The following post by Song Yangbiao (宋阳标), a professional journalist, was deleted from Sina Weibo sometime before 6:26 p.m. yesterday, December 2, 2012. The post shares a pastiche of newspaper reports about China in Hong Kong media, including a summary of the latest revelations from the New York Times over the assets held by the family members of current Premier Wen Jiabao, a devastating 120-car pile-up in Shandong province killing at least 7 people, and the use of scrap steel to make false teeth. Song Yangbiao currently has just over 17,000 followers, according to numbers from Sina Weibo. [More on deleted posts at the WeiboScope Search, by the Journalism and Media Studies Centre]

Numb and spicy hot pot, scrap steel to make fake teeth, and tragic car accidents — what is China coming to?

The original Chinese-language post follows:

麻辣火锅 废钢做牙 惨烈车祸 中国，这是怎么了？

NOTE: All posts to The Anti-Social List are listed as “permission denied” in the Sina Weibo API, which means they were deleted by Weibo managers, not by users themselves.

In November and December 2012, Chinese media reported widespread corruption in the administration of a national school lunch program. Media found that in many places in China the 3 yuan per day allocated for each child through a national school lunch program was giving children nothing more than a piece of bread and a box of milk — the rest of the money being pocketed by corrupt administrators. In the above cartoon, posted by artist Da Shixiong to Sina Weibo, an official hiding a suitcase full of cash behind his back labeled “corruption” urges a student to soar. The student, however, has only a paper airplane (labeled “Healthy School Lunch”) strapped to his back with which to fly because the corrupt local official has undercut his future by stealing his lunch money. The child is carrying a piece of bread and a box of milk. Behind the child is a rundown school building raising the national flag.

The following post by “Strange Bird” (怪鳥), the deputy general manager of a Beijing-based internet company, was deleted from Sina Weibo sometime before 8:51 p.m. yesterday, December 2, 2012. The post shares an image of Liu Xiaobo: A Biography, a 2011 book by Yu Jie about Nobel laureate and political prisoner Liu Xiaobo. The book, published in Hong Kong, is of course not available in mainland China, where Liu Xiaobo still cannot be mentioned in the press. “Strange Bird” currently has just under 19,000 followers, according to numbers from Sina Weibo. [More on deleted posts at the WeiboScope Search, by the Journalism and Media Studies Centre]

Ha ha! I’m starting it now.

The original Chinese-language post follows:

呵呵，入手

NOTE: All posts to The Anti-Social List are listed as “permission denied” in the Sina Weibo API, which means they were deleted by Weibo managers, not by users themselves.

Daniel A. Bell, a professor of philosophy at Tsinghua University, has courted controversy this year with his arguments about political meritocracy in China. Many scholars, in China as well as in the West, have questioned Bell’s idea that China leaders have a deep reserve of “performance legitimacy” and that China’s political system has broad support because it is seen by Chinese to produce leaders with an “above-average ability to make morally informed judgments.” Some have bypassed the finer points and branded Bell an “apologist.”
The arguments for and against Bell’s assertions about China’s political system are perhaps best left to political philosophers and experts. But Bell leapt right in to the wonderful cesspool of Chinese media scholarship a few days back when he wrote his rebuttal to Mark MacKinnon’s profile in the Globe and Mail, “A Canadian iconoclast praises China’s one-party system.”

The provocative headline of Bell’s piece, with its question-mark hedge — “Freedom Over Truth?” — hinted at the core question (assertion?) from the outset: does China’s restricted media culture actually produce fairer and more accurate journalism while freer Western media twist the facts to pander to bottom lines and base instincts?
As though playing out a psychological pattern, Bell finds merit in the “Chinese way” of doing things:

However, there are some advantages to the Chinese way of reporting news. When Chinese journalists interview their subjects, they try to put forward a balanced account of what the interviewees have to say, with emphasis on what can be learned and communicated as something new and interesting. They rarely engage in muckracking, public character assassination, or put on a smiling face then betray their interviewees in print.

I don’t want to occupy space here explicating Bell’s ignorance on both sides of this issue. This should be as clear to Bell himself as it is to journalists and communications scholars on both sides of the fence he has unfairly raised.
Let me just say there is no such thing as “the Chinese way of reporting news” — something, time permitting, we will address in the next few days. There is such a thing as the Marxist View of Journalism. But the View has nothing to do with “balanced accounts” or avoiding deceptive geniality.
The three chief principles of the Marxist View of Journalism are as follows:
1. Support for the Party’s principles. Journalists must understand that media work for the interests of the Party, as opposed to the public.
2. Criticism of the “bourgeois concept of free speech.”
3. Maintaining correct guidance of public opinion. Journalists must stick to the propaganda and media control objectives of the Party in order to maintain social and political stability.
It is so very retro (Teddy Roosevelt retro) of Bell to say “muckraking” with such a pejorative snarl. But of course Chinese media do engage in “muckraking” — tisk tisk — and I encourage Bell to start with our book on the subject, Investigative Journalism in China.
I must admit that I read Bell’s essay “Political Meritocracy is a Good Thing” — most readers at The Huffington Post, unfortunately, would have missed the insider’s reference to Yu Keping’s “Democracy is a Good Thing” — only after the 18th National Congress. As I read the professor’s remarks about how Chinese “cadres are put through a grueling process of talent selection, and only those with an excellent record of past performance are likely to make it to the highest levels of government,” I immediately thought of Premier-in-waiting Li Keqiang.
Mr. Bell may not know — though he will if he reads our chapter about “muckraking” on HIV-Aids in China — that Li Keqiang presided over one of the worst Aids epidemics in history. He was responsible for the cover-up of the epidemic, which resulted from a blood trade in which government officials were involved. Does that, I wonder, make Li more or less qualified to deal with this pressing health issue? Should Li’s actions to cover up the scandal be construed as “morally informed judgements”?
But given Bell’s assertions about Chinese media, it might be best to take a look at exactly how the Chinese media have treated Mr. Bell. And what better place to start than at the beginning?
Daniel A. Bell first appeared in China’s press on June 7, 2006. The article, reported by China Youth Daily, was re-posted on many websites in China, including the websites of both the official People’s Daily and Xinhua News Agency.
In the story, Bell talks about his background, his ideas, how he came to be at Tsinghua University, and how his experience has gone so far. The story is full of epiphanies that are quite frankly silly — probably played up and caricatured by the China Youth Daily reporter. At one point, for example, Bell is concerned that a student sitting in on his class might be a spy. But his fears are eventually allayed and he comes to see things are far more open than he imagined:

