Sino-US Colloquium IV
Core Values and World Order
Opening Address
“Knock, Knock, Knock”
Dr. Patrick C P Ho
Deputy Chairman and Secretary General
China Energy Fund Committee
Ladies and Gentlemen
Good morning!
I am Dr. Patrick HO, the Deputy Chairman and Secretary General of China Energy Fund Committee, or CEFC, and I welcome all of you to this Fourth Sino-US Colloquium. In my previous capacity as the Secretary for Home Affairs of the Hong Kong Government, I have come to learn that mutual trust and respectarethe prerequisites to any conflict resolution. Mutual trust and respect come from a better understanding of each other’s history, culture and social norms, which is why CEFC, apart from addressing energy issues, takes an intense interest in promoting Chinese culture, and values.
As far as I know, today, we made history! This could be the first time that a non-governmental organization from China has ever undertaken on its own initiative, an in-depth cultural dialogue in Washington, the capital of the United States; and also the first time that a Chinese think-tank has ever conducted an open dialogue in the Carnegie Library, a prominent historic-cultural landmark in the heart of Washington; and perhaps also the very first time that such a formidable team of academic intellectuals from China has ever engaged their counterparts in a meaningful dialogue on the issue of core values on American ground.
We believe that continuous open dialogue is the mainstay of modern public diplomacy. With deeper understanding of each other’s core values, cultural traditions as well as historical backgrounds, undue apprehension and anxiety could be allayed. Political mutual trust could only be made possible when misinterpretation, miscalculation and misjudgment stemming from suspicion, erroneous assumption, and misreading of intention were eliminated.
The issue of core values is always at the heart of any in-depth cultural dialogue. Core values dictate the meaning of life and the purpose of living. Core values govern our thinking process and are translated as our action and behavior. They define what is good, what is bad, what happiness means, what is beauty, what counts as success, who are heroes. Core values define the choices we make. Why do we prefer hamburgers to Chinese dumplings(xiaolongbao)? Why do we watch Mickey Mouse cartoons instead of Monkey King(Sunwukong)? Each of our communities is driven by a collective system of values and a set of moral codes that govern thoughts, establish identity, drive economies, set agendas, dictate choices, and inspire expectations. Most importantly, it underpins how our respective communities of citizens prefer one form of political or economic system over another form, one type of social structure over another type, or choose certain categories of people as our leaders, or believing in news reports expounding a particular direction of story‑line. These are the values that motivate our communities in the consideration of what make themharmonious and what can result in a sense of well‑being and national pride. Simply put, discussions on politics are a debate of values, cultural values. These values are time-tested and evolve through incessant modifications and re-qualifications. They underpin our historical legacy and cultural background, and define who we are.
Exchanges between Chinese and Western Cultures and Chinese Core Values
In the last 5,000 years, the Chinese has recorded at least four periods of prosperity. The first in the Zhou Dynasty (BC 1042-996) in which the Chinese feudal system of administration was introduced. The second in the Han Dynasty (BC 180-141) when Emperors governed with non-interference, farming, peaceful development , and were not only able to repel the invasions of the Mongols from the north, but were able to dispatch envoys to forge the first contacts with the West, and opened up the Silk Road for trade. The third was in the Tang Dynasty (AD 627-649) when China’s GDP was about one third of the world’s, and students came from Japan and neighboring countries to study in China. The fourth rise of China occurred in the Ming Dynasty (AD 1403-1435) when Admiral Zheng He and his powerful fleets were sent to sail from the South China Sea to the Indian Ocean, to Africa and, arguably, even to America, some 71 years before Columbus.
The Chinese people are a peace loving people. Whereas Julius Caesar said “I came, I saw, I conquered”, the Chinese said “I came, I saw, I made friends, and I went home”. Not one battle was fought, not one colony seized, and nobody was enslaved.
Throughout history, China, made up of 54 different races, has always subscribed to the principles of tolerance, forgiveness and self-commitment. With such a breadth of mind, China has been able to embrace the world, digest and absorb foreign cultures and ways of thinking without being insistent of its might and assertive of its power. What was successful and operative in the Han Dynasty could still be adopted for use in the Tang and Sung Dynasties. The Chinese cultural core values were adjustable through centuries to be made applicable to the time and provide solutions to the problems at that time.
In the 14th century, the Renaissance delivered Europe from the darkness of the Middle Ages, freed minds, stimulated innovation and creativity in literature, art, science and technology and hastened the birth of individualism, capitalism and colonialism. The Industrial Revolution, together with the advancement of seamanship, empowered the West to stretch its influence around the globe and starting in the 15th century, the West “knocked” on the ancient door of China.
The First “Knock” on China’s door
The first-ever attempt by the West to open up China began in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, during which Matteo Ricci, a Jesuit priest, visited China. Not only did he come to preach Christianