A week-in-review weekend links edition

Via the recently launched Somo Gallery

For those who want a rundown of this whole Wang Lijun escapade: C. Custer has you covered. [China Geeks]

Corollary: Wang's (fake?) open letter via sociologist Li Yinhe begins: "When everyone sees this letter, I’ll either be dead or have lost my freedom. I want to explain to the whole world the reasons behind my actions. In short: I don’t want to see the Party’s biggest hypocrite Bo Xilai carry on performing: When such evil officials ruling the state, it will lead to calamity for China and disaster for our nation." [Danwei]

You had me at "Cormac McCarthy": "Some 20 million people lost their lives, many of them in grotesque ways. There are enough beheadings, flayings, rapes, suicides, disembowelments, mass killings and acts of cannibalism in 'Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom' — more about these things in a moment — that it can seem like a version of Sun Tzu’s 'Art of War' spat into being by Cormac McCarthy." [NY Times]

This month in history, and such. "Westerners still tend to underestimate Chinese military prowess, viewing China as a historically peaceful nation frequently invaded by bellicose neighbors: Huns, Mongols, Manchus, and, of course, Japanese. During World War II, U.S. and British propaganda strengthened this image by depicting China as a hapless victim of a modernized, assertive, and militarily effective Japan. // Most westerners even believe that the Chinese invented gunpowder but never used it in weapons, reserving it for fireworks. In fact, the first guns were developed in China, as were the first cannons, rockets, grenades, and land mines." [The Diplomat]

Well, if you need a reminder that in this city of ours they tear shit down, Jonathan Kaiman is here. "The demolition of Beijing's historical courtyard alleyways, called hutong, has long been one of the city's most controversial issues. At the height of the city's headlong rush to modernity in the 1990s, about 600 hutong were destroyed each year, displacing an estimated 500,000 residents. Seemingly overnight, the city was transformed from a warren of Ming dynasty-era neighborhoods into an ultramodern urban sprawl, pocked with gleaming office towers and traversed by eight-lane highways." [The Atlantic]

The Economist launches China blog: Banyan.

Your Jeremy Lin reads of the day: Deadspin, China Smack, Yahoo. Also from Deadspin: "What appears to be New York Knicks superstar Jeremy Lin's Xanga—chinkballa88.xanga.com, naturally—popped up on Reddit earlier this week, but somehow we missed it, and now it's password-protected. Drat."

Rupert Hoogewerf on China's super rich: "...the second thing is that these people are sending their children to study overseas. This is a phenomenon that's unbelievable. We estimate that 85 per cent of the millionaire class in China are now thinking of sending their children to study in, it's America, UK, Australia, Canada are the big four." [Shanghaiist]

NON-CHINA READ: Because no doubt you will have found James Fallows's analysis of Obama's presidency through other means, I present you this: "The injections came without warning or explanation. As a low-ranking soldier in the Guatemalan army in 1948, Federico Ramos was preparing for weekend leave one Friday when he was ordered to report to a clinic run by US doctors. // Ramos walked to the medical station, where he was given an injection in his right arm and told to return for another after his leave. As compensation, Ramos's commanding officer gave him a few coins to spend on prostitutes. The same thing happened several times during the early months of Ramos's two years of military service. He believes that the doctors were deliberately infecting him with venereal disease." [Nature]

Your Happy-Times-Back-at-Work Links Edition

Photo by Ren Hang via NeochaEDGE

Yesterday, most Chinese returned to work. By yesterday I do indeed mean Sunday. The holiday schedule is fucked up, don't ask questions.

Oops. "[Famous architect] Liang [Sicheng's] 'siheyuan,' the traditional courtyard home, was reportedly bulldozed by a real estate developer on Thursday in the name of preservation. // The former rectangle brick structure in Beizongbu hutong where Liang and his also architect wife Lin Huiyin (Phyllis Lin) resided and started the unprecedented profiling of ancient Chinese architecture during the 1930s was reduced to piles of rubble surrounding a lone wooden gate. // The government said Saturday that the demolition was not approved by the cultural heritage authorities and officials would investigate and deal with the case in accordance of the law." [Xinhua via China Daily]