Last year, Bell was invited to teach at Peking University. After his first class a student came up and introduced himself in English, saying he was a student at the Central Party School. He wanted to know if he could listen in on the class. Bell welcomed him to join but had questions in his head. During the second class, he paid particular attention to this student and his reaction trying to suss out why he had come to listen in on the course.
“I asked a friend whether the Chinese Communist Party would dispatch spies to my class. Why had this student told me he was from the Central Party School? Did he have any special objective? My friends laughed loudly. They told me that it was completely normal for many students from other schools to go to Peking University, Tsinghua and other famous schools to listen in. This was purely a matter of academic interest. He laughed and told me not to always be suspicious.”

China Youth Daily also has Bell voicing surprise over the degree of freedom he has found in China:

Although he cannot yet use Chinese to write academic studies, Bell has already developed an intense interest in China’s academic publications. He says the “freedom of [China’s] academic publications has really surprised me. While publications do not have direct attacks on leaders, they do severely criticize specific policies such as limitations on the movement of the population under the household registration system.”

Notice that Bell says, according to the story, that he is surprised by the freedom he finds in “academic publications.” This is a most interesting point to note given the fact that the headline of the Bell story as it appeared at Xinhua Online and many other places in 2006 was: “Academic Freedom in China Really Surprises.”
Now hold on just a minute. Begging your pardon, Dear Chinese Media, but I believe Professor Bell was remarking on the degree of “freedom” he found in the research printed in academic journals in China. He did not say that China’s “academic freedom” in general surprised him. This, it seems, is a brazen mischaracterization.
But here is Bell just the other day on the problem of sensational and misleading headlines in the Western media:

Another advantage is that Chinese journalists often discuss the choice of headlines with the writers. The aim is to come up with a headline that best reflects the general theme of the article. In the Western press, by contrast, the aim is often to come up with provocative headlines that catch the attention of the reader. The only bad headline, I’m told, is a boring headline. Subjects of interviews, or writers of op-ed comments, are almost never consulted about the choice of headlines. Many readers blame the authors or the interviewees for the headlines because they do not know that headlines are not chosen by them.

The headline at Xinhua Online is arguably quite provocative, suggesting that a Western scholar’s eyes have been opened to the wonders of academic freedom in China. Was Bell, I wonder, consulted about the headline choice?
In any case, it was the reading suggested by the headline that caught the attention of many Chinese academics at the time, prompting a bit of chatter and no doubt some eye rolling as well. China had just had a number of rather high-profile incidents underscoring problems in Chinese higher education. They all boiled down to a system that was not, cringe, merit-based.
In 2005 world-renowned artist Chen Danqing had resigned from Tsinghua in disgust over the unnecessarily rigid (not rigorous, mind you) screening system for student recruitment and academic qualification. Chen saw the system as antagonistic to talent. Right on the heels of Chen Danqing’s resignation from Tsinghua, prominent Peking University legal scholar He Weifang penned an open letter announcing that he would refuse to accept master’s degree students for the 2006 academic year. Why? Because the admissions process was fundamentally flawed, he said, and many of the brightest students were not being admitted because of needless and fussy requirements.
Academic freedom in China? What was this Western newcomer talking about?
Here is an editorial that appeared in Guangzhou’s New Express newspaper on June 9, 2006, two days after the Bell profile made its rounds on the internet and in several newspapers:

