[Radix] Follow up & thanks on China disaster meeting

[bwisner at igc.org]

Dear George et al.,

I couldn't agree more with your coherent and articulate statement, George.  It illuminates our options in a very helpful way.  I experienced in Sichuan and in Beijing precisely what you describe, the technical experts were more than willing to discuss the problem of school safety in detail.  I found that by discussing successes and failures in other parts of the world -- Canada, Nepal, Turkey, Colombia -- provided a way of approaching critique of China's policy and practice in an oblique way.

Cheers,

BEN

-----Original Message-----
>From: George Kent <kent at hawaii.edu>
>Sent: Jan 28, 2009 3:33 PM
>To: T.G.Cannon at greenwich.ac.uk
>Cc: terrycannon at blueyonder.co.uk, radix at ecie.org
>Subject: Re: [Radix] Follow up & thanks on China disaster meeting
>
>I appreciate Terry’s January 27 email inviting further discussion on  
>the Chinese government’s response to events such as the Sichuan  
>earthquake.
>
>I am uncomfortable with the suggestion that the question here is how  
>to deal with governments that have significant authoritarian  
>tendencies. All governments have those tendencies. I’m not convinced  
>that the guidelines for diplomacy differ for countries we label as  
>more authoritarian.
>
>Similarly, I question the generalization that the Chinese regime does  
>not respond to external pressure, “seeing it (in a parallel way to  
>Mugabe and some South African ANC ministers) as imperialist attacks.”  
>Instead, I would begin with the assumption that disaster specialists  
>come together as technical experts, and therefore have common  
>interests and, to some extent, a shared culture.  That could prove to  
>be wrong, but it is a healthy assumption to make at the outset.
>
>Terry asks, “how should outsiders comment on Chinese repression?” I  
>would say that in a technical meeting, outsiders should not comment on  
>that. I say this partly based on my experience in going to  
>international human rights meetings, where it can be embarrassing to  
>be from the U.S. At those meetings, I don’t want to have to answer for  
>the government’s positions on issues not relevant to the current  
>meeting’s agenda.
>
>I think it is useful to talk about bad governance (that is, bad  
>management) about a particular issue or episode, such as U.S. handling  
>of Hurricane Katrina, without extending that to generalizations about  
>bad government.
>
>I particularly like Terry’s saying,
>
>“When I mentioned rights, and the essential need for civil society to  
>be enabled in relation to community-based disaster preparedness, I  
>emphasised that this was in order to allow citizens to HELP the  
>government to ensure that the government fulfils its remit of  
>protecting its own citizens. Civil society can therefore be part of  
>the process by which government achieves its goals against corruption  
>at lower levels, rather than a threat to government.”
>
>This captures the all-important shift from viewing rights mainly in  
>terms of a national government’s obligations to submit to outsiders’  
>standards to instead seeing a system of rights as a tool through which  
>national governments can pursue their own goals more effectively. The  
>point is not to submit to outsiders’ standards for school  
>architecture, but to set your own, and to get ordinary people to  
>understand that they have the right and the means to insist that those  
>standards are met.
>
>Terry says he doesn’t share the optimism that engagement is the best  
>route to reducing China’s repressiveness. It may not be the best, but  
>that doesn’t mean it is not worth doing. I think we should take every  
>opportunity to become engaged with Chinese counterparts on any of the  
>issues that interest us. What has engagement achieved of the past two  
>decades? I would say a lot—though certainly not everything.
>Terry says, “the issues are all linked by the type of power that is  
>operating in China, and I cannot see how we can avoid analysing and  
>criticising this form of power and how it links to disasters,” I think  
>that in technical meetings one should speak diplomatically. That means  
>not talking in ways that are likely to end discussions.
>
>Terry summarizes as follows:
>
>“I am not against the idea of engagement if it can be shown that it  
>works, and that it is preferable to making loud critical remarks (in  
>order to achieve reduced vulnerability). But I am far from convinced.  
