approaching locomotive. The train, like China's roaring economy, was an
express.
August 1, 2004
Amid China's Boom, No Helping Hand for Young
Qingming
If his gruesome death was shocking, the life of this peasant boy in
the rolling hills of northern Sichuan Province is repeated a millionfold
By JOSEPH KAHN and JIM YARDLEY; Joseph Kahn reported from Pujia for
this article, and Jim Yardley from other parts of rural China.
across the Chinese countryside. Peasants like Qingming were once the
PUJIA, China— His dying debt was $80. Had he been among China's
core constituency of the Communist Party. Now, they are being left
urban elite, Zheng Qingming would have spent more on a trendy
behind in the money-centered, cutthroat society that has replaced
cellphone. But he was one of the hundreds of millions of peasants far
socialist China.
removed from the country's new wealth. His public high school tuition
China has the world's fastest-growing economy but is one of its
alone consumed most of his family's income for a year.
most unequal societies. The benefits of growth have been bestowed
He wanted to attend college. But to do so meant taking the annual
mainly on urban residents and government and party officials. In the past
college entrance examination. On the humid morning of June 4, three
five years, the income divide between the urban rich and the rural poor
days before the exam, Qingming's teacher repeated a common refrain: he
has widened so sharply that some studies now compare China's social
had to pay his last $80 in fees or he would not be allowed to take the test.
cleavage unfavorably with Africa's poorest nations.
Qingming stood before his classmates, his shame overtaken by anger.
For the Communist leaders whose main claim to legitimacy is
''I do not have the money,'' he said slowly, according to several
creating prosperity, the skewed distribution of wealth has already begun
teachers who described the events that morning. But his teacher -- and
to alienate the country's 750 million peasants, historically a bellwether of
the system -- would not budge.
stability.
A few hours later, Qingming, 18 years old, stepped in front of an
The countryside simmers with unrest. Farmers flock to the cities to
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find work. The poor demand social, economic and political benefits that
week. The problem is that the gap has widened partly because the
the Communist Party has been reluctant to deliver.
government enforces a two-class system, denying peasants the medical,
To its credit, the Chinese government invigorated the economy and
pension and welfare benefits that many urban residents have, while often
lifted hundreds of millions of people out of abject poverty over the past
even denying them the right to become urban residents.
quarter century. Few would argue that Chinese lived better when
Even in a country that ruthlessly punishes dissent, some three
officials still adhered to a rigid idea of socialist equality.
million people took part in protests last year, police data show. Most
But in recent years, officials have devoted the nation's wealth to
were farmers, laid-off workers and victims of official corruption, who
building urban manufacturing and financial centers, often ignoring
blocked roads, swarmed government offices, even immolated themselves
peasants. Farmers cannot own the land they work and are often left with
in Tiananmen Square in Beijing to demand social justice.
nothing when the government seizes their fields for factories or malls.
India, the world's other developing giant, has a less pronounced gap
Many cannot afford basic services, like high school.
between urban and rural living standards, and an open political system.
This year, the number of destitute poor, which China classifies as
In May, India's governing party lost an election largely because the
those earning less than $75 a year, increased for the first time in 25 years.
strong economic growth did not trickle down fast enough to the rural
The government estimates that the number of people in this lowest
masses.
stratum grew by 800,000, to 85 million people, even as the economy
''This government has recognized the problem of lopsided
grew by a robust 9 percent.
development,'' Chen Xiwen, the top rural policy coordinator for China's
No modern country has become prosperous without allowing some
prime minister, Wen Jiabao, said in a recent interview. ''Yet India does
people to get rich first. The problem for China is not just that the urban
show that if this problem cannot be managed rationally, it could become
elite now drive BMW's, while many farmers are lucky to eat meat once a
a danger'' for the Communist Party, he said.
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Mr. Wen and Hu Jintao, the president and Communist Party chief,
they said financial worries and family pressure weighed most heavily.
have promoted a new ''scientific development'' plan, emphasizing social
For in an era when peasants have long since lost their ''iron rice
fairness in addition to fast economic growth. Mr. Wen also ordered
bowl,'' the state's guarantee of a livelihood, Qingming wanted to attend
officials to reduce taxes on farmers.
college not only as a matter of pride, but also because he needed to
But for now the party's strongest reaction to reports of rural
provide for his relatives.
discontent is to suppress them. A muckraking exposé on illegal taxation
''Qingming had the talent to go to college, but he did not have the
and police abuses in the countryside was banned this spring, just after it
money,'' said Deng Jun, a classmate and close friend. ''He could not bear
became a best seller.
being left behind.''
A seven-page official report on the death of Zheng Qingming,
A Village Defines Poverty
prompted by questions submitted to the Sichuan authorities by The New
Sichuan's hill country, north of the metropolis of Chongqing, is as
York Times, concluded that the school did everything possible to help
picturesque as it is poor. The landscape is lush and green from spring
his poverty-stricken family. It denied that the school had insisted he pay
rains, but summer brings a stifling heat that shrouds the region, ''China's
his tuition. It said insanity led to his death.
oven,'' in a halo of steamy mist.
''The investigation team thinks that the school's handling of Zheng's
The Zheng family village, Sanceng, is nestled into a mountainside,
death was objective, just, voluntary and humanitarian,'' the report
accessible by a dirt trail that climbs through terraced rice paddies. The
concluded.
rumble of a waterfall drowns the occasional roar of trucks passing below.
Yet relatives, classmates and several teachers gave a starkly
Making a phone call requires a sweaty 20-minute hike to a dusty
different account. They said the school hounded Qingming to pay his
roadside store.
debt. Several friends said he behaved erratically in his final weeks, but
The house the Zhengs share with several other families has
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electricity but little else. It is a sprawling barnlike structure built of adobe
to pay tuition.
and wood more than a century ago. Food is cooked on open wood fires.
The elder Mr. Zheng had few ways of making money. He had little
At lunch smoke chokes the interior and leaves doors and windows
schooling and could not read. But even at 74, his strapping forearms and
stained with black ash.
muscular hands look as if they belong on a weightlifter, or a convict
Zheng Qingming grew up here by chance. He was born a second
doing hard labor. He found work chopping stones into pebbles to make
child to parents who could not afford the fine they faced under the one-
roads.
child policy if they wanted to rear him. Just after birth he was secreted
''Every cent that came in went right out to pay his school fees,'' Mr.
into the care of his mother's brother and sister-in-law, who are both
Zheng said. ''As you can see,'' he added, waving his hand around his
mentally retarded.
earthen home, ''there wasn't enough for anything else.''
His foster parents were often mute and disoriented, and the burden
Qingming proved a worthy investment. His high-school admission
of raising him fell on his maternal grandparents. He was given the family
test score qualified him to attend the area's top school, in Dazhou.
name of his grandfather, Zheng Zili, who raised the boy to be the healthy
But his grandfather worried that money and class put that out of
son he never had.
reach. He had once seen schoolchildren in Dazhou wearing sporty
''I carried him on my back every day in the fields,'' Mr. Zheng
windbreakers and sneakers, not the padded blue Mao jackets and sandals
recalled in his thick hill-country accent. ''That child grew so fast. I started
many peasants wear. He said he feared city youngsters would look down
with one box of milk powder a week, but soon that didn't last three days.''
on his grandson. Moreover, the basic tuition at the local high school, in
The family grows corn and rice, and raises a dozen chickens and
Pujia, was half as much.
ducks on a half-acre of land. They produce enough food to eat but little
If Qingming resented missing the chance to attend an elite school,
extra to sell, a problem when Qingming reached school age and needed
he did not tell his closest friends. ''He knew the reality of his family's
4
situation,'' said Deng Jun.
Even so, migrants are an underclass. They do not have residency
In school in Pujia, Qingming excelled in biology, and dreamed of
rights in cities. They cannot easily send their children to school there.
becoming a doctor. He also loved literature. He filled his scrapbook with
They are often abused by employers.
clipped essays and wrote his own ditties. One he repeated so often that
College offers a brighter path to legal residency, a white-collar job
his grandfather recites it from memory:
that pays a steady salary and provides a safety net for the whole family.
The challenge for a rural youth like Qingming is getting there. Only
Do not toady to those above.
Do not flatter the rich.
Do not cheat the poor.
Make way for a new generation.
15 percent of college-age youth get any tertiary education, and most are
urban.