“Academic Freedom in China is Surprising”
By Xue Limai (雪里埋)
Daniel Bell — in Chinese named Bei Danning (贝淡宁) — a Canadian professor of politics seen in Western academia as a “representative of modern-day communitarianism,” arrived at Tsinghua in 2004. At first he believed that “coming to Beijing would be a major challenge,” and he had already “prepared [himself] to face political restrictions.” But two years later, these preconceived ideas are totally changed, and he now believes that “academic freedom in China is surprising.” (SEE China Youth Daily, June 7).
It must be said that Daniel Bell’s understanding of “academic freedom” in China is superficial, and he has not come into contact with “lack of freedom” in the education system. I think his so-called “academic freedom” us hard to support in light of He Weifang’s refusal to admit new master’s degree students, in light of the “Gan Dehuai Incident” involving Peking University law school dean Zhu Suli (朱苏力), or in light of the case of Chen Danqing, who left Tsinghua in fury [over the vagaries of art education in China].
In my view, the basic condition of academic freedom must be the independence and autonomy of the university. This means that universities as a form of social organization maintain a sufficient distance from government power, and that they enjoy a definite degree the right to govern themselves and to develop themselves. On this foundation, the academic freedom enjoyed by faculty does not just mean the freedom of academic research and the freedom to publish the results of that academic research — more importantly, it means having the freedom to manage the university. And yet the biggest problem with the present management system for higher education [in China] is the way administration has entered the academic process (学术行政化), so that academic governance and administrative governance are smashed into one. Administrative methods replace academic competition, academic logic steps aside for administrative thinking, and external power (外部权力) dominates the distribution of education resources. In such a system, how can one even talk about “academic freedom.”
[We have an old saying that], “Tangerine trees growing south of the Huai River bear tangerines while those growing to the north bear citrons instead.” We might say that this is what “academic freedom” is like. Daniel Bell is observing local customs. For example, he’ll no longer do things Oxford-style, “tearing the other side to pieces.” He will do as his Chinese colleagues do, politely “adding a few remarks” after the other has finished speaking. This being Bell’s basis for “academic freedom,” he’s so flush with happiness (as we say) that he forgets his duties back home. Perhaps we should say that he “cannot see the true face of truth” because “the mountain looms up right before him.” [NOTE: This last line is a reference to the Song Dynasty poet Su Shi, who writes that he cannot see the true face of Lu Mountain because he lives in its cracks and folds.]

I hardly know what else to say: Xue Limai has said it so well. But of course Xue’s criticism of Bell’s views was based in the first place on a mischaracterization of Bell’s remarks.
I find Bell’s first appearance in the Chinese media rather elucidating given his recent remarks pitting some nebulous notion of Chinese principles against an equally fuzzy and over-generalized notion of Western pettiness. Perhaps, just perhaps, things are more complicated than Professor Bell has made out?
For just a bit more background, allow me to also provide a partial translation of the very lengthy profile of Bell that appeared in China Youth Daily on June 7, 2006:

