The Wheat Harvest of 1973

A word of warning first: this post is speculative in nature as I have no proof, nor do I think that what I say is provable, verifiable or falsifiable.  So there is no point in trying to prove or disprove this -- you should just address the challenge in the final paragraph.

The starting point is my post yesterday titled Middle-Class Self-Identity in Beijing.  In that post, I translated an article that summarizes ethnographic interviews with three middle-class households in Beijing today.  These people do not appear to be exceptional; you have probably met many such people before, in China and elsewhere.

After going through the article, I asked myself the hypothetical question: What are the chances of getting these people to engage in the democratic project so beloved by overseas democracy proponents?  For example, can you get these people to go out on the streets today to demand the end of one-party rule? or vindication of June 4, 1989? and the other pet democratic issues?

As I say, I have no proof but I believe that they will not engage.  This particular group of people grew up after the Cultural Revolution and at the start of the economic reforms.  They would have heard about what happened before, and they can see that their lives are a lot better than before.  They are fairly content with what they have accomplished so far, their discontent appear to be apolitical and tolerable and they are unwilling to risk everything that they have for some unknown future with a potentially huge downside.  This group of people is also the engine of the current economic growth of China.  My question was: So what does the democracy project have to say to them to get them to engage?

I am idealistic and moralistic.  I feel that one should always be able to appeal on the basis of fairness and justice.  The economic development of China over the past two decades or so had not been equitable.  Initially, it was a concerted decision to develop the major urban areas and the coastal regions as rapidly as possible, at the expense of the rural sector.  That was not necessarily a bad decision.  Completely even development is illusionary, and one ought to take advantage of the best opportunities available.  But at some point, one is morally obliged to redress those historical inequities.

But how much empathy would the urban middle-class have for the rural poor?  They might have flipped through the book by Chen Guidi and Wu Chuntao's The Chinese Peasants Study and felt sorry.  But that's not enough.  I want to see them actually do something about it.

Here, I am going to go back in time to pay a tribute to the Great Proletariat Cultural Revolution.  Yes, I agree fully that the campaign was a sham that masked the sectarian power struggles among various cliques.  Yet, I submit that at the base level, there was some degree of genuine faith that created a popular empathy which no longer exists today.

I am going to quote a paragraph from Jan Wong's Red China Blues.  The reported event took place in the heydays of the Cultural Revolution.  At the time, Jan Wong and her friend Erica Jen were the first two North Americans studying at Beijing University.

In June 1973, Erica and I excitedly joined our classmates for the wheat harvest.  We arose at 4:30am., splashed water on our faces and stumbled over to the Big Canteen, where we bought our double rations of tasteless steamed bread and extremely salty pickles.  After lining up in military formation for a roll call, we climbed into the back of damp army trucks for the bumpy ride to the commune.  My classmates cut the wheat with small sickles.  Since I was left-handed, my job was to bundle it, making "rope" by twisting shanks of fresh-cut wheat.

Stupidly, I had forgotten my straw hat.  By eight the sun had vaporized the clouds.  Because of a storm the previous day, the ground was literally steaming.  When I finally stopped to straighten my back, the wheatfields shimmered like a sea of molten gold and the sky was so brilliant that my eyes hurt.  I thought I was going to pass out when the class leader called a break.  I checked my watch and was depressed to see it was only nine-thirty.  At noon, I collapsed on a straw mat and dreamed of ice coffee.  My hands were lacerated from the straw, my back hurt, and my throat and tongue were thick with thirst.  I couldn't eat the steamed bread and salted pickles.  Scarlet was ravenous and ate her lunch and mine.  We finally quit at five in the afternoon, after half a dozen classmates had fainted from heat exhaustion.

I submit that the class of students from the elite Beijing University back then would be much less concerned about taking care of their pets first than seeing that the Chinese peasants becoming 'well-off'.  Maybe they have lost faith in the words of their political leaders and they don't ever want to get fooled again.  But I don't think that they would wish the fate of what they had gone through for one day onto the majority of the Chinese population for their entire lives.

Still, that is history, as interesting as it may have been.  Meanwhile, what does the democracy project have to say to this current generation of the middle-class, which forms the backbone of the economic engine of China?  I have no suggestions.  But unless the democracy proponents can come up with effective messages, their project is hopeless.  

The criteria are simple: think about people like the middle class families in the Wen Wei Pao article, and see how you can persuade them to unequivocally and passionately demand the end of one-party rule, the beginning of democratic direct elections and the vindication of June 4, 1989.  All I can say is that you are not getting through to them right now.  If you say "F**k them and their black hearts!!" and go for a peasant rebellion instead, you will have made sure that they are on the other side.  Is that the best way to go?  And are you sure that you know how to connect with the peasants either?