As he entered his senior year, with marks that put him in the top tier
Top colleges cater to the elite and favor children in their home
of his class, he and his grandfather imagined that Qingming might go to
cities, often requiring rural students to outperform urban counterparts on
college.
national tests.
The Rutted Road Out
Even in the days of Mao Zedong's radical egalitarian ideology,
For most rural Chinese teenagers, college is a distant hope.
workers in cities lived better, enjoying cradle-to-grave benefits provided
Compulsory education ends after ninth grade, and most youths then hop
by factory or government work units. Farmers had a semblance of
a train or bus to the swelling cities to eke out a living at a low-wage
collective welfare when they lived in communes, though standards were
factory or construction site.
lower.
More than 100 million people leave the farm each year, and they
Today, the gap has grown. Nearly all urban residents get health
send back $45 billion to their relatives. Without this money, many
insurance through their companies or the government. Cities have bigger
villages would wither and die.
budgets and better schools with lower tuition. The government mandates
5
this because it worries that urban residents could more easily organize
By Western standards, the long list of fees -- tuition, dormitory
and rebel if they lost their economic security.
rooms, textbooks, computer access -- may seem a pittance, about $290 a
The countryside is another story. Deng Xiaoping dismantled
year. But that is more than the $253 average per-capita income for
inefficient communes a quarter century ago in favor of land contracts,
farmers in Sichuan in 2002. A comparable ratio in the United States
raising rural output. But the government gutted services as well. Rural
would have public schools charging each student about $43,000 a year.
governments get almost no support from wealthier areas. They tax local
Even so, Zheng Zili had kept his grandson up-to-date on school
farmers and impose endless fees to finance schools, hospitals, road
payments until winter of his senior year, when he was hit by what might
building, even the police.
seem like a perfect storm of financial problems, except that they were
A new study by Li Shi, a leading Chinese sociologist, concludes
perfectly ordinary.
that China's urban-rural gap grows to extreme levels -- higher than any
His boss at a government road project stopped paying him. Mr.
other nation's -- when urban housing, education, welfare and health care
Zheng was given I.O.U.'s, totaling $200. He made trips to the county
benefits are considered along with income.
construction bureau to demand payment. Officials alternately blamed
Qingming and his family would have had a hard enough time
middlemen and superiors. Nobody got paid.
overcoming these obstacles. But this year the pressure became greater
Then Mr. Zheng's wife, who is 78, took ill with lung disease. Like
for a simple reason: money.
most peasants, they have no medical insurance. The hospital demanded
No Money? No School
$250 for treatment and drugs. The family savings were exhausted.
Pujia Senior Middle School, the formal name of Qingming's high
As Qingming entered the final half of his senior year, his family
school, is a grimy building where students pay enormous fees to get a
was behind on school payments, and the strain began to show.
government education.
Qingming's teacher, Zhang Xudu, often scolded him in front of the class
6
for not having paid his tuition, classmates said. The teacher said,
say, the pressure got to him.
''Anyone who hasn't paid his fees must do so immediately.'' Everyone
A student who shared his dorm room said Qingming had
knew he meant Qingming.
nightmares, moaning about school fees and his teacher. He began having
Qingming returned home several times to request money, and the
disciplinary problems. He picked fights with classmates. He once
family raised what it could. His grandfather wrote to a distant relative on
inexplicably stormed out of class during a lecture.
the coast who mailed 500 yuan, or $60. Qingming still owed $80 to the
On May 6, Mr. Zhang told Qingming to join him on a trip. They
school.
went by motorcycle to Sanceng to meet Mr. Zheng, the grandfather. As
The teacher, Mr. Zhang, did not return repeated phone calls seeking
Mr. Zheng recounted, the teacher told him his grandson had been
comment. But the official investigation of Qingming's case said the
misbehaving so badly he suspected the boy might have ''mental
teacher had not pressed the young student to pay his debts.
problems.''
Qingming, friends said, had always been frugal. But his
Qingming, who was standing by his grandfather's side as the teacher
economizing in his senior year set him apart. He spent 40 cents each
spoke, shot back, ''You're the one who has mental problems,'' Mr. Zheng
meal for vegetables and rice at the school cafeteria. Many others spent
said. Qingming then dashed out of the house and returned to school on
double that and ate pork, chicken, soybean curd or eggs.
his own.
''Qingming ate meat just once a week,'' one classmate recalled. ''He
A few days later, Mr. Zheng tried to smooth things over. He
went home and his grandmother killed a chicken.''
collected 50 eggs from his chickens and hitched a ride to Pujia. He sold
His academic promise was confirmed when he tested into the most
the eggs, earning $6. Then he invited the teacher to dinner. The $6
elite class at the school. But with the college entrance exam looming and
bought several meat dishes and two bottles of beer. ''Officials expect
his tuition payment still unresolved, Qingming's friends and classmates
favors,'' Mr. Zheng said.
7
He said he urged Mr. Zhang that day to agree to waive the school
Later that day, Qingming was spotted at a railroad depot. He was
fees, pleading poverty. The grandfather said the teacher ''gave me the
wandering on the tracks, barefoot. According to a police report, a railway
impression'' that the request would be considered, but he never received a
officer asked him what he was doing. Qingming said he worked for
formal reply.
Interpol, then scurried away.
Just after 9:30 that night, he came back and stood his ground. The
The End of a Promising Life
The matter came to a climax on June 4, three days before the
train that crushed him was No. 1006, the Chongqing-to-Beijing express.
college entrance exam, teachers and classmates said.
His jacket, containing one arm and his identification card, was found 30
Mr. Zhang called Qingming to his desk. As classmates listened, Mr.
yards from his body.
Zhang insisted, again, that Qingming must pay his $80 debt. Otherwise,
The Bureaucrats Close the Books
the school would withhold his license to take the exam, effectively
Qingming's death sent shock waves through the school. Teachers
ending his hopes of attending college.
said school officials were obsessed with fending off outside inquiries.
Qingming said flatly that he had no money. One classmate stood up
When the police first notified the school, officials initially denied
and volunteered to sell blood to help Qingming.
Qingming was a student there, said one teacher involved in the
''I don't care if you sell a life,'' Mr. Zhang responded, according to
discussions. The reason cited was that Qingming had failed to pay his
teachers who looked into the incident later. ''He pays the fees or he
tuition, and so was not a registered student in the school's care.
doesn't take the test.''
A few days after the incident, school officials traveled to Sanceng to
Qingming exploded. He kicked an umbrella across the room, then
visit the family. Zheng Zili was not there that day. But the officials found
picked it up and threw it out the window, the teachers said. He then fled
Qingming's uncle, his mentally handicapped foster father. They offered
the building.
him 18,000 yuan, or $2,150, to sign a document that absolved the school
8
of culpability. The uncle signed the paper and took the money.
The official investigation confirmed that Mr. Yang made teachers
Officials have issued two reports on the death: one an internal
accountable for tuition and that he docked the pay of a teacher for this
document the school sent to higher authorities in June, the other
reason. But it said Mr. Yang did not link school fees to the college exam.
prompted by questions from The Times in July. They both maintain that
Ultimately, the authorities insist, Qingming died accidentally
the school never pressed Qingming to pay his dues. They also say the
because he ''lost his mind''; he did not intend to commit suicide. Several
school reduced his tuition because of his family's poverty. But they differ
students said their teacher had arranged individual meetings with them
significantly on the details of when and how much the school reduced his
after Qingming's death to remind them of his erratic behavior and to
fees.
impress upon them that they should emphasize this if outsiders asked
Officials also said they found no evidence that Qingming and Mr.
about the case.
Zhang had had a confrontation on June 4, the day of his death. But in an
Mr. Zheng, the grandfather, dismissed the official explanations of
account of Qingming's death in a state-owned newspaper, the West
what happened. He said the school never reduced his grandson's tuition.
China City Daily, Mr. Zhang was quoted as saying he had last spoken to
He said Qingming was upset, not insane. He is suing the school for
Qingming on June 4 and had told him that he must pay his fees.
having caused Qingming's death.
