German Marshall Fund Blog » Blog Archive » On China policy, the game has moved on
The author here argues that western countries will not feature human rights concerns prominently in their relations with China despite objection about Darfur, Tibet, etc., etc.
On most of the ‘soft’ issues, while there is a fair volume of noise,
the Chinese government now faces little targeted international pressure
and can move pretty much to its own timetable.
China’s growing weight in international relations is pretty much indisputable. For confirmation look no further than the number of trips President Bush has made to China, something like 14 in all, more than he has made anywhere else during his presidency. Some of the reasons are obvious: China has both more hard and soft power than it did when it began its regional and global emergence, issues requiring Chinese cooperation–from nuclear proliferation to trade and climate change–occupy increasingly important spots on the international agenda. And, possibly, the U.S. after years of renditions and waterboarding and Gitmo and Abu Ghraib no longer holds a sufficient high moral ground to keep human rights in a prominent position.
A cultural aspect also needs to be considered. From everything I have learned, the Chinese culture emphasizes saving face. For example, Liu Xiang made an attempt to defend his gold medal even though his Achilles’ tendon could barely handle walking. Applied to IR, China will not likely respond well to public pressure. The last thing the Chinese government wants is to seem weak, like the rest of the world is telling them what to do. A far more successful approach, in my opinion, is to discuss China’s human rights record behind closed doors.
I agreed with the author in that human rights seems to have been put on the back-burner in terms of international pressure on China. With the US and other nations intertwined with China in so many different ways (aside from their obvious influence through population, soft power, etc. there is more benefit in not picking this bone with China), I think fewer groups would be inclined to point out China’s wrongs in this aspect. Also, as Dr. Klunk said, other nations have participated in rights’ violations, so probably they would not want to have fingers pointed back to their wrongdoings.
I think that this is a pity though, because it means that some of the more serious problems of human rights violations may go unattended in the future. I am not saying that people will ignore it all, or that anything China has done to our knowledge escalated to Rwanda-proportions, but that some acts they do commit on an individual basis gain rewards rather than reprimand. Like for Olympic athletes who endure family separations (many at a young age), grueling trainings, and mental stress (to train, win, halt academics, etc.) to make their nation proud. These ongoings were reported to an extent, but at the same time, China was rewarded with the most gold medals and given the “thumbs up” for restoring China’s pride. While these violations are minor, nobody objected them or said it was wrong… and it seemed as though China winning only re-affirmed that this way of treating people like athletes was the only right way. I hope putting human rights out of the spotlight won’t mean neglecting it when it is needed.