WEBVTT - The View from Beijing 0:00:15.396 --> 0:00:22.196 Pushkin from Pushkin Industries. This is Deep Background, the show 0:00:22.236 --> 0:00:25.436 where we explore the stories behind the stories in the news. 0:00:25.956 --> 0:00:30.396 I'm Noah Feldman. Here in the US, coronavirus seems to 0:00:30.436 --> 0:00:34.356 be spreading steadily. Now. I know we cover this in 0:00:34.396 --> 0:00:37.916 a special episode last week with Mark Lipsitch, But for me, 0:00:38.476 --> 0:00:42.876 this whole pandemic issue is still very much front of mind, 0:00:43.636 --> 0:00:46.116 and it feels like most people I've talked to over 0:00:46.116 --> 0:00:49.796 the last few days are thinking pretty much the same thing. 0:00:51.036 --> 0:00:54.316 As of my taping this on Monday night, ten states 0:00:54.396 --> 0:01:00.276 have now reported cases Arizona, California, Florida, Illinois, Massachusetts, Oregon, 0:01:00.476 --> 0:01:05.076 Rhode Island, Washington, Wisconsin, and New York. With its geographical spread, 0:01:05.156 --> 0:01:07.796 that list tells you that pretty shortly it'll be all 0:01:07.876 --> 0:01:11.516 fifty states that have cases. But in China, where the 0:01:11.556 --> 0:01:15.396 epidemic first erupted, the outbreak, at least for the moment, 0:01:15.756 --> 0:01:20.876 appears appears to finally be slowing down. About a week ago, 0:01:21.036 --> 0:01:24.316 as that process was beginning, I spoke to Ian Johnson, 0:01:24.636 --> 0:01:28.196 a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist who's based in Beijing. I 0:01:28.236 --> 0:01:31.676 asked him what life is like in a city where 0:01:31.756 --> 0:01:35.396 everybody is sheltering in place, all twenty million of them 0:01:36.396 --> 0:01:40.236 in Tell me what the mood is among the people 0:01:40.316 --> 0:01:45.516 you speak to with regard to coronavirus. Well, there are 0:01:45.556 --> 0:01:49.156 some cities in China where for a couple of weeks, 0:01:49.156 --> 0:01:52.676 although things are loosening up a bit now, they had 0:01:52.796 --> 0:01:57.956 people under complete lockdown where you couldn't leave your housing 0:01:58.036 --> 0:02:02.916 compound without permission, or sometimes families could only leave their 0:02:02.916 --> 0:02:06.636 housing compound once every couple of days to go shopping 0:02:06.716 --> 0:02:10.156 or something like that, where all the park sort of closed. 0:02:11.036 --> 0:02:13.516 In Beijing, which is of course a big city, so 0:02:13.556 --> 0:02:15.876 it's even hard to generalize in Beijing, but it's a 0:02:15.916 --> 0:02:20.396 little easier the parks are open, and of course in 0:02:20.436 --> 0:02:24.076 the capital, buying groceries and so on is no problem. 0:02:24.516 --> 0:02:28.076 And I guess also the thing in Beijing, the government's 0:02:28.116 --> 0:02:31.276 influence is probably at its strongest, just like probably in 0:02:31.316 --> 0:02:35.916 any capital city. So I think overall in Beijing, the 0:02:35.996 --> 0:02:39.876 sense I get is that people are they're getting a 0:02:39.916 --> 0:02:42.956 little frustrated. They're feeling that boy has been going on 0:02:43.036 --> 0:02:46.956 for a while. The government's asking us not to meet anyone, 0:02:47.156 --> 0:02:49.316 not to go out. But how long are we supposed 0:02:49.316 --> 0:02:52.916 to do this? I think when it started. It started 0:02:52.996 --> 0:02:55.356 right around Chinese New Year, which is a time when 0:02:55.396 --> 0:02:59.196 people tend to be more inwardly focused anyway, visiting family members, 0:02:59.796 --> 0:03:01.996 and so it became sort of like a really long 0:03:02.196 --> 0:03:04.596 Thanksgiving weekend or something like that, which is good or 0:03:04.636 --> 0:03:06.436 bad depending on how you're feeling about your family at 0:03:06.436 --> 0:03:09.076 the end of Thanksgiving weekend exactly, you know, sort of 0:03:09.156 --> 0:03:11.956 again the weekend from hell. And I think that's what 0:03:11.996 --> 0:03:13.596 it's going to become for some people, because this long 0:03:13.596 --> 0:03:16.636 weekend's gone into two weeks and now it's a month, 0:03:17.916 --> 0:03:19.636 