Letters from China No 19

Early January, 2009

Now this might sound very run-of-the-mill to people who live in a free democratic society, but to us who live in a society that is far from being those things, the following is an amazing step forward. It all started with me telling my students the return date for classes after the Chinese New Year (Spring Festival) holiday. I told them that college would resume on February 9^th, to be met with looks of dismay and astonishment. One brave soul had the strength to utter “But, Robert, that is the day of the Lantern Festival. Our families meet and eat a special meal on that day. We can’t be here then.” It’s a bit like saying classes would resume on Christmas Day after having had a few days off for shopping. I told them I’d check with the office and come back to them. Up until Thursday the Chinese director of our department was insisting that classes would resume on Feb 9^th, but suddenly on Friday morning, he admitted that the college had capitulated and that we would resume on Feb 16^th, one week more of holiday. That all sounded very mature and reasonable until we heard what had happened to sway this decision. Apparently the student body had held a meeting, which in its own right is illegal here as the right of free assembly does not exist. They held a debate over whether they should return on the 9^th or simply miss classes for several days and eventually voted on a decision. They chose to forego their festival days at home and return to college in order not to waste their tuition fees. The debate was apparently very well organized and voting was held in a very democratic way. It appears that subsequently the parents had applied pressure to the college board and had the dates changed. These two happenings are things which are unheard of in China. People kow-tow to the powers-that-be and never, repeat, never, dispute a decision by anyone in authority.

Now, we foreign teachers have been teaching the principles of debating and voting in our classes and use debate as a way of stimulating speech. Plus, we have been drumming into the students that they are not merely students here, but fee-paying customers and that their parents pay for what they receive and if it doesn’t come up to scratch, then complain. Complaint is almost unheard of here, again, they kow-tow to anyone in a position of power, be it a manufacturer or the person who serves them their food in the canteen. Now the students have organized themselves into groups who inspect the restaurants/canteens and have a questionnaire they are completing with peoples opinions. It seems that our ministrations over the past six years are eventually coming to fruition.

As I said, this might sound trivial to you all out there, but here it is an amazing change of attitude.