I cited in the post titled "What Kind of Country is China Today?") said, "In the local Political Consultative Conference (政协), there may be one third of us [from other parties] and two thirds CCP members, so when taking votes they always win."

My academic friend added that there used to be a time when most 政协 members were knowledgeable professionals from all sorts of fields, and they had sharp minds and fresh ideas. I asked when that was, and he said it was before the June 4^th massacre of 1989. "After the Cultural Revolution, those people had seen the future for China to go on a different political path, so they enthusiastically participated in the Political Consultative Conference. But they lost hope after June 4^th and were gone."

Good Translation is Hard to Find

The China Beat posted a funny Chinese poem with an excellent English translation by David Moser. I especially loved how the rhymes were done, all the while successfully retaining the poem's original humor. In other words, little has been lost in the translation.

An Interview

Aimee Barnes runs an interview with me today. Her blog is quite interesting, especially the interviews with various professionals.

The Predicament of a Buddhist Temple in Chongqing

I have been occupied by several other commitments in the past two weeks, including teaching a fiction workshop for the New Hampshire Writers Day. As such I haven't posted much or kept up with current China news. (I even briefly toyed with the idea of taking refuge from the China-blog world: being an independent blogger is such a lonely business, for she pleases neither lovers nor haters of China.)

Yesterday, however, a blogger friend sent me a link to a post in CDT titled "Thousand Year Old Temple to be Demolished, Luxury ‘Bathhouse’ to Take its Place." Upon reading it, I could no longer sit steadily minding my own business. The Hot Spring Temple, 1586 years old, is located in my birth town, Beibei, a suburban district of Chongqing, and in my childhood that temple and the north hot spring were my family's regular weekend retreat.

I began to search my Chongqing contact list, needing to do something to help stop the commercial developer from demolishing this historical treasure. But I still had questions. What exactly is going on? Who owns the property rights of the Buddhist temple? What is the government's position on this?

From the Chinese blog post translated by CDT, it is unclear what exactly is happening, other than the fact that the monks and local worshippers are very angry at, and frustrated by, the developer's activity around the temple. Though the word 毁 – "destroy" – is used in the post, no demolition plan is mentioned.

Following a link provided by the Chinese post, I found a blog written by an abbot of the Hot Spring Temple, in which he complained about the media's dismissive attitude toward their appeals for help. (One strange thing is that the blog uses a propaganda image of Lei Feng as its header. There must be some reason for this but for now I don't have time to research that.)

In his April 25 (yesterday) post, the abbot blogger said he received a call from Chongqing's government-run "Buddhist Association" ordering him to stop leading Buddhist demonstrations in Beibei's streets, which he said he had not done. Clearly, the government is not on the monks' side.

But a big crowd of the Chinese netizens are; the monks' appeal has been circulated and echoed on major web portals. Probably because of the internet anger, some reporters did take notice. China Economic Times (run by the Development Research Center of the State Council) published a report Friday, which is linked to by the abbot's blog. The report cited arguments from both the developer's and the temple's sides.

The developer, Yunnan's 柏联集团, was actually found and appointed by the Beibei district government, and they signed an agreement to build a giant spa center surrounding the Hot Spring Temple, using the hot spring and the temple as attractions for the spa business. The developer felt wrongly accused of "destroying" the ancient temple. "A vast cursing voice on the internet, we've been treated too unfairly!" A company executive cried to the reporters. He said he couldn't understand, "[The project] should be beneficial and a big promotion for both sides, why do things have to be like this?"

From the monks' perspective, however, a modern spa center encircling the temple breaks the tranquil Buddhist environment and atmosphere, and the massive view of exposed bathers is unacceptable to worshippers. To date, the chaotic construction activities have already damaged some cultural relics and interrupted the temple's religious affairs. Since the construction began, worshipers have been prohibited from entering the temple, the joss sticks and candles stopped burning.

In negotiation, the temple has proposed that the developer builds a wall around the temple's property, in order to block the unsightly entertainment scene in the spa and leave the temple in peace. The managing abbot also wanted to block vehicles from passing through the temple. However the developer rejected those ideas, threatening to withdraw the investment if the temple insists on its position.

The report mentions that the blogger abbot was beaten up by a mob last week and suffered many injuries. But it does not say who the mobs were and how the beating happened.

The report also answers my question about the temple's property rights: It still belongs to a government agency. Even though urban residents in China now enjoy property rights to 70 years, nothing has changed with regard to religious properties. We are talking about the officially legal religions in China, one of which is Buddhism.

