China 2020: How Western Business Can—and Should—Influence Social and Political Change in the Coming Decade

1. Beyond the Shadow of Tiananmen

1 Beyond the Shadow of Tiananmen The Role of Foreign Business in China’s Uncertain Path to Democracy and Human Rights When the Olympic cauldron rose into the night sky above Beijing’s National Stadium on August 8, 2008, it marked a momentous step in China’s emergence as a global power. The riveting spectacle, a combination of fireworks, high-tech wizardry and precisely choreographed routines executed by thousands of Chinese citizens was extravagant even by Olympic standards. When the elaborate ceremony was completed without a misstep, most ordinary Chinese people, some 1.3 billion of them, collectively exhaled—a sigh of relief mixed with nationalistic pride. With the Olympics, China’s moment on the world stage had arrived. For two weeks, global attention was riveted on China, and China put on a spectacular show. Chinese athletes performed with distinction, accumulating more gold medals than any other nation. Outside the stadium, Beijing seemed transformed into a modern metropolis, with soaring skyscrapers, (almost) clear air, a prosperous workforce, and orderly traffic. Teary-eyed basketball star Yao Ming summed up the feelings of a nation when he declared that these Olympics were about “optimism and hope for the 2 China 2020 future.” President Hu Jintao declared that the Olympics were “an opportunity not only for China but for the whole world” to “deepen mutual understanding.” With these Olympic Games, China had truly put its best foot forward. China’s Olympic moment was especially poignant for millions of older Chinese who remembered that on October 1, 1949, less than ten miles directly south of the Olympic Stadium, Mao Zedong stood at the Gate of Heavenly Peace overlooking Tiananmen Square and declared that “the Chinese people have stood up.” As he spoke from the exact spot where for centuries emperors had addressed their loyal subjects, every Chinese person knew what Mao meant. The founding of the People’s Republic of China marked the end of the “century of shame” when this proud and ancient nation had been occupied by foreigners, first by Europeans starting in the nineteenth century and then by Japan during the Second World War. Now, nearly sixty years later, China was having its coming-out party. While there had certainly been significant setbacks—like the tens of millions who starved to death during Mao’s disastrous economic folly of “the Great Leap Forward” in the late 1950s and the millions more who suffered extreme degradation, humiliation, forced labor, and physical abuse during the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s—these setbacks seemed rooted in a distant past as China basked in the glow of the Olympic torch. Nearly three decades have passed since Deng Xiaoping declared that “to get rich is glorious.” In that time, China has embraced free market economics, enjoying approximately 10 percent annual economic growth. Hundreds of millions of Chinese have been lifted out of poverty. Foreign investors are eager to invest billions to bet on the country’s future. In 1997, China reacquired Hong Kong from the United Kingdom, ending another humiliating chapter in its history. The Olympics marked the strongest sign yet of China’s power and prestige. In this shining moment, China could even dream of being reunited with Taiwan. What power, riches, and glory could lie ahead in the twenty-first, the Asian, the Chinese Century? Although China’s Olympic moment was domestically exhilarating, many Western observers had a decidedly different perspective; these negative images and attitudes could be termed the “Shadow of Tiananmen.” Many Westerners still cannot forget the searing images of China from June 1989: students occupying Tiananmen Square and erecting the Goddess of Democracy; the same students and workers being slaughtered in the streets Beyond the Shadow of Tiananmen 3 by People’s Liberation Army soldiers; and a brave, solitary man defiantly standing in front of a column of rolling tanks. For many Westerners, the dark legacy of Tiananmen will always define China no matter how prosperous and powerful it becomes. In the years leading up to the Olympic Games, the collective concept of the Shadow of Tiananmen permeated the Western media through a steady drumbeat of negative stories: lead paint in toys, environmental catastrophes, child labor scandals, Internet censorship, toxic toothpaste, crackdowns on human rights, deadly pet food, counterfeit medicine, and on and on. Seemingly every day one organization or another issued a formulaic press release about the Olympic torch “shining a light” on corruption...