>Engagement and support to reform and reformers is very similar to the  
>position of the British (and other western) government on countries  
>like China, and in my view it is in danger of becoming a cop-out. Is  
>there a RADIXal version of engagement?”
>
>This helps to clarify that Terry sees criticism as the alternative to  
>engagement. However, I would say the distinction is really not so  
>sharp, since criticism can be couched in more or less constructive  
>ways. My view is that it is a mistake to view these two as wholly  
>different, and an even bigger mistake to suggest that one must choose  
>one path or the other. Radix should be engaged in many ways, including  
>criticism, but this should be done in constructive ways, ways that  
>open new possibilities rather than closing them. Different kinds of  
>responses are appropriate in different kinds of forums. Let’s not  
>limit ourselves by insisting on choices where none needs to be made.
>
>Terry has given several examples of China’s misbehavior. The US does  
>that regularly, in its annual report on the human rights performance  
>of other countries. See http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/  (Note  
>that it omits economic, political and cultural rights.) In a dance  
>that has now become very regular, China responds with an account of US  
>human rights failures, drawn from US media sources.  Its  report for  
>2007 is available at http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-03/13/content_7779839.htm 
>  We might quarrel with the Chinese report, but even so, I think it  
>provides a healthy corrective to what otherwise might be a somewhat  
>unbalanced view on our part.
>
>This Chinese report’s unremitting negativity is not helpful. This is  
>not what I would describe as constructive criticism. It is generally  
>useful to couple criticism to some serious, positive recommendations.  
>With regard to issues of corruption, for example, we could go beyond  
>railing against it and point out that there are now some well  
>developed methods for limiting it, as illustrated by the work of  
>Transparency International (www.transparency.org) and Tiri  
>(www.tiri.org).
>
>To summarize, we should engage with the Chinese on these issues at  
>every opportunity, with approaches that are as constructive as  
>possible. Criticisms should generally be focused on the issues  
>immediately at hand, and they should be accompanied with serious  
>positive recommendations for action.
>
>Aloha, George
>
>
>
>On Jan 27, 2009, at 5:29 AM, T.G.Cannon at greenwich.ac.uk wrote:
>
>> Dear RADIXers
>> This letter is mainly for those who responded to my call for advice  
>> on how to deal with the presentation I gave last week on the Chinese  
>> earthquake. The meeting was co-hosted by Fondation Madariaga and the  
>> Chinese embassy to the European Union, and the Chinese ambassador  
>> was there along with many other officials. Two Chinese disaster  
>> specialist also spoke. You can see the programme and presentations at:
>>
>> http://www.madariaga.org/events/events-2008/46-2008/159-chinas-ability-to-cope-with-natural-disaster
>>
>> and see my Powerpoint.
>>
>> Because the issues are of general interest to RADIX, I am sharing  
>> these thoughts, but I do especially want to thank Ben Wisner, George  
>> Kent, Terry Jeggle, James Lewis and John Wiener for their  
>> substantial messages to me. (Apologies for not responding  
>> individually to you, and I hope I have not left anyone out).
>>
>> It really helped to have your thoughts, though I think it would open  
>> up a very good if we were to discuss on RADIX the issue of how we  
>> deal with our approach to governments that have significant  
>> authoritarian tendencies. That is why I am sending my response to  
>> the list: this is a very general issue.
>>
>> While I came to the view (as a result of most of the comments from  
>> the above) for this meeting that I should be ‘diplomatic’ and  
>> "engage" with the officials in Brussels, and that the approach  
>> should be one of supporting reform and reformers, I still have very  
>> serious doubts about whether that will actually have an effect.
>>
>> I realise that part of the problem with the Chinese regime is that  
>> it does not respond to external pressure, seeing it (in a parallel  
>> way to Mugabe and some South African ANC ministers) as imperialist  
>> attacks. So how should outsiders comment on Chinese repression?
>>
>> One of my approaches at the meeting was to make it quite clear that  