Teachers said that even if Mr. Zhang had wanted to help, he might
All he has left now to remember the grandson he once carried on his
have had few options. They said the school's headmaster, Yang Fangfu,
back is a stack of workbooks -- trigonometry, politics, history. Mr.
held teachers responsible for their students' tuition and used the college
Zheng does not recognize enough Chinese characters to read them. But
exam as leverage to collect debts. The year before, they said, Mr. Yang
he keeps the books as memorials.
deducted $75 from the salary of one teacher after two of his students,
One is Qingming's scrapbook. Near the end, Qingming pasted in a
citing poverty, did not pay their tuition.
magazine article about a retarded farm girl. She was raped, then
9
abandoned by her relatives for the shame she inflicted on them. In the
Mr. Obama and the Democrats who favor labor standards in trade
margins of the text, Qingming scribbled his thoughts: ''We must extend
agreements mean well, for they intend to fight back at oppressive
our helping hand to any innocent underdog. Only by so doing can that
sweatshops abroad. But while it shocks Americans to hear it, the central
person find a footing in society.''
challenge in the poorest countries is not that sweatshops exploit too
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many people, but that they don’t exploit enough.
*
Talk to these families in the dump, and a job in a sweatshop is a
January 15, 2009
cherished dream, an escalator out of poverty, the kind of gauzy if
Where Sweatshops Are a Dream
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
probably unrealistic ambition that parents everywhere often have for
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia—Before Barack Obama and his team
their children.
“I’d love to get a job in a factory,” said Pim Srey Rath, a 19-year-
act on their talk about “labor standards,” I’d like to offer them a tour of
old woman scavenging for plastic. “At least that work is in the shade.
the vast garbage dump here in Phnom Penh.
Here is where it’s hot.”
This is a Dante-like vision of hell. It’s a mountain of festering
Another woman, Vath Sam Oeun, hopes her 10-year-old boy,
refuse, a half-hour hike across, emitting clouds of smoke from
scavenging beside her, grows up to get a factory job, partly because she
subterranean fires.
has seen other children run over by garbage trucks. Her boy has never
The miasma of toxic stink leaves you gasping, breezes batter you
with filth, and even the rats look forlorn. Then the smoke parts and you
been to a doctor or a dentist, and last bathed when he was 2, so a
come across a child ambling barefoot, searching for old plastic cups that
sweatshop job by comparison would be far more pleasant and less
recyclers will buy for five cents a pound. Many families actually live in
dangerous.
I’m glad that many Americans are repulsed by the idea of importing
shacks on this smoking garbage.
10
products made by barely paid, barely legal workers in dangerous
impact on production costs that companies are always trying to pare. The
factories. Yet sweatshops are only a symptom of poverty, not a cause,
result is to push companies to operate more capital-intensive factories in
and banning them closes off one route out of poverty. At a time of
better-off nations like Malaysia, rather than labor-intensive factories in
tremendous economic distress and protectionist pressures, there’s a
poorer countries like Ghana or Cambodia.
special danger that tighter labor standards will be used as an excuse to
Cambodia has, in fact, pursued an interesting experiment by
working with factories to establish decent labor standards and wages. It’s
curb trade.
When I defend sweatshops, people always ask me: But would you
a worthwhile idea, but one result of paying above-market wages is that
want to work in a sweatshop? No, of course not. But I would want even
those in charge of hiring often demand bribes — sometimes a month’s
less to pull a rickshaw. In the hierarchy of jobs in poor
salary — in exchange for a job. In addition, these standards add to
countries, sweltering at a sewing machine isn’t the bottom.
production costs, so some factories have closed because of the global
My views on sweatshops are shaped by years living in East Asia,
economic crisis and the difficulty of competing internationally.
watching as living standards soared — including those in my wife’s
The best way to help people in the poorest countries isn’t to
ancestral village in southern China — because of sweatshop jobs.
campaign against sweatshops but to promote manufacturing there. One
Manufacturing is one sector that can provide millions of jobs. Yet
of the best things America could do for Africa would be to strengthen
sweatshops usually go not to the poorest nations but to better-off
our program to encourage African imports, called AGOA, and nudge
countries with more reliable electricity and ports.
Europe to match it.
I often hear the argument: Labor standards can improve wages and
Among people who work in development, many strongly believe
working conditions, without greatly affecting the eventual retail cost of
(but few dare say very loudly) that one of the best hopes for the poorest
goods. That’s true. But labor standards and “living wages” have a larger
countries would be to build their manufacturing industries. But global
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campaigns against sweatshops make that less likely.
His remarks apply equally well to good intentions. And one such
Look, I know that Americans have a hard time accepting that
Western good intention may actually end up doing more harm than good.
sweatshops can help people. But take it from 13-year-old Neuo
In the Western mind, the recent award of the Nobel Peace Prize to the
Chanthou, who earns a bit less than $1 a day scavenging in the dump.
Chinese dissident, Liu Xiaobo, was an unmitigated good. Several
She’s wearing a “Playboy” shirt and hat that she found amid the filth,
Western commentaries said the prize should be given to “individuals
and she worries about her sister, who lost part of her hand when a
struggling against the overwhelming force of an oppressive state or an
garbage truck ran over her.
unjust social order.” In these pages, the chairman of the Norwegian
“It’s dirty, hot and smelly here,” she said wistfully. “A factory is
Nobel Committee, Thorbjorn Jagland, compared Liu to Andrei
better.”
Sakharov, another Nobel Peace Prize winner, who struggled against
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“human rights abuses in the Soviet Union.”
*
Many Chinese, however, believe that the award of the Peace Prize to
November 11, 2010
Liu could well do more harm than good. Few Chinese intellectuals,
Counterpoint: An Ignoble Nobel
By KISHORE MAHBUBANI
inside or outside China, have celebrated the award, publicly or privately.
In an article on these pages on Oct. 23 (“Why China is wrong about Liu Xiaobo”),
Thorbjorn Jagland, the chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, argued against
the notion that supporting a Chinese dissident could worsen conditions for the
opposition, asserting that silence undercuts the most basic tenets of human rights. Mr.
Mahbubani continues the debate.
They do not believe that a candle has been lit for freedom. Instead, this
award may set back the steady progress toward more personal freedom
in China. This inability of the West to understand that there may be an
SINGAPORE — Max Weber once wisely stated, “It is not true that
alternative point of view could well create a major problem for the
good can only follow from good and evil only from evil, but that often
world.
the opposite is true. Anyone who says this is, indeed, a political infant.”
Over the past 30 years, the Chinese government has done far more
12
good than harm both for China and the world. The largest poverty-
standards when it comes to judging human-rights violations. It does not
reduction exercise in human history was achieved by the Chinese
condemn American society because it violated every canon of human
government. When Deng Xiaoping launched his famous reforms in
rights by being the first modern Western society to reintroduce torture.
1978, over 800 million people lived in absolute poverty. Today, fewer
Instead, it sees Guantánamo as a blemish that should not take away from
than 200 million do. Over 600 million were lifted out of absolute
all the good that American society has done. The same judgment should
poverty.
apply to Deng: Tiananmen was a blemish that
For this achievement alone, Deng should have earned the Nobel
should not take away from all the good that Deng had done.
Peace Prize. But he did far more. He took great political risks in opening
Equally importantly, the West needs to understand that for Deng to
up China. He allowed foreign investment and opened up China to
achieve all the good he did for China, he had to maintain social and
Western influence. He sent hundreds of thousands of young Chinese to
political order even as Chinese society opened up dramatically to the
study in Western universities. He did all this aware that they could come
world. In the Western political imagination, the march to progress is
back with ideas that could undermine the Chinese system. It is hard to
made by steadily weakening the state and enlarging individual freedom.
think of any other recent leader who has been as courageous as Deng.
In the Chinese political experience, the weakening of the Chinese state
Before him, the Chinese had no freedom to leave their villages, let alone
has inevitably led to chaos and enormous personal suffering. There can
leave China. Today, over 40 million Chinese leave China freely each
be no doubt that the past 30 years since Deng’s reforms began have been
year. And they return to China freely each year. China today is at least
the best 30 years that the Chinese have experienced since the Opium
one thousand times less oppressive than it used to be.
War of 1842.
So why was Deng not considered for the Nobel Prize? One word:
One reason for this is that the Chinese government managed to find
the right balance between opening up society and maintaining order —
Tiananmen. Tiananmen was a mistake. But the West has double-
13
and that in a country of 1.3 billion people.
Kishore Mahbubani is dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy
at the National University of Singapore.
