A NEW SET OF SPECTACLES (Zhong Dian)
WESTERNERS STRUGGLE to find the correct paradigm to understand China today. One cannot assume that Chinese automatically instantiate Western middle-class, cosmopolitan values out of thin air - when it has taken 200 years of post-agricultural society to develop them.
This was Illustrated in a discussion between Regan and Zhang Zemin in the 80's:
Regan: You should let your people travel and move overseas.
Zemin: Oh yes? How many million do you want?
98% of the current Chinese population has worked, or parents have worked on a farm - 75% still do today. This experience strongly shapes their thinking. The correct paradigm for thinking about China's values is agricultural life.
On the farm - plants are sown, grow and then are reaped. Animals are born, live and die. Both of these so that humans can live. In the same way - on the famr, humans are born, live and die. They are connected to the cycle of life and thus death is inevitable - as a natural part of life. Humans exist only to work on the farm, make more humans, and die to make way for others.
In this context - life doesn't have a lot of value - like a swaying sunflower or teething calf - you take your chances.
This paradigm existed in Western culture in the 1800's. The principles behind our Criminal laws were drafted in this era, when farm machinery was far more expensive and valuable than that cost of human work to do the same activity - so protecting it was paramount. Even today Criminal penalties for theft and damage to property are more punitive than those for assault and battery.
So as we went dancing in the square after dinner and Sharlene handed me a boiled sweet with an unusual wrapper I was not surprised. I expected a strawberry, or an orange - but instead got a cob of corn - a corn flavoured lolly. Perhaps the cosmopolitan equivalent would have been a corn flavoured one.
Today - to understand China is to understand the paradigm of agricultural life. These are the spectacles we must put on when viewing China. But for how long? The self-validating humanistic philosophy of the West seems terribly contagious. Just look at the rise of tortious litigation.
This was Illustrated in a discussion between Regan and Zhang Zemin in the 80's:
Regan: You should let your people travel and move overseas.
Zemin: Oh yes? How many million do you want?
98% of the current Chinese population has worked, or parents have worked on a farm - 75% still do today. This experience strongly shapes their thinking. The correct paradigm for thinking about China's values is agricultural life.
On the farm - plants are sown, grow and then are reaped. Animals are born, live and die. Both of these so that humans can live. In the same way - on the famr, humans are born, live and die. They are connected to the cycle of life and thus death is inevitable - as a natural part of life. Humans exist only to work on the farm, make more humans, and die to make way for others.
In this context - life doesn't have a lot of value - like a swaying sunflower or teething calf - you take your chances.
This paradigm existed in Western culture in the 1800's. The principles behind our Criminal laws were drafted in this era, when farm machinery was far more expensive and valuable than that cost of human work to do the same activity - so protecting it was paramount. Even today Criminal penalties for theft and damage to property are more punitive than those for assault and battery.
So as we went dancing in the square after dinner and Sharlene handed me a boiled sweet with an unusual wrapper I was not surprised. I expected a strawberry, or an orange - but instead got a cob of corn - a corn flavoured lolly. Perhaps the cosmopolitan equivalent would have been a corn flavoured one.
Today - to understand China is to understand the paradigm of agricultural life. These are the spectacles we must put on when viewing China. But for how long? The self-validating humanistic philosophy of the West seems terribly contagious. Just look at the rise of tortious litigation.
posted by Unknown | 9:30 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home