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There exists a condition so prevalent in China that it borders on mass psychosis and, in common with many such phenomena, its root causes are political and historical curricula with zero debate and a straight-jacketed media that reinforces the classroom message.

One of the nationwide consequences of these policies is a condition that I’ve decided to call State-Induced Retribution Syndrome (SIRS).

SIRS manifests itself most obviously as a nationalistic desire for revenge against all those countries considered to have transgressed on Chinese soil or to have procured territory or wrested artifacts from the Middle Kingdom in the pre-communist era.

Lust for ‘getting your own back’ is nothing new in the field of human psychology, and resentments can understandably linger for generations. But in the natural order of things resentments dissipate with each passing generation until past events no longer stand in the way of good relations. 

However, when historical grievances are deliberately fostered and encouraged, as China’s leaders do with such relish, the state is accountable for an undercurrent of discontent that have the potential to spill over in a nationalistic wave of rage. It’s a dangerous and irresponsible game, primarily because a heightened and collective case of SIRS cannot be readily attenuated.

China needs a new generation of leaders confident enough to face up to their own history and to look more – far more – objectively at China’s past in relation to other countries without deliberately fuelling the emotive kneejerk condemnations that are symptomatic of SIRS.

All they need do is allow different historical viewpoints and calm, open discussion of the issues raised throughout academia. Of course, this also means accepting that China has not been the Planet’s only ‘victim’ and that she has occasionally made victims of others.

Here is an example of how it works:

Between 1914 and 1945 Britain and Germany stood on either side of global conflicts that took warfare to new levels of killing, depravity, and destruction. Those years are not forgotten by either country, but despite the often deeply harrowing accounts of some aspects of that period in history, there is no presentation of the attendant resentment associated with SIRS when Japan is the topic of the day in China.

If Britain and Germany disagree, as they have recently over economic issues, their respective populations don’t give way to mass hysteria induced by perceptions of each other that are dressed in the cloak of wartime propaganda and stereotypes.

Rather, there is an understanding that the appalling acts of past conflicts were of a different age, and were not inspired by, or present in, the minds of the current generation. Sure, there are still crackpot jingoists and holocaust apologists, but they are firmly on the lunatic fringe. The majority of people look back not with bitterness, but through a desire to learn and understand how we got to be where we are today.  

Those looking for a colonialist example should consider India; plenty of bad shit went down there, but SIRS is not one of India’s present day ills. By and large, India and Britain have shared a good relationship since the days of empire, because that relationship is not defined by a time when one was colonist and the other colonised.

Not so China. Through the mechanism of SIRS, China considers its relationship with Britain in terms of the need to avenge the opium trade, the Boxers, or over-exuberance at the Summer Palace. China, or more specifically the Chinese government, have cultivated specific strains of SIRS not only for Britain, but also for Japan, Korea, Vietnam, India, Russia, France, America, Portugal, Holland, ‘the west’, Tibet, and Taiwan. You name the country or region, and China will regurgitate a list of hard-wired grievances.

That’s a lot of beef. Too much beef, in fact. And like a plugged volcano, eventually something’s going to blow.

Nobody is saying we should forget the past, but there is a need for a balanced historical record without a nationalistic agenda. If such measures are not taken to eradicate SIRS in China, she is a certainty for strained international relations or even armed conflict in the next decade.

In short, it’s time for China to get over it. If she can’t, then the so-called ‘peaceful rise’ will go the same way as Chamberlain’s ‘peace in our time’. And we don’t want to go there again.

Economical with his anniversaries?

It’s going to be a big year of anniversaries for China, as Jonathan Fenby  wrote in his article for the Guardian yesterday. In the great Chinese tradition of rote learning and the reduction of history to a politically tolerable list of names, dates, and events, it is also likely to be a year of selective memory for Chinese leaders.

Here are a few salient points from Fenby’s article:

History is still an intensely political matter in China but can, by its nature, be hard to control in the popular memory.

The echoes from the past are evident, from the central-provincial relationship to Tibet, from corruption to top-down rule and from regime legitimacy to the current harassment of signatories of the Charter 08 petition calling for greater political freedom.

…The approved version is written by those on top. Inconvenient events are either air-brushed out or presented in a stylised manner to fit current needs, as in the insistence that by crushing the 1989 protests the party and the army served the interests of the people.

…Hu’s personal link with the suppression in 1989 and the presence of his lieutenants in the territory’s administration increase the stakes. The crackdown on the Charter 08 movement has shown how concerned the politburo still is with dissent, however peaceful.

Holding up a distorting mirror to the past can be a tricky exercise when present realities provide a more challenging narrative. The snag for Hu Jintao and his colleagues is that they have only one version of history to present in this year of anniversaries, even if it is one that does not withstand examination.

The article is well worth reading in full.

Although Fenby is undoubtedly correct in saying that the version of history likely to be presented by Chinese leaders this year is not going to be one that can “withstand examination”, the real issue lies in the suppression of peoples’ will to examine in the first place.

It’s not that questioning, investigation, and scrutiny of the official word are uniquely western predilections, but rather that the scope and insistence of Beijing’s ‘message’ has rendered mute the voice of domestic inquiry. Indeed, the present wave of nationalistic fervour has strengthened opposition to those who would dare examine Chinese history without CCP blinkers. 

To this end the Chinese leadership are sitting comfortably, safe in the knowledge that any attempts by journalists, bloggers, historians, or intellectuals to present a more balanced view (or discussed at all on some issues) can be effectively spun as ‘western propaganda aimed at stifling China’s rise’. 

That is not to say there are no brave individuals in China willing to speak out against their repressive regime, or that non-Chinese commenters should give up their critiques of a government that stunts the intellectual growth of a nation by refusing to allow alternative viewpoints.

It is to be hoped that the growing number of seasoned, well-informed commenters among the expat community in China will lend their talents to a more open and objective discussion of 2009′s anniversaries, such that, several decades from now, we might one day be celebrating the anniversary of end of closed historical debate in China.

One such commenter, Jeremiah Jenne of the excellent Jottings from the Granite Studio, regularly writes ‘on this day in history’ articles for his site. They are always well-researched, well-balanced, and well-written. As a Qing historian teaching and researching his PhD thesis in Beijing, his writing also offers a fascinating insight into the historical record as it relates to China.

There’s certainly no shortage of important dates to keep him occupied in 2009, and they will be a must read for anyone with even a passing interest in this year’s anniversaries.