Perhaps the most telling recent example took place during the world tour of the Olympic flame in the run-up to the 2008 Beijing Games. During the tour, many young Chinese people took to the streets of Buenos Aires, Paris, London and Sydney to counteract demonstrations in support of Tibetan independence and human rights. Although there is no denying that Chinese embassies played a role in orchestrating these protests, the initiative shown by the students themselves in hitting the streets to protect the Olympic flame from Western saboteurs must not be underestimated.40
This sense of nationalism which Beijing promotes among its population and which at times becomes very deeply entrenched has spread beyond Chinese borders and filtered through to the overseas community. There is no shortage of examples of Chinese expats such as Harry Sun who are prepared to fight tooth and nail to defend the motherland on behalf of Chinese people overseas. This does not mean that the Chinese diaspora forms part of some monolithic entity that is following the lead of the Chinese party-state to unite against their Western rivals. That would be an oversimplification of the facts. However, it is clear that the Chinese overseas community has benefited from its economic alliance with Beijing’s regime, making money and taking advantage of China’s arrival in the international economic system. In this current climate, full of opportunities for business and investment and rapid economic and geopolitical growth, forcing political change is not exactly a priority for the Chinese global community. As such, pressure to put an end to the hegemony of the Communist Party, or even to encourage the regime to become more open, has been forgotten. Only time will tell whether this situation is temporary or if it is here to stay.
* Migrant workers (literally, “workers from the countryside”).
2
The New Silk Road
“Annam is adjacent to Champa and the hundred barbarians, with all of whom frontiers should be maintained, so that there are no encroachments or transgressions. Likewise, neither civilians nor soldiers should be permitted to cross the frontier, or privately go on the seas and trade with barbarian countries.”
Emperor Zhu Di (1403–24), 1407 edict aimed at limiting
China’s contact with other countries1
After we’ve lain fourteen torturous hours on a filthy bunk, the long-distance bus from Urumqi is finally making its way along Horgos’s semi-deserted main avenue. As we step off the bus, the air is filled with the smell of lamb’s brain boiling in a nearby pot—how long it has been there is anyone’s guess. Women and children pester travelers with baskets of fruit, sweets, pickled chicken feet and other local delicacies suitable only for the more daring palate. The bearded faces topped with traditional doppa, the colorful hats worn by the Uighur minority, easily locate us in the remote and troubled Xinjiang Province, whose name means “the new frontier” in Mandarin. With its strong Muslim roots, this immense region, dominated by imposing mountains and deserts, stretches across a sixth of China’s total territory. The province boasts 25 percent of China’s oil and gas reserves, as well as 40 percent of its coal reserves and mineral deposits. Xinjiang welcomes us with the fiercely intense blue sky typical of Central Asia and a magnificent quality of light, something rarely seen now in industrialized China with its sad skies and shades of metallic gray.
The street signs and posters in both Mandarin and Uighur, with its alphabet derived from Arabic, highlight the dramatic coexistence of two cultures—Chinese and Uighur—which have been clashing constantly ever since the expansionist Qing dynasty seized control of the region in the eighteenth century.2 Here we see the meeting of two very different worlds: that of the Uighur culture, with its deeply entrenched traditions and Muslim roots dating back to the tenth century, and the Chinese world, hungry for economic development and with the Communist Party’s values as its only creed. The clash between these two worlds has led to mutual distrust, hostility, repression and bloodshed. Today, the two ethnic groups live very separate lives: one lives to the south of the treacherous Taklamakan desert and practices Sunni Islam in mosques—an activity looked on with suspicion by Beijing—while the other lives mainly in the urban hubs to the north of the region, where they use bulldozers and pass new regulations fueling the destruction of historic districts in order to make room for banks, shopping centers and karaoke bars housed in striking glass buildings. The scene is set for the struggle between tradition and modernity that is taking place in this historic enclave on the old Silk Road, which is now being used as a springboard to further China’s strategic objectives in Central Asia.