and people are start of wondering, well, when's this going 0:03:19.676 --> 0:03:21.436 to end? In one sense is in the government that 0:03:21.476 --> 0:03:23.796 there are people asking that question. Also, even if for 0:03:23.796 --> 0:03:26.436 another reason than GDP reasons like when can the economy 0:03:26.516 --> 0:03:29.276 get going again? So I think there's a little bit 0:03:29.316 --> 0:03:33.556 of frustration and percolating up. The frustration makes perfect sense 0:03:33.556 --> 0:03:36.516 to me. This is sort of fascinating that almost precisely 0:03:36.556 --> 0:03:40.036 at the moment that you're describing people in Beijing thinking 0:03:40.196 --> 0:03:43.036 can this be over? Already? In much of the rest 0:03:43.036 --> 0:03:45.956 of the world, people are waking up to think, oh 0:03:45.996 --> 0:03:49.036 my goodness, this might just be getting started. Do you 0:03:49.036 --> 0:03:51.076 think that in Beijing there just haven't been a large 0:03:51.156 --> 0:03:53.596 number of reported cases, so people don't have a sense 0:03:53.636 --> 0:03:56.236 of the immediacy of the danger. Yeah, I think it's 0:03:56.236 --> 0:03:58.316 partly about but I think the government also set this 0:03:58.476 --> 0:04:01.116 up wrong. The government set this up as a quick 0:04:01.476 --> 0:04:05.676 crisis that it could manage and come out successful, where 0:04:05.676 --> 0:04:08.596 they were going to put the country into lockdown, implement 0:04:08.596 --> 0:04:12.236 these your onian measures for two weeks or four weeks, 0:04:12.436 --> 0:04:15.036 and in some ways, statistically we are You see the 0:04:15.156 --> 0:04:19.476 rate of increase in China has gone way down. But 0:04:19.556 --> 0:04:23.156 also as the country gets back to work, people are 0:04:23.196 --> 0:04:25.636 going to come into contact with each other. You can't 0:04:25.716 --> 0:04:30.076 have even Hubei Province can't stay indefinitely locked down. This 0:04:30.116 --> 0:04:33.116 would be almost like the entire Midwest. This would be 0:04:33.116 --> 0:04:37.756 like Chicago plus Illinois plus maybe Michigan to So to 0:04:37.796 --> 0:04:40.356 get a sense of the overall economic impact of Hubei 0:04:40.436 --> 0:04:43.476 Province right at the crossroads of the country being locked down. 0:04:43.836 --> 0:04:46.716 That can't go on forever, and so it's going to spread. 0:04:47.036 --> 0:04:50.116 They're going to be other centers of the epidemic, and 0:04:50.236 --> 0:04:53.316 the government hasn't set people up for this. The messaging 0:04:53.356 --> 0:04:54.916 is sort of off. It's that it's going to be 0:04:54.956 --> 0:04:58.036 over by now, and these draconian measures are going to stop, 0:04:58.636 --> 0:05:00.356 but I don't know what they're going to do when 0:05:00.396 --> 0:05:02.996 this continues on. I think everybody now has come to 0:05:03.036 --> 0:05:05.796 the realization in the sort of expert community that this 0:05:05.916 --> 0:05:09.356 is going to continue on for months to come. The 0:05:09.436 --> 0:05:14.476 Chinese government is pretty sophisticated in managing the way that 0:05:14.996 --> 0:05:18.116 its own citizens make sense of what's going on in 0:05:18.156 --> 0:05:20.556 the world, and I'm wondering if there isn't a pivot 0:05:20.596 --> 0:05:24.316 point available to them as it becomes more of a 0:05:24.316 --> 0:05:27.796 global phenomenon. Is there a way for the Chinese government 0:05:27.796 --> 0:05:30.836 to say to their own citizens, Look, this is bigger 0:05:30.836 --> 0:05:33.636 than just us, and we're just doing what everyone else 0:05:33.636 --> 0:05:34.876 in the world is going to have to do, and 0:05:34.916 --> 0:05:37.556 this is an unfortunate normal, But don't look at us 0:05:37.556 --> 0:05:40.156 and say, why didn't you solve this? After all, no 0:05:40.316 --> 0:05:43.436 government in the world has a simple or straightforward solution 0:05:43.516 --> 0:05:45.996 to this problem. It's nature. And in a way, might 0:05:46.036 --> 0:05:48.556 that in a sense almost let them off the hook. Yeah, 0:05:48.596 --> 0:05:51.596 I think that would work better if the