The Nobel award to Liu could upset the delicate political balance in
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China by stirring up a “color revolution,” reintroducing chaos to China
and setting it back 150 years. That, in turn, could lead to an overreaction
January 2013
by the Chinese government and a clampdown on the many personal
A Press Renaissance? The Legacy of China's
'Southern Weekend'
freedoms the Chinese people have gained in recent decades. In short, the
By Helen Gao
Liu award could generate less, not more, personal freedom.
What effect will the Southern Weekend incident have on the future of
Over time, China will become a democracy, especially when it
Chinese media?
develops the world’s largest middle class. However, it is likely to get
As the curtain falls on a dramatic week-long standoff between
there faster if the present balance of rapid economic transformation and
Chinese journalists and their state censors, which had evoked a torrent of
gradual political transformation is maintained. Few Chinese believe that
public discussion on issues such as freedom of speech, it may have
the West is trying to do China any good by trying to accelerate the
heralded a new era for civil dissidence in China.
political transformation. Indeed, most Chinese believe that the Western
Immediately following the New Year, journalists at Southern
agenda is to unleash the same chaos in China as it did with instant
Weekend, a newspaper based in the southern province of Guangdong,
democracy in Russia. When Jagland compared Liu to Sakharov, he
staged a high profile protest against their censors, who had watered down
confirmed the Chinese conviction that the goal of this prize is to
the paper's New Year editorial urging greater respect for constitutional
destabilize China. If the West persists in its refusal to understand China’s
rights. The newspaper staff demanded the resignation of Tuo Zhen, the
fundamental concerns, it will do more harm than good with its good
propaganda chief of Guangdong province, and threatened to go on strike,
intentions.
and their moves have galvanized tens of thousands of Chinese free
14
speech advocates. On Sina Weibo, China's Twitter-like social network,
riling the handlers, the paper's staff has over the years learned to exercise
countless users rushed to post and repost messages about Southern
their own judgment in navigating the censorship minefield. Although the
Weekend in an effort to thwart online authorities. Crowds gathered
task of self-censorship has left them disgruntled, by and large they have
outside the newspaper's headquarters, carrying slogans demanding
acquiesced, knowing that the compromises were crucial to the
freedom of expression and other constitutional rights.
newspaper's survival.
In a nation where censorship is a fact of life, the newspaper staff's
The censors' most recent meddling with the New Year's Greetings,
brazenness has stunned many observers. The event's quick
however, appears to have been the last straw. More than anything else, it
transformation from an editorial spat into a national-wide political
has trampled upon the newspaper's sense of journalistic integrity, already
campaign is also remarkable. Together, they are evidence of the public's
weakened through more subtle methods of censorship.
growing impatience with the state's draconian control of their private
"It is our view that Minister Tuo Zhen's actions overstep the bounds,"
lives, and their increasing willingness to find reasons to seek redress for
wrote a number of former Southern Weekend journalists in an open
their grievances.
letter, according to a translation provided by China Media Project. "They
The Democracy Report For a long time, journalists at Southern
are dictatorial ... they are ignorant and excessive."
Weekend, a relatively liberal voice in the Chinese media sphere, have
"The New Year Greetings is like the face of our publication, and this
managed to maintain a functional, if uneasy, coexistence with censors.
is a slap in the face," as one journalist -- who left Southern Weekend last
Each article goes through four rounds of scrutiny -- by the reporter, the
year after a 10-year stint and who prefers not to be named -- told me. "If
editor, the managing editor and the editor-in-chief -- before it reaches a
you keep putting up with things like this, how can you live among other
group of final "reviewers," mostly retired party-loyal journalists
media professionals in the industry?"
deployed by the state to serve as the newspaper's handlers. To avoid
If the journalists' anger has led to open letters and a strike, it has
15
led them to conduct some soul-searching among themselves: what have
government critics like writers, lawyers and academics, movie stars,
they done, or failed to do, that allowed such things to happen?
corporate executives, students, and tens of thousands of other ordinary
"We are like frogs being slowly cooked in warm water," the former
citizens have joined the fight. Many of their messages at the protests
Southern Weekend journalist told me. "We were perishing slowly
show a new sense of urgency.
without knowing it, until this bowl of boiling water was dumped on us."
"If I don't stand up today, I won't be able to stand up tomorrow," a
"All these years, people like us have seen our articles killed and our
sign outside Southern Weekend's Guangzhou headquarter read.
voices silenced, and we've started to get used to it. We started to make
"We can still choose to stay silent and passive today, in the face of
compromises and to censor ourselves," reflected Lin Tianhong, a
power that has run amok," students at Sun Yat-sen University wrote in
Chinese journalist at Renwu magazine, in a message that had been
an open letter titled "Today, We Have No Choice." "It is because we
reposted over 5,000 times. "We've gone too far, as if we have forgotten
have yielded to power that it has become unbridled and wanton; it is
why we had chosen this industry to begin with."
because we have been silent that the Constitution has become a rubber
Just as journalists consider their collective acquiescence to censorship
stamp."
in the past partially responsible for their current humiliation, citizens who
Similar sentiment has also prevailed on Sina Weibo, where outspoken
decided to speak out are also demonstrating a keener awareness of their
Web users urged fellow citizens to join their cause. "Don't think press
own civil responsibilities. Large-scale protests in China in the past were
freedom is only the journalists' concern," one user named
triggered mostly by perceived foreign affronts or economic grievances,
ConnieLeelixin wrote in a message. "Everyone should have freedom of
and limited mainly to the working class. In the most recent protest over
expression, and that is exactly what [the Southern Weekend journalists]
speech, however, both online and on the street, middle- and upper classes
are fighting for." "I used to think things were OK as long as I was able to
have come out in large numbers. Besides the traditionally more vocal
lead my happy life. But now I realize this is the environment we all live
16
in," user mmx139 wrote. "It's the environment our children and
will be affected by the actions they collectively take or fail to take.
grandchildren will live in. If so, how are they going to have a free mind
The Tiananmen movement is still a taboo subject in Chinese public
and free will?"
discourse, and few in the most recent protest brought it up. Instead, most
In a widely reposted message, Web users found inspiration in the
protestors made carefully calibrated demands that dovetailed with calls
story of Rosa Parks, the iconic African American civil rights activist.
from incoming president Xi Jinping for stronger constitutional
"Her sitting down allowed African Americans to stand up...Perhaps she
protections. Now is a perfect opportunity to test the strength of the
wasn't thinking about bravery, but was just very tired, and had had
leadership's commitment to fulfilling its pledges -- and more tests are
enough of the rules [of racial segregation]," the message read. "When
sure to come.
we've all had enough, history has then reached a tipping point."
For now, demonstrations over the Southern Weekend spat are
Some Western observers have found parallels between the current
winding down, and journalists have returned to work. They put out the
protest and China's democracy movement in 1989. Granted, the new
paper's newest weekly edition on Thursday. They have extracted promise
protest, which germinated on the Internet, does not compare in its scale
from provincial officials to loosen some of the intrusive censorship
to Tiananmen, which mobilized tens of thousands. The current
control, and will be closely watching how the deal will be followed
protestors' demands, which are largely focused on rights enshrined in the
through.
constitution, are far less radical than the student rally's cry for democracy
On the day of the agreement, however, another face-off took place at
and a multi party system 23 years ago. However, the current protestors
Beijing News, a sister newspaper of Southern Weekend. The News
do share with their 1989 counterparts a rising level of civil consciousness
balked at pressure from censors to print an editorial attacking Southern
in their words and actions. They perceive themselves as members of an
Weekend. The editorial eventually appeared on Wednesday's edition of
organic society to which they bear responsibility, and one in which each
The News, while a detailed account of the incident offered by a journalist
17
daughter’s education.
at the paper also came into public view. "The way news is managed, I
feel that I should be a witness," it began.
Many families in the West sacrifice to put their children through
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/01/a-pressrenaissance-the-legacy-of-chinas-southern-weekend/267081/
Copyright © 2013 by The Atlantic Monthly Group.
*
*
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school, saving for college educations that they hope will lead to a better
life. Few efforts can compare with the heavy financial burden that
*
millions of lower-income Chinese parents now endure as they push their
children to obtain as much education as possible.
Yet a college degree no longer ensures a well-paying job, because the
February 17, 2013
In China, Families Bet It All on College for Their
Children
number of graduates in China has quadrupled in the last decade.
