Globalaffairs

Issue 3/June-July 2007
By Jaime Mateu

In order to tackle the fourth generation of Chinese leaders, it is necessary to introduce briefly the concept of generation. Chinese history tends to classify governments according to dynasties. In the history of the recent People’s Republic of China ages have been classified according to leader in power. Since 1949 until his death Mao was the leader of the first generation and he established the basis to convert China into the workers paradise and to fulfil the dream of an equal society.

After his death, in 1978 Deng Xiaoping led the second generation so as to carry out the reforms to overcome the Chinese economic and institutional crisis, however, in 1989 Jiang Zemin was selected for raising attempts to become the representative of the third generation and make China an international power. The truth is that Deng Xiaoping held the power in the shadow thought a Commission of old party leaders who had the right of veto over the measures taken by the Politburo Standing Committee since his death in 1997. From 1997 to 2002 the third generation really began.

In 2002 the fourth generation led by Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao replaced Jiang Zemin with a new priority: to keep economic development but stressing attempts to achieve a more equal society re-taking somehow the Mao’s rhetoric. The arrival of these leaders was planned in the 80’s by Deng Xiaoping, who for the purpose of ensuring a stable and peaceful political transition avoided gerontocracies such as it happened in the ex Soviet Union, and carried out the program of four transformations in order to train future leaders of the Chinese Communist party.

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Issue 2/ April-May 2007
By Roger Casas

A series of events have just commemorated in Taiwan the 60th anniversary of the so-called “February 28 (Feb-28) Incident”, a popular uprising against the Nationalist Party (Kuomintang-KMT) administration which took place on February 28, 1947, and was brutally repressed by government forces. A ceremony held at the Feb-28 Memorial Park in Taipei was attended by hundreds of victims´ relatives; Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian himself, as well as several other members of his government, took active part in several official events, which included the inauguration of a new Memorial Hall dedicated to the victims of the massacre. The President promised justice and compensations for those repressed by the KMT in the past: “without truth, there will be no reconciliation”, he said. But the demand for historical truth is only a part of the complex political game Feb-28 has become.

At the end of the Second World War, and after around 50 years of Japanese administration, Taiwan island was handled back to the Republic of China (ROC) of the KMT, at that time fighting (and losing) the war against Mao Ze Dong´s Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in the mainland. At the beginning of 1947, after almost two years of ROC governance, administrative corruption was so spread that tension among locals was high: 50 years of Japanese government had got Taiwanese used to authoritarian but efficient rule, and KMT government´s theft of private property, embezzlement of international aid, and mistreatment of local population (mostly descendants of Fujianese migrants, and often seen by KMT members as pro-Japanese and suspects of betraying the “Chinese nation”) were too much for them.

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Issue 1/February-March 2007
By Roger Casas

On 21 July 2006, Ta Mok (also known as “the butcher”), one of the former main leaders of the Khmer Rouge, died in a hospital of the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh . Together with other leaders of that group, Ta Mok was considered responsible for the annihilation of more than one million and a half Cambodians through violent death, overwork or starvation, under the rule of Democratic Kampuchea (DK), between 1975 and 1979. DK policies, inspired on Maoist thought, were aimed at radically transforming Cambodian society, destroying the old social order and its institutions -such as private property, formal education, markets and currency, religious practices, etc.

“As historian David Chandler has pointed out, “no Cambodian government had ever tried to change so many things so rapidly” ; no other regime had such radical consequences for the whole country, which saw its population decreased in around 25%: The results of this utopia continue affecting the lives of millions of Cambodians today”.