government weren't 0:05:51.756 --> 0:05:55.476 partly culpable for the outbreak, and they also just haven't 0:05:55.476 --> 0:05:58.876 been able to downplay that that is still kind of 0:05:59.396 --> 0:06:04.636 popularly understood on some level that there were these whistleblowers, 0:06:04.796 --> 0:06:08.276 they did try to say something, and at least local 0:06:08.316 --> 0:06:11.876 officials were responsible for the outbreak. Now I think the 0:06:11.876 --> 0:06:13.516 government's going to try to just push all onto the 0:06:13.516 --> 0:06:16.436 local officials. But I think there is on some level 0:06:16.436 --> 0:06:19.596 and Moong more sophisticated people or not maybe more sophisticated 0:06:19.596 --> 0:06:22.356 the wrong world, but maybe in a narrower group of people, 0:06:22.716 --> 0:06:25.236 there's an understanding that the government was also responsible. So 0:06:25.276 --> 0:06:27.636 that makes it harder to make that case. I think, 0:06:28.436 --> 0:06:30.636 is it clear that had the early whistle blower has 0:06:30.676 --> 0:06:34.916 been taken more seriously, that could have actually contained the virus, 0:06:34.916 --> 0:06:38.916 because the sense that I have from speaking to epidemiologists 0:06:39.036 --> 0:06:41.716 is that as we learn more about how the virus 0:06:41.756 --> 0:06:43.756 spreads and whether you can spread the virus when you 0:06:43.796 --> 0:06:46.876 don't have any symptoms at all, it's at least possible 0:06:47.236 --> 0:06:50.476 that nothing that the government could have done would really 0:06:50.516 --> 0:06:52.996 have been able to contain this well. I think that's right. 0:06:53.596 --> 0:06:56.716 I think the government sort of hasn't made that argument yet, 0:06:56.756 --> 0:06:59.636 but it's probably true. And I mean, even this heroic 0:06:59.676 --> 0:07:03.596 guy who died the face of the whistleblower Leeu and Leang, 0:07:03.756 --> 0:07:07.436 the doctor whose image is now ubiquitous even in Chinese 0:07:07.476 --> 0:07:12.316 social media. He wasn't a real whistleblower. He was telling 0:07:12.756 --> 0:07:16.596 a social media group of friends of classmates about this. 0:07:17.116 --> 0:07:19.596 It wasn't as if he had filed a formal complaint 0:07:19.596 --> 0:07:23.396 to the government or gone on widespread social media about this. 0:07:23.476 --> 0:07:26.556 So it just shows, of course how ubiquitous the government 0:07:26.596 --> 0:07:28.716 censorship is that they can even see what you're saying 0:07:28.716 --> 0:07:34.356 to your classmates. But he hadn't actually started a process 0:07:34.396 --> 0:07:37.236 that could have resulted in anything, even if the government 0:07:37.236 --> 0:07:39.916 had been open to it. So yeah, I think that's 0:07:39.956 --> 0:07:42.196 that's probably true. It's not clear at all that that 0:07:42.276 --> 0:07:44.796 would have changed things, but at least there's a sense 0:07:44.836 --> 0:07:47.116 in terms of trying to make win the pr battle 0:07:47.516 --> 0:07:50.596 that the government's partly responsible for it. What is your 0:07:50.716 --> 0:07:55.316 daily life like in light of the current situation. Well, 0:07:55.396 --> 0:07:59.316 my daily life, like other people's, is sharply constrained. So 0:08:00.316 --> 0:08:03.716 it's very hard to go and meet people because for 0:08:03.796 --> 0:08:06.996 the people who are buying the government line, they're still like, oh, 0:08:07.076 --> 0:08:09.676 we better not meet because the government's told we shouldn't 0:08:09.676 --> 0:08:12.716 read people. And then even for the people who aren't 0:08:12.756 --> 0:08:16.356 binding the government line, is getting harder and harder to 0:08:16.396 --> 0:08:19.196 get into people's housing compounds, because if you just go 0:08:19.276 --> 0:08:22.436 to somebody's apartment block and to try to get in, 0:08:22.556 --> 0:08:25.116 you can't even necessarily get into the building. And then 0:08:25.156 --> 0:08:28.516 with most restaurants and cafes closed, the most you can 0:08:28.516 --> 0:08:30.716 do is go for a walk in the park or 0:08:30.716 --> 0:08:33.756 something like that with somebody. So it's hard to get 0:08:33.836 --> 0:08:37.156 as much information as before. It's sort of fascinating because 0:08:37.156 --> 0:08:41.796 it draws out the ways in which a quarantine works 0:08:41.876 --> 0:08:47.956 alongside technological control to really shift the way information spreads. 