As such, Horgos has been called to play a decisive role: to act as a gateway into Central Asia. Close to the border with Kazakhstan, today it is little more than a quiet, unwelcoming town with barely 20,000 inhabitants in the middle of nowhere. However, the future is already being built at breakneck speed. “Come back in ten or fifteen years and Horgos will be full of hotels and skyscrapers,” warns Wang Yanjiang, an entrepreneur and vice-president of the local business association. As he drives his 4×4, Wang proudly explains that the town has been officially listed as a Special Economic Zone (SEZ),3 guaranteeing it a wave of new infrastructure building and an enticing legal framework to attract investors. The aim: to transform the town into a first-class manufacturing and logistics center. “Over the next decade, the population of Horgos will multiply by ten to 200,000 inhabitants. The same will happen with businesses, whose number will reach 10,000,” Wang assures us.
Looking at the important role that the SEZs have played in China’s spectacular economic development over the last thirty years, there is no doubt about the effectiveness of these zones and China’s capacity to carry out projects on such a grand scale. Selling land in Horgos at affordable prices, or even giving it away, and facilitating credit and earnings exemptions from certain taxes, Beijing is hoping to re-create the runaway success seen in Shenzhen.4 Once a small fishing town close to Hong Kong, Shenzhen was selected as one of China’s first SEZs. Just three decades later it is now a dazzling city of 15 million inhabitants, brimming with skyscrapers and wide, endless avenues. Thanks to enormous investments in new infrastructure, Shenzhen is now the second richest city in China, giving birth to a new urban middle class that has filled the city with shopping centers, golf courses, luxury cars and smart residential districts. While in the past China prioritized its eastern and southeast regions, it is now using the exact same model to develop its impoverished “Great West.”
As we drive towards the border, Wang points out the three large shopping centers lining the road, where hundreds of small shops are displaying everything from washing machines and electrical appliances to knick-knacks, matryoshka dolls and soft toys. When we reach the border we are able to see for ourselves how Horgos is preparing to become the next Shenzhen. Busloads of potential Chinese investors from other provinces travel across the 5.2-square-kilometer area authorized by China and Kazakhstan to house the future Free Trade Zone. Free from the shackles of bureaucracy and the current tax rates, the zone will pave the way for Chinese products to be exported throughout the markets of Central Asia and perhaps even beyond into European territory. Beijing’s plan for the economic development of its “rebel province” has brought the historic Silk Road back to life, and it is now showing the same startling vitality that it once boasted all those centuries ago.5
A plentiful supply of cheap labor also provides China with a powerful advantage when it comes to conquering the Central Asian markets. “Producing something in Kazakhstan costs five times more than in China because of taxes and salaries. A Chinese employee in Horgos earns an annual salary of around 18,000 yuan (2,000 euros), while a Kazakh worker expects 1,200 euros each month. This has caused many Kazakh businesses to lose sectors and market share,” Wang explains. Crossing the border at Horgos is enough to give us an idea of the power of Chinese products in the region. An army of lorries loaded with Chinese tea, DVD players, crockery, electrical appliances and bicycles is queuing to be inspected by the Kazakh customs control. The lorry drivers, mostly he
fty-looking Central Asians, leave their vehicles and kill time by playing cards, drinking and smoking, flashing the gold teeth typical of the people of the former Soviet Union every time they laugh. The customs officials arrogantly measure, weigh and take note of the products, confident in the sense of authority granted by their gray uniforms. “It costs 20,000 dollars to take a lorry across the border,” Wang tells us, referring to the exorbitant customs duties imposed on Chinese products in a vain attempt to fend off an invasion that is unstoppable in the face of such vast differences in production costs: once we arrive in Kazakh territory we count almost 300 empty lorries queuing for several kilometers at the side of the road to get back to China to stock up on supplies. Here, as in so many other places, taxes are powerless against the pull of Chinese products.6
The pedestrian border crossing also defies any kind of common sense. A multi-ethnic mob of around 200 thieves, soldiers and men loaded down with gigantic bundles and boxes crams into a space measuring just a few square meters at the gates of a narrow passage lined with iron railings. At the end of the passage, one Chinese soldier is waiting to carry out the preliminary passport check. The sweaty, noisy crowd mercilessly push each other out of the way. The only law here is the law of the jungle; the most forceful surge forward without paying any attention to the hopeless cries of the people they trample on their way. The strongest and most impatient applicants are the first to cross the border in this cut-throat place where the philosophy is always “me first, you later.” The rest of the horde, mostly made up of chubby women and old men with silvery beards, waits its turn: this is natural selection in its purest form. Meanwhile, the Chinese find opportunities amidst the chaos, with the shopping-mad Kazakhs as their potential customers. They sell them passport covers and other useless items, or offer the use of wheelbarrows to carry their great piles of shopping—plasma televisions, dryers, clothing—across the border in exchange for just a few dollars. All these items can be sold in Kazakhstan for several times their original price.
