Xi Jinping’s ‘Chinese dream’
Xi Jinping’s recent public remarks on ‘national rejuvenation’, ‘revival of the Chinese nation’ and the ‘Chinese dream’ have caused a minor stir among certain Western press. They lambast that such references are emblematic of China’s ‘victimization complex’ and used by Chinese leaders to stoke the fires of nationalism. For them, his remarks are inappropriate in the backdrop of China’s disputes with her neighbours over territorial claims in the South China Sea.
This is a fundamental misreading of Xi’s words which are aimed at a domestic audience, designed to appeal to patriotic sentiments, especially among the single-children young who have only known rising prosperity in the reform era. For older Chinese, however, they have known mostly war, hunger, and social and political chaos. The exhibit and Xi’s remarks are about remembering the nearly two centuries of subjugation and war at the hands of foreign colonial powers (along with the civil war waged by Chiang Kai-shek) so that the country does not devolve into another cycle of decline and weakness. Mr Xi’s message is clear: China’s modernization remains a ‘work in progress’ and the Chinese people must keep their eyes firmly on the prize.
Two phrases stand out in his talks: “without revival, China will continue to be beaten” and “empty talk condemns the nation; only through hard work will the nation prosper”. During the Opium Wars, Britain, the first narco-state and its allies, defeated the corrupt, inept, and backwardly equipped Qing Dynasty with little effort and extorted indemnities that nearly crippled the country. Later, the weakness of central state power under the Kuomintang ushered in decades of warlordism that allowed the Japanese to annex Manchuria and eventually invade the rest of China, causing death and destruction to millions.
But also implicit in Mr Xi’s remarks is a rejection of the folly of Maoist utopianism during the disastrous Great Leap Forward that contributed to the ensuing famine. Just as calamitous was his radical political program since the Anti-Rightist Movement of 1957 and 1959 culminating in the debilitating persecution and social upheaval of the Cultural Revolution. Mr Xi stressed that after the first 30 years of gross mistrials, the Chinese people had finally found a winning formula, a viable path toward modernization, and for the first time in two centuries, have hope of realizing that dream.
For Mr Xi, the ‘China Dream’ is not simply an ‘American Dream’ writ Chinese. It means not only the pursuit of individual happiness through hard work (a universal value) but the development ethos that has defined Chinese aspirations for a strong and prosperous country since before Sun Yat-sen’s 1911 Republican Revolution. On a visit to the ‘Road Toward Renewal’ exhibit at the National Museum of China, Mr Xi said, “In my view, to realize the great renewal of the Chinese nation is the greatest dream of the Chinese people in modern history”.
A commentator for Hong Kong’s Ta Kung Pao daily said Mr Xi’s remarks were most relevant for China’s youths. Today, despite increasing prosperity, utilitarianism and cynicism pervade young people’s thinking. In this respect, they need a spiritual revival encapsulated in his speeches.
“A country where most people do not hold ideals cannot rise as a great nation in the world. To become a successor to and promoter of modern civilization, China must provide vitality and hope to the young with ideals lighting their way…I hope that during Mr Xi’s time in office, an environment is created for the average Chinese to realize his/her dream through hard work and in so doing reflect the attractiveness and temperament of a rising China”, she wrote.
Mr Xi has set a timetable to realize that dream: “I believe that by the time when the CCP marks its 100 founding anniversary (2021), the goal to complete the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects will be inevitably achieved…and the great renewal of the Chinese nation accomplished”.
Yet, even by then, China’s full modernization will be incomplete as China continues to urbanize through the 2030s. Currently, China still has over 100 million people living under two US dollars a day. Only when China’s per capita incomes approach that of rich countries can the Chinese truly say their dream has been fulfilled.