0:08:48.396 --> 0:08:50.476 That sounds as if for someone like you who talks 0:08:50.516 --> 0:08:52.836 to people about things that they may not want the 0:08:52.836 --> 0:08:55.596 government to hear, there's actually a real limitation on your 0:08:55.596 --> 0:08:58.916 ability to gather information. Yes, it is hard to talk 0:08:58.956 --> 0:09:01.556 to people. I mean I think when you read things 0:09:01.596 --> 0:09:03.636 on social media, you really have to parse things. And 0:09:03.676 --> 0:09:06.356 I find a look at an article on social media, 0:09:06.356 --> 0:09:07.756 and one of the things I try to do because 0:09:07.756 --> 0:09:12.596 things get erased so quickly, is I'll quickly send myself 0:09:12.716 --> 0:09:14.916 on wa chat. There'd be things through these articles that 0:09:14.996 --> 0:09:18.156 people write, they sort of self published someone wa chat, 0:09:18.276 --> 0:09:19.876 and so I'll see something like this, some sort of 0:09:19.956 --> 0:09:22.236 edgypiece about how the governments in trouble and so on 0:09:22.316 --> 0:09:26.516 and so forth, and I'll quickly save the URL and 0:09:26.676 --> 0:09:29.036 printed to PDF for something like that, so that if 0:09:29.036 --> 0:09:30.996 it's gone, I still have a record of it. But 0:09:31.036 --> 0:09:32.836 I sometimes have to do that really quickly, because if 0:09:32.876 --> 0:09:34.036 I sort of say, oh, I'll do that in a 0:09:34.036 --> 0:09:36.116 couple of hours, I go back and reopen the URL 0:09:36.236 --> 0:09:39.636 and it's been closed. So the government's pretty quick on that, 0:09:39.636 --> 0:09:43.876 although sometimes what I'm surprised is that not everything is erased. 0:09:44.516 --> 0:09:47.396 And I just had an article that somebody sent me 0:09:47.916 --> 0:09:50.916 the other day on how nothing will nothing can be 0:09:50.956 --> 0:09:54.596 the same after the coronavirus, and partly they were talking 0:09:54.676 --> 0:09:57.716 about how the government had to allow a free or 0:09:57.716 --> 0:10:01.636 flow of information. They avoided key words that would cause 0:10:01.916 --> 0:10:05.036 the bots to censor the article, like freedom of speech 0:10:05.676 --> 0:10:08.476 and stuff like that, but I was surprised that that 0:10:08.556 --> 0:10:11.636 hasn't been eras yet. Do you have a theory about why. 0:10:12.876 --> 0:10:17.036 I think partly the censorship works on two levels. One 0:10:17.116 --> 0:10:18.516 is they have bots to just go through and so 0:10:18.556 --> 0:10:20.996 if you say something like you know, the Nobel Prize 0:10:21.356 --> 0:10:24.956 winning dissident to Leosha boy, you put those three characters 0:10:24.956 --> 0:10:27.316 out there boom, your piece is probably going to be 0:10:27.356 --> 0:10:31.476 automatically erased. But I think also things that are a 0:10:31.516 --> 0:10:36.276 little harder to tell from just if if you're just 0:10:36.396 --> 0:10:38.996 using AI, maybe you need a human eye on it. 0:10:39.396 --> 0:10:41.636 I think the flood of articles right now is such 0:10:41.716 --> 0:10:44.596 that probably the censors are just a little bit behind 0:10:44.636 --> 0:10:47.236 on their work. You know, that's probably the only explaination. 0:10:47.316 --> 0:10:49.116 I don't think it means that there's a split in 0:10:49.156 --> 0:10:51.876 the government and that therefore the information is getting out 0:10:51.876 --> 0:10:55.396 because someone in the propaganda ministry, etcetera, etcetera. I don't think. 