Crossing the 350 kilometers between the Chinese border and Almaty, the economic capital of Kazakhstan, means taking a road that has no dividing lines between lanes and is full of potholes: a world away from the spotless G-312 motorway that took us from Urumqi, Xinjiang’s provincial capital, to Horgos on the Chinese side of the border. The dangerous second-hand Audis and Mercedes imported from Germany after being retired by their European owners can barely make their way through the potholes on a precarious road that shows just how little interest Kazakhstan has in increasing its overland trade. This is the complete opposite of what is happening on the other side of the border. The reason for this is that the little that Kazakhstan sells to China—mainly oil and gas—is generally not transported on this road but through underground pipelines. The only effect of improving overland transport would be to promote the arrival of more Chinese products into Kazakh markets.7
This sense of crossing through time as well as space—of taking a leap back into the past—is a familiar feeling whenever we leave China by land. This contrast is mostly a result of the country’s recent revolution in new infrastructure building.8 Enormous bridges that defy all the rules of logic, perfect motorways which cut across mountain ranges, and railway lines connecting the four cardinal points of the country make up the new landscape of a state which has always understood the importance of investing in its transport networks in order to strengthen its governance.9 In the past, the mandarins made their way to the furthest corners of their territory to ensure control of their dominion. Today, the creation of new infrastructure serves the same purpose as it did in the Imperial era: to improve links and trade between Chinese urban centers located thousands of kilometers away from Beijing. However, the modern-day transport links also play a role that was restricted or even openly opposed by the Imperial governments—the expansion of Chinese trade outside its own borders.10
As such, China has broken with centuries of isolation and aversion to having any contact with the outside world—even in questions of trade—out of fear of the potential consequences that this might have on a domestic level. One example of Imperial China’s reluctance—or even outright opposition—to dealing with the rest of the world is seen in the experience of the first British trade envoy sent to China by George III in September 1792. The group of diplomats, merchants, soldiers, scientists and painters led by Lord George Macartney traveled to Macao in the hope of persuading the Emperor Qianlong to allow Great Britain access to Chinese ports and to encourage Beijing to lower its custom duties on its products. In order to impress the holder of the “Mandate of Heaven,” the delegation carefully carried telescopes, barometers and clocks on their four-month journey across the entire length of the country from the southern city of Canton—the only port authorized for foreign use—to the northern Forbidden City in Beijing. After a brief encounter with the Emperor, Lord Macartney came away with just a short and disheartening response from the Son of Heaven:
We have never valued ingenious articles, nor do we have the slightest need of your country’s manufactures. Therefore, O King, as regards your request to send someone to remain at the [Chinese] capital, while it is not in harmony with the regulations of the Celestial Empire we also feel very much that it is of no advantage to your country.11
ALL ROADS LEAD TO CENTRAL ASIA
The Chinese government is anticipating an influx of millions of dollars in investment over the next five years to help develop infrastructure in Xinjiang: in May 2010 it approved a project budget of between $17 billion and $22 billion—the equivalent of Bolivia’s entire GDP in 2009—a figure which will enable the amount of road in the province to increase from the current 15,000 kilometers to 80,000 kilometers by 2016.12 There is also an ambitious plan in place to extend the country’s rail network, including its high-speed railway.13 Improving the efficiency of transport links in the region will not only increase the number of routes available for exporting Chinese products into Central Asia. Coinciding with China’s rapid process of urbanization, the improved transport links will also facilitate the development of “cluster-towns,” important logistical and production centers such as the one that is quickly becoming a reality in Horgos.