When Daniel Bell first decided to accept a position to teach philosophy at Tsinghua University, his Western colleagues all stared at him in astonishment: “Are you crazy?” At the time, this Canadian professor of philosophy was teaching in Hong Kong. His colleagues were well aware that Hong Kong not only had a relaxed academic environment but its incomes were enviable.
“Of course I understood their concerns,” Bell says. “Free and unrestricted discussion is extremely important to research in this field. But I also understood that coming to Beijing was a major challenge for me.”
Daniel Bell is not “blind to China.” Back when he was studying in England, he started a multinational family with Chinese student Song Bing (宋冰). . .
“Actually, even my Chinese family at the time didn’t support my coming to Beijing,” Bell confesses. But compared to Hong Kong students, Beijing students left a very deep impression on him. Before, on the many occasions he was invited to Beijing to give lectures, the curiosity of Beijing students made him feel “very excited.” “But in Hong Kong, the relationship between teachers and students mostly stays politely cool.”
However, he admits that another thing that charmed him about Tsinghua was that “this school’s students are all China’s brightest and best young people, and many of China’s leaders graduated from Tsinghua University.”
In this way, overriding all objections, [Bell] in 2004 became a visiting professor in the School of Philosophy in the College of Humanities at Tsinghua University. The next year, he formally became a professor. Wan Junren (万俊人), the head of the School of Philosophy at Tsinghua University, says of Bell: “He is no different from the other Chinese professors.” According to Wan Junren, Tsinghua University was the earliest among philosophy schools at major universities in China to a foreign professor.
Bell is not a blind optimist. In fact, before he came to Beijing he had already prepared himself to “endure political restrictions.” But this originated more with his “Singapore experience.”
After his wedding, Bell and his wife discussed where to go in order to develop their careers. “We were from the East and from the West, and we wanted to find a place compatible with both Eastern and Western cultures. At the time we felt the best choices would definitely be Singapore or Hong Kong.”
Bell’s doctoral thesis was about communitarianism. In the 1980s, the debate between communitarianism and liberalism was an important tide in philosophy. In the 1990s a number of leaders from Asian countries began raising criticisms about Western-style democracy and political freedoms.
. . .
“When I was teaching at the National University of Singapore, the department head there was a member of the ruling People’s Action Party. After he was replaced, the new department head wanted to see my list of readings, and he said I should speak more about communitarianism and less about John Stuart Mill (a representative figure of liberalism – reporter’s note). When I spoke about politically sensitive material such as Marxist ideas, a number of special people would appear in the classroom. When I used [Singapore’s] domestic politics to make my points, the students would keep quiet. For that reason, when my contract wasn’t renewed after it terminated there was nothing strange about it.”
Bell says that this sort of situation has never occurred during his time in Beijing. “Tsinghua University has never given me explicit directions about what I should teach. When I submitted my course outline, it was quickly approved by the department. When I taught ‘Problems in Contemporary Philosophy’ and ‘Ethics of War’ to graduate students, the student remarks during class were excellent, and my colleagues were very friendly. I can discuss anything whatsoever with them.”
Although he cannot yet use Chinese to write academic studies, Bell has already developed an intense interest in China’s academic publications. He says the “freedom of [China’s] academic publications has really surprised me. While publications do not have direct attacks on leaders, they do severely criticize specific policies such as limitations on the movement of the population under the household registration system.”
“Could this be a trap?”
When he first arrived in China, Bell was full of curiosity about everything Chinese, but he had his concerns. “As a newcomer I didn’t know where the boundaries were,” he says.
One day, a student invited him to take part in a salon at Tsinghua at which the topic was democracy. “Could this be a trap? I immediately discussed this with some friends I trust, and with my wife. They all advised me to give it a wide berth.” Bell smiles. “Only later did I find out that this was an normal academic discussion among students and I was worrying unnecessarily.”
Last year, Bell was invited to teach at Peking University. After his first class a student came up and introduced himself in English, saying he was a student at the Central Party School. He wanted to know if he could listen in on the class. Bell welcomed him to join but had questions in his head. During the second class, he paid particular attention to this student and his reaction trying to suss out why he had come to listen in on the course.
“I asked a friend whether the Chinese Communist Party would dispatch spies to my class. Why had this student told me he was from the Central Party School? Did he have any special objective? My friends laughed loudly. They told me that it was completely normal for many students from other schools to go to Peking University, Tsinghua and other famous schools to listen in. This was purely a matter of academic interest. He laughed and told me not to always be suspicious.”
Later, Bell became acquainted with the student from the Central Party School. The student told him that he came to Peking University to listen in “just because he wanted to hear some foreign-taught classes and improve his foreign language skills.”
. . .
A Talk at the Central Party School
Bell joked one time with the student sitting in on his class, asking if he might be able to go to the Central Party School to give a talk. Without a moment’s thought, the student said: “No!” But before long this student gave him an invitation.
“I really couldn’t believe it. A foreign professor of political science really could go to the highest institution of learning in the Chinese Communist Party and give a talk?” Bell’s eyes open wide.
“‘Yes!’ the student answered quite seriously, ‘The Central Party School is now revising its past policies. So long as someone is approved by the vice-principal, foreigners now can talk at the Central Party School.”
For a time both sides were uncertain about what the topic of the talk should be. Finally it was the student who suggested: “You can talk about how to improve your English.”
Bell laughed. “I don’t know anything about that! You know I’ve spoken English since childhood. What use it that to Chinese students?”
The student encouraged him: “Don’t be so modest. You are a big professor, there’s definitely something you can talk about. It’s settled. I’ll pick you up tomorrow.”
. . .
The focus of professor Wan Junren’s academic research is contemporary Western ethics and political philosophy. Daniel Bell’s research came to his attention in the early 1990s. After that, he came to understand [Bell’s research] more through international academic conferences.
“I’ve met many scholars from Western academia, so why did I hire Bell?” Wan Junren poses the question himself and answers it: “Ethics and political philosophy are subjects we’ve decided to prioritize going forward. And Bell is very focused on classical political philosophy in China and on Confucian ethics, and his research is unique. His understanding and sympathy for Chinese culture and education, as well as his career objectives and timing were all reasons. At the time that we hired Mr. Bell, Peking University and other universities were in talks with him. His decision to accept our offer had a lot to do with his endorsement of our academic team. The addition of Mr. Bell was very positive for the development of the ethics and political philosophy program at Tsinghua University’s School of Philosophy.
. . .
He’s Becoming More and More “Chinese”
The first thing many people ask Bell is what language his uses in the classroom.
He says that his hope is to be able to use Chinese, but in fact he still uses English. “For my first class close to 100 students came, but for the second class only 20 or so came. I was somewhat disappointed by that. Later I learned that many students had come to my class to practice their English, and when they found they didn’t understand they just didn’t come back.”
As Bell’s Chinese has improved his acceptance of Chinese in class has grown. He has now started accepting questions in Chinese during class. But if the questioner has a strong local accent, or the question is long and deals with lesson topics, he asks for the question to be repeated.
. . .
Even his wife Song Bing admits that Bell has over the past two years become more and more “Chinese.” Living with his mother-in-law [his family] contact is closer than that of many traditional Chinese families. Some students compliment him on his handsome looks, and unlike Westerners he doesn’t shrug nonchalantly and say, “Thank you.” He casts his eyes down, lowers his head and says, “Oh, it’s nothing” (哪里，哪里).
. . .
He has now grown accustomed to calling his colleagues “Teacher” rather than addressing them by directly by name. And no longer does he keep the Oxford style of “tearing the other side to pieces.” Like his Chinese colleagues, he simply politely “adds a few remarks” after the other has finished speaking, in this way criticizing the views of the other side and defending his own views.
After living in China for a few years, Bell has found that when returning to Canada to visit relatives, he’s puzzled at how his mother says farewell at the door. “Why don’t you send me off at the airport?” So, he has already become accustomed to the Chinese method of sending people off at the airport or the train station. It is only in habits like playing hockey . . . that others can see that Western ways of life are still impressed upon him.
“Teachers in China, and especially professors at top universities, have a high social status, so it seems that the hatred they suffered during the Cultural Revolution is a thing of the past. This is change!” Bell hopes to see changes in Chinese society, so he plans to stay in Beijing over the long term. He even plans to open a quiet restaurant in the neighborhood of Tsinghua University. “It has to be the kind of place where you can read a book, talk about ideas and enjoy good food with friends.”