0:10:55.396 --> 0:10:57.956 I don't think that's happening. In light of what you 0:10:58.036 --> 0:11:02.276 have described as genuine mismanagement of the crisis from the 0:11:02.276 --> 0:11:04.756 standpoint of the government, and in light of the fact 0:11:04.756 --> 0:11:07.756 that this is, you know, almost certainly the most significant 0:11:07.836 --> 0:11:11.556 threat to the country that Chi Jinping has faced during 0:11:11.596 --> 0:11:14.356 his entire time in office. What do you think are 0:11:14.436 --> 0:11:19.716 likely to be the longer term consequences for his relatively 0:11:20.436 --> 0:11:27.036 still young transformation of the political codes of the country. Well, 0:11:27.196 --> 0:11:29.716 I hate to say it depends, but it sort of 0:11:30.236 --> 0:11:32.676 depends on how quickly we can pull out of this. 0:11:33.036 --> 0:11:36.236 It's like the government has sort of put the patient 0:11:36.356 --> 0:11:39.116 in a coma to try to solve the illness, and 0:11:39.156 --> 0:11:40.396 now I was going to try to pull it out 0:11:40.396 --> 0:11:43.036 of the coma. And if that works and the illness 0:11:42.836 --> 0:11:47.396 is cured literally and metaphorically, then I think the government 0:11:47.396 --> 0:11:50.196 can still say it was a big success. You know, 0:11:50.276 --> 0:11:53.196 we took firm, resolute measures, and it was difficult. And 0:11:53.316 --> 0:11:55.516 GDP's taken a hit and probably will be you know, 0:11:55.596 --> 0:11:57.676 zero in the first quarter or something like that, but 0:11:58.356 --> 0:12:01.196 this was a difficult situation. It was a national crisis, 0:12:01.196 --> 0:12:02.436 and we did the right thing and so on and 0:12:02.516 --> 0:12:05.836 so forth. But if this goes on, and if we 0:12:05.956 --> 0:12:08.996 do indeed have another wave of cases, which a lot 0:12:08.996 --> 0:12:11.636 of people are expecting as the country gets back to work, 0:12:11.956 --> 0:12:14.436 and if there's maybe another wave again in the autumn, 0:12:14.476 --> 0:12:17.996 which is sometimes a possibility in these patterns, and the 0:12:18.076 --> 0:12:20.916 numbers keep going up and up and up, I think 0:12:20.956 --> 0:12:24.116 it will be hard for this to not be seen 0:12:24.436 --> 0:12:28.636 as another really major crisis. The memory of the SARS 0:12:28.716 --> 0:12:30.956 crisis of two thousand and two and two thousand and 0:12:30.996 --> 0:12:34.996 three is still surprisingly fresh for people who were saying 0:12:35.676 --> 0:12:39.916 over thirty or thirty five years of age, people still 0:12:39.916 --> 0:12:42.636 refer to it all the time, and that it wasn't 0:12:42.636 --> 0:12:45.956 really handled maybe all that well. So I wonder whether 0:12:45.996 --> 0:12:47.436 this isn't going to be another one. In fact, I 0:12:47.476 --> 0:12:49.076 think it's going to be hard for it not to 0:12:49.116 --> 0:12:52.396 be a case like that, unless this turns into some 0:12:52.556 --> 0:12:56.876 full blown real disaster or with tens of thousands of 0:12:56.956 --> 0:12:59.716 people dead or something. I don't think this is going 0:12:59.796 --> 0:13:02.916 to be a Chernobyl type event, which is the other 0:13:02.996 --> 0:13:07.316 scenario that people look at. It's amazing how the government 0:13:07.356 --> 0:13:10.556 can control these narratives. Thirty one years ago there was 0:13:10.596 --> 0:13:14.596 a Channeman Square crackdown when hundreds and hundreds of people 0:13:14.596 --> 0:13:16.556 were gunned down to death in the center of Beijing. 0:13:16.916 --> 0:13:20.156 The government came out of that wounded and damaged, but 0:13:20.276 --> 0:13:22.636 still okay, and was able to keep control. I think 0:13:23.276 --> 0:13:26.396 one always has to be careful in China about saying 0:13:26.476 --> 0:13:29.196 this is a turning point that will shake people's faith 0:13:29.196 --> 0:13:33.956 in the system. People's stability to believe in the system again, 0:13:34.076 --> 0:13:38.916 just like in any country, is amazingly resilient. So I'm 0:13:38.916 --> 0:13:41.156 hesitant to say that this will be a turning point 0:13:41.236 --> 0:13:44.636 or shake thing. So what you say it makes enormous sense, 0:13:44.796 --> 0:13:48.036 especially with respect to the overall system of Communist Party rule. 0:13:48.116 --> 0:13:50.236 I guess what I'm wondering about is whether, at just 0:13:50.316 --> 0:13:52.796 a more micro level it might have an effect on 0:13:53.276 --> 0:13:57.396 Shijun Ping's own bid