Given the scale of the development planned for the region on China’s northwest border, one question cannot be ignored: what are the aims behind this immense deployment of resources? From a domestic perspective it is clear that Beijing understands perfectly the potential impact that economic development may have on its strategy to stabilize the turbulent Xinjiang province at any cost. This has become even more urgent since 2009, when the region became the site of the worst outbreak of violence in the country since the 1989 protests in Tiananmen Square: inter-ethnic violence left 197 people dead and over 1,700 injured.
At the same time, the new infrastructure will create endless opportunities for trade both in Central Asia and beyond. Xin Guangcheng, an expert in Central Asia at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, drew our attention to both factors: “The government wants to create a new Shanghai in Xinjiang. It aims to take advantage of the province’s geographical position, since over 70 percent of trade between Central Asia and China passes through this region. The biggest challenge it faces in order to do this is to attract human capital and investments,” he explained during a two-hour interview in Beijing which was meticulously transcribed by a civil servant so that it could later be submitted to the Communist Party’s commissioners for review.
Xin Guangcheng is hinting here at the prospect of a massive influx of people of Han Chinese ethnicity moving to the Muslim province, attracted by the new opportunities that are bound to emerge from the immense government investment and favorable tax conditions. The arrival of thousands of Han traders, investors and workers will have one inevitable and obvious consequence: the dilution of the Uighurs’ dominance within Xinjiang’s ethnographic panorama.14 This would be nothing new in the history of a country whose central government—whether Imperial or republican—has regularly
used population displacement as a tool to support the territorial and ethnic conquest of the Han people.15 The Communists made extensive use of this practice from the moment they came to power, submitting the unruly provinces of Xinjiang and Tibet to a gradual, silent process of ethnic and cultural assimilation. This is still taking place today with the arrival of waves of Han Chinese emigrants from other regions in the country.16 There is therefore little doubt that the economic development plan outlined for the region has a carefully calculated dual purpose: to weaken Uighur resistance by encouraging ethnic assimilation, and to use the region as a springboard for conquering new foreign markets.
The consequences of this development are crystal clear for Xinjiang and the Uighurs, but what mark will the flood of Chinese products leave on China’s neighbors? On the other side of the border, China’s plans for expansion are looked on with a mix of anxiety, distrust and resignation. Kazakhstan, the most important of the ex–Soviet republic countries in Central Asia, is already suffering the real-life consequences of this Chinese “invasion.” While it is difficult to get hold of any reliable data on the number of Chinese products flooding the Kazakh markets,17 some experts place the figure at between 70 and 80 percent of the total.18 The merchandise itself ranges from basic necessities such as food to machinery, construction materials and electronic devices. Competition from Chinese products has not just caused the deterioration of Kazakh industry; it has brought it to its knees. When Kazakhstan achieved independence in 1991, it inherited a grim industrial landscape made up of obsolete technology and unproductive factories—when there were factories at all. At the same time, China was being flooded with foreign investment, thus modernizing its production systems and becoming the industrial power that it is today. And so, the law of logic prevailed: out of the two countries, China won hands down.
China's Silent Army Page 7