Piss

Well, this pretty much sucks a big stinky asshole. "Obama... made it a point to remind the world that though the defence budget had been trimmed, U.S. defence spending would still continue to remain higher than the combined defence budgets of the next 14 biggest militaries in the world.... // The latest Pentagon doctrine identifies China as the enemy the U.S. will have to confront. 'Over the long term, China's emergence as a regional power will have the potential to affect the U.S. economy and our security in a variety of ways…. The U.S. will continue to make a variety of investments to ensure that we maintain regional access and the ability to operate freely,' the document states. 'The growth of China's military power must be accompanied by greater clarity of its strategic intentions in order to avoid causing friction in the region.' Though U.S. officials keep on harping about the China threat, they do concede that the country is far away from achieving any kind of parity in military capabilities with the U.S." [Frontline, "India's national magazine"]

Corollary: "China should impose 'sanctions' against the Philippines after it offered to allow more US troops on its soil, state media said Sunday, amid growing tensions over disputed waters in the South China Sea." [AFP]

Shit

Interview about democracy in China. Uh-oh. "I still think China needs democracy, that it needs to change."

Fuc... wait a minute. This is actually intelligent...

Ian Johnson interviews former deputy editor of Southern Metropolis Weekly Zhang Ping in the New York Review of Books.

I really oppose several arguments [that are commonly made] about why China can’t have democracy, such as the argument that China is unique—that Chinese people need to wait because their “quality” [a Chinese term, suzhi, that implies everything from educational level to manners] isn’t high enough and other ridiculous things like that. Some people said that democracy wasn’t part of Chinese culture, and then Taiwan became democratic. Then they said that Taiwan was a special case. Now look at Wukan. They had their own elections. People say it’s special, but in fact Wukan is really typically Chinese. It’s a Chinese town but they organized everything. So what argument are you left with? If Wukan can have democracy so can other parts of China.

I’m not saying that China should have western-style democracy. In fact, there’s not a single western model. What do they mean? Germany didn’t copy America and America didn’t copy Britain. The issue isn’t copying. It’s do you or don’t you want democracy? Of course democracy has a lot of problems but it’s a way forward.

Who knew, democracy really is sunshine.

A Global Times editorial done right... not by Global Times, of course. Oh no -- if you want something done right, you gotta let someone like Eric from Sinostand do it (I'm assuming Eric, who owns the site, wrote the post, but if not, apologies to the real author). "I’ve taken the liberty of re-writing it so that it has a chance of actually influencing some people toward GT’s viewpoint," the author writes. Go compare the results: Original vs. Modified. [Sinostand]

The Economist just can't catch a break. This is the third straight links post in which the London-based news magazine has been dissed. "Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi derided western economic prescriptions of the late 20th century as 'medicine that turned out to be worse than the disease.' // He singled out The Economist magazine for criticism, saying policies it advocated a decade ago had set the continent on the path to recolonization." By the way, the story is about the African Union's new headquarters in Ethiopia, and yes, it is somehow related to China. [Voices of America]

Picture of the Day: new 798 gallery Art Bridge's logo

It's a good one:

The character 拆 -- "demolish" -- in the shape of a house with a tree in the front yard.

We should probably all be following what's happening in Wukan

The New York Times called it an "open rebellion." Business Insider gave three reasons the protests are "totally unprecedented." Roads are blockaded. It has its own Wikipedia page ("Siege of Wukan").

The situation: a bunch of people are angry that government officials or cadres, in cahoots with developers, are evicting them to build luxury housing that they won't be able to afford. Of course they haven't been properly compensated -- oh, and a village representative was killed while in custody. This is a huge deal. Because while chai-qian (demolish-relocate) is common -- the biggest surprise is these large-scale protests don't happen more often -- a death of a well-respected villager is the type of cataclysmic event that can galvanize and embolden the masses, and suddenly a dispute has become a months-long protest.

We should probably be clear about what the villagers are fighting for, though. It's not, as Hong Kong's Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movement in China chairman Lee Cheuk-yan rather selfishly put it, "democracy in China" (quote: "We are very much encouraged by their struggle and we believe this is the hope for democracy in China.") For fuck's sake, their land is being pillaged; I think "democracy" and all its nebulous meanings is the last thing on their minds. We can help the movement or we can hurt it, and wielding words like "democracy" and, really, "rebellion" (implying overthrow of the government) probably aren't the best. In this sense, this is nothing like Occupy, and not really at all like Arab Spring: these villagers have a specific reason for protesting, and it's a pretty narrow, selfish reason, however justified they are.