>> I am not criticising China in isolation from critical comments that  
>> could be made about many other countries. I started by talking about  
>> Hurricane Katrina as an example of bad government, and when I spoke  
>> of corruption (re schools that were not constructed properly) I  
>> emphasised that this has to be seen in much a wider context. For  
>> this I mentioned the recent global financial crisis as a product of  
>> (in effect) corrupt behaviour in western banks, the British  
>> Aerospace corruption (linked to the UK government) over arms sales,  
>> and the Common Agricultural Policy as an example of a policy  
>> designed to deny development to the poor and support the already  
>> rich – institutional corruption if you like.
>>
>> When I mentioned rights, and the essential need for civil society to  
>> be enabled in relation to community-based disaster preparedness, I  
>> emphasised that this was in order to allow citizens to HELP the  
>> government to ensure that the government fulfils its remit of  
>> protecting its own citizens. Civil society can therefore be part of  
>> the process by which government achieves its goals against  
>> corruption at lower levels, rather than a threat to government.
>>
>> All this came after a rather positive account of the emergency  
>> response effort of the Chinese government (AND ordinary people), so  
>> that it was in context.
>>
>> I don’t share the optimism of most of my advisors that engagement is  
>> the best (or only) route. While many Chinese may themselves be  
>> uncomfortable about repression (including that related to the  
>> earthquake and other disasters), what has engagement achieved over  
>> the past two decades? See below on the Olympics; the doctor who blew  
>> the whistle on SARS has regularly been placed under house arrest  
>> around June 4 each year in case she makes some other kind of protest.
>>
>> The bereaved parents who started a law case against local  
>> governments that oversaw school construction have had their case  
>> dismissed. The human rights lawyer Huang Qi who acted for some  
>> parents to make other claims was imprisoned last May, and is still  
>> in prison, accused of betraying state secrets (a catch all and  
>> indefensible accusation). He is seriously ill, and has been offered  
>> release only if he gives up his human rights activities.
>>
>> (Relating to the Olympics, the government had agreed to improve its  
>> reputation to allow civil society activities during the Games. It  
>> designated four areas in Beijing parks for people to hold  
>> demonstrations – for which they had to make an application. As far  
>> as I know, none were ever permitted. Two women in their 70s who  
>> applied to hold a protest about the demolition of their homes were  
>> arrested and held without charge. Others were harassed.)
>>
>> Some of my advisors argued that I should not make links between the  
>> collapse of schools and corruption and repression with other recent  
>> issues (toxic baby-milk, Amur river chemical discharge, SARS, AIDs  
>> scandals…). I understand that this approach would have made it  
>> difficult or impossible to make a supportive engagement to “work  
>> with reformers” in the system who also share these doubts. BUT the  
>> issues are all linked by the type of power that is operating in  
>> China, and I cannot see how we can avoid analysing and criticising  
>> this form of power and how it links to disasters.
>>
>> Given that part of our role (our duty) in RADIX is to make such  
>> analysis, how should we then relate it to action (and words) to make  
>> the analysis have an effect? This for me is the key missing link,  
>> and I am not convinced that “engagement” is an effective translation  
>> of our analysis into action.
>>
>> So this is where we need a debate on RADIX at least, to fathom out  
>> how we should do this.
>>
>> I am not against the idea of engagement if it can be shown that it  
>> works, and that it is preferable to making loud critical remarks (in  
>> order to achieve reduced vulnerability). But I am far from  
>> convinced. Engagement and support to reform and reformers is very  
>> similar to the position of the British (and other western)government  
>> on countries like China, and in my view it is in danger of becoming  
>> a cop-out. Is there a RADIXal version of engagement?
>>
>> At the end, the Ambassador commented that he enjoyed my presentation  
>> very much!
>>
>> best wishes
>> Terry
>>
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