[CORRECTION: The title of Bell’s piece in The Huffington Post was “Freedom Over Truth,” not “Freedom or Truth” as previously written here.]

December is just around the corner, and that generally means we can expect a wave of end-of-year media specials in China. What were the top ten news stories of 2012? And the top online memes?
These lists can sometimes get media into trouble. In 2010, Guangzhou’s Time Weekly published a list of 100 “most influential” people that included food safety activist Zhao Lianhai (赵连海) and several prominent academics and writers who had signed Charter 08, the political manifesto penned by jailed Peace Prize laureate Liu Xiaobo (刘晓波). Peng Xiaoyun (彭晓芸), the chief editor of Time Weekly‘s opinion section, who had been in charge of the list, was placed on involuntary leave.
The same year, planned lists by Tencent and Southern Weekly were killed by censors.
This week, Chinese internet users kicked off the best-of season with their own list of the “10 Most Horrid People of 2012.” The list was shared on Sina Weibo by “Weekly Commentary” (每周评论), an Anhui-based Weibo user with a strong following, but was deleted sometime before 12:05 p.m. yesterday, November 26, 2012.
The post shares an image strip of ten men, all academics, experts or pundits associated with nationalism and conservatism in China, and provides brief background. All ten men get what is apparently the top “horrid rating,” shown by red flags to the right with five stars.
“Weekly Commentary” currently has just under 75,000 followers, according to numbers from Sina Weibo. [More on deleted posts at the WeiboScope Search, by the Journalism and Media Studies Centre]
The post from “Weekly Commentary” accompanying the image read:

We’ve come to year’s end. The 10 Most Horrid People of 2012 have been chosen online. How many do you know? And do you know of their accomplishments? Do you support their selection to the list? Or do you have more of your own to add?

The Top Ten are listed out as follows, and we’ve provided partial translations of the introductions provided in the online post:
1. Sima Nan (司马南): Well-known Mao-style leftist called the “anti-American warrior.” He famously said that fighting America was his work, and going to America was a lifestyle choice.
2. Kong Qingdong (孔庆东): Professor at Peking University, with a rude, left-leaning mouth . . . He cursed the people of Hong Kong, saying they were dogs.
3. Han Deqiang (韩德强): Professor at Beihang University and a representative figure of China’s new left. During anti-Japanese protests in Beijing, an old man took issue with the use of the slogan “Mao Zedong, we believe in you,” and Han Deqiang slapped him.
4. Wu Danhong (吴丹红), a.k.a. Wu Fatian (吴法天): Professor at People’s University of China. This person frequently attacks people of conscience on the internet. Internet users have called him a representative figure of the “Fifty-Cent Party”.
5. Fang Binxing (方滨兴): Head of the Beijing University of Post and Communications. He was the chief architect of China’s Great Firewall (GFW) online censorship system, so is called by web users “the Father of China’s Great Firewall.”
6. Zhang Zhaozhong (张召忠): Professor at China National Defense University. He is also a special commentator on military affairs for China Central Television. As his points of view always show a high level of consonance with those of the authorities, he frequently appears on commentary programs. He said in a recent interview with a reporter: “For an excellent television news commentator, the most important thing is not knowledge, but the most important thing is rather one’s political character and moral fiber. Political character demands that you must without condition maintain unity with the central Party.”
7. Rui Chenggang (芮成钢): China Central Television reporter. He has a penchant for asking strange questions when covering world events . . . Attending the Davos Forum in Dalian in 2011, he asked U.S. Ambassador Gary Locke if he had flown coach as “a reminder that US owes China money”. He became a laughing stock online.
8. Fang Zhouzi (方舟子): An extremely complicated figure, he was first a manager for an overseas website, and after returning to China became a full-time anti-fake campaigner, being called an “anti-fake warrior” by the media. On the surface, he has made his reputation by questioning and criticizing public figures. In fact, he has willingly taken on a role for the authorities in suppressing religious activities and has received the appreciation of authorities.
9. Hu Xijin (胡锡进): Editor-in-chief of the Global Times newspaper. The Global Times is the mouthpiece of China’s left and has been dubbed by interest users as the “great encampment of China’s angry youth.”
10. Zhang Hongliang (张宏良): A leading theorist for the new left, and a frequent contributor to the Utopia (乌有之乡) website, that leftist encampment.
The original Chinese language post follows:

到年底了，网络评出2012年中国十-大恶—心人物，你知道几个?及他们的主要业绩？你赞同他们上榜的理由吗？或者说你还有没有补充的？

NOTE: All posts to The Anti-Social List are listed as “permission denied” in the Sina Weibo API, which means they were deleted by Weibo managers, not by users themselves.

Earlier this month we took a look at what Hu Jintao’s political report to the 18th National Congress had to say about cultural policy in China — specifically, the focus on building China as a “socialist cultural power” (社会主义文化强国) to offset perceived Western cultural dominance.
A report in today’s People’s Daily summarizes the discussion — basically, a recapitulation of official Party policy — that happened recently at an academic forum accompanying the launch of a new book edited by Guo Jianyu (郭建宁), a professor of philosophy at Peking University.
According to the People’s Daily report, participants at the Beijing forum discussed the importance of “cultural soft power” development and the building of a “socialist cultural power” in achieving “national cultural security (国家文化安全).