Still: we should pay attention. You never know where the threshold is for critical mass, and once that's reached, things will never be the same.

POSTSCRIPT: Somehow related: Christian Bale stopped from visiting Chen Guangcheng. Some days, I tell ya... fuck this government.

My new hero, Yang Youde

Badass of the Week:

The big shot pompous assholes of SuperMechaCorp Developers offered Youde the Chinese monetary equivalent of about $19,000 for his land, which amounts to roughly one-fifth of what the farm is actually worth. When Youde brought this up in "negotiations", the developers told him that if he didn't agree to it they would send a couple dozen guys to beat the fuck out of him in the hopes that some massive head trauma would help him change his mind. Youde told them to hump a lawnmower.

ESWN:

On May 25, Yang Youde said that several dozen men came armed with shields and helmets behind bulldozers. This time, Yang Youde fired several shots. Before firing, he used a megaphone to declare aloud: "I kept mentioning Document 46 (2009) and the lack of an agreement about the land." At the same time, he yelled, "This is going to cause injuries on both sides." Yang Youde said that he was forced to open fire when the evictors continued to advance.

SMH headline: China farmer uses cannon to fight eviction

NTDTV: a video!

Caochangdi update

Wrote this for City Weekend, reposting here in full:

The Beijinger blog announced this morning that “everyone in the area” of Caochangdi was “issued notices that they will be evicted and the suburb demolished.” While this is technically true, the one-page notice was actually received three weeks ago, on April 16, and, like previous notices last summer, was typically vague and noncommittal.

Government-stamped and originating from a village office, the April 16 notice read, in part, “Following the progression of urbanization, our village has been listed in the area of demolition and eviction, but the time has not been specified.” Three Shadows Photograph Art Gallery founders Rong Rong and Inri, along with artist Huang Rui, responded by quickly drawing up a petition to save Caochangdi. It was circulated electronically and via hard copies, in English and Chinese. You can sign it here.

So where does that leave us now? Same as before - uncertain. Many people, villagers and artists alike, believe demolition is inevitable, or are at least resigned to that fate. “There are rumors and everything, and it would be a great shame (if they tore this down), but Beijing is expanding and there’s a price to pay for that,” says Fabien Fryns, owner of F2 Gallery. But Caochangdi’s future is far from sealed. According to a Beijing News article on April 23, a town government official denied reports of any impending demolition.

Last month we put Caochangdi on the cover of this magazine hoping to draw wider attention to a bustling urban village that’s home to some of the better – though understated – art galleries in the city. We timed the publication with the opening of PhotoSpring, a photography festival spearheaded by Three Shadows and modeled after the world-famous Arles festival in France. And while it was impossible to ignore the sense of uncertainty and dread that permeated – Caochangdi faces the same fate as many art districts, the specter of being leveled by developers who believe the space is living down its economic potential – the area has proven remarkably resilient.

Residents have been conducting business as usual while PhotoSpring, which closes on June 30, is chugging along just fine. The festival attracted more than 5,000 visitors on the opening weekend, April 17-18, leading Jillian Schultz, a Three Shadows international affairs officer, to say, “I was certain there was no way (developers) could proceed.”

“But then again,” she adds, “it’s developing China, and you never know.”

“Right now, there’s no solid news,” says Rose Jiang Wei, owner of Art Channel Gallery. “We do hope we can stay, so people are working hard at it, but we’re not clear what stance the government is taking. We really don’t know."

The other side of the artist demolition story

Scroll down in this Guardian article and read by LostInWonder has to say:

Almost all the "art areas" in Beijing are built illegally on agricultural land: when artists were looking for cheap studio space, they approached peasants, who would either put up basic buildings and rent them out, or allow artists themselves to build studios, signing leases for 3, 5 or 10 years. However, both sides knew that this was illegal as the land was only zoned for agriculture. Only land zoned for industry (usually land with abandoned factories) could be put on 30 year leases to the artists, and these leases are usually honored.

