Changing China
Not the Country You Thought You Knew
Not the country you thought you knew, China’s transformation to a modern, pop-culture society with a capitalist economy is propelling the country to be the world’s fastest growing economic empire of all time. Learn about those who are part of the change, and from one man who narrowly survived the 1989 uprising at Tiananmen Square.
The World’s Oldest and Largest Country
With a population of 1.3 billion people, the People’s Republic of China is historically known for oppression, overpopulation and rigid communism.
A strong proponent of societal sameness, the Communist Party of China (CPC) Chairman Mao Zedong was both forceful and relentless in establishing a no-nonsense culture of communism during his reign from 1949-1976. His strict ideology stripped citizens of their rights to land, primitive but free education, and professional and religious freedoms. Essentially, any notion of individualism was eliminated and considered counter-revolutionary to Mao’s communist code.
China is Changing
Gone are the days of China’s gray jacketed bicycle commuters in sandals and straw-horn hats making their way to factories and government-appointed jobs. Along with the Country’s new focus on capitalism and modernism have come wealth and opportunity that Mao himself could not have seen coming.
The garb of Mao’s poverty-stricken working-class has given way to cash, color, and brand names like Armani, Claiborne and Ralph Lauren. Even bluejeans, tees, sunglasses and women’s makeup have found their place in Chinese society. Today, no two citizens look alike.
There are some who attribute the country’s high-speed evolution and modernism to the 1970 opening of China’s borders to American tourism. And more recently, the controlled albeit open invitation for the world to attend the 2008 Beijing Winter Games.
China is increasingly emerging as a global, economic world power. Modern metropolitan cities are filled with well-educated, well-dressed, techno-savvy consumers stopping in for morning Starbucks on their way to work — to jobs of international significance.
In just a few decades, Mao’s dynasty has all but disintegrated. And from its dust, cities like Beijing and Shanghai are growing towering skylines with too many skyscrapers to count and hundreds still under construction. And like those in America’s largest cities, oversized billboards and JumboTron screens climb the buildings like digital ivy, battling for attention in China’s largest business districts.
Although some describe China’s growth as temporary and calculated to overcome tainted images of China’s past, some say China is simply pulling the oldest trick in publicity: to woo sizable crowds, attract media attention, and make a dazzling splash strong enough to erase negative impressions with images fabulous, seemingly genuine and new.
Publicity stunt or not, China’s bid to host the 2008 Summer Games was evidence enough that the country (once closed) is making an effort to selectively welcome the world.
China is changing.
The Tiananmen Square Tipping Point
Having dedicated his entire education and career to the study of China, International Studies Director at Utah Valley University, Boyd Bauer, believes it is critical for the world to understand the miraculous economic changes that are taking place in China. In fact, he’s on a mission, of sorts, to educate about this East Asian phenomenon.
According to Bauer, China’s global influence as an economic force is going to provide a profound culture of both competition and opportunity as the world develops and transforms into a new, global economic machine.
According to Bauer, the CPC operated with one-eye-closed during eighties when university education became an opportunity for many of China’s poor who never dreamed of such possibility. Then, in 1989, the unforgettable protests at Tiananmen Square where the new generation of university students banded together to demand government reform and end to political corruption.
It is the Tiananmen Square demonstration by university students that many refer to as a tipping point for the People’s Republic of China.
On June 4, a day quietly referred to (if at all) in Mainland China as “The June Fourth Movement” or “6/4,” the world watched as the CPC moved in with full armor to clear the square, which they did by end of the day on June 5. But in the process, many lives were lost, and images of a hostile communist government embedded world-wide — like the “Unknown Rebel,” the famous photo of a single protestor as he stood up to a line of armored tanks in what has been interpreted as a symbolic gesture to stop government corruption.
“We must be increasingly prepared to meet the challenges presented by such world changes,” Bauer says.
A Journalist in Beijing
Now living and working in Utah, journalism professor Jing Dong Liang says, “As a child, I thought of Beijing as a poor place.” He recalls as a young boy thinking, “The cars are not good, the streets are dirty and there is not much opportunity.”
The son of a government-appointed engineer, Liang was spared from poverty with both parents working to provide a living. Participating in the government’s primitive, yet free education system, Liang proved himself an academic standout among his peers. In a post-Mao era, and with an interest in China’s political system and a love for writing, he trained to write for the government-owned Xinhua News Agency. Ambitious to publish, he often submitted articles to China Daily and People’s Daily, the two popular daily newspapers of the People’s Republic of China. Quickly, he gained notoriety and excelled in his field.
Of his work for a Chinese government-run press, “I never remember a time where I felt censored,” he recalls. “The news media simply has a different role in China. As a member of the media, you feel as though you are helping your country, that you were performing an important service.” Liang said he recalls a few times his editor passed along assignments that could be considered negative or in opposition to the government, but we wrote them, and they were published.”
After working as a journalist for several years, Liang earned one of few desired visas for his high-performance testing and perhaps recognizable name as a national reporter. “My score on the TOEFL test was more than 100 points higher than what is required of Harvard,” he says. “I was lucky,”
How now teaches his trade in a free-press society. In the United States, Liang enrolled at the University of Utah where he earned his doctoral degree in journalism.
When asked about the dichotomy of working in both free- and controlled-press societies, Liang says, “In China you write and feel as though you are being helpful to the government, and you gain notoriety and become trusted.”
Liang recalls frequent invitations to U.S. and European embassies, as well as to Chinese government receptions and parties.
In America, Liang describes, the role of a journalist as “very different.” Here, the American press takes on the role of “government watchdog” and “people’s advocate,” he says. “But whether you are a journalist in China or America, you are still just a writer.”
To Liang, “both roles are equally significant, just different.”
I Was There
On June 5, 2007, the New York Times featured a front-page photo of a massive candlelight vigil held in Hong Kong. From all parts of the world, moments of silence and prayer poured into China’s capital city in remembrance of the military’s forceful march on Tiananmen Square. And on June 5, the world honors the anniversary of the act of the “Unknown Rebel.”
One of the last protestors to leave the Square, the famous photograph of a single man standing up to a battalion of government tanks is an image China would prefer the world forget.
When Morning Came, the Shooting Started
“I was at Tiananmen Square and I knew something big was going to happen. I did not want to leave,” says Jingdong Liang. “Thousands of us sat awake all night long on June 3 knowing something was going to happen.”
According to Liang, The Square was so crowded, there was no room to lay his head, Liang describes, “The anticipation and rumors of the marching military kept us wide awake.”
When morning came, the shooting started. He recalls, “The woman journalist I was with was shot and wounded. Standing alone, I knew I would not be shot. The world was watching, I could see the news cameras. My death would be too public. I stayed in the Square, where the world was watching.”
Outside of the Square, I saw tanks run right over the top of crowds of students and their bicycles. I watched my people tear down stone walls with their bare hands to throw bricks at the military. Many have debated, but I was there and I can say as a witness there were no deaths inside Tiananmen Square, only on its borders, and within a few miles from there.”
A People’s Cry
Many laud the act of the “Unknown Rebel” and his contemporaries that day as an unforgettable and symbolic gesture of the people’s cry for democracy and an end to oppression. A tipping point, indeed, and tragically at the cost of human life. Though one thing is clear with the perspective of time: Indeed, China is changing. And perhaps 6/4 is the day change truly began.