[ABOVE: Peking University professor Guo Jianyu, one of China’s leading proponents of “soft power” development.]
Professor Guo is one of China’s most outspoken pundits on the issue of “cultural soft power” development. In this piece, written right on the heels of Hu Jintao’s inclusion of “soft power” in the political report to the 18th National Congress in 2007, Guo wrote:

Harvard University professor Joseph Nye in the United States raised the concept of “soft power” in the 1990s. Today our understanding of cultural “soft power” is more complete, as shown by the fact that overseas we have now built more than 100 “Confucius Institutes” and we have had steady successes in hosting “Year of Chinese Culture” events. Zbigniew Brzezinski wrote in The Grand Chessboard that there are four marks of a great nation, namely: a developed economy, a strong military, strong science and technology, an attractive culture. History and reality both attest to the fact that the rise of great nations is not only an economic phenomenon but also a cultural phenomenon. It’s not just about economic development; it’s also about cultural prosperity.

Guo’s new compilation is called China’s Cultural Power Strategy (中国文化强国战略). The book is one among a wave of such books on China’s soft power strategy to emerge since late 2008. But it might make a useful reference for those wanting to know more about how official China is conceptualizing culture, and turning that understanding of culture into strategy — what the People’s Daily article calls a “blueprint.”

[ABOVE: Today’s edition of the People’s Daily reports (bottom left) on a forum held in Beijing about “cultural soft power.”]
A partial translation of the People’s Daily article follows:

“Accelerating Our Pace in Building a Cultural Strong Nation”
Zhang Xuecheng (张学成)
People’s Daily
November 26, 2012, 07
The “Academic Research Forum and Publishing Launch Forum for China’s Cultural Power Strategy“, hosted by the School of Marxism at Peking University and the Higher Education Publishing House, was held not long ago in Beijing. Drawing on the book China’s Cultural Power Strategy, edited by Guo Jianyu (郭建宁), the participants studied such issues as the great importance of building a socialist cultural power (社会主义文化强国) and how to put a strong cultural nation strategy into effect.
It was the view of participants that cultural soft power (文化软实力) has already become a core element of international competition. The role of culture is now more pronounced and important than it has been at any time before. [in the view of the participants]. Building a socialist cultural power is a necessary task in the enhancement of our country’s comprehensive national strength (综合国力) and the protection of our national cultural security (国家文化安全). It is also an objective need in satisfying the people’s cultural demands (精神文化需求) and preserving the people’s cultural rights and interests.
. . .
Participants emphasized that [we] must build a socialist cultural power with a high degree of cultural consciousness (文化自觉) and cultural confidence (文化自信). The blueprint has now been drawn, the task is already clear. The key now is to place all of the ideas and actions of the Party and society together with the spirit and prescriptions of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, fulfilling them and putting them into full effect. We must further raise our ideological understanding and increase our cultural consciousness, correctly grasping the principles of cultural development, actively taking on the historical responsibility of building a socialist cultural power . . . Further strengthening cultural soft power, promoting cultural self-improvement, liberating our ideas, seizing opportunities, using [our] diverse cultural resources, leveraging the institutional superiority of the socialism, accelerating the pace of the building of a socialist cultural power.

The following post by “Old News Soldier” (新闻老兵), the deputy editor-in-chief of Chizi Magazine, was deleted from Sina Weibo sometime before 6:00 p.m. yesterday, November 25, 2012. The post includes an image of President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao smiling at the recent 18th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party. “Old News Soldier” currently has more than 38,000 followers, according to numbers from Sina Weibo. [More on deleted posts at the WeiboScope Search, by the Journalism and Media Studies Centre]

[They] say high-sounding things about fighting corruption, but they can’t speak in loftier tones [on this front] than Mao did. [They] say high-sounding things about reform, but they can’t speak in loftier tones [on this front] than Deng Xiaoping. Without their own tunes, just blowing the horns of others, how can they make a place for themselves in history? The clarion call that needs to be sounded right now is for constitutionalism, democracy and rule of law. Blowing anything else right now is pointless, even if you blow until you’re blue in the face.

The original Chinese-language post follows:

高调反腐，调子高不过老毛。高调改革，调子高不过小平。没有自己的调子，吹别人的喇叭，难以青史留名。现在应该吹的调子，只有宪政、民主、法治，吹别的都荒腔走板，吹得冒汗也没用。

NOTE: All posts to The Anti-Social List are listed as “permission denied” in the Sina Weibo API, which means they were deleted by Weibo managers, not by users themselves.

The following post by Song Yangbiao (宋阳标), a newspaper journalist, was deleted from Sina Weibo sometime before 11:00 p.m. yesterday, November 25, 2012. The post makes an oblique reference to the latest report from the New York Times about the businesses and investments of Premier Wen Jiabao. Song Yangbiao currently just under 17,000 followers, according to numbers from Sina Weibo. [More on deleted posts at the WeiboScope Search, by the Journalism and Media Studies Centre]

That thing about the Premier and Ping An that cannot be said . . .

The original Chinese-language post follows:

总经理和平安保险不得不说的那些事儿

NOTE: All posts to The Anti-Social List are listed as “permission denied” in the Sina Weibo API, which means they were deleted by Weibo managers, not by users themselves.

