Keeping the May Fourth Spirit Alive

Matthew Pottinger spoke in Mandarin to mark the May Fourth Movement

I completely missed the speech by Matthew Pottinger, Deputy National Security Advisor on May 4 to mark the 101th anniversary of the May Fourth Movement. He spoke it entirely in Mandarin, which is pretty good, and it must have been tiring to read out a speech that was over 20 minutes long, but his points are very interesting.

To be able to speak directly to the Chinese, let alone Beijing is very interesting, though sadly his speech was censored so not many actually got to watch it.



But the content of his speech and using the anniversary of the May Fourth Movement to talk about the importance of democracy is fascinating.

He says on May 4, 1919, following World War I, thousands of university students descended on Tiananmen Square to protest the unfair treatment of China at the Paris Peace Conference. Western nations appeased Imperial Japan by granting it control of a territory including previously German-occupied Shandong Peninsula.

"The Chinese students who marched to Tiananmen that day shouted 'give us back Shandong!' and 'don't sign the Versailles Treaty!' Police forced the students to disperse," Pottinger says. "But as frequently happens when governments close down avenues for peaceful expression, some protesters resorted to violence. In a principled move that acknowledged popular anger, China refused to sign the Treaty of Versailles later that year."

He adds "Mr Science" and "Mr Democracy" were mottoes of the movement that propelled China into the modern era.

Then Pottinger talks about Hu Shih, a Chinese philosopher, essayist and diplomat. During the May 4 Movement, he was a key contributor in releasing the Chinese language free from scholars and imperialist culture and instead giving it to the ordinary people. "Bai hua" or literally "plain speech" is what Hu advocated which was revolutionary at the time.

Hu's peer, Chang Peng Chun, or PC Chang also made a big contribution. He studied in the United States, adapted Mulan for the stage, and organized a US tour for Peking opera singer Mei Lanfang. However Chang's greatest achievement was his contribution to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, says Pottinger.

"Marrying Western belief in the primacy of the individual with Chinese concern for the greater good", Chang helped craft a document that would be relevant to all nations... A declaration on human rights was not simply about the rights of the individual, in Chang's view. It was also about the individual's obligations to society," says Pottinger.

Then he pivots, asking who today embodies the May Fourth Spirit, and Pottinger immediately brings up ophthalmologist Li Wenliang, who alerted his group of friends about a new virus that seemed contagious, but later was forced by the police to sign a "confession" for leaking word about the coronavirus. Li died from the virus days soon after.

"Dr Li's comment to a reporter from his deathbed still rings in our ears: 'I think there should be more than one voice in a healthy society, and I don't approve of using public power for excessive interference.' Dr Li was using Hu Shih-style 'plain speech' to make a practical point," observes Pottinger.

He also names citizen reporters who have also tried to find the truth but are missing: Chen Qiushi, Fang Bin, and Li Zehua; he also points out more foreign reporters have been expelled from China than the Soviet Union did over decades.

Pottinger also names people who have served as "China's conscience". "Many are regular citizens. Xu Zhangrun [Xi critic], Ren Zhiqiang [tycoon and Xi critic], Xu Zhiyong [civil rights activist], Ilham Tohti [Uighur academic], Fang Fang [novelist who wrote Wuhan Diary], 20 Catholic priests who have refused to subordinate God to the Communist Party, and the millions of Hong Kong citizens who peacefully demonstrated for the rule of law last year. The list goes on," he says.

Towards the end of his speech, Pottinger asks what the ultimate legacy of the May Fourth Movement will be, and the answers can be found by the Chinese people.

"Those with fortitude to seek and speak the truth in China today may take comfort, however, in something Lu Xun wrote: 'Lies written in ink can never disguise facts written in blood.'"

One can see why Pottinger's speech was censored, but a strong case for China to continue in the May Fourth Spirit towards democracy... as it later led to the establishment of the Communist Party...

Property Tycoon Questions Migrant Worker Crackdown

Property tycoon Ren Zhiqiang questions why China uses hukou system

Property tycoon Ren Zhiqiang has been known for speaking his mind, and last year he got into trouble when he criticized Chinese President Xi Jinping's call for the media to show loyalty to the Communist Party.

He was back voicing his opinion on Wednesday, comparing China to North Korea over its rigid household registration system called hukou.

A migrant worker takes last look at where he lived in Beijing

At an annual conference of financial magazine Caijing in Beijing, Ren, 66, said the registration system was "adopted only by a limited number of countries, including China and North Korea", and that Beijing's ongoing eviction of migrant workers was a deluded way to solve the city's problems.

