Chinese whispers: Rita Ricketts provides impressions of China following a recent visit.

• Author: Ricketts, Rita
• Position: Essay

The year of the fire monkey in China symbolises cleverness, energy and quick thinking but also mischievousness and opportunism. There is nothing new in this. Paradoxes have typified China's past. Modern times are just as confusing. The ingenious consumer-led style revolution, which coexists with traditional, Confucian, belief in moderation, seems to belie economic slowdown. Leaders assure the world that peace is essential to China's future development, but military posturing and adventures in the South China Sea would seem to contradict their recent goodwill missions. Students of international politics can only try to interpret the diverse whisperings of financial and political analysts. But what they hear may not be what they see.

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The Chinese are certainly clever--their young children earn laurels at overseas universities, and four of them will soon take up Rhodes scholarships at Oxford, the first for China. China's diplomatic activity has been energetic: intensive dialogue with the United States and Russia, red carpet welcomes in Africa and Europe and a state visit to the United Kingdom. The impact of the financial turmoil cannot be gainsaid, but the government's quick thinking and opportunism has arrested slowdown. Its shopping spree, it is predicted, will lead to $1 billion of overseas investment in the next five years, making China the second largest outward investor after the United States (it is currently fourth). At home, cars fast replace concrete as the government furthers high-tech innovation and higher wages fuel yet more consumption; the two-child policy will deliver another 30 million workers qua consumers.

But monkey-like China is also mischievous--Machiavellian even. Its display of military muscle at last year's Tiananmen Square parade and island-building in the South China Sea have rattled its Asian neighbours as much as the Americans; Australia, in response, is increasing its military budget. An offloading of surplus steel at knockdown prices (along with Russia) risks trade war. And there is plenty of other monkey business. In the name of stability the government cracks down on social media, Christian churches, minority groups, human rights lawyers, journalists, non-governmental organisations and intellectuals. The continued disappearance of three Hong Kong booksellers, known to be critical of the mainland government, might remind the government that Sun Yat-sen, kidnapped in London, lured to Chinese Embassy and detained, returned to China to be revered as a symbol of modernisation. Given the paradoxes that typify modern China, students of international politics can only try to interpret the diverse whisperings of financial and political analysts. But what they hear may not be what they see.

In the gardens of Beijing's Temple of Heaven, there may not be a thousand flowers in bloom but people of all ages are twirling, swaying, gyrating to traditional dance music, practicing tai chi or placidly kneading meditation balls. Others sit on the old wall outside the sacrifice stables click clacking mahjong counters, shuffling cards and counting their trumps. Shopping malls pulsate with life. Billboards illuminated in splendid calligraphy encourage the mood of optimism with their slogans of equality, fraternity (nationalism and patriotism), peace and solidarity (working together qua democracy?). Stylish passers-by have no doubt that they will come up trumps. They feel at home in their shoes, able once more to follow Chinese tradition that venerates state, family and ancestors. At Chinese New Year they flock to family reunions and to the temples, as they will later at Qing Ming. They appear to see no contradiction between the Confucian idea of moderation and their avid consumption. A child's university education, discounting the expense, is almost every parent's aspiration. Overseas, in New Zealand, Australian, British and American universities for example, as the folk song reminds, 'the Good Children of China' are gaining the know-how to move their country into the vanguard of the next technical and scientific revolution. They alone are enough to give China a great comparative advantage.

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While China goes out to the world, foreign investors, businessmen, consulate officials, political and economic journalists and academics flock to China. They come to build bridges, but have to unravel truth entwined with enigmas. Those familiar with the party game of Chinese whispers know that either you do not hear what was said, and inadvertently pass on a different message, or you hear correctly but choose to pass on your own interpretation. To see Chinese consumers is to doubt the stories of repression and economic downturn. Venture into poor rural areas, where the people are equally industrious, and conspicuous consumption is much less apparent. Their situation is making some commentators nervous. They fear, or perhaps hope, that history could repeat itself. The founder of the Ming Empire, Hongwu, came from peasant stock, as did Mao Zedong. Those familiar with more recent history may reflect on the May the Fourth uprising in 1919. Triggered by the ceding of...