Though it turns out that the CDT post has an inaccurate title and it's not a demolition case, I felt little relief. It appears to me this is another serious clash between cultural and commercial interests, and clashes like this have been happening in China frequently ever since the economic reform began. The Beibei district government and the developer see only the commercial benefits the spa project would bring, and have no regard for the cultural significance of maintaining the temple's non-commercial environment. I am not a practicing Buddhist, but I have tremendous respect for Buddhism. I applaud the monks' courage to fight commercialization; their stance is especially commendable given that many temples I have visited in China in recent years have already been willingly commercialized, worshiping money instead of Buddha.

A small comfort brought by the report is that an official from Chongqing's city government has rejected the developer's notion to take over the management of the temple and make it part of their spa business. However, for a more thorough resolution, it may be time for the government to return the property rights to the temple as they had been before 1949.

I will continue to watch the case and report back developments as I can. Meanwhile, dear readers, if you have connections in Chongqing, please do something to help the Hot Spring Temple 温泉寺.

The First Issue of Terracotta Typewriter Published

Take a look at the inaugural issue of Terracotta Typewriter – not particularly because it includes an essay of mine, but because it is an English language literary journal with Chinese characteristics. The magazine (in PDF format) is published by Matthew Lubin, who has lived in China as a teacher and editor. As far as I know, it is the only literary magazine of its kind. Enjoy the poems and prose.

Readers' comments

Apparently my blog is blocked in China again, and readers who reside in China had trouble posting comments. Two readers have sent their comments through email on some recent topics, and I'm posting these for them here:

1. hsknotes commented on "What Kind of Country is China Today?":

You may want to look at some work on 'authoritarian deliberation', or as I prefer to refer to it as, 'deliberative authoritarianism' “审议权威主义”.

as you know, 审议 is just one of the ways of expressing 'deliberation', so you might want to search a few of the others as well.

Rebecca McKinnon gave a long talk on the internet in china where she touched on this, but the idea is not hers. A quick search on the internet can get you to many of the main source, and watching Rebecca's talk may be interesting.

http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/interactive/events/luncheons/2009/02/mackinnon

2. Paul Armstrong-Taylor commented on "Blog Rally to Help the Boston Globe":

Newspapers need to figure out what they can do better than anyone else - TV or other websites. The problem is they try to be all things to all people, and, in any field, there are other places people can get better, more focused information, analysis or whatever.

Take sport: you can go to ESPN (website or TV) for general information; you can go to somewhere like Baseball Prospectus for statistical analysis of baseball; you can go to Sons of Sam Horn for interactive discussion of the Red Sox.

It is simply not possible for one publication to compete with all these sources - and others in news, politics, opinion, business, etc. I think newspapers as we think of them - generalist publications - can not survive. They need to focus on one area where they have an advantage and become the best source for that area. Maybe the WSJ is one example of how to do that - focusing on business.

One area I would like to see newspaper focus on is investigative journalism - trying to uncover the truth when there maybe some who do not want the truth exposed. Generally I think the US media does a poor job of this. Political reporting often consists of: Democrat said X, Republican said Y with no effort to determine the truth and or whether one or both were lying.

I think some effort to use their media access to report the truth not only would improve the knowledge of Americans (compare knowledge about the case for Iraqi WMD prior to the war in the UK and US), but would also providing a compelling reason to buy a newspaper.

The Rise of Political Confucianism in Contemporary China

(Note: In June 2008, The China Beat published my commentary "China: Democracy, or Confucianism?", which helped to draw wide attention to Jiang Qing (蒋庆)'s research on Political Confucianism. I learned last week that, an international conference titled "The Origins and Development of Social and Political Reflection in East and West" was held at Uppsala University, Sweden, and Prof. Wang Rui-Chang from Humanities School of the Capital University of Business and Economics presented a paper to explain Political Confucianism more clearly. I'm posting an excerpt of Prof. Wang's presentation with his permission. – Xujun)

The Rise of Political Confucianism in Contemporary China

by Wang Rui-Chang

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Abstract: Political Confucianism is a newly emerged school of thought addressing political and social reform in Mainland China. It challenges the current prevalent democratic movement, both inside and outside of China, which proposes governance with legitimacy wholly resting on the ballot. Instead, Political Confucianism advocates the wisdom of “centrality and harmony” contained in Confucianism, especially the Confucian tradition of Gongyang School that flourished in the Han and late Qing dynasties in China. It is aimed at revitalizing Confucianism and reconstructing the politics of the Kingly Way in the modern global context. The present paper is meant to give as clear as possibly a presentation of Political Confucianism to current, especially Western, scholars for critical evaluation.