...

So, the situation is not at all black and white as the Western press generally presents it, of the evil or negligent Communist government, helpless peasants, wronged artists, and rapacious officials, although these all exist to some degree. Everyone is out for a good deal, and the outcome is generally decided on economics, much as in the West. The difference is that, since the laws are not set up for private ownership, there is a lot more chance of ambiguity, with much more maneuvering where each party tries to work out how to secure themselves, or to work things to their own advantage.

Also see: Andrew Jacobs's reporting in the New York Times.

Not exactly the way to go about evicting someone

Last night, artists in Zhengyang Creative Art Zone were attacked by a large group of men in what is believed to be an eviction-related assault. If you'll remember, the artists at Zhengyang have steadfastly refused to vacate the premises of their district despite repeated threats from developers and their goons. The artists "fought" back with exhibitions to attract media attention, which was strong at the outset but has dwindled recently.

About 20 artists took to Changan Jie yesterday in protest, drawing the attention of Global Times. According to the article,

The group began its march at Jianguomen, holding posters saying "Civil Rights!" and yelling slogans such as "Capital Beijing, brutal demolition!" Their posters were confiscated.

Also,

Li Jiemin, deputy party chief of Jinzhan Township, vowed that "a police investigation will find out who is behind the incident. I can assure you the township government had nothing to do with the incident."

Three of the assailants were allegedly captured by artists and turned over to police, which should lead to a quick determination of who the ringleaders were and swift but necessary justice absolutely nothing.

Imagine seeing your livelihood -- your life's work, including that which has made you immensely proud -- get pulled down from their shelves, from the walls, shattered on the ground without dignity or reason. And destroyed by a bunch of hoodlums adorned in symbols of incorrigible power, faceless hoodlums wielding clubs, who jumped out of the night from military trucks. How angry would that make you?

Update on artists fighting eviction notice

The fourth fire commenced as planned on Feb. 3, but the next day, according to an artist who sent me the above pictures, a group of about 50 "Black Society" people descended upon Zhengyang Art District to manually chai the buildings. The police were called in, and "bloodshed averted." (I have to point out here by way of disclaimer that this is all hearsay -- not sure myself how tense the situation was.)

Introduction to Warm Winter.

RedBox Review has more information, along with some handy links.

Warm Winter update: commencement of "fourth fire"

As mentioned in my first Warm Winter post, a rift is beginning to form in the ranks as artists find themselves undecided about how much to risk, exactly, in the fight against developers. The impossibility of this task has, it appears, made artists in the Jiangfu Art Zone -- who have more to lose because their landlord is actually protecting them -- at least rethink their tactics. These are stressful times.

The artists postponed their "fourth fire" (show) from January 29 to February 3, 1:30 p.m. at Dongying Art Zone in the outer woods.

Zhou Yong, the artist most upset that a harder line hasn't been taken, has written an open letter on his blog to another of the event organizers. Read it here (I'll translate it later, maybe).

And now I'd like to show you the most loathed word in contemporary Chinese society:



Even in Taiyuan, 拆 is 拆, except here the residents are even more helpless to do anything about it. Let's just say the mafia is a bit stronger and has a bit more interest in matters concerning money, while law enforcers a little more chickenshit.

POSTSCRIPT: Marbury plays tonight. Stay tuned.

Roger Cohen: The self-immolation of Tang Fuzhen

NYT, 1/25:

On that day, Nov. 13, as Tang Fuzhen yelled at the demolition brutes to stop the violence against her siblings, as she pleaded with them to leave her house intact, she doused herself three times in gasoline, saying she would set herself on fire, right there on the roof, if the beating of her family continued.

The blows continued to rain down and the self-immolation of Tang Fuzhen, 47, was added to the long list of victims of explosive Chinese development.

The nexus of that growth often comes down to real estate: Who owns it, who gets the sweet deals on it, who gets ousted, and who among Communist Party officials and their developer cronies pockets the big bucks from the infrastructure, business and residential projects that have turned China into a monumental construction site.

