One of things that surprised me most about my recent trip to Shanghai was the lack of governmental presence. From the customs and immigration posts at the airport to the bustling streets of the city, it was rare to see a uniformed government official or even so much as a flag of the PRC. The absence of flags was especially noticeable. It was almost as if there was an intentional effort to hide the identity of the country you were in. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if that actually was the case.
In Shanghai the emphasis is all on business. No one wants to talk about politics. The local people will tell you that Beijing is where the politics is, Shanghai is where the business is. Which is understandable up to a point. But after a while the act of tippy toeing around the eight hundred pound gorilla sitting in the corner of the room gets to be a bit ridiculous. I speak of course of the eight hundred pound gorilla wearing the cap with the Red Star. For although you can find people to talk about almost anything in Shanghai, the one word you rarely if ever hear mentioned is communism. Yes communism, as in the Chinese Communist government that rules over the most populous country on earth.
Now you might think that no one wants talk communism for fear of reprisal. But, as far as I could tell, it wasn't as if the secret police were monitoring every conversation. In fact the environment appeared to be fairly open for sharing thoughts and opinions. Of course that may simply be how it came across on the surface. That certainly is the impression that I'm sure the Chinese government wants foreigners to have. And I was only in Shanghai for five days, hardly enough time to draw hard conclusions. But during my short stay I got the feeling that if someone wanted to express displeasure with their government they could have.
I just don't think that most of them care. At this point it appears that they are happy with the tradeoff between freedom and security. In the old days of communism the tradeoff involved giving up political freedom in exchange for economic security. You didn't have freedoms of speech, religion, or assembly for example, but you were guaranteed a job, a place to live, and health care. Now, in China at least, the tradeoff is political freedom for economic opportunity, the ability to pursue and accumulate wealth.
If you're busy pursuing material gain you don't worry much about politics. I'm not saying that this is the attitude of all Chinese people, just the ones I came across. And I fully understand the folly in extrapolating from my very limited experience. Trying to draw wider conclusions about China from visiting Shanghai would be like trying to claim that you understand America after spending five days in New York City. But it's what I got and I'm going with it.
The key question becomes how long this situation will last. In some ways China today is similar to South Korea and Taiwan in the 60's, 70's, and 80's (although the Chinese government is much more repressive than either ever was). Both countries enjoyed prosperous, booming economies, but had limited political freedoms. Over the years they have transitioned slowly and sometimes painfully towards democracy. Today both boast relatively free and stable democratic systems. Economic freedoms eventually led to political freedoms.
And it's possible that the same thing could happen in China, although it's hard to imagine it occurring without upheaval. Or China could decide to stick with the current formula and hope that its people will continue to be willing to sacrifice political freedom for economic gain. It seems to have worked for Singapore.
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