|
Tuesday, 30 January 2007 14:45 |
By Jim Genaro
After outlining some of the political and economic factors of Chinaës ascendancy as a world power at UNC Ashevilleës Reuter Center on Jan. 18, Dr. Steven Levine and Dr. Sarah-Ann Smith answered questions about what Chinaës growth means for the United States.
The forum, which was sponsored by Leadership Asheville Forum, the North Carolina Center for Creative Retirement and the World Affairs Council of Western North Carolina, was attended by several hundred people.
A woman asked about reports she had heard that Chinese "textbooks have eradicated all mention of Mao."
Levine
replied that while this was not exactly correct, they had changed the
textbooks to "make him kind of seem like this abstract figure who did
nothing wrong and should be sort of worshipped in some sort of abstract
way."
He added that
because of the extensive censorship practiced by the Communist Party,
"the average Chinese student knows less about their recent history than
the average American college student whoës taken a class in Chinese
history."
A significant
omission from Chinese curricula is any mention of atrocities carried
out by the government, Levine said. Instead, Chinese history textbooks
tend to focus on the harm done to China by outsiders ÇƒÓ such as the
Opium Wars and European colonization.
"Thatës all
true," he acknowledged. "But nothing that foreigners have done to China
in the modern period is as bad as what China has done to itself."
"One of the big
issues that Iëve heard about the development of China is that some of
the ecological issues are huge," a woman said. "Could you comment on
that?"
"Yes, the ecological issues are major," Smith answered.
The country suffers from extreme air pollution because of "the enormous dependence of China for its energy on coal," she added.
Other
environmental problems include contamination of water supplies and
desertification of large regions of the northwestern part of the
country, Smith noted.
Elaborating on
her answer, Levine said, "I think the consciousness of ecological and
environmental issues in China is about 40 years back from where we are
ÇƒÓ and weëve still got a long way to go."
He added that in many parts of the country, air pollution is so severe, "you canët see across the street."
A woman asked
about the threat posed by China. "Is the threat political? Should we be
afraid that they will come in and take over our country? ... Should I
learn Arabic or Chinese? ... Or is the threat economic because
everything we buy is made in China?"
"I can pretty
much say I donët think weëre going to see Chinese armies marching into
the U.S. and taking over this country," Smith answered. "Thatës not the
kind of threat this is."
As to the womanës question about learning Arabic or Chinese, Smith said, "God help us if we all have to learn either."
Furthermore, she
added, the economic challenges posed by Chinaës ascendancy should not
necessarily be perceived as a threat. Rather, she said, the situation
should be seen as "a competition that can go a number of ways."
She added that the U.S. will not suffer from such a competition unless it neglects its own economy.
"We are in a transition stage in our own economy and itës intersecting with a transition stage in Chinaës economy," Smith said.
As the U.S. has
moved away from being a manufacturing-based economy, China has
undertaken its own industrialization, filling the place of the U.S.
"We arenët ever going to get those manufacturing jobs that have gone to China back," she added.
One
often-overlooked statistic is that "U.S. investment is 13 times the
current Chinese investment in the U.S.," Smith noted. "But the trade
balance is so much in Chinaës favor, we donët notice."
However, another imbalance between the two countries poses a threat ÇƒÓ an imbalance of education about each other, she said.
"As a nation, we are abysmally ignorant of other parts of the world," Smith asserted.
Levine
concurred. Chinese students, he noted, generally know more about
Americaës geography than Americans do about Chinaës. Most Chinese
classrooms feature two maps on the wall ÇƒÓ one of China and one of the
U.S.
The Chinese
government has been attempting to rectify this disparity by
establishing a number of educational centers in the U.S. to teach
Chinese and educate Americans about Chinese culture, Levine said.
The schools are
called "Confucius Institutes" ÇƒÓ ironically, Levine noted, for a
government that once considered the practice of Confucianism to be a
threat to its rule and strictly prohibited the proliferation of
Confuciusë teachings.
|