POSTSCRIPT: Also from the NY Times, a different subject but also one I closely follow: Education as a Path to Conformity. Quote:

Starting at 6, children are buried under an avalanche of studies until they graduate from high school. Twelve-hour days (less on weekends, but no days off) are common among first-graders. For his first Chinese New Year semester break, my 6-year-old son was given 42 pages of math and 42 pages of Chinese homework to complete in four weeks. The goal? Entrance to an elite college like Peking or Tsinghua University.

Yet once there, laziness can set in. Many students kick back, relying on their elite network to smooth a path through life. After the slog of the previous 12 years they feel they deserve a break. Perhaps they do. But it’s no incentive for academic brilliance.

Warm Winter: artists unite in fight for personal homes, national property rights

Warm Winter is a collaborative touring art exhibition involving artists from the city's 20 major art colonies. It started as a response to a particularly invidious demolition squad hired by real estate developers, but it has since become something much bigger.

This is why you should care.

In China, demolish-and-relocate (chai-qian, 拆迁) is commonly accepted as an inevitable consequence of the country's headlong rush towards urbanization, i.e. "progress," without regard to individual costs. Most of the time, the evictees have no voice and no means of fighting back -- and they always lose -- since typical leasing contracts have a force majeure clause that excuses landlords from compensating tenants.

These artists, however, do have a voice, and what makes this story significant is that they're steadily gaining listeners.

The artists have staged three shows so far, with the next one on January 29. On January 12, a group of thugs incited violence that was witnessed by a large local media contingent (the incident made the front page of The Beijing News (this picture)).

I was at an event last Thursday (see pictures, below) at Zhengyang Creative Art Zone -- in many ways the center of this conflict -- which was also attended by the firebrand Ai Weiwei, who told the assembled media, "Human rights must be won by the people."

"Our society should have common sense," he continued. "That a country constantly speaking about its own formation and future would relentlessly destroy its self-built art districts is a farce. (This may happen) in North Korea, sure. But constantly demolishing people’s homes? Before ‘49 (the formation of New China), this sort of thing might have happened.

"They’re even going to demolish Tiananmen. Zhongnanhai is next.

"They might demolish anything. We're preparing ourselves. Yesterday we searched for ways to oppose tanks." Laughter from assembled media.

"Did you find a way?" a journalist asked.

"Not yet. This I can’t talk about here. You’re going to get me run out."

He added, "Artists are soft. Today they’re operating within their own comfort zone. I don’t feel like there’s much significance in this (show)."

He then likened the artists to "masturbators" who "crawl under the blankets to do it."

"I don’t think there’ll be much upshot," he said.

Several hours later, artists from the show marched about 2 km to Jiangfu Art Zone, where the plan was to meet up with others for a dinner. Along the way, shopkeepers poked out of their stores as the artists chanted, "We're exercising our bodies to protect our homes!"

Along the way, the artists were cheered by a mother with her small child and by a man standing in an abandoned building, waving a red flag underneath a tattered Chinese flag.




Two plainclothes officers trailed us the entire time:

Watched us during the event, too.

But when the artists reached their destination, they were in for a surprise: Jiangfu's residents -- artists who successfully petitioned the city government last year to preserve their district -- turned the marchers away out of fear of formal retribution. The artists were denied the confrontation with authorities they were angling for.

"Successful artists don't want trouble, and the Jiangfu artists are 'successful,'" said artist Zhou Yongyang. He was apoplectic as we drove away.

The rift forming between the artists illustrates another reason tenants face an uphill battle in housing disputes. Those with nothing to lose (like Zhou, who lost his home to developers in 2005) are usually outnumbered by those who prefer deference, like the artists of Jiangfu.

But at the center of it all, the issue that needs addressing is China's unjust property rights laws and what the government might do about them.

In March's National Committee of CPPCC plenary meeting, national leaders will discuss whether to reform its demolish-and-relocate laws. (Incidentally, Warm Winter will conclude just before then.) There will be no shortage of lobbyists. "We're not anti-government; we support the country's policies," one of Warm Winter's co-organizers told me in a 90-minute interview last week. "But these methods are inhumane. They deprive us of our most basic living requirements." The artists, like most Chinese petitioners, are hopeful (perhaps naively) that if they "make things big, the government will intervene."