Mr. Wu and Mrs. Cao, who grew up in tiny villages in western China
By KEITH BRADSHER
and became migrants in search of better-paying work, have scrimped
HANJING, China — Wu Yiebing has been going down coal shafts
their entire lives. For nearly two decades, they have lived in a cramped
practically every workday of his life, wrestling an electric drill for $500 a
and drafty 200-square-foot house with a thatch roof. They have never
month in the choking dust of claustrophobic tunnels, with one goal in
owned a car. They do not take vacations — they have never seen the
mind: paying for his daughter’s education.
ocean. They have skipped traditional New Year trips to their ancestral
His wife, Cao Weiping, toils from dawn to sunset in orchards every
village for up to five straight years to save on bus fares and gifts, and for
day during apple season in May and June. She earns $12 a day tying
Mr. Wu to earn extra holiday pay in the mines. Despite their frugality,
little plastic bags one at a time around 3,000 young apples on trees, to
they have essentially no retirement savings.
protect them from insects. The rest of the year she works as a substitute
Thanks to these sacrifices, their daughter, Wu Caoying, is now a 19-
store clerk, earning several dollars a day, all going toward their
year-old college sophomore. She is among the growing millions of
18
Chinese college students who have gone much farther than their parents
income for the average wage earner, while an in-state public university
could have dreamed when they were growing up. For all the hard work
costs about six months’ pay, but financial aid is generally easier to obtain
of Ms. Wu’s father and mother, however, they aren’t certain it will pay
than in China. Moreover, an American family that spends half its income
off. Their daughter is ambivalent about staying in school, where the
helping a child through college has more spending power with the other
tuition, room and board cost more than half her parents’ combined
half of its income than a rural Chinese family earning less than $5,000 a
annual income. A slightly above-average student, she thinks of dropping
year.
It isn’t just the cost of college that burdens Chinese parents. They face
out, finding a job and earning money.
“Every time my daughter calls home, she says, ‘I don’t want to
many fees associated with sending their children to elementary, middle
continue this,’ ” Mrs. Cao said. “And I say, ‘You’ve got to keep studying
and high schools. Many parents also hire tutors, so their children can
to take care of us when we get old’, and she says, ‘That’s too much
score high enough on entrance exams to get into college. American
pressure, I don’t want to think about all that responsibility.’ ”
families that invest heavily in their children’s educations can fall back on
Ms. Wu dreams of working at a big company, but knows that many
Medicare, Social Security and other social programs in their old age.
graduates end up jobless. “I think I may start my own small company,”
Chinese citizens who bet all of their savings on their children’s
she says, while acknowledging she doesn’t have the money or
educations have far fewer options if their offspring are unable to find a
experience to run one.
job on graduation.
For a rural parent in China, each year of higher education costs six to
The experiences of Wu Caoying, whose family The New York Times
15 months’ labor, and it is hard for children from poor families to get
has tracked for seven years, are a window into the expanding educational
scholarships or other government financial support. A year at the average
opportunities and the financial obstacles faced by families all over China.
private university in the United States similarly equals almost a year’s
Her parents’ sacrifices to educate their daughter explain how the
19
country has managed to leap far ahead of the United States in producing
of the valley began to curve upward before turning into vertiginous,
college graduates over the last decade, with eight million Chinese now
forested slopes that soared into the clouds.
getting degrees annually from universities and community colleges.
The relentless work left little opportunity for education. Mrs. Cao,
But high education costs coincide with slower growth of the Chinese
now 39, learned to read some Chinese characters at first- and second-
economy and surging unemployment among recent college graduates.
grade classes conducted in her village. But later grades were taught at a
Whether young people like Ms. Wu find jobs on graduation that allow
school in a larger village at the other end of the valley, a seven-mile walk
them to earn a living, much less support their parents, could test China’s
away, and Mrs. Cao dropped out in third grade.
ability to maintain rapid economic growth and preserve political and
Her husband, now 43, grew up in a similarly poor village on the other
social stability in the years ahead.
side of the mountain and did not attend school at all.
They married early, and Mrs. Cao had just turned 20 when she gave
Leaving the Village
The ancient village of Mu Zhu Ba is perched on a tree-covered crag
birth to Ms. Wu. The couple earned just $25 a month. As their baby grew
overlooking a steep-sided mountain gorge in southwestern Shaanxi
into a toddler, they began worrying that she would inevitably drop out of
province, deep in China’s interior, 900 miles southwest of Beijing. The
school early if she had to walk so far to classes every day. So like
few scarce acres of flat land next to a stream on the valley floor were
hundreds of millions of other Chinese over the last two decades, they
reserved until recently for garden-size plots of rice, corn and vegetables.
decided to leave their ancestral village and their families.
“All the parents in the village want their children to go to college,
Villagers were subsistence farmers. Every adult and all but the
because only knowledge changes your fate,” Mrs. Cao said.
youngest children worked from dawn to dusk, planting, weeding, handwatering and harvesting rice, corn and vegetables to feed themselves.
By the time Ms. Wu reached middle school, the crystalline mountain
They also built and maintained three-foot-wide terraces where the sides
air of Mu Zhu Ba was a dim memory. The family had moved to Hanjing,
20
a coal mining community on the plains of northern Shaanxi province,
students who wanted to qualify for anything but the worst universities.
nearly 300 miles northeast of their ancestral village.
The village had an English teacher, and Ms. Wu started learning the
A Coal Miner’s Daughter
language in fourth grade. But then the teacher left, so she was not able to
Mr. Wu built the family’s two-room brick house himself. They
study English during fifth and sixth grade.
bought their first small refrigerator, a coal stove and a used stereo, and a
Ms. Wu resumed English classes in the seventh grade, but her mother
bare light bulb for the living room and another for the bedroom.
was concerned and began hiring substitute teachers as English tutors for
The house, on the town’s rural outskirts, was across a two-lane paved
her daughter.
road from a small coal mine where Mr. Wu learned to maneuver a
Mrs. Cao said that she was convinced that this would help her
shoulder-carried, 45-pound electric drill in narrow spaces far under the
daughter become the first in the family to attend college. “If we had not
earth, working long shifts and coming home covered with coal dust. He
come here, she would have needed to stay home, to help cook and cut
earned nearly $200 a month then, providing more money to educate their
wood,” Mrs. Cao said.
daughter. In the family bedroom, where calendar posters of the actress
But their financial sacrifices were only beginning.
Zhang Ziyi had been plastered on the wall for extra insulation, Mrs. Cao
For high school, Wu Caoying began attending a government-run
carefully kept all of her daughter’s school papers. Wu Caoying was in
boarding school two miles from the family’s house. Many high schools
seventh grade, but her village school was already teaching her geometry
in China are boarding schools, an arrangement that allows local
and algebra at a level beyond most American seventh graders. She was
governments to impose hefty fees on parents. Tuition was $165 a
also studying geography, history and science, filling homework
semester. Food was $8 a week. Books, tutorials and exam fees were all
notebooks with elegant penmanship.
extra.
The problem was English, an increasingly important subject for
Boarding School
21
Ms. Wu and seven other teenage girls had bunk beds in a cramped
The new job, however, allowed Mr. Wu to double his income, and he
dormitory room. She dressed better than the other girls, in a tight blue
brought back his pay every two months to his wife to pay for their
coat her mother had just given her for Chinese New Year.
daughter’s education.
Their main worry was their daughter’s academic performance; they
She woke at 5:30 every morning to study, had breakfast at 7:30, then
attended classes from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30, 1:30 to 5:30 in the afternoon
thought she did not study hard enough. “She likes to talk to boys,
and 7:30 to 10:30 in the evening. For entertainment, there were
although she doesn’t have a boyfriend,” Mrs. Cao said.
occasional showings of patriotic movies. She studied part of the day on
Their daughter ranked 16th in her class of 40, respectable but not
Saturdays and Sundays. But she also joined a volunteer group that visited
good enough in their eyes. But they despaired of being able to help Ms.
the elderly — social work that might help on a college application in the
Wu when she came home on weekends. “We just have an elementary
United States but not in China, where the national entrance exam for
school education. We don’t really know what she’s studying,” Mrs. Cao
universities is all-important.
acknowledged.
