Table Of ContentThe China Code
What’s Left for Us?
Frank Sieren
Translated by Thomas Rede
THE CHINA CODE
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F S
RANK IEREN
The
China
Code
What’s Left for Us?
Translated by Thomas Rede
© Frank Sieren 2007
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2007 978-0-230-00135-0
All rights reserved.No reproduction,copy or transmission of this
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may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
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work in accordance with the Copyright,Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published 2007 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN
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175 Fifth Avenue,New York,N.Y.10010
Companies and representatives throughout the world.
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN is the global academic imprint of the Palgrave
Macmillan division of St.Martin’s Press,LLC and of Palgrave Macmillan Ltd.
Macmillan® is a registered trademark in the United States,United Kingdom
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ISBN 978-1-349-27983-8 ISBN 978-0-230-62508-2 (eBook)
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Contents
Preface vi
Chronology ix
1 The Yellow Peril? 1
2 The Crisis of Self-Esteem 36
3 The Decline of Power 56
4 The Kingdom Without A Middle 79
5 The ‘Heave-ho’ Economy 95
6 Reform Roulette 124
7 Dictatorship for the Common Good 173
8 The Concubine Economy 205
9 Controlling the World 232
10 The Globalisation Trap 246
11 The China Code 278
Notes 297
Bibliography 318
Companies Index 323
People Index 325
Word Index 329
v
Preface
This book was written out of curiosity. It observes a phenomenon, which I
am convinced, will have an important impact on our lives. This belief has
developed steadily over the 13 years that I have been living in China.
I went to Beijing’s first jazz bar with my Chinese friends. We also went
to Ikea to buy the first Billy bookcase. I enjoyed parties in their first
privately-owned apartments and toasted their first cars. Many had their first
mobile phone before my friends in Europe. I also experienced the elastic
nature of the Chinese legal system when my friends tried to get their rights
upheld. Then there was also the corruption and the brutal competition
amongst people trying to move to the top. It was only once I had lived in
China that I realised the meaning of legal rights but also how important sta-
bility and growth are for a country. I had my run in with public officials who
were so stubborn but then also more flexible than one would experience it
in the west. I watched cities like Beijing and Shanghai grow. It fascinated
me yet sometimes I was terrified and wondered whether it would all work
out in the end. Deep in the west of the country I experienced breath-taking
landscapes but then also mega-cities that were so massive,loud and unruly
that everything which I had known before paled in comparison. I am also
mightily impressed with what the Chinese have achieved in the last decade.
An even greater challenge was to find out just how stable the new China is.
This book not only talks about a globalisation phenomenon,it is a global
product itself and would not have been possible without the help of so many
people across the world. At its completion people in seven countries were
involved in its production:Germany,China,USA,Laos,South Africa,India
and Britain.
vi
Preface vii
First of all I would like to thank Stefan Baron,Düsseldorf,Germany,the
chief editor of WirtschaftsWoche(The German Business Weekly),a brilliant
journalist,who polished my articles,taught me not to give in,and to follow
an idea clearly to its conclusion even if that means rowing against the tide.
Thank you also to his wife Yin Guangyuan, Cologne, Germany, who has
been an untiring mediator between the two cultures. I also have to thank
Professor Dr Eberhard Sandschneider, the Director of Research at the
Deutsche Gesellschaft für Auswärtige Politik (DGAP, German Council on
Foreign Relations), Berlin, Germany. In a very impressive way he is in the
process of modernising the DGAP so that it generates new ideas and theo-
ries instead of transforming other peopleís ideas into footnotes. Apart from
his immediate support, it was a great incentive to follow his example with
this book. I am also very grateful to the former German Ambassador to
China, Dr Hans-Christian Ueberschaer, Bonn, Germany, for his immense
assistance.
I am very thankful to my agent Barbara J. Zitwer,New York,USA,who
took care of the book as if it had been written by herself. And Bob Breen,
Düsseldorf, Germany, who translated the initial proposal. My deep thanks
goes especially to Thomas Redl,Vientienne,Laos,for translating the book
into English under enormous time pressure and keeping its spirit. Thanks to
Yang Liu,Berlin/Beijing,for designing the cover.