Ta Mok, who was 80 at the time of his death, was one of two former Khmer Rouge leaders imprisoned for crimes committed during the period of DK; the other one, Kaing Guek Eav, also known as “Duch”, head of the Khmer Rouge secret police and of the infamous prison S-21 (Tuol Sleng), a detention center in Phnom Penh where around 15 thousand people lost their lives, is awaiting trial . The rest of the leaders of DK are still roaming free: among them, Nuon Chea, “Brother Number Two” in the Khmer Rouge hierarchy, Khieu Samphan, nominal head of state and chairman of the state presidium, or Ieng Sary, minister for foreign affairs. Pol Pot, “Brother Number One” of the Khmer Rouge and virtual strongman of the regime, died in his jungle refuge in 1998. The recent deaths of Slobodan Milosevic and Augusto Pinochet, both facing trial for genocide, have raised fears that the rest of potential culprits may disappear before being put on trial.

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Issue 1/February-March 2007
By Li Cheng

In November of 2006, a documentary aired by Central Chinese TV (CCTV) has provoked a great public interest. This documentary called ‘The Rise of the Great Nations’ draws in 12 episodes the rise and fall of 9 countries (Portugal, Spain, Holland, England, France, Germany, Japan, Russia and the USA) throughout last 500 years in History.

It is very significant when this program has been broadcasted: at the beginning of November where the African-Chinese Cooperation Forum took place in Beijing with the participation of 48 African countries, which was a real display of the diplomatic capability and ‘soft power’ of the host country nowadays. With one year and a half to celebrate the Olympic Games 2008, China is playing an active role on the international scene with the ‘peaceful rise’ slogan as fundamental foreign policy strategy. On the other hand, CCTV is the Television with the highest audience ratings and it has always been the Government voice so as to broadcast official messages to Chinese citizens. In this sense, this documentary can be seen as a token of attitude and world view of the political and intellectual Chinese elite.

We clearly remember our school time when History books were written in a classical style of Marxist-Leninist ideology and class struggles, with a central nationalist axis. Unlike this traditional tone, ‘The Rise of the Great Nations’ is an audiovisual trip to the leading countries in Modern and Contemporary History that tries to explain from different perspectives and with academic rationality how the current world structure has taken shape. Most documentary was filmed in situ, combining current images with virtual reproductions of historical events. In the script there are known events and anecdotes that make think. The interviews with intellectuals are especially interesting; they provide their opinions about ‘the secret of success’ of the Great Nations from different points of view. Amongst them there are important figures such as Joseph Stiglitz, Paul Kennedy, Joseph S. Nye, Lester R. Brown and Zbigniew Brzezinski.

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Issue 1/February-March 2007
By Eugenio Bregolat

In the last quarter of century China has led a galloping growth, never surpassed by any other country in history. China is managing three transitions at the same time: from a planned economy to a market one, from a rural society to an urban one and from a closed economy to a globalized one. According to the World Bank “China is managing in one generation what took centuries to most countries”.

From 1978 until today, Chinese economy growth ranges between 8 to 10% a year. In 1978 when Deng Xiaoping launched the “economic reform and external opening” policy the GDP was 215.208 million dollars and the income per capita was 217 dollars. In 2005 the GDP was 2,26 trillion dollars, in other words, the GDP was multiplied by 10 in 27 years. In 2005, the income per capita was 1.730 dollars thus in this period of time it was multiplied by eight after a 400 million population growth. Regarding its GDP China is the fourth world country. For the forthcoming year China is expected to surpass Germany that means it will be in the third position in the world ranking just after the USA and Japan. According to forecasts in 3 or 5 decades the Chinese GDP could be the biggest one in the world in regard to its nominal value. In terms of purchasing power parity (PPP) the China’s GDP is the second one, just surpassed by the USA. In terms of PPP the Chinese GDP in relation to the world one increased from 3,4% in 1980 to 15,4% in 2005.

Nowadays China has 425 million mobile phones and 150 million Internet users. With 20 million university students and 430.000 students abroad it produces 1,3 million graduates in Engineering, Sciences and Technology. Nine members of the Politburo Standing Committee, the most important power institution, are engineers. China has a true obsession for Science and Technology. In 2006 its R&D budget was, according to OECD, the second one in the world exceeding Japan and just behind the USA.

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