Mr. Wu no longer worked at the coal mine across the street, which
Sitting at home while his daughter was at boarding school one day
had been closed because of a combination of safety regulators’ concerns
several years ago, Mr. Wu said he was so disappointed with his
and depletion of the coal seam. He had become a migrant once more,
daughter’s performance that he would not mind if she dropped out,
taking a job 13 hours away by train at a coal mine in a northern desert.
caught a train to Guangdong province, 30 hours away on the coast and
Mr. Wu worked 10-hour shifts up to 30 consecutive days. Safety
took an assembly line job at a factory.
standards were lower at the new mine, in an industry that kills thousands
Odds Against Rural Youths
of Chinese miners in industrial accidents each year and maims many
As Ms. Wu approached the national higher-education entrance exams
more.
in the spring of 2011, the odds were stacked against her, and heavy costs
22
loomed for her parents as a result.
Affiliated with provincial and local governments or run by private
Youths from poor and rural families consistently end up paying much
businesses, polytechnics charge up to twice as much tuition as top
higher tuition in China than children from affluent and urban families.
universities, which are owned, operated and heavily subsidized by the
Yet they attend considerably worse institutions, education finance
central government. Despite high tuitions, the polytechnics spend much
specialists say.
less teaching each student than universities because they receive so few
The reason is that few children from poor families earn top marks on
subsidies.
the national exams. So they are shunted to lower-quality schools that
While the central government offers extensive, need-based grants and
receive the smallest government subsidies.
loans for students at four-year universities, little financial aid is available
The result is that higher education is rapidly losing its role as a social
for students at polytechnics to help pay higher tuitions. Yet students at
leveler in China and as a safety valve for talented but poor youths to
polytechnics tend to be from poor or rural backgrounds. China’s
escape poverty. “The people who receive higher education tend to be
education ministry said last year that 80 percent of students at
relatively better off,” said Wang Jiping, the director general of the
polytechnics were the first in their families to go into higher education.
Central Institute for Vocational and Technical Education in China.
The national entrance exam heavily favors affluent urban children.
Top four-year universities in China have resisted pressure to expand
Top universities, concentrated in Beijing and Shanghai, give preference
enrollments. So roughly half of all college students now attend a growing
to local high school students, admitting them with lower exam scores
number of less prestigious three-year polytechnics instead.
than students from elsewhere. Rural students have to score higher to get
The polytechnics resemble community colleges in the United States,
in.
but they offer more specialized vocational training and fewer general-
That is doubly difficult because a crucial section of the exam tests
knowledge courses like history or literature.
competence in a foreign language, almost always English. Rural schools
23
like Ms. Wu’s struggle even to find English teachers.
Her elementary school back in Hanjing has now begun teaching
Most students at Peking University, one of the country’s most
English starting in kindergarten, she said, adding that she hoped the next
prestigious, come from such affluent backgrounds that researchers last
generation would fare better on the national test.
summer had to suspend a long-running survey that rewarded students
Ms. Wu has tried, unsuccessfully so far, to do well enough in
with second-class train tickets if they would write about changes in their
classes at her polytechnic to transfer to an affiliated, four-year university,
hometowns. The students began refusing to write the essays because they
where the tuition is 25 percent lower.
were not interested in second-class tickets, preferring costlier seats on
The Chinese government offers a few scholarships for polytechnic
new bullet trains.
students, but they are distributed mostly based on grades, not financial
For Ms. Wu, coming from a less affluent family, the challenge of
need. Top students, often from more affluent families who could give
getting into a top university would prove too great.
them more academic support during their formative years, receive grants
Student in a Big City
that cover up to three-quarters of their room and board.
Ms. Wu passed the national college entrance exam, but just barely.
Average students like Ms. Wu pay full cost and hear frequent
complaints from their parents. “I tell my daughter to study harder so she
She scored 300 points out of a possible 750, slightly above the 280
can reduce the school fees,” Mrs. Cao said.
threshold for being allowed to attend an institution of higher education. It
was far below the 600-plus scores needed for the nation’s finest four-
But studying is almost all that Ms. Wu does. She says she still has no
year universities. So she attends a polytechnic in the metropolis of Xi’an,
boyfriend: “I have friends who have boyfriends and they argue all the
the capital of Shaanxi province.
time. It is such a hassle.”
What tripped her up on the exam was her weakness in English. By
The big question for Ms. Wu and her family lies in what she will do
contrast, she did well in Chinese and other subjects.
on graduation. She has chosen to major in logistics, learning how goods
24
are distributed, a growing industry in China as ever more families order
when we get old,” Mrs. Cao said. “My head is killing me with thinking,
online instead of visiting stores.
‘What if she can’t get a job after we have spent so much on education?’ ”
But the major is the most popular at her school, which could signal a
future glut in the field. That is a sobering prospect at a time when young
May 2008
college graduates in China are four times as likely to be unemployed as
Gilded Age, Gilded Cage
young people who attended only elementary school, because factory jobs
China's sudden prosperity brings undreamed of freedoms and new
anxieties.
Leslie T. Chang
are more plentiful than office jobs.
Ms. Wu realizes the odds against her. Among those who graduated
At the age of four, Zhou Jiaying was enrolled in two classes—Spoken
last spring from her polytechnic, she said, “50 or 60 percent of them still
American English and English Conversation—and given the English
do not have a job.”
name Bella. Her parents hoped she might go abroad for college. The next
Mrs. Cao is already worried. The family home across the road from
year they signed her up for acting class. When she turned eight, she
the abandoned coal mine is starting to deteriorate in the wind and acrid
started on the piano, which taught discipline and developed the
pollution, and they have scant savings to rebuild it. Her husband has
cerebrum. In the summers she went to the pool for lessons; swimming,
been able to move home after being hired at a new mine in Hanjing as a
her parents said, would make her taller. Bella wanted to be a lawyer, and
drilling team leader. The extra responsibility allows him to almost match
to be a lawyer you had to be tall. By the time she was ten, Bella lived a
his pay at the desert coal mine, but at his age carrying a heavy drill is
life that was rich with possibility and as regimented as a drill sergeant's.
becoming more difficult, and he won’t be able to continue doing hard
After school she did homework unsupervised until her parents got home.
labor forever. Their daughter is the parents’ only hope.
Then came dinner, bath, piano practice. Sometimes she was permitted
“I’ve only got one, so I have to make sure that one takes care of me
television, but only the news. On Saturdays she took a private essay class
25
followed by Math Olympics, and on Sundays a piano lesson and a prep
entrance exams for middle school. Every student knew where he or she
class for her entrance exam to a Shanghai middle school. The best
ranked: When teachers handed back tests, they had the students stand in
moment of the week was Friday afternoon, when school let out early.
groups according to their scores. Bella ranked in the middle—12th or
Bella might take a deep breath and look around, like a man who
13th in a class of 25, lower if she lost focus. She hated Japan, as her
discovers a glimpse of blue sky from the confines of the prison yard.
textbooks had taught her to: The Japanese army had killed 300,000
For China's emerging middle class, this is an age of aspiration—but
Chinese in the 1937 Nanjing massacre. She hated America too, because
also a time of anxiety. Opportunities have multiplied, but each one brings
it always meddled in the affairs of other countries. She spoke a fair
pressure to take part and not lose out, and every acquisition seems to
amount of English: "Men like to smoke and drink beer, wine, and
come ready-wrapped in disappointment that it isn't something newer and
whiskey." Her favorite restaurant was Pizza Hut, and she liked the spicy
better. An apartment that was renovated a few years ago looks dated; a
wings at KFC. Her record on the hula hoop was 2,000 spins.
mobile phone without a video camera and color screen is an
The best place in the world was the Baodaxiang Children's
embarrassment. Classes in colloquial English are fashionable among
Department Store on Nanjing Road. In its vast stationery department,
Shanghai schoolchildren, but everything costs money.
Bella would carefully select additions to her eraser collection. She owned
Freedom is not always liberating for people who grew up in a stable
30 erasers—stored in a cookie tin at home—that were shaped like
socialist society; sometimes it feels more like a never ending struggle not
flipflops and hamburgers and cartoon characters; each was not much
to fall behind. A study has shown that 45 percent of Chinese urban
bigger than a thumbnail, and all remained in their original plastic
residents are at health risk due to stress, with the highest rates among
packaging. When her grandparents took her to the same store, Bella
high school students.
headed for the toy section, but not when she was with her parents. They
Fifth grade was Bella's toughest year yet. At its end she would take
said she was too old for toys.