to say, remain in power you 0:13:57.596 --> 0:14:00.516 much longer than his predecessors have done. Do you see 0:14:00.516 --> 0:14:04.476 it having a micro effect on those internal party developments 0:14:04.476 --> 0:14:08.356 and debates. I think it can. I think the problem 0:14:08.876 --> 0:14:12.956 with is that he hasn't also really handled this very well. 0:14:12.996 --> 0:14:16.556 I don't think this is I'm not trying to project 0:14:16.556 --> 0:14:19.276 what I think a Western politician would have or should 0:14:19.276 --> 0:14:20.996 have done in this case, in other words, that they 0:14:21.036 --> 0:14:24.516 should be out glad handing people or visiting all the 0:14:24.556 --> 0:14:29.636 emergency wars and so on. But the only visibility that 0:14:29.676 --> 0:14:33.436 he's shown at all was to go to one neighborhood 0:14:33.596 --> 0:14:36.116 in Beijing, which is not badly affected at all. The 0:14:36.156 --> 0:14:39.516 city and the neighborhood is not particularly affected, so that 0:14:39.836 --> 0:14:45.716 is not much visibility. He's made speeches and said sort 0:14:45.716 --> 0:14:47.396 of the right thing. He recently said that this was 0:14:47.436 --> 0:14:52.236 a grave and serious crisis to the country. But he's 0:14:52.316 --> 0:14:54.636 normally at the forefront of these kind of big things, 0:14:54.636 --> 0:14:58.596 and it looks, I think even for casual viewers, it 0:14:58.636 --> 0:15:03.036 looks as if he's not willing to take responsibility because 0:15:03.036 --> 0:15:05.756 it is such a problem, and he's let the premier, 0:15:06.196 --> 0:15:08.996 who is supposed to be in charge of the leavers 0:15:09.116 --> 0:15:12.396 of the actual bureaucracy and government, he's let him take 0:15:12.396 --> 0:15:14.916 a greater role. Although even he hasn't been really out 0:15:14.916 --> 0:15:17.796 there every day. So I guess there are different models 0:15:17.796 --> 0:15:20.836 of authoritarian rule. There's a sort of Putin model, which 0:15:20.956 --> 0:15:24.476 is he's you be out there probably on talk shows 0:15:24.516 --> 0:15:28.596 and fielding questions and stuff like that. Teaching thing would 0:15:28.596 --> 0:15:31.076 never be like that anyway, but he's been, I think, 0:15:31.156 --> 0:15:35.716 quite noticeably absent from the day to day managing of 0:15:35.756 --> 0:15:39.716 a crisis. One story that's gotten a fair amount of 0:15:39.756 --> 0:15:44.316 coverage outside of China is the Chinese government's decision to 0:15:44.596 --> 0:15:49.516 expel three journalists associated with the Wall Street Journal in 0:15:49.636 --> 0:15:55.556 retaliation for the headline of an op ed editorial piece. 0:15:55.956 --> 0:16:00.276 The headline referred to China as the sick man of Asia, 0:16:00.516 --> 0:16:03.996 a reference to a nineteenth century formulation that was actually 0:16:04.196 --> 0:16:07.076 mostly used about Turkey in the nineteenth century, although I 0:16:07.156 --> 0:16:10.196 learned in this context it was also sometimes said about China. 0:16:10.356 --> 0:16:12.916 My first question is, are you surprised by the government's 0:16:12.916 --> 0:16:15.716 decision to do that? Well, I am surprised. You know, 0:16:15.756 --> 0:16:17.876 I could see where they would expel perhaps one person, 0:16:17.916 --> 0:16:20.876 but three seems a lot. It must also be tied 0:16:20.916 --> 0:16:25.476 to the State Department's decision to declare Chinese media companies 0:16:25.476 --> 0:16:28.596 to be the agents of foreign influence or something like that, 0:16:28.596 --> 0:16:31.996 that they're essentially working for the state, which is accurate, 0:16:32.276 --> 0:16:34.876 but that that was sort of maybe in Chinese do 0:16:34.996 --> 0:16:37.836 a provocation or throwing the gauntlet down, and so they 0:16:37.876 --> 0:16:39.516 had to say something. So I think the number of 0:16:39.516 --> 0:16:42.436 people probably went up from one to three. The government 0:16:42.476 --> 0:16:45.356 had been asking for several days for some sort of 0:16:45.396 --> 0:16:49.356 an apology, the people in the journal even before the expulsion, 0:16:49.916 --> 