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Background of the Rise of Political Confucianism

Probably anyone who cares about China may have not failed to notice that China is witnessing a revival of Confucianism and traditional culture: more and more scholars come to talk about “national studies”(guoxue); university teachers giving lectures on national television channels become “star scholars” overnight; classics recital classes for children are sprouting up in many parts of the country; thousands of books on Confucianism or traditional culture are piled high and sold well in book stores every day; attending “national studies training class” hosted by the prestigious universities has come to be a fashion for businessmen, civil servants or other part of the more fortunate and affluent part of the population; even the state leaders, as the Canadian political science scholar Daniel A. Bell put it, have also “rediscovered Confucianism."

In 2005, Fang Keli (1938- ), chairman of the Society of the History of Chinese Philosophy, observed:

"Since the May 4th Movement, the New Confucianism movement in modern China has undergone three generations of Confucian scholars and three stages of development. I think, with the 2004 Confucian Conference in Guiyang Yangming Academy ( also known as Summit Conservatism Conference ) as the starting point, the whole New Confucianism movement has now entered on its forth stage, i.e. a stage on which Mainland China Confucians represented by Jiang Qing, Sheng Hong, Kang Xiaoguang, and Chen Ming play the leading role."

In a sense, New Confucianism is a new Neo-Confucianism, a modern version of the Neo-Confucianism as represented by Cheng Hao (1032-1085), Cheng Yi (1033-1107), Zhu Xi (1130-1209), Lu Xiangshan (1139-1193) and Wang Yangming (1472-1529) from Song to Ming Dynasties.

As to the question of politics and social development, the New Confucians unanimously hold the position that China’s traditional political system and the political ideas embodied therein are out of date, and modernization with democracy and science as its true meanings is destined to be China’s political and social future. They argued that although democracy as well as science has been created and developed by westerners in western history, it is rather a “universal instrument” regardless of East or West. Furthermore, democracy, they hold, is actually the inner demand of the logic of Chinese cultural development, it is an instrument by which the ancient sages’ ideal of “making the world under haven impartial and common to all” (tian-xia-wei-gong) could eventually be fulfilled. As the most creative and influential New Confucianism exponent Mou Zongsan put it:

"Modernization takes its origin in the West. However, once it occurs, it is no indigenous product confined to particular countries; as far as it is truth, it is universal. Therefore, every nation must admit it. To put in our old Chinese words, we call it 'the Way of Kingliness', or 'Storing the world in the world itself (letting people themselves rather than emperors decide their own destiny).' To put it in new words, it is 'an open society' or 'democratic politics.' This is a common ideal. For these reasons, although democratic politics originated from the West, we should also realize it according to the requirements of our own inner life."

The New Confucianism flourishing in Taiwan and Hong Kong has exerted strong and durable influence on Mainland China’s intellectual circles since the state of conflict across the Taiwan Strait was lessened and cultural exchange between the two sides became possible when Deng Xiaoping came to power in 1978, and at the same time the New Confucian masters have attracted many sincere followers in the Mainland, some of whom are now quite prominent scholars. But in a strict sense, by “Mainland China New Confucianism” we don’t mean the scholarship of this group of followers who just repeat the thoughts of their masters, but the thought of another group of scholars who, though in a more or less degree influenced by the oversea New Confucianism, are more creative in their thought and have gone on a quite different way from their oversea forerunners. In short, the Mainland New Confucianism is not the simple photocopy of the Oversea New Confucianism.

It should also be pointed out that Mainland China New Confucianism is a newly emerged school of thought that is still in its maturing process, and the major scholars under this name actually develop their own thought with no intentional cooperation and they often fail to agree on many issues.

Political Confucianism, on which the present paper is focused, is developed by Jiang Qing, the leading scholar of Mainland China New Confucianism.