26
If Bella scored well on a test, her parents bought her presents; a bad
The past decade has seen the rise of something Mao sought to stamp
grade brought a clampdown at home. Her best subject was Chinese,
out forever: a Chinese middle class, now estimated to number between
where she had mastered the art of the composition: She could describe a
100 million and 150 million people. Though definitions vary—
household object in a morally uplifting way.
household income of at least $10,000 a year is one standard—middle-
Last winter Grandmother left her spider plant outdoors and forgot
class families tend to own an apartment and a car, to eat out and take
about it… This spring it actually lived. Some people say this plant is
vacations, and to be familiar with foreign brands and ideas. They owe
lowly, but the spider plant does not listen to arbitrary orders, it does not
their well-being to the government's economic policies, but in private
fear hardship, and in the face of adversity it continues to struggle. This
they can be very critical of the society they live in.
spirit is worthy of praise.
The state's retreat from private life has left people free to choose
She did poorly in math. Extra math tutoring was a constant and would
where to live, work, and travel, and material opportunities expand year
remain so until the college entrance examination, which was seven years
by year. A decade ago most cars belonged to state enterprises; now many
away. You were only as good as your worst subject. If you didn't get into
families own one. In 1998, when the government launched reforms to
one of Shanghai's top middle schools, your fate would be mediocre
commercialize the housing market, it was the rare person who owned an
classmates and teachers who taught only what was in the textbook. Your
apartment. Today home ownership is common, and prices have risen
chances of getting into a good high school, not to mention a good
beyond what many young couples can afford—as if everything that
college, would diminish.
happened in America over 50 years were collapsed into a single decade.
You had to keep moving, because staying in place meant falling
But pick up a Chinese newspaper, and what comes through is a sense
behind. That was how the world worked even if you were only ten years
of unease at the pace of social change. Over several months in 2006,
old.
these were some of the trends covered in the Xinmin Evening News, a
27
popular Shanghai daily: High school girls were suffering from eating
with 64 percent in the United States. Yet the desire to foster well-
disorders. Parents were struggling to choose a suitable English name for
rounded students has fed an explosion of activities—music lessons,
their child. Teenage boys were reading novels with homosexual themes.
English, drawing, and martial arts classes—and turned each into an arena
Job seekers were besieging Buddhist temples because the word for
of competition.
"reclining Buddha," wofo, sounds like the English word "offer." Unwed
Such pursuits bring little pleasure. English ability is graded on five
college students were living together.
levels stretching through college, and parents push children to pass tests
Parents struggle to teach their children but feel their own knowledge
years ahead of schedule. Cities assess children's piano playing on a ten-
is obsolete; children, more attuned to social trends, guide their parents
level scale. More than half of preteens take outside classes, a survey
through the maze of modern life. "Society has completely turned
found, with the top reason being "to raise the child's future
around," says Zhou Xiaohong, a sociologist at Nanjing University who
competitiveness."
first noticed this phenomenon when his own father, a retired military
Parents tend to follow trends blindly and to believe most of what they
officer, asked him how to knot a Western tie. "Fathers used to give
hear. The past is a foreign country, and the present too. "We are a
orders, but now fathers listen to their sons."
traditional family" was how Bella's mother, Qi Xiayun, introduced
Because their parents have such high hopes for them, children are
herself when I first met her in 2003. She was 33 years old with the small,
among the most pressured, inhabiting a world that combines old and new
pale face of a girl, and she spoke in a nonstop torrent about the difficulty
and features the most punishing elements of both. The traditional
of raising a child. She teaches computer classes at a vocational college;
examination system that selects a favored few for higher education
her husband works in quality control at Baosteel, a state-owned
remains intact: The number of students entering college in a given year is
company. They were appointed to those jobs after college, as part of the
equal to 11 percent of the college-freshman-age population, compared
last generation to join the socialist workforce before it started to break
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apart.
The effort to shape Bella is full of contradictions. Her parents
Bella's parents met the old-fashioned way, introduced by their parents.
encourage her independence but worry that school and the workplace
But after they had Bella in 1993, they turned their backs on tradition.
will punish her for it. They fret over her homework load, then pile more
They chose not to eat dinner with their in-laws every night and rejected
assignments on top of her regular schoolwork. "We don't want to be
old fashioned child-rearing methods that tend to coddle children.
brutal to her," says Bella's father, Zhou Jiliang. "But in China, the
When Bella was not yet two, her grandmother offered to care for the
environment doesn't let you do anything else."
baby, but her mother worried that the grandparents would spoil her.
Bella teaches her parents the latest slang and shows them cool Internet
Bella went to day care instead. When she entered third grade, her mother
sites. When they bought a new television, Bella chose the brand. When
stopped picking her up after school, forcing her to change buses and
they go out to eat, Bella picks Pizza Hut. One day soon, her parents
cross streets alone. "Sooner or later she must learn independence," her
worry, her schoolwork will move beyond their ability to help her. When
mother said.
Bella was younger, her parents began unplugging the computer keyboard
So Bella grew up, a chatty girl with Pippi Longstocking pigtails and
and mouse so she wouldn't go online when she was home alone, but they
many opinions—too many for the Chinese schoolroom. In second grade
knew this wouldn't last.
she and several classmates marched to the principal's office to demand
Recently, Bella's father and his sister and cousins put their grandfather
more time to play; the protest failed. Her teachers criticized her temper
in a nursing home. It was a painful decision; in traditional China, caring
and her tendency to bully other children. "Your ability is strong," read a
for aged parents was an ironclad responsibility, and Bella's parents have
first-grade report card, "but a person must learn from the strengths of
extra room in their apartment for their parents to move in some day. But
others in order to improve." In second grade: "Hope you can listen to
Bella announced that she would one day put her parents in the best
other people's opinions more."
nursing home.
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"The minute she said that, I thought: It's true, we don't want to be a
By 8:30 the students were seated at their desks for elections. Their
burden on her," Bella's father says. "When we are old, we'll sell the
pretty young teacher asked for candidates. Everyone wanted to run.
house, take a trip and see the world, and enter the nursing home and live
"This semester I want to change my bad nail-biting habits, so people
a quiet life there. This is the education my daughter gives me."
don't call me the Nail- Biting King," said a boy running for propaganda
I went to school with Bella one Friday in her fifth-grade year. She sat
officer.
up in bed at 6:25, pulled on pants and an orange sweatshirt, and tied a
"I will not interrupt in class," said a girl in a striped sweater running
Young Pioneers kerchief around her neck. Her parents rushed through
for children's officer. "Please everyone vote for me."
the cramped apartment getting ready for work, and breakfast was lost in
The speeches followed a set pattern: Name a personal flaw, pledge to
the shuffle. Bella's mother walked her to the corner, then Bella sighed
fix it, and ask for votes. It was self-criticism as campaign strategy.
and headed to the bus stop alone. "This is the most free I am the whole
Those who strayed from the script were singled out. "My grades are
day."
not very good because I write a lot of words wrong," said one girl
Today there would be elections for class cadres, positions that mirror
running for academic officer. "Please everyone vote for me."
those in the Communist Party. "My mother says to be a cadre in fifth
"You write words wrong, please vote for me?" the teacher mimicked.
grade is very important," Bella said.
"What have you left out?"
The bus dropped us off at the elite Yangpu Primary School, which
The girl tried again. "I want to work to fix this bad habit. Please
cost $1,200 a year in tuition and fees and rejected 80 percent of its
everyone vote for me."
applicants. Her classroom was sunny and loud with the roar of children
Bella delivered her pitch for sports officer. "I am very responsible,
kept indoors. It had several computers and a bulletin board with student-
and my management abilities are pretty good," she said breathlessly.
written movie reviews: The Birth of New China, Finding Nemo.
"Sometimes I have conflicts with other students. If you vote for me, it
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will help me change my bad habits. Please everyone give me your vote."
place all their hopes on their children. "Right now is the hardest time,"
In a three-way race, Bella squeaked to victory by a single ballot.
says Wang Jie, a sociologist who is herself the mother of an only child.
Election day, like everything in school, ended with a moral. "Don't feel
"In my generation we have both traditional and new ideas. Inside us the
bad if you lost this time," the teacher said. "It just means you must work
two worlds are at war."
even harder. You shouldn't let yourself relax just because you lost."