But intervene on whose behalf?

"It appears there have been lots of suicides this year, jumping off buildings, everything," Ai Weiwei said. "This seems to me like a particularly painful thing to do. It should be the government, not the people, jumping off buildings."






Warm Winter has received considerable local press (including English-language Beijing Today), but as yet nothing from international media -- duly noted by the Newswatch blog -- and my pitches to CNN, The New York Times, London Times, Guardian and Observer have been summarily ignored (Slate at least wrote back). The editors' approach -- wait-and-see -- is understandable, considering the number of chai-qian incidents and minor protests that spring up. It may well require a nail-house type incident to attract the big media companies.

And that type of incident is what Ai Weiwei was saying he wanted -- what Zhou, in fact, wants -- and that there are people -- influential, well-known -- who are actively trying to incite disorder is what makes this story worth following. Stay tuned.

UPDATE: Xiao Ge's website coverage here.

Links of the day, and a note about China Geeks

Haven't done this in a while...

• Wall Street Journal on chaiqian (拆迁), i.e. demolish-and-relocate (or "remove," as WSJ translates it.)
  

  The struggle between small homeowners and property developers has become a recurring theme in contemporary China, leading to increasingly dramatic protests against local officials and even inspiring a novel Chinese interpretation of the hit film Avatar.
  
  Aiming to reduce the social tensions inherent in the process of urban redevelopment, Beijing has been planning to revise the regulations that govern the tearing down of people’s homes to make way for new real estate projects. A draft of the new rules is expected to be released for public comment in the coming weeks. In the meantime, experts, lawmakers and officials have been meeting to discuss proposed changes.

  
  
• CN Review's Kai Pan, writing in classic Kai Pan style, summarizes the Google debate, offers a viewpoint and links to every article that was ever written on the subject here.
  
  
• The Peking Duck: Censor Me
  
  
• More about Google, from Fifty 5 (56minus1)
  
  
• Danwei: Dirty jokes by mobile phone
  
  
• Bokane: on Confucius (the movie) and the State Administration of Radio Film and Television (and via a comment from that post, The Warring States Project from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst).
  
  
• the Beijinger: pictures of masked civilians (Shredder look-alike contest, as the authors call it)
  
  
• And finally, via Shanghaiist, this article from Business Week says "modern" doesn't necessarily equate to "Western."
  

  We also asked young Chinese to choose one wish that would make their life happier. Surprisingly, 82% chose to do something for their parents, most commonly to provide them an easy life.
  
  

And finally, I have absolutely no idea how I could've missed this -- and I'm appalled, trust me -- but China Geeks, which has been active since at least May 2009 (and possibly before that -- forgive me for not being able to check at the moment), has to be one of the best China blogs active today. It's only getting stronger with the addition of one of ChinaSmack's team members.

Links of the week

Because these are too interesting:

• John Pomfret, former Beijing bureau chief of the Washington Post, weighs in on why China will remain a "muscle-bound adolescent" rather than develop into a superpower.
  
  
• Pole dancing is gaining traction in China, despite the built-in barriers. Check out the video, too.
  
  
• Everything you need to know about China? You decide.
  
  
• The Pew survey everyone's been linking to.
  
  
• Even for the Chinese, 150 cm is very short.
  
  
• Ignore the title of this article, because the protest these Nigerian athletes are planning has little to do with Beijing but because "were not happy with the shoddy treatment they alleged the National Sports Commission (NSC) meted out to them and as such, according to them, 'want the whole world to know what we passed through before coming to the games'." Interesting. So the Olympics are being politicized by neutral parties as well.
  
  
• Lead: "Beijing has set up a sex determination lab to test female Olympic athletes suspected to be males." Read more.
  
  
• Sports Illustrated's Olympic preview issue, which always wins some national magazine award, is coming out this week. Check out Alexander Wolff/Richard Deitsch's essay on these Olympics.
  
  
• TBJ: Changes around Beijing.
  
  
• New Yorker: China's neocons (best article about China I've read this year).
  
  
• Oops. (It's about Tiananmen, late-80s-ish.)
  
  
• Beijing hutongs and the modern siheyuan.

And finally, the picture of the day:

DON'T DEMOLISH