Foreign Business In China. Can't Live With 'Em, Can't Live Without 'Em.
In one of my college history courses, my professor was big on emphasizing how much China's mistrust and dislike of foreigners had influenced it. This professor saw the Great Wall as THE symbol of China's attitudes towards foreigners and he ascribed virtually everything China did to its desire to keep its distance from foreigners. Though I have never been a fan of "one motive" analysis, I do think it would be naive to believe China's highly charged history with foreigners does not continue to influence it today.
I was starkly reminded of that today when I read this China Source post, entitled, "What Do They Really Think of Us Laowai?" (h/t China Hope Live). Here's the money portion of that post:
I was attending a banquet hosted by a delegation from a foreign [not for profit] organization that’s been in China for a long time, and has maintained a good relationship with the Chinese government. One of the guests at the banquet was a local academic who was helping us understand the government’s attitudes towards foreign organizations.At one point, a delegation member asked the scholar “what does the government think of us (the organization specifically). It was assumed the answer would be positive. Instead, the scholar, without hesitation said “They hate you. “But you are useful to them.”
I completely buy it. What do you think?
UPDATE: Just read an excellent post on Mark's China Blog, entitled, "Sometimes the More Information You Have, the Less You Know," that seems at least tangentially related. The post contains a great pull-out from Peter Hessler's book, Oracle Bones, on how China is China and it just keeps on being China and foreign criticism is just not going to have much of an impact on China. Hard really to briefly summarize the post so I urge you to go read it.
Comments (16)
Read through and enter the discussion by using the form at the endandeli - March 7, 2010 3:01 AM
Not sure this only applies to foreigners, there is as much hate between the north and south, east and west as there is between nei and wai (not to mention the city/country side relationship). I see Chinese abuse each other everyday, so maybe it just the thing with China, if you not related, then the one next to you is a potential enemy.
Anonymous - March 7, 2010 8:16 AM
I think it important to distinguish between the government and the people in this case.
My sense is that the government has never liked us, but the difference we're seeing now is they no longer feel obligated to *pretend* to like us.
As for the people, (and here I refer to the masses, not necessarily the elites) they seem to follow government propaganda very well. When it's useful for the government to appear to like any particular barbarian country, Xinhua picks up the message, and so do the masses.
Over the years, as Xinhua's opinion of America has waxed and waned, so have the opinions of average guys in restaurants all over China.
Irvin - March 7, 2010 8:18 AM
I think what you are saying is true of China, but also true of just about every country in the world.
Bill Rich - March 7, 2010 10:07 AM
Chinese government hates foreigners even when it, and Xinhua, says it likes you. The general public like foreigners, or at least say so, when they think they can take your money. They hate foreigners after they have taken your money, and when they don't think they can take your money.
Their complaints about people giving money to Chile after the earthquake is a good incident to think about. And also the donation to Yale by a Chinese.
jada - March 7, 2010 6:59 PM
well, let me ask a question first, do laowai by any chance love the chinese gov.? If not, why still come here to endure the pain of being hated? isn't that partially coz of money? Guess it's always easier for the pot to call the kettle black...
Anonymous - March 8, 2010 3:25 AM
"The article, titled “Dear Laowai, Don’t Mess With Our Chinese-ness” is a screed reminding us all of the fact that there are only two kinds of people in the world: Chinese and foreigners, and that the categories are mutually exclusive."
Another very important point about understanding China. If you can understand this concept, you are ahead of the game. And thus, quit kissing their butts in meetings and negotiations. They don't like you, so stop embarrassing yourself by trying to make them like you.
Jada, as for being here, all dictatorships are a threat to liberal democracy. It is hoped by many that if western countries can invest in China it will help turn China away from dictatorship and thus no longer be a threat to democracy and democratic nations. One day we will succeed. And in the meantime if I can take back at least one buck of the many that are cheated out of me while I am here, all the better.
Irvin, that's not true and you know it!
easteuropist - March 8, 2010 5:05 AM
There's a big mistrust between China and rest of the world. China is feared of the west and vice versa. There's a ton of reason why paranoia drives western relations with China.
To be worse, West doesn't shows any good will towards China. West has mouth full of big words, forgetting that path of democracy and human rights are long one. It was not long ago when blacks was denied their rights, colonists left Africa and west-backed wars raved trough part of Europe.
What we need is change of approach. Chinese gov is aware of problems they have. It is not same to manage 1,3 billion country with separatist regions and 10 million big Sweden. Western often think about Chinese gov. as Big Brother which is far from the truth. They even struggle to control BJ and big cities! And now, know-it-all/uber-self-righteousness foreigners steps in telling them what they should do - right now. Yeah, right.
What western media tells is that we cannot trust to Chinese. Sadly, but we cannot believe western governments as they violently act for their own interest trough history. That colonial spirit still lives in westerns and brings a fear to Chinese. At this moment, EBRD and EIB impose very harsh conditions to EE countries. Eg: Serbia asked for 60 mil EUR to reconstruct a important bridge on Corridor 10, with to conditions: reconstruction should be conducted by western company and Gypsies that lived under the bridge should be relocated, solid houses should be given and they need to be employed! It is impossible condition for country with 700 000 refugees and 1.2 mil unemployed!
So what Serbs did? For money for another bridge they asked Chinese government. They got it favorable conditions.
I lived in China for 3 years. I must tell that Chinese official differently reacted on my countrymen and on other nation. My country always maintained good relations, never attacked China, helped them during floods and earthquake...