In math class later that day, the fifth graders whipped through
The language of child education is Darwinian-grim. "The elections
dividing decimals using Math Olympics methods, which train kids to use
teach students to toughen themselves," Bella's teacher, Lu Yan, said over
mental shortcuts. They raced across a field in gym class, with the slowest
lunch in the teachers' cafeteria. "In the future they will face pressure and
person in each group punished with an extra lap around the track. School
competition. They need to know how to face defeat."
ended at 1:30 on Fridays. The bus let Bella off outside her building,
Some schools link teacher pay to student test performance, and the
where she bought a Popsicle and headed inside. Her weekend was
pressure on teachers is intense. Bella's class had recently seen a drop in
packed with private tutoring, so Friday was the best time to finish her
grades, and the teacher begged parents to help identify the cause. Lu Yan
homework.
had just gotten her four-year college degree at night school and planned
I told her that no American ten-year-old did homework on a Friday
to study English next. All her colleagues were enrolled in outside
afternoon.
classes; even the vice-principal took a weekend class on educational
"They must be very happy," Bella said.
technology. A math teacher was fired three weeks into the school year
In the five years since I met Bella and her family, their lives have
because parents complained she covered too little material in class.
transformed. They moved into a new three-bedroom apartment—it is
Life will not always feel like this. The next generation of parents,
almost twice the size of their old one, which they now rent out—and
having grown up with choice and competition, may feel less driven to
furnished it with foreign brand-name appliances. They bought their first
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car, a Volkswagen Bora, and from taking the bus they went straight to
Social mobility ran in both directions. A friend of Bella's mother
driving everywhere. They eat out a couple of times a week now, and the
stopped attending class reunions because he was embarrassed to be a
air-conditioner stays on all summer. At age 12, Bella got her first mobile
security guard. A company run by a family friend went bankrupt, and his
phone—a $250 Panasonic clamshell in Barbie pink. Her parents' annual
daughter, who was Bella's age, started buying clothes at discount stalls.
income reached $18,000, up 40 percent from when we first met.
Society was splintering based on small differences. Family members
As the material circumstances of Bella's family improved, the world
only a decade younger than Bella's parents inhabited another world. One
became to them a more perilous place. Their cleaning lady stole from
cousin ate out every night and left her baby in the care of her
them and disappeared. Several friends were in near-fatal car accidents.
grandparents so she could focus on her career. Bella's father's younger
One day Bella's father saw her holding a letter from a man she'd met
sister, who was childless, thought nothing of buying a full-fare plane
online. Bella's parents changed the locks and the phone number of the
ticket to go somewhere for a weekend. Friends who were private
apartment. Her father drove her to and from school now because he
entrepreneurs were having a second child and paying a fine; Bella's
thought the neighborhood around it was unsafe.
parents would probably be fired by their state-owned employers if they
Bella's mother took on more administrative responsibilities at work
did that.
and enrolled in a weekend class to qualify to study for a master's degree.
Bella tested into one of Shanghai's top middle schools, where teachers
Bella's father talked about trading in their car for a newer model with
often keep students past five in the evening while their parents wait in
better acceleration and more legroom. They frequently spoke of
cars outside. She is level three in English and level eight in piano. She
themselves as if they were mobile phones on the verge of obsolescence.
still ranks in the middle of her class, but she no longer has faith in the
"If you don't continue to upgrade and recharge," Bella's father said,
world of adults.
"you'll be eliminated."
She disdains class elections now. "It's a lot of work," she says, "and
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the teacher is always pointing to you as a role model. If you get in
At times educators go to extremes: At the Zhongguancun No. 2
trouble and get demoted, it's a big embarrassment." She loves Hollywood
Primary School in Beijing, vice-principal Lu Suqin recently took two
films—especially Star Wars and disaster movies—and spends hours
fifth-grade boys into her home. "Their parents couldn't get them to
online with friends discussing Detective Conan, a character from
behave, so they asked me to take them," she explains. "After they learn
Japanese comic books. She intends to marry a foreigner because they are
disciplined living, I will send them back."
richer and more reliable.
Bella had one free day during the 2006 weeklong National Day
Her parents no longer help with her homework; in spoken English she
holiday. Some of her extended family—seven adults and two children—
has surpassed them. They lecture her to be less wasteful. "When she was
took a trip to Tongli, a town of imperial mansions an hour's drive from
little, she agreed with all my opinions. Now she sits there without saying
Shanghai. Bella's father hired a minibus and driver for the trip; a friend
anything, but I know she doesn't agree with me," her mother said one
had just been in a car accident and broken all the bones on one side of his
afternoon in the living room of their new apartment, as Bella glared
body. Bella sat alone reading a book.
without speaking. "Our child-raising has been a failure." In China, there
Developing China zipped past the window, city sprawl giving way to
is no concept of the rebellious teenager.
a booming countryside of fish ponds and factories and the three-story
Across Chinese society, parents appear completely at sea when it
houses of prosperous farmers. Bella's mother indulged in the
comes to raising their children. Newspapers run advice columns, their
quintessential urban dream of a house in the country. "You have your
often rudimentary counsel—"Don't Forcibly Plan Your Child's Life" is a
own little yard in front," she said. "I'd love to live in a place like that
typical headline—suggesting what many parents are up against. Some
when we retire."
schools have set up parent schools where mothers, and the occasional
She was thinking seriously about Bella's future. If she tested into a
father, can share frustrations and child-raising tips.
good college, she should stay in China; otherwise she would go abroad,
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and they would sell the old apartment to pay for it. She had decided that
"What about middle school?"
Bella could date in college. "If she finds someone suitable in the third or
"Yes. Some."
fourth year of college, that's fine. But not in the first or second year."
"Do you have a boyfriend?"
"And not in high school?" I asked.
She wrinkled her nose. "There's a boy who likes me. But all the boys
"No. Study should be most important."
in my grade are very low-class."
Tongli was mobbed with holiday visitors. Bella's family walked
She wanted to go to Australia for graduate school and to work there
through its courtyards and gardens like sleepwalkers, admiring whatever
afterward. She could make more money there and bring her parents to
the tour guides pointed out. They touched the trunk of the Health and
live with her. "On the surface China looks luxurious, but underneath it is
Long Life Tree. They circled a stone mosaic said to bring career success.
chaos," Bella said. "Everything is so corrupt."
They could not stop walking for an instant because crowds pressed in
Some observers of Chinese society look at children like Bella and see
from behind. It was the biggest tourist day of the year.
political change: Her generation of individualists, they predict, will one
Bella politely translated for a great-aunt visiting from Australia who
day demand a say in how they are governed. But the reality is
didn't speak Chinese, but it was just an act. "This is boring," she told me.
complicated. Raised and educated within the system, they are just as
"Once you've seen one old building, you've seen them all."
likely to find ways to accommodate themselves to it, as they have done
I sat with her on the ride home. She was deep into a Korean romance
all along.
novel.
"Just because they're curious to see something doesn't mean they want
"It's about high school students," she said. "Three boys chasing a girl."
it for themselves," says Zhang Kai, Bella's middle-school teacher.
"Do people have boyfriends and girlfriends in high school?" I asked.
"Maybe they will try something—dye their hair, or pierce an ear—but in
"Yes."
their bones, they are very traditional. In her heart Zhou Jiaying is very
34
traditional," he says, and he uses Bella's Chinese name.
A good friend is also an enemy because they vie for the same class rank.
Bella is 15 now, in the ninth grade. She has good friends among her
Her compositions describe what the pressure feels like:
classmates, and she has learned how to get along with others. School is a
I sit in my middle-school classroom, and the teacher wants us to say
complicated place. One classmate bullied another boy, and the victim's
good-bye to childhood. I feel at a loss. Happiness is like the twinkling
parents came to school to complain. Because they were politically
stars suffusing the night sky of childhood. I want only more and more
influential, they forced the teacher to transfer the bully out of the class.
stars. I don't want to see the dawn.
The incident divided Bella's class, and now her friends in the Tire
Clique won't speak to her friends in the Pirate Clique. A friend got into
school without taking the entrance exam because her mother's colleague
had a cousin in the education bureau.
Bella's teacher nominated some students for membership in the
Communist Youth League. Bella thought it meaningless, but she fell into
line and pulled an application essay off the Internet. She couldn't afford
to get on her teacher's bad side, she told me, citing a proverb: "A person
who stands under someone else's roof must bow his head."
The high school entrance exam is a month away. In the evenings
Bella's father watches television on mute so he won't disturb her studies.
35