The government is currently getting rid of thousands of migrant workers in mostly the outskirts of the capital, either knocking on doors late at night and giving people 15 minutes to clear out all their stuff before demolishing their homes, or cutting off water and electricity as a sign to move on, just as the cold winter sets in.

The evictions are part of a campaign to address safety threats in the aftermath of a residential fire that killed 19 people last month.

Thousands of migrant workers evicted from Beijing

While the government may think this is an effective way to quickly get rid of people it doesn't want in the city, these migrant workers are crucial cheap labour doing menial jobs that need to be done. Most recently hundreds were evicted from an area near Beijing Capital International Airport where they work.

"The Beijing government once boasted that there was no family with housing problems in the city -- but it was only talking about locals," said Ren, the former chairman of Huayuan Property, a company owned by the Beijing government.

"The biggest problem with China's [housing] market adjustment and control policies is that they are illegitimate," he said.

Ren said there was no law giving the authorities the right to interfere in property prices, but in reality all local governments could cap these prices at a level they deemed appropriate.

A fire in Daxing prompted evictions of migrant workers

However, he added, land sales -- a key source of revenue for local governments -- were left alone, even though they were the main reason property prices had skyrocketed.

"If China doesn't solve the land problem and change the household registration system, all of its so-called long-term [market] mechanisms will be built on sand," he warned.

For years Ren has openly criticized the government's policies to control the property market and other political and social issues. He had 37 million followers on Weibo before his account was deleted in February last year when he questioned why the media should be loyal to the party when news outlets were funded by taxpayer money and so they should serve the public, not the party.

"When did the people's government turn into the party's government? [Are the media] funded by party membership dues?" he wrote at the time.

Following his comments, Ren came under attack by state media, and a news site linked to the Beijing municipal party committee declared he was spreading "anti-Communist Party" thought, and he represented capitalists who sought to topple the party's rule. He was then placed under a year's probation by the party in May and has kept a low profile -- until now.

Will he get in trouble for his criticism of the country's hukou system? Looks like so far so good...

Xi Defines State Media Role

Xi Jinping is "anchoring" the news, saying state media must work for the Party

When I worked in state media in Beijing, my colleagues who were Communist Party members would disappear once in a while for an entire afternoon for a "meeting". It was actually a study session to decipher then President Hu Jintao's "Three Represents" (三个代表).

They would also be reminded that the state media was the medium in which the Party's doctrine would be communicated, that everyone must be in line with the Party for the sake of unity and ensure everyone got the same message.

This was said behind closed doors.

And periodically Hu or the Premier Wen Jiabao would visit state media outlets and re-emphasize these points that were published in newspapers, read out in news casts and such.

But the exercise was stepped up by President Xi Jinping last Friday when he visited Xinhua, People's Daily and CCTV and insisted state media must show absolute loyalty to the Party.

Ren Zhiqiang says the media should serve the people

There were no vagaries here -- it was straight to the point. According to a report in People's Daily:

The Party's news and public opinion work must adhere to the principle of the Party character, cleaving fundamentally to the Party's leadership of news and public opinion work. Media run by the Party and government are propaganda positions of the Party and the government, and they must reflect the Party. All work of the Party's news and public opinion media must reflect the will of the Party, mirror the views of the Party, preserve the authority of the Party, preserve the unity of the Party, and achieve love of the Party, protection of the Party and acting for the Party; they must all increase their consciousness of falling in line, maintaining a high level of uniformity with the Party in ideology, politics and action.

It's pretty clear how Xi is instructing how the media should operate. What happened to the so-called "vibrant media" in China, where there were different shades of red?

Seems like that is no more, as everyone must disseminate the same message.

But perhaps even more interesting is that an outspoken tycoon has criticized Xi's pronouncement about state media's role in society.

Ren Zhiqiang said on Weibo on Friday that the media should serve the people, that news operations were funded by taxpayer money and so should serve the public rather than the leadership.

"When does the people's government turn into the party's government? [Are the media] funded by party membership dues? Don't waste taxpayers' money on things that do not provide them with services," he wrote.

Needless to say Ren was immediately attacked by a news site affiliated with the Beijing municipal party committee, accusing him of "anti-Communist Party" thought.

Qianlong.com claimed Ren represented capitalism that sought to topple the Party's rule and establish Western-style constitutionalism on the mainland, and even accused him of having "completely" lost his Party spirit.

It'll be interesting to see how Ren gets himself out of this fiasco unscathed if possible, but he is technically right. Taxpayer money does go to state enterprises like state media and it is the job of media to inform its readers.

But, things are done differently on the mainland, and with Xi in charge, it's near impossible to beat the President.

Nevertheless, with 37 million followers, Ren could win in the court of public opinion, though politically and financially he may lose big time.