0:16:53.036 the people on the news side of it, the reporters 0:16:53.036 --> 0:16:55.076 in the bureau, many people were sort of appalled at it. 0:16:55.716 --> 0:16:59.236 So I think that it was something that the government 0:16:59.276 --> 0:17:01.236 probably felt it had to do something not to be 0:17:01.276 --> 0:17:03.156 sort of a conspiracy theorist, because this is sort of 0:17:03.196 --> 0:17:05.756 hard to prove this, but I think this also plays 0:17:05.956 --> 0:17:08.676 wonderfully into the government's narrative. I mean, this was something 0:17:08.716 --> 0:17:12.076 that they could blast out on social media. I don't 0:17:12.076 --> 0:17:14.836 think this term sick man of Asia. It was to 0:17:14.916 --> 0:17:17.916 me sort of a face plant, a grown sort of like, Oh, 0:17:17.996 --> 0:17:22.356 I can't believe they did that headline. I mean, I 0:17:22.756 --> 0:17:25.236 worked the Walsta Journal for many years. I know the 0:17:25.876 --> 0:17:28.996 opinion page very well, and they like to provoke. They 0:17:29.076 --> 0:17:32.596 like to make people to get up and notice something, 0:17:32.676 --> 0:17:34.876 and so it's not atypical for them. But when I 0:17:34.916 --> 0:17:37.116 saw that, I was okay. So I was a little shocked, 0:17:37.116 --> 0:17:40.556 but I was even more shocked by the government's reaction. 0:17:40.596 --> 0:17:42.636 And I think it's a nice way for them to 0:17:43.756 --> 0:17:46.476 shift attention away from the crisis and be able to 0:17:46.756 --> 0:17:50.196 blame a foreign country for kicking China while it's down 0:17:50.316 --> 0:17:53.916 and stuff like that. I think it's this outrage has 0:17:53.956 --> 0:17:58.596 been really fomented by the government and probably they're quite 0:17:58.636 --> 0:18:00.316 happy for this sort of thing. And this might also 0:18:00.356 --> 0:18:04.396 be a precursor of a strategy in the future if 0:18:04.396 --> 0:18:06.476 the crisis spins out of control and we feel a 0:18:06.516 --> 0:18:10.636 need to somehow sort of divert attention and blame foreigners, etc. 0:18:11.876 --> 0:18:15.076 Going back to your face palm reaction. Was your reaction 0:18:15.116 --> 0:18:17.236 because you thought to yourself, Oh, my goodness, this is 0:18:17.236 --> 0:18:21.516 going to make the Chinese government crazy? Or was your reaction? Boy, 0:18:21.636 --> 0:18:24.996 that's actually kind of offensive, because, as I discovered after 0:18:25.036 --> 0:18:27.956 a little poll of my friends and family. Most people 0:18:27.996 --> 0:18:30.836 are not going to get their reference to, you know, 0:18:30.996 --> 0:18:34.876 nineteenth century European treatment of the Ottoman Empire, and so 0:18:34.996 --> 0:18:37.156 most people are just going to see it as a 0:18:37.276 --> 0:18:40.676 kind of you know, almost quasi racist statement that China 0:18:40.796 --> 0:18:44.556 is sick in some way because of the coronavirus. Well, 0:18:44.636 --> 0:18:47.396 I mean, first of all, my face plant failing was like, 0:18:47.436 --> 0:18:50.236 this is a stupid cliche. I can't believe they're using that. 0:18:51.476 --> 0:18:55.316 But you know, I think when countries are down. Historically, 0:18:55.316 --> 0:19:00.076 when they've been down, they often look to analogies to 0:19:00.156 --> 0:19:02.436 the human body. You know, if you go back to 0:19:02.436 --> 0:19:04.796 say Germany in the mid nineteenth century, there was this 0:19:05.596 --> 0:19:10.356 movement among nationalists who wanted to unite Germany to literally 0:19:10.556 --> 0:19:15.276 improve the physical strength of people to get out there 0:19:15.316 --> 0:19:19.716 and climb mountains and do outdoors activities and things like that, 0:19:20.156 --> 0:19:23.316 to strengthen the physical body of the people, and that 0:19:23.316 --> 0:19:28.676 would strengthen the body politic and the national character and 0:19:28.756 --> 0:19:30.756 so on and so forth. And so I think it 0:19:30.836 --> 0:19:33.396 is sort of on a deeper level, it is sort 0:19:33.396 --> 0:19:35.996 of insulting to people to imply that their country is 0:19:36.036 --> 0:19:39.956 sick and that it has some sort of fundamental illness. 