The Jasmine Revolutions - why China's leaders should be on their toes

A survey by the Pew Research Centre last year suggested 87% of Chinese were satisfied with "the way things were going" in their country. The vast majority of the Chinese people, particularly the rising middle-class, feel that they have never had it so good. It is a historical record that 400 million Chinese people have been lifted out of centuries of poverty. For the first time, the national pride of the Chinese people have been restored as China's economy is now the world's second largest and China's international influence is gaining by leaps and bounds. Most of the complaints are isolated cases of individual grievances. There is no popular demand for regime change in the absence of a viable, better alternative.  Morever, in China, Facebook and Twitter are banned and Google is routinely censored . The Great Firewall is very effective. 

So, for now, it would appear that all this talk about a Jasmine Revoluion spreading to China is something of a non-story. See an Aljazeera blog 'Call me if there's a revolution' at http://blogs.aljazeera.net/asia/2011/02/20/… and a ChinaGeeks report 'The Revolution that Wasn't' at http://chinageeks.org/2011/02/the-revolution-that-wasnt/

The above obervations, albeit true, could instill a false sense of complaceny. 

First, it was Premier Wen Jiabao who said openly to an international audience (first in 2005) that China's development is 'Unstable, Unbalanced, Uncoordinated, and Unsustainable. (The Next Asia, Stephen Roach, John Wiley and Sons, 2009). expand »The PEW high satisfaction rating applies largely to the middle-class in cities. The other side of the 87% satisfaction rating coin means 13% of 1.3 billion people, those largely in the poorer provinces, are not so well satisfied. 

Keenly aware of the crictical threats to its stability, the Chinese leadership has long come to grips with the required shift in emphasis, starting with the last Five Year Plan (2005-2010). 'The most impressive gain' is in rural areas, according to the Petersen Institute (Morris Goldstein and Nicholas Lardy, The Future of China's Exhange Rate Policy, Washington D.C., July 2009, pp.36-37) :
 
(a) Partial reimbursement (about 30%) of healthcare costs has registered a 20-fold increase by 2007, covering 730 million people, quadruple the number covered in 2005;

(b) Additional health insurance (2009-2011) will extend the coverage to 90% of the population by 2011. (Government pays half or more of the costs, up from 16% in 2001);

(c) Old Age Pensions for retirees now averaged RMB 1,173 in January 2009 (higer than the national average wage, although still well below the going wage in cities);

(d) A minimum living standard quarantee program with dramatically-increased monthly payments from RMB50 in 2002 to RMB140 by 2008.

As for pollution, out of sheer necessity, China is going green. See 'Can Red China become Green China?', in Hot, Flat and Crowded (Thomas Friedman, Penguin Books, 2009). Or your may care to see a powerpoint presentation 'China on the Doorstep to a Low Carbon Future' at http://www.andrewleunginternationalconsultants.com/files/…

The coming 12 Five Year Plan (2011-15) is expected to be a watershed shifting the nation towards a more balanced and sustainable society with greater economic equality, social justice, technological upgrading, innovation, ecological conservation, agricultural productivity, regional balance, and domestic consumption.

However, the test of the pudding is still in the eating. Meanwhile, there is a rising undercurrent of discontent due to galloping prices, irregular land grabs, labour disputes, on-going pollution, corruption, inequality, and injustice.

Second, anongst the rising, more educated, middle-class, there is an increasing yearning, if not open demand, for more accountability and representation. This yearning is now empowered by the connectivity of an internet population of 420 million people, expanding rapidly. 

Third, the Jasmine Revolutions sweeping across the Middle East show how powerful this New Age connectivity is and how quickly a spark could ignite a forest. The effectiveness of the kind of imaginative, non-violent resistance tactics outlined by Tina Rosenberg (Join the Club: How Peer Pressure Can Transform the World, W.W. Norton & Co, 2011) is eye-opening. An adapted exercept can be accessed on YaleGlobal Online at http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/revolution-u?utm_source=YaleGlobal+Newsletter&utm_campaign=85342088a9-Newsletter9_14_2010&utm_medium=email

It is no coincidence that on 19 February, President Hu urged officials to redouble efforts to improve, or at least maintain, social harmony. See http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2011-02/19/…
 
The demand for more political representation, accountability and civil liberty is likely to continue to grow as China's middle class expands to over half of the population in the coming decades. It remains to be seen how China will be able to evolve effectively to respond to the changing times.
 
Best regards,
 
Andrew

www.andrewleunginternationalconsultants.com