Translated by @krizcpec
Listened to a talk by economist Mr Chen Zhiwu yesterday morning.
What a talk! At noon my friends and I had lunch with Mr Chen, then in
the afternoon I was occupied with other things. As a result, I didn't
get the time to watch Obama's inauguration ceremony. But with
advanced communication channels available, I can watch a recap this
morning after I woke up.
Obama's philosophy is rooted in the liberal and democratic
tradition of the United States. I knew this without having to watch
the ceremony. Such is the rational expectation people can have with
the protection of a good system. His speech began with economy,
security, foreign relations, and sense of responsibility—nothing
particularly impressive. But look at the way he spoke, and his
political ideas, compare with those the living-dead faces of our
officials, and the zombie-like sameness of words they use in speeches
– and one would see what a difference there is.
An inaugural speech is not a lecture. It is not an instruction
either. The speaker does not reproach the people with a stern face.
Instead they would outline their promises in a cordial and pragmatic
manner. Whatever is said, the specific plans in particular, must be
honored.
To overcome stiffness in delivering public speeches may not be
easy for Chinese officials today, but that's not the most difficult
part. What the Chinese officials need to work at, most importantly,
is to fulfill the beautiful promises they made. Most of the promises
the authorities made in the past sixty years ended up as lies.
I said before that if one percent of the self-praise and promises
of the government in the past sixty years had been realized, China
would be a human paradise. Sadly, that didn't happen. China becomes a
hell on earth instead.
That's to say, beautiful words and moving promises, without the
good system that makes them happen, will only become nothing. You
cannot but put a big question mark on the good promises the officials
made when there is no genuine supervision of the government; no
freedom of speech; and restriction on newspapers and political
parties remains in place.
In our country where officials see fabrication as the norm, their
speeches to refute rumors or to smooth things over are just
ridiculous—and they think they succeeded in what they do. Just like
the films made from the official perspective that tend to portray the
KMT as idiots and so total victory become possible. The officials
think the public are irredeemably stupid and they can keep lying
without bearing any consequences. There is no behavior more foolish
than this.
As societies evolve to this day, people have spent ample time to
prove the doubtless universal suitability of a free and democratic
system. Whoever coming up with excuses not to move a country toward
freedom and democracy are enemies of the people. In his speech, Obama
would of course not forget to remind us our victory over fascism and
communism, and convey a message to countries that are superstitious
about imposing violence on their own peoples. This is his ongoing
perseverance in promoting democracy and freedom.
In his article “On Obama's inaugural speech”, Xu Zhiyong wrote
that his focus on Obama was not out of high expectation of him.
Rather, he intended only to point out through this election a matter
of common sense—politics can be good. Two millions Americans
watched the inauguration ceremony with heartfelt good wishes. What a
saying, it can serve as a wake-up call for today's Chinese populace
to get to understand the meaning of politics.
For thousands of years, China has been a social jungle; even to
this day, China is still not a modern country with civilized
politics, it is only a state where people have to give anything to
get what they need to survive, where their way of life is governed by
hidden rules and the law of the jungle. These naturally entail the
ugly politics that we see.
Politics under the influence of the law of the jungle would of
course endorse all sorts of tricks, and take the greatest advantage
of information asymmetry. Politics that favors the use of trickery to
destroy opponents instead of creating a situation in which all
parties win and that prefers victory by force to peaceful
co-existence is certainly bloody and ugly.
But if we put politics out in the open, and make sure that various
check and balance forces are in place, then, like Xu Zhiyong said,
“politics can be good”. I have no intention to deify the system
of freedom and democracy. But when it comes to handling public
affairs, a better alternative is yet to be found.
Politics is not innately dirty. It is the ugly policies put
forward not in compliance with universal values that is dirty.
The Chinese people like to say that they do not like politics,
that they have developed political apathy syndrome. This is exactly
what those in power in dictatorship would want to see.
It's okay not to work as a government official. But it's not okay
to turn a blind eye to politics, which is related to our rights in a
myriad of ways. Politics is everybody's business, the officials have
no monopoly on it. Unless our attitude toward politics has changed,
we would not be able to put an end to the fate of being enslaved and
exploited.
Seeing Obama's “American dream” of becoming the president came
true, and looking at the seemingly indefinite wait for the Chinese to
realize their dream of being a free people, I think we should keep
working at that without slackening off, not even at times of cheers
and happiness like the lunar new year.
January 21, 2009, 8:58 in Chengdu
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