Shallow Scholars and Parroty Journalists

 A good friend in Melbourne suggested that I sign up to watch a Taiwan-Australia Dialogue organised by the University of Melbourne’s Asialink on 30 July. I promptly did.

It was moderated by Colin Haseltine. The panel from Taiwan comprised Paul Kuoboug Chang, former head of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Tel-Aviv, Dr Fu-Kuo Liu, director of Taiwan Centre for Security Studies, Dr Mignonne Chan, deputy director of Taiwan Centre for Security Studies and Dr I Yuan, Adjunct Research Fellow at the Institute of International Relations, National Chengchi University.

One of the Australian speakers was Dr Sow Keat Tok. I would assume that his family name is Tok, judging from the Australians’ nomenclature on names.

In public, Chinese thinkers and scholars cannot usually articulate well in English, these speakers from Taiwan were no exception. But I must say their arguments and messages reflect the views of many in Taiwan who are genuinely concerned about the island’s future. They were quite unhappy with their President Lai Ching-te’s way of managing the cross-strait relationship. Mignonne Chan could not be more blunt when she said that China’s “One China, Different Systems” was simply the best win-win situation for both sides of the strait.

I was looking for a robust response from the Australian side. Prof Hugh White of the Australian National University was a little tentative, nonetheless, he was asking the right leading questions, which helped to generate some very insightful replies from the members of the Taiwan panel.

Alas, when Tok was invited to speak, I could tell from his English that he must have hailed from my “kampung” (i.e., a fellow Malaysian). I was totally dismayed by the shallowness of his knowledge and felt like leaving the webinar half-way through. Nonetheless, I stayed on until he finished. He was talking like a typical China-hating western journalist!

He was parroting what the western media wants us to believe about China’s economy. Earlier this year, they were celebrating that the Chinese economy was in serious trouble, thanks to high youth unemployment and the collapse of real estate there, blah, blah, blah. Tok is repeating these lines again! He also argued that Xi Jinping’s reform efforts were meant to prop up CCP’s legitimacy and personal pursuit of his fourth term in China. What a load of rubbish! He reminds me of a lecture given by a certain ANZ economist in the same university a couple of months ago, which I have written dismissively earlier in my blog. He contended that the trajectory of Chinese economic growth was no different from that of Japan; nothing exceptional.

Sure, China’s economy did look grim last year. But the context must be understood. Why did youth employment spike? Why did the real estate sector seem to go into a tailspin? Did these armchair analysts really understand the reasons. I am afraid not. The government is always on its toes; many of its short-term pains were results of its attempt to transform and the real estate ill was a case in point. And much of the exceptionalism we are seeing in China today is a consequence of the relentless efforts by the US and its allies to retard China. They help spur China’s homegrown champions like Huawei and universities to make breakthroughs that seem impossible in the western lenses. Thousands, hitherto naturalized to become citizens in the US and in Europe, have also returned to China because of the discrimination they are experiencing in these adopted countries.

Back to Tok. I do not mean to be insulting; his use of the acronym CCP clearly demonstrates that he does not quite know the proper name for the governing party in China, which is the Communist Party of China, or CPC. CCP is usually used by western or pro-west journalists to give the Chinese government a certain baggage – a subtle Stalinist association of suppression, totalitarianism and what-have-you, instead of a party that is legitimately and popularly governing China. (Which “democratic” government in the world has an approval rating that is higher than CPC’s?)

I also read an article written by a certain Tan Chee Meng of the University of Nottingham Malaysia published in the Asia Times on 3 August. The title of the article is: China needs to pick a side, and it just might pick the West (https://asiatimes.com/2024/08/china-needs-to-pick-a-side-and-it-just-might-pick-the-west/.) Just because Russia has signed a peace treaty with North Korea, the author talks as if Russia is deserting China. And Russia is losing the war in Ukraine and China needs to press Russia to sue for peace with Ukraine. And he also repeats the same western narrative that “China has been reeling from a real estate crisis, a volatile stock market, a massive 288% debt-to-GDP ratio, as well as high youth unemployment. He seems to observe that Chinese government bond prices soared from increasing demand, suggesting that investors are seeking safer investment alternatives as confidence in the Chinese economy remains low. He further argues that “a battered economy isn’t the only problem the Chinese government faces. It has traditionally employed economic performance to legitimize its rule. So given the poor economic climate, Beijing needs to jump-start its ailing economy to maintain power.”

Does it read like those you have been reading in the western and pro-West press during the last couple of months? I have taken the liberty to produce some of his readers’ comments in the Appendix below.

Why am I singling out people like Tok and Tan for criticism?

The colour of their skin gives non-Chinese readers or viewers that they know China well and can speak authoritatively on China. The truth is this: These are the very western educated Chinese who want to show that they are more western intellectually than their kinsmen. They stereo-type opinions and reinforce the west’s prejudice against China on geopolitical issues.

Singapore’s Channel News Asia (CNA) also often invites academics to comment on “China versus the world” matters. Several of them are teaching in the local universities, mostly mid-level scholars. I could see that that they were originally from China and perhaps because of their anxiousness to shed their China-born identity or image and show that they were impartial in their views, their comments tended to be somewhat negative with regards to China’s stances in the dispute or issue in question.