China’s political battles are complicated affairs, waged largely behind the scenes between flesh-and-blood Party leaders with their own, competing agendas. But the language of China’s Party politics, the script that emerges as “consensus” from this backstage melee, can offer us important clues to emerging trends.
The trick is knowing how to read the Party’s script.
Since September this year, Qian Gang, a veteran Chinese journalist and director of the Journalism & Media Studies Centre’s China Media Project, has made an in-depth study of the political discourse, past and present, of the Chinese Communist Party in a series called Watchwords: Reading China Through its Party Vocabulary.

Qian Gang’s study, which ran in Chinese on the New York Times website and in English on the China Media Project website, looked at the development over time of the Party’s distinctive political phrases, referred to in Chinese as tifa.
On the basis of his analysis, Qian Gang developed a “report card” that could be used to assess the language used in Hu Jintao’s most recent political report to the 18th National Congress of the CCP and answer key questions. What direction is China heading? Is political reform on the Party’s agenda? How does it plan to tackle issues like corruption?
Qian Gang’s initial conclusions based on President Hu Jintao’s 2012 political report were shared on the China Media Project website. Mr. Qian also summed up his findings in an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal on November 12 (“China Stand Still at the Crossroads”):

Just like a quarter century ago, real political reform in China requires a change in the Party’s power structure. This entails tough questions, and even tougher answers, about the origin of power, the independent exercise of power, and safeguards to ensure power is effectively checked and monitored. Instead, Mr. Hu’s pronouncement that China “will resolutely not follow Western political models” revives a hardline phrase that has often presaged a stubborn unwillingness to carry out any sort of meaningful reform.

Those interested in learning more about Qian Gang’s research on China’s political discourse are encouraged to attend his public lecture on Monday, November 26.
PUBLIC LECTURE
The 18th Party Congress and Prospects for Political Reform in China
Nov. 26, 2012 (Monday)
5:30p.m.-7:00p.m.
CPD-3.28, The Jockey Club Tower, Centennial Campus
The University of Hong Kong
The talk will be conducted in Putonghua
For enquiries, please contact Miss Emma Dong at [email protected]
Admission is Free
ABOUT THE SPEAKER:
Currently director of the China Media Project, Qian Gang is a veteran Chinese journalist and the author of The Great Tangshan Earthquake. In this talk, Mr. Qian shares his perspectives on the 18th Party Congress of the Chinese Communist Party, based on textual analysis of historic CPC party documents, including Hu Jintao’s most recent. He’ll also discuss the prospects for political reform in China under Xi Jinping.

On Monday, Ren Jianyu (任建宇), a young former village official in Chongqing’s Pengshui County, was released from a re-education through labor facility after serving 15 months of his two-year sentence stemming from comments posted to Sina Weibo in August 2011. Ren’s case has drawn an unprecedented level of attention inside China to serious problems with the country’s system of re-education through labor, or laojiao (劳教). [Background on the Ren case and his release].
Signaling that the laojiao issue is getting attention at senior levels in the Party leadership, the People’s Daily ran an editorial yesterday saying that the whole re-education through labor system was “now in the awkward position of being in violation of the law” thanks to legal advancements stipulating (as in China’s Legislation Law) that a citizen’s rights can only be curtailed by means of laws.
In a Weibo post sharing a link to the People’s Daily editorial, Zhu Huaxin (祝华新), director of the Public Opinion Research Center at People’s Daily Online, wrote: “People’s Daily has spoken: the system of reeducation through labor has found itself in violation of the law . . . ”

[ABOVE: Yesterday’s edition of the People’s Daily runs an editorial on page 9 criticizing the re-education through labor system.]
Veteran journalist Fu Jianfeng responded: “This piece from the People’s Daily is a break with form. It’s the first time I’ve seen the People’s Daily criticizing the laojiao system. Is this a prelude to the abolishment of this nasty law allowing re-education through labor? I hope it is!”
The law Fu Jianfeng refers to is the Decision on the Question of Reeducation through Labor (关于劳动教养问题的决定), which went into effect back in 1957. Much of the concern today’s centers on how the laojiao system can be abused by local governments in China in cases like Ren Jianyu’s.
The English-language Global Times today called Ren’s release “an essential step toward more freedom of speech.”
In Chinese commercial media, perhaps the boldest voice on the issue came from yesterday’s Southern Metropolis Daily and its sister paper in Hefei, the Jianghuai Morning Post (江淮晨报). Below are partial translations of the editorials in both the People’s Daily and Southern Metropolis Daily.

