A few weeks back, one of my friends visited Beijing and ended up getting stuck there because the embassy was, literally, unable to reprint her visa (they had printer problems). Anyway, she made it back in the end and we had dinner, where we of course talked about China.
I must confess that I've generally held a rather dim view of modern China: cut-throat, unscrupulous, and business-like to a fault (all about efficiency and profit maximization, and not about passion or learning for learning's sake). that, and the fact that culturally the individual always seems subsumed into the larger whole -- that even distinction and hence escape from involves following a fixed and pre-determined path (such as excelling at an exam, or sport...). I guess I just didn't like that China seemed an accentuated version of all the things I didn't like about my own country.
Visa-issues aside though, my friend has rather the opposite view of China. We talked about how China is doing "humanitarian" work in Africa and she explained how China doesn't donate, it approaches such work with a business mindset: building infrastructure such as roads, hospitals and schools and then providing training and taking a cut of the profits. Not as idealistic as the Western approach, but certainly effective (and from an economic point of view, a good solution, since everyone has their incentives lined up in the same direction in an arrangement like this).
She also told me about some earthquake up in the mountains (a disaster akin to Haiti/Katrina) and how the response was quick, and efficient because the Chinese had battalions of emergency response workers on standby for exactly such an eventuality. It was even more admirable because the response teams had to parachute in at considerable risk to their own lives, due to the high altitude -- they did so willingly out of a sense of national pride. Less sensationally, but perhaps more importantly, donations for the disaster went to a central disaster relief fund that supports such relief workers, but due to it's permanent nature has 2 benefits over other disaster relief funds: First, there are no constraints on when the money must be spent, meaning it can be spread out over years and sustain rebuilding efforts, instead of being squandered in the first few weeks and then wasted because the public loses interest later and doesn't follow up (what normally happens). Second, there are less constraints on where the money can be spent (donations were excessive, and approaching some ridiculous number like 20 million per villager).
Now I initially had a very cynical view of all this -- to me it seemed like doing coordinating such things well was simply politically expedient for China's leaders. After all, China has a long history of rebellion when people think their leaders no longer have their best interests at heart. But my friend thinks there is also something more: that China's leaders are no longer just motivated by power (at least at the highest levels), but are thinking about their legacy and how they want to be remembered.
Now this really got me thinking. It makes sense -- after a certain point, how much power can you keep accumulating? If look at in in the context of Maslow's hierarchy of needs (loosely applied), then after a person's basic personal needs are met: food, shelter, security... a mate... then next comes the need to feel good about ourselves, to be able to think of ourselves as more than just a very successful breed of animal and wonder what we will leave behind. This point has perhaps already been reached in the first world. And maybe these stirrings in China simply show that such progressions are not culturally restricted and happen naturally with economic growth. What I found interesting though (and this is not restricted to China), is that with improvements in technology, a greater proportion of individuals in society than ever before are finding themselves at this decision point. This has manifested itself in a number of social phenomenon, such as the one percent foundation, which I like to think of as practicing "philanthrophy as you go". Perhaps technology, simply by ensuring man is better able to meet his base personal needs, has the capacity to elevate us culturally and make us "better people" as well.
It would be pretty cool, if it did.