The former category should visit China more often and read materials that are produced by thinkers and scholars who do not harbour any prejudice against any party. Two names deserve my highest level of respect: Columbia’s Jeffrey Sachs and a former senior minister in the Singapore government, George Yeo. Sachs is his in-depth knowledge of the history of issue and his fearlessness to call spade a spade. Yeo, like Sachs, has an encyclopedia knowledge about countries and their constituents. He knows many world leaders in person. But he is a diplomat extraordinaire. His warnings are always couched in words of wisdom; even the people his messages were intended for will have difficulty in disagreeing with what he has said. (Kishore Mahbubani is also a popular speaker. However, he is often viewed as a China apologist. Much he opined is not without foundation, but I tend to have this feeling when it comes to his speeches on China: You hear one, you hear all.)

There are in fact many objective analysts and commentators on China issues in many parts of the world. Some of them are American and they often podcast from China. Several are of South Asian ethnicity, and they are in think tanks and universities. Taiwan has literally created a podcast streaming industry out of some ten to twenty popular thinkers there – academics, ex-diplomat, financial experts, ex-senior military figures, etc. The host is usually a very smooth-talking young man or woman presenter who will outline issues of the day and invite his or her panel to comment. They, in my opinion, can rival any world-class scholar in terms of insights and knowledge about the issues of the day. But I suspect people like Tok are quite oblivious to their existence.

Now on the western and pro-West media:

Many journalists and reporters in our region tend to report or speak like western reporters. Many of them are ethnically Chinese. South China Morning Post’s reporting on China vis-à-vis its neighbours and the west largely reflect their negative opinions of China’s stances. (However, I must say that their knowledge of the developments in Chinese science and technology is pretty solid and objective.) I also observe a similar phenomenon with some reporters and journalists in Singapore.  

I can understand their TV channels’ news readers; they must read what they are given. And also their papers, where they have to reproduce articles from Reuters, Bloomberg, etc wholesale. However, for those reporters or journalists who are based in Beijing, they need to come up with facts they see on the ground, and not parrot what the west has been reporting or has written. I took exception of the way Olivia Xiong is presenting developments in China. Her tone often reflects her doubt over what she hears from the official spokesmen in China. I still remember when the US had already admitted that the Chinese balloon they shot down over their sky was indeed a weather balloon, she still used the term “Chinese spy balloon” to describe it. Another one who reports on business shows similar attitude when the matter or issue is about China. If they are less western-centric in their mindset, I believe their opinions will be more respected by readers.

Anyone one who bothers to put on his or her thinking cap when he or she reads or listens will know much of the stuff said by the west about China is designed to hobble China. Imagine, there is even double standard in the doping tests that is being practised on Chinese athletes in the Olympics today! Do these Chinese sportsmen and sportswomen want to cheat, knowing that their blood or urine sample cannot survive the rigorousness of the modern laboratories? Certainly not.

The reality is this: their coaches have long believed in traditional oriental medicine; unfortunately, many of these concoctions contain parts of both living things and inorganic substances that have traces of prohibited elements!

Thanks to the reporters from the west, particularly the US, these Chinese sportsmen and sportswomen are now made to be seen like suspected criminals.

Journalists in our region should remind themselves that they owe their society a duty to be more wholesome in their reporting.

The 100-metre free style is the bluest of blue-ribbon event in Olympics and in Paris, Chinese swimmer Pan Zhanle has won the gold medal in the men’s 100m freestyle with a world record-breaking 46.40 seconds. An Australian coach went to the extent of saying that the feat was not humanly possible. You know the basis of his skepticism. I hope people like Tok and Tan and Xiong do not share this Australia’s coach’s insinuation.

 

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Appendix

Some readers’ comments on Tan Chee Meng’s Asia Times article (as they appeared; unedited):

- Lots of nonsense. First of all, there’s no way that Russia loses the war. It has already gained all the territory it sought. Secondly, China is not going to ally with the US and EU, with both not only economic rivals, but emerging enemies.

- This article is the most ridiculous piece of wishful thinking and misinformation I have seen for years. I don’t know what CM Tan was smoking but to say China will join the West that have invaded and colonized and oppressed her for centuries is silly. BRICS and SCO and the Global South are the future, not the colonists of the past.

- smoking weeds article.

- wishful thinking post – china is economically, industrially, militarily [except for the no of nukes], diplomatically, financially etc etc the most powerful country in the world now and it doesnt have to pick a side – and if anything its the US that needs to pick a side between cooperating or not with china just to survive the self-inflicted, coming economic, social and financial carnage – moreover only fools believe russia has some nefarious design on europe but it would be fair that europe has been extremely threatening, aggressive and hostile towards russia …

- Are you kidding me? China is the world’s largest economy. Biden wants to destroy that. If Russia falls, China will be next.

- Why is Asia Times publishing this? If Russia loses that will be the end of everything. Putin has promised nuclear Armageddon if Russia is defeated. Ukraine must be defeated and Russia objectives attained; demilitarization, denazification and neutralization of Ukraine. China will never abandon Russia, BRICS+ and SCO, that is just Western willful ignorance and arrogance. China prioritizes its security concerns over its economy. No more humiliation.