Thanks as well to Catherine Moat and my brother Andreas Sieren,
Johannesburg,South Africa,for polishing the work at short notice. Thanks
to Vidhya from Chennai, India, for efficent project management and to
Assistant Editor Alexandra Dawe in England for getting everything
smoothly organized and checking the final proofs.
And I am grateful to Stephen Rutt, Global Publishing Director with
Palgrave Macmillan, who had the confidence of placing this book in a
prominent position on their publishing agenda.
When I first started this project I received incredible support from
Kerstin “Anna”Wesendorf,the head librarian of Beijing’s Goethe Institute.
She managed to provide me with decisive books and articles at exactly the
right moment, with the greatest efficiency. I would also like to thank her
husband Dirk Brauns,an outstanding writer and journalist. His almost com-
pleted novel and this book are now so closely related that they have become
inseparable.
My gratitude also goes out to Anna Vandenhertz and Professor Wolfgang
Engler whose influence on me can never be underestimated, although they
have nothing to do with China. This can also be said of Sabine Schneller and
Dr Bernward Dörner whose suggestions helped to put me on the right
course.
Preface
viii
Kathrin Albrecht, Sonja Banze, Dr Leo Flamm, Dr Claus Knoth, Julia
Kühn, Uwe Kräuter, Li Aihua, Petra and Otto Mann, Professor Dr Erling
von Mende,Konstantin Menzel,Zhang Wei,Günter Schabowski,Dr Martin
Posth, Erk Schaffarczyk, Justus Krüger and the Trier Gang of Sinologists
provided additional support. (I am especially grateful to Dr Katharina Ahr
who brought China closer to me and Sabine Lippelt who enticed me to
China.)
Thanks also to Jürgen Kracht,founder of the Hong Kong-based consult-
ing firm Fiducia, who generously shared his 30 years of experience of the
Chinese market with me. Christian Sommer and Leif Goeritz, who are in
charge of the German Centres in Shanghai and Beijing,were very helpful in
spreading the word about the book. I would also like to thank a number of
Chinese friends and acquaintances from Beijing’s Ministry of Economics
and various university departments who also assisted me,but who prefer not
to be mentioned because they feel that their influence is more important
than being named here.
This book is particularly dedicated to Peter Seidlitz,Geneva,Switzerland,
who was at the beginning of the nineties the first German economic corre-
spondent in China,and who enlightened this work with his clear and vision-
ary analysis. He is a true pioneer, and there will be many generations of
economic correspondents in China who will follow in his footsteps. Many of
my colleagues,including me,are tremendously indebted to him.
I am also especially grateful to Bernhard Bartsch whose rigorous argu-
ments refined the concepts and ideas in the book and through his practical
support ensured that it was completed on schedule.
Lastly I would like to thank my parents who unrelentingly encouraged
me to try a little bit harder,and now with the same wonderful patience urge
me to work a little bit less. Finally and most importantly,thank you to Anke
for enduring your human typewriter and for all you have done and continue
to do for me.
FRANKSIEREN
Beijing,September 2006
Chronology
1368–1644 Ming-Dynasty
1405–33 First Chinese journey to the West
1433 Capital punishment on international maritime trade and
military naval expeditions
1521 Ferdinand Magellan reaches the China Sea
1644–1911 Qing-Dynasty
1658 German Jesuit Adam Schall is appointed Mandarin of the
First Class,the highest distinction ever awarded to a foreigner
since mid- European traders on China’s east coat
17th century
1742 Prohibition of the Christian religion is reintroduced in
China
since 1760 Operations of European merchants are restricted to the port
of Canton and to certain months of the year
1834 The East India Company’s monopoly on the opium trade
collapses
1838 The Chinese court sends Lin Zexu as a special
commissioner to Canton
1839–42 First Opium War
1842 ‘Unequal Treaties’between England and China
1851–64 Taiping Rebellion
1853 Taiping forces take the former empirial capital Nanking
1856–60 Second Opium War
1856 British and French troups occupy Peking
ix