The Main Arguments of Political Confucianism

 
1) Division of “Self-cultivation Confucianism” and “Political Confucianism”

“Self-cultivation Confucianism” and “Political Confucianism” are a pair of terms first coined by Mr. Jiang Qing to denote the two traditions Jiang himself recognized in Confucianism after Confucius. The two traditions are contrasted with each other in many respects: firstly the former is created out of “existential concern," or “concern of life salvation," while the latter is out of “institutional concern,” or “concern of political legitimacy” ; secondly, holding human nature as innately good, the former approaches the issue of elevating human mind and human nature almost wholly by means of self-cultivation, thus moral improvement being none other than restoring one’s humanity a prior, political and social environment being of little relevance, while the latter, taking a realistic point of view of human nature and deeming it is empirically bad, holds that rituals, institutions and penalties are critically important in improving human nature or keeping men or women from moral degeneration; thirdly, the former is aimed at purifying personal life to become a sage or saint while the latter is directed to the construction of a desirable and stable political system and the betterment of society. In a word, Self-cultivation Confucianism is, by its nature, oriented to the inner life of moral idealism while Political Confucianism is oriented to the outer political structure of social realism.

These two traditions, Jiang argued, are all handed down from Confucius and are equally important. Yet unfortunately, after the Han Dynasty this Political Confucianism of Gongyang Studies was entirely neglected and was buried in complete oblivion, so much so that nowadays scholars equate the teachings of the Song-Ming Neo-Confucianism and the modern oversea New Confucianism with the authentic Confucianism.

2) Theory of Three-Dimensional Political Legitimacy

The central theory of Political Confucianism as advocated by Jiang Qing is the doctrine of political legitimacy. He argues that “political legitimacy” is the foundation of, and the prerequisite to, all political system, political process, political activities and tactics, without which everything political loses its meaning and value.

For Jiang, to be fully legitimate, a political power or regime must simultaneously meet three conditions: 1), it must be at one with, or sanctioned by, the holy, transcendental Tao as expressed or implied in the Confucian Scriptures, and as interpreted by the prestigious Confucian Scholars; 2), it must not deviate from the mainstream of the national cultural heritage and break the historical continuity of the nationality; 3), it must comply with the will or endorsement of the common people.

The first condition is of the divine foundation of a political power, which can be symbolized by Heaven; the second is of historical foundation of a political power, being symbolized by Earth, since national culture and civilization are closely connected with particular regions on the earth; and the third is of the human or secular foundation of a political power, symbolized by Human. This is the so-called “the three dimensions of political legitimacy of the politics of the Kingly Way”, a political idea rooted in traditional Chinese political culture.

The dimension of legitimacy of human will and desire sounds easy to be understood by modern people, especially by Westerners, for it seems similar to the democratic idea that government is legitimate to the extent that it derives from people’s support. But Jiang warns over and over again that this democratic dimension of legitimacy should not have superiority over the other two dimensions. A political system is legitimate if and only if all three dimensions of legitimacy are properly balanced, with no one dimension being superior to the others. Jiang argued, it is the ancient Chinese “middle and harmonious” way of thinking, anchored deeply in the Book of Changes and the Spring and Autumn Annals, that makes this non-linear, tridimensional understanding of political legitimacy possible.

The dimension of historical continuity of nationality is the most disputable one of the three, but Jiang insists that this dimension is indispensible. He cited Edmund Burke’s view to support his stance. As we know, in Burke’s eyes, state is an organic body, politics is the outcome of historical evolution, and thus social heritage, or even prejudices, should be taken with respect. Burke said: “To avoid, therefore, the evils of inconstancy and versatility, ten thousand worse than those of obstinacy and the blindest prejudice, we have consecrated the state, that no man should approach to look into its defects or corruptions but with due caution; that he should never dream of beginning its reformation by its subversion; that he should approach to the faults of the state as to the wounds of a father, with pious awe and trembling solicitude. By this wise prejudice we are taught to look with horror on those children of their country who are prompt rashly to hack that aged parent in pieces and put him into the kettle of magicians, in hopes that by their poisonous weeds and wild incantations they may regenerate the paternal constitutions and renovate their father’s life.” For Jiang Qing, if the state was comparable to a father, then the legitimacy of historical continuity would be comparable to a father’s life blood, which cannot be neglected when considering establishing a political system.

This theory of three-dimensional political legitimacy is meant on the one hand to recognize, and on the one hand to circumscribe, the unbridled selfish human desire, whether of a collective nature or an individual nature, and by this way to create a better pattern of political system for China as well as for the world. For these reasons, Jiang asserts that human history, in a proper sense, has by no means “ended” as Fukuyama claims. On the contrary, it urgently waits to be re-created to avoid the“vital defect”in modern democratic politics.

3) Proposition of Tri-Cameral Legislature

To translate this theory of three-dimensional political legitimacy into realities, Jiang proposes to establish a tri-cameral legislature, with each house representing one dimension of legitimacy.