“System Supply Should Keep Step with the Times”
November 21, 2012
For college student and village official Ren Jianyu (任建宇), the past two days have brought a series of ups and downs. First, on November 19, the Chongqing Municipal Reeducation through Labor Committee (重庆市劳教委), revoked its decision on [Ren’s] labor reeducation [sentence] and gave him his freedom, citing the reason that [his case] “had not been handled properly.” Then, on November 20, the Chongqing Third Intermediate People’s Court dismissed a lawsuit filed [by Ren against the Re-education through Labor Committee], saying that it had “passed the statutory prosecution deadline” [required by China’s Administrative Procedure Law].
After this “self-correction” on the part of the Chongqing Municipal Reeducation through Labor Committee received the general support of public opinion, what people are asking is: How do we view the courts? And what about the law?
Ever since Ren Jianyu was sent for reeducation through labor, this case has drawn the attention of the general public. A youth who only re-sent some text and images on the internet, and even the original creator [of this content] was never pursued? How can a shirt printed with the words, “Give me liberty or give me death,” become physical evidence of breaking the law? These details, which sound absurd, cause those paying attention to the original court case to think hard about reeducation through labor itself.
Only by being sensible can we be clean; only by being just can we have public integrity. Ren Jianyu now has his freedom, but as to why he lost his freedom in the first place, this is all still very unclear. If we say that Ren Jianyu’s “negative remarks” constituted guilt, well then, when prosecutors no longer find them to be a crime, is it reasonable for relevant [government] departments to deprive him of his personal freedoms for a year using the reeducation through labor system? When the national [Party and government] have on repeated occasions emphasized the people’s right to know, right to participate, right to express and right to monitor, how can the basic rights of the people avoid this threat of indiscriminate [justice]? Even in cases where a citizen illegally abuses his right to expression, do administrative departments have the right to simply take the matter into their own hands?
These questions have arisen from the unclarity of our reeducation through labor system as it is currently practiced. The system of reeducation through labor in our country has been in place for more than 50 years, ever since the 1957 “Decision on the Question of Reeducation through Labor” (关于劳动教养问题的决定). As democracy and rule of law have advanced in our country, the many shortcomings of this system have become apparent. In particular, since such laws as the Legislation Law (立法法) have been promulgated, it has been the case that the personal freedom of citizens can only be limited by the process of law — which means reeducation through labor is now in the awkward position of being in violation of the law. In addition, as the examination and approval process for reeducation through labor lies in the hands of public security organs, the necessary monitoring mechanisms are not in place. Inevitably, there is great license in the actual exercise [of the system], so that it has become in some areas a “legal loophole” (法律小灶), or even a tool of retaliation wielded by the few. For this reason, not long ago, a responsible person from relevant central-level departments said that broad consensus had already been reached on the need for reform of the reeducation through labor system, and that a reform program was being explored.
Rule of law is the fundamental method of governing a nation. According to classical theory, rule of law has two key elements. The first is good laws; the second is general respect for the law. Of these, [the need for] “good laws” is the fundamental precondition. In this regard, it is only by ensuring that system supply maintains step with the times, and by ensuring that laws and regulations constantly advance with the times, that we can meet the preconditions and firm up the foundations for a country ruled by law, bringing every operation of power under rule of law.

[ABOVE: Yesterday’s edition of the Southern Metropolis Daily runs an editorial criticizing the re-education through labor system.]
The following was the lead editorial yesterday in both the Southern Metropolis Daily and the Jianghuai Morning Post.

“Ren Jianyu’s Release is ‘Great’“
Southern Metropolis Daily, AA02
November 21, 2012
In the early hours of November 20, 2012, he refreshed his Weibo account and wrote, “It’s great to be back.” This prompted a wave of well-wishing from web users. His is Ren Jianyu, a college student and village official from Chongqing’s Pengshui. He was born in 1987. In September 2011, he was sentenced to two years of reeducation through labor for posting “negative” information on the internet. In August 2012, he filed a complaint in court against the Chongqing Municipal Reeducation through Labor Committee. Yesterday afternoon, the Chongqing Third Intermediate People’s Court dismissed [Ren’s] complaint [against the ], giving the reason that it had “passed the statutory prosecution deadline.” In the less than 24 hours prior to this, the Chongqing Municipal Reeducation through Labor Committee cancelled Ren’s reeducation through labor sentence on the grounds that his case “had not been handled properly.”
“It’s great to be back”
Losing his life of freedom for more than a year has been a huge strain on Ren Jianyu, and he is now more cautious and reserved. But the events of the past two days provide some solace for those who have long followed Ren’s case. The people need answers to the fear and doubt created by the Ren Jianyu case, and the most welcome response would be a judicial process rendering justice. There needs to be a judicial decision that is beyond doubt, serving as an assurance of conscience and justice — even if it comes a bit late.
The release of [Ren Jianyu] and the cancellation of his reeducation through labor sentence is a welcome sign. But at this time, a process of judicial justice (司法正义) would have a greater and more responsible effect.
Looking back on the experiences of the citizen Ren Jianyu over the past year and more, one thing people feel quite personal about is the fact that the conduct that landed him in trouble is the same behavior hundreds of millions of internet users in China have regularly engaged in and are still engaging in. The ordinary instances of web users expressing themselves are . . . in fact precisely what Premier Wen Jiabao was talking about when he said [the government needed to] “create the conditions for the masses to criticize the government.”
@People’sDailyOnline (@人民网), the official Weibo [of the People’s Daily Online website], said in a re-post on the Ren Jianyu case that “what prompts serious questioning in this case is that nothing whatsoever happened to the original creator [of the content in question], no penalties were given and [they] are still speaking in the public space, while the person who re-posted this content was branded a criminal. A true example of the saying that if you want to condemn someone you can always trump up a charge.”
. . .
The citizen Ren Jianyu, in deciding to think for himself and speak freely, should received the determined protection of the constitution. With Ren Jianyu’s return, we hope that his rights and interests have prevailed, just as we believe to the last that history and the law will stand ultimately on the side of justice.

[ABOVE: Yesterday’s edition of the Jianghuai Morning Post runs an editorial criticizing the re-education through labor system.]