I have strong believing that China will find their path toward human rights. Only problem is that it will take at least 10 years to came where they headed.
Inst - March 8, 2010 9:29 AM
I just want to mention that the foreign NPO sounds as though it were a religious charity in an atheist country, especially with the missionary comments. Not that I can comment on your overall thesis, however.
Mingyu - March 8, 2010 12:00 PM
To understand Chinese attitude towards 'laowai', you gotta to understand one very simple thing: Chinese never forget. Chinese aren't even forgetting the invasion of Jin about one thousand years ago and a big portion of well educated people, me included, still feel bitter about it. If you have done something bad to China and Chinese, expect it is remembered for at least one thousand years, even if after you paid heavily for it.
If you go to Tian'anmen square and see the big stony thing in the middle of it, and understand what's written at the back of it, you know what I am talking about. It might seem a very long time for westerners and you don't think you have absolutely nothing to do with it and there is no way you should be responsible for it, but I for one cannot forget the invasion and dignity lost since 1840, and I hold the westerners responsible for it. And you can count on the majority of Chinese remembering it for another 800 years. If you ask me why Chinese never really trusted westerners, this is exactly the reason. You cannot expect to break into a house, feed the people living in the house opium, rob their precious jewels, kill a bunch of them, and then come back the next day expecting a smiling face. Well, they may smile at you, but that's only because you are 'useful'. For a people with a very long memory like the Chinese, it's even more so. Every time I go to a museum in US and see the Chinese antiques in them, I try very hard not to burst in tears. 170 years is an extremely short time for the Chinese, what happened in 1900 in Beijing seems to just have happened yesterday for us.
The Chinese civilization is, in fact, a very open civilization. The basic idea towards foreigners and foreign influence has always been 'absorbing the good of it, and discard the bad of it'. China adopted Buddism, Marxism and now captalism, all of them are foreign. However, if you expect Chinese doesn't look at westerners with an suspicous eye, your only hope is probably go back in time and stop the Brits from exporting opium.
James G - March 9, 2010 4:22 AM
I don't know, I'd kind of like to think about individual Chinese as having varied opinions, rather than just a blanket hate or mistrust of all foreigners.
Ditto for government officials.
There was a movie once - Donnie Darko - where a central character said that there were only two main emotions, love and fear. He got people to agree with him because of the primal strength of those two feelings, but really, would many people say that all their relationships with Chinese and China are thinly disguised malice, or simply mercenary?
I'm not sure what I have to offer the Chinese (classmates, coworkers, acquaintances, perhaps even a genuine friend or two) I know, but I don't imagine them hating me.
Why oh why, in 2010, are there still people writing such sweeping statements as "what do they really think of us"? Who is this "they", the great Chinese collective?
If you ask a question to many people, you might get many answers... choose the one that best suits your outlook, and regard it as the gospel truth. Hmm....
Anonymous - March 10, 2010 10:22 PM
Mingyu - Grow up!
NM - March 12, 2010 9:12 AM
Note that a careful reading of the quoted blog entry suggests that the "foreign [nfp] organization" was in fact in some way a religious organization ("faith-based" - cf. final para of the China Source entry). If so, then the point the entry actually makes is that 'the Chinese government doesn't like foreign religious organizations missionising in Cn." Big Surprise!!! What, if anything, follows from that with respect to "its" attitude to other foreign organizations (business, academic, ngo, charitable, ... ... ...) is quite open. Little, if you ask me.
The Cn Daily piece struck me as mildly ironic, if not particularly clever or funny - unlike the outraged yowls of associated laowai (which, to be fair, were even dumber, but very amusing).
casual observer - March 12, 2010 11:33 AM
Minyu forgets that the Ming and Qing used opium to suppress their populations from rebelling (the French and British were more efficient and had better opium), or that the foreign powers helped the Qing put down the Taiping Rebellion.
China likes to remember everything done to it but conveniently forgets what it has done to others, namely:
13 invasions of Vietnam, and constant interference in its current international relations
2 multi-century occupations of Korea, one put to an end by the Japanese
3 attempted invasions of Japan, turned back only by the weather.
Current, subsidized influx of over 1 million Chinese peasants and mobsters into Siberia
Currently massing 30,000 troops on the Indian border
Colonization of Burma
The international bullying of peaceful Olympic protestors
Chinese maps annexing half of Kazakstan, the entire S. China Sea, the northern 1/3 of India, the Korean peninsula, the PI and Taiwan.
stuart - March 13, 2010 2:47 AM
"170 years is an extremely short time for the Chinese, what happened in 1900 in Beijing seems to just have happened yesterday for us."
And what happened 20 years ago seems to never have happened at all. Go figure.
Btw, if you want to weep over lost 'Chinese' artifacts, go see the Han antique peddlers in Lhasa.
FIERO - July 23, 2010 9:17 AM
Cant really blame them for not trusting westerners considering what they did to China, and the world. If you look around the world. Look at what the west did to Africa. I got reason to beileve the IMF and world bank is still in Africa stiring up trouble. Look what they did to south east Asia. believe how they massacred the native Americans and took over their land. Look how they did the aborigines in Australia, the Maori in NZ. Even up until the 1990's, the west was oppressing people in south Africa. I do not know what Europeans are doing, but I suspect they aren;t much different than America, but America is responsible for sponsoring a good % of the worlds worst dictators in the name of "business".
samuel welsh - September 2, 2010 10:10 PM
busisness with the devil.
chinese are terrible at busisness.
corperate sellouts of fine local labour shame on you.