0:19:40.716 --> 0:19:43.276 I know, the article itself didn't make that the case 0:19:43.316 --> 0:19:44.876 exactly like that. It was saying there was something wrong 0:19:44.916 --> 0:19:48.196 with the political system. But you can see where people 0:19:48.276 --> 0:19:51.116 might take it if they're not really reading the article anyway, 0:19:51.116 --> 0:19:53.356 and they're just reading this stuff on social media third 0:19:53.356 --> 0:19:55.276 hand and fourth hand and so on and so forth, 0:19:56.316 --> 0:19:58.516 that they would say, hey, you know, China is not sick. 0:19:59.076 --> 0:20:01.396 And the whole story the columnist party is pushed over 0:20:01.436 --> 0:20:03.636 the past seven years is that the Chinese people have 0:20:03.796 --> 0:20:07.116 stood up. That's what Mao said in nineteen forty nine 0:20:07.596 --> 0:20:10.596 at think Dat of Heavenly Peace in downtown Beijing. This 0:20:10.636 --> 0:20:13.436 is his famous of saying at the founding the People's Republic, 0:20:13.476 --> 0:20:15.796 we've stood up. We're on our own two feet. And 0:20:15.796 --> 0:20:17.996 then a few years later they fight the US to 0:20:18.076 --> 0:20:21.036 a down still in the Korean War. So now to 0:20:21.076 --> 0:20:24.516 sort of imply that China is weak and sick, it 0:20:24.756 --> 0:20:28.836 is a bit of a provocation to many people. So 0:20:28.876 --> 0:20:33.436 before the coronavirus story came to dominate your coverage and 0:20:33.796 --> 0:20:38.076 the West's consumption of news about China, you were doing 0:20:38.196 --> 0:20:42.716 amazing work in explaining the complexities of the Hong Kong 0:20:43.196 --> 0:20:46.676 protests to the rest of us, and I was following 0:20:46.716 --> 0:20:49.676 your coverage of that extremely closely, and in fact, when 0:20:50.436 --> 0:20:52.996 my producer Lydia Jina first reached out to you, we thought, well, 0:20:53.036 --> 0:20:56.476 we'll talk to Ian about Hong Kong. Presumably Hong Kong 0:20:56.556 --> 0:20:58.516 is going to have to undergo the same kind of 0:20:58.556 --> 0:21:01.596 nobody in the streets, nobody talking to each other, shelter 0:21:01.676 --> 0:21:06.236 in place arrangement as other major cities in China have 0:21:06.276 --> 0:21:09.596 been undergoing. What is that going to do to the 0:21:09.676 --> 0:21:13.916 protest movement that otherwise was sort of continuing. Well, I 0:21:13.916 --> 0:21:16.276 think in the short term, this, of course will make 0:21:16.316 --> 0:21:18.396 it hard to have protests if you're not allowed to 0:21:18.396 --> 0:21:20.956 be out on the streets. But I think it feeds 0:21:21.076 --> 0:21:23.356 much more strongly, much more importantly. I think it feeds 0:21:23.356 --> 0:21:26.276 into this overall feeling that we don't want to be 0:21:26.396 --> 0:21:31.356 part of this governing system which is sort of not 0:21:31.476 --> 0:21:33.276 on our level. I mean, I think there's this feeling 0:21:33.276 --> 0:21:36.076 among Hong Kong people at some basic level that we're 0:21:36.196 --> 0:21:40.796 much more advanced. We've got a modern, functioning, cosmopolitan city 0:21:40.836 --> 0:21:43.396 that we built. Yes, it was a British colony, but 0:21:43.436 --> 0:21:46.396 we Hong Kong people, we built the city. These are 0:21:46.556 --> 0:21:51.236 our freedoms and so on, and we don't want to 0:21:51.236 --> 0:21:53.156 lose this, and we don't want to be part of 0:21:53.196 --> 0:21:55.516 this sort of messed up system north of the border 0:21:55.996 --> 0:22:00.396 that isn't able to handle a public health emergency without 0:22:00.436 --> 0:22:04.516 having a giant conniption fit that you know, has all 0:22:04.516 --> 0:22:06.116 these other problems. So I think they're going to look 0:22:06.156 --> 0:22:09.556 at this as further proof of the incompatibility of Hong 0:22:09.596 --> 0:22:13.716 Kong with the mainland, and when people in the mainland 0:22:13.716 --> 0:22:16.116 get frustrated about those people south of the board are 0:22:16.156 --> 0:22:21.436 protesting all the time, those uppity, no good Hong Kong people, great, 0:22:22.076 --> 0:22:24.676