The House of Profound Confucians (Tong Ru Yuan) represents the legitimacy of the sacred Way, the House of National Continuity (Guo Ti Yuan) represents the legitimacy of cultural heritage and tradition, and the House of Plebeians (Shu Min Yuan) represents the legitimacy of the common people’s will and desire.

The particular way of choosing the members of each house of the legislature, and the mechanisms of check and balance among the three houses, are quite complex and are still under elaboration. Of this I can only give a very brief hint. The members of the House of Profound Confucians are chosen by nomination and appointment by non-governmental Confucian organizations and official Confucian institutions; the members of the House of National Continuity should be representatives of religions (including Buddhism, Daoism, Islam, and Christianity) and descendants of great sages and historical figures. The members of the Plebian House are chosen by elections and functional constituencies. According to Jiang’ s latest opinion in An Explanation of The Diagram of the Kingly Way, The Position of the House of Profound Confucians is the highest, the Plebian House is the lowest, and the House of National Continuity is positioned in between. Bills of great importance must be passed simultaneously by all three. If a bill is passed by all of the three Houses, it is a perfect law. If not, it may be delayed, suspended or vetoed. By dint of this device of tri-cameral legislature the theory of tri-dimensional legitimacy is hoped to be embodied.

4) Restoration of Confucian Religion as the State Religion

Jiang’s Political Confucianism is closely connected with his views about the Religion of Confucianism. For Jiang Confucianism is not merely a theory, not simply a system of abstract ideas, it is a great religion embedded in Chinese civilization, being comparable to Buddhism, Islam and Christianity. In ancient China, Confucianism played a role of state religion. To re-establish China’s political system, Confucianism as a religion is indispensible; it should again be restored as the state religion of China. He writes:

"As a state religion, Confucianism has defined the nature of Chinese civilization, molded the cultural identity of Chinese nation, and shaped the axiological consensus and spiritual convictions of the Chinese people.

In history Confucian religion has performed three functions: first, it provided political legitimacy for Chinese government by laying a transcendental and sacred foundation for politics; second, it provided ethical norms to regulate the social conduct of the Chinese people on the basis of rites; third, it provided religious faith for the people on the basis of transcendental and sacred values as interpreted by the Confucian sages. These three functions are not obsolete in the contemporary world. "

Jiang insists that, being faced with all-round challenges from the West, China must restore Confucian religion in all respects and at all levels. To put in his own words: “It is a task of top priority.”

To be sure, Jiang is against the prevalent idea of total separation of sate and religion, but he takes care not to go so far as to tighten state and religion strictly together as was the case in Middle Ages, or in Tsarist era Russia. But still his proposal to enshrine Confucianism as a state religion is deeply unpopular in China’s intellectual circles, even by some scholars otherwise sympathetic to Confucianism. For example, one of China’s top Confucianism scholars and professor of philosophy at Beijing University Chen Lai, welcomes the new departure in Political Confucianism research conducted by Jiang. In fact, he has helped to have Political Confucianism published. Still, he shook head at the idea that does not separate state and church apart. Their main worry is that other thoughts may be treated as heresies and suffer persecution once Confucianism is set up as state religion. To this Jiang answers:

"In the UK, the Anglican Church, the state religion established by the unwritten English common law, boasts of its privileges; in Northern Europe, the Lutheran church, as the state religion, also boasts of its privileges, In modern Greece, the Eastern Orthodox Church, as the state religion established by the Greek constitution, has its privileges as a rule. But all these countries remain the so-called liberal democratic countries. By the same token, to restore Confucianism as the privileged state religion by no means means spiritual persecution, it only means a certain consensus and unity of the Chinese national spirit and mind. No worry is necessary.”

In fact, the history of China also shows that such worry or fear is groundless.

(Wang Rui-Chang, penname Miwan. Some of his writings in Chinese can be found on http://www.confucius2000.com/writer/miwan.htm)

Blog Rally to Help the Boston Globe

We have all read recently about the threat of possible closure faced by the Boston Globe. A number of Boston-based bloggers who care about the continued existence of the Globe have banded together in conducting a blog rally. We are simultaneously posting this paragraph to solicit your ideas of steps the Globe could take to improve its financial picture.

We view the Globe as an important community resource, and we think that lots of people in the region agree and might have creative ideas that might help in this situation. So, here's your chance. Please don't write with nasty comments and sarcasm: Use this forum for thoughtful and interesting steps you would recommend to the management that would improve readership, enhance the Globe's community presence, and make money. Who knows, someone here might come up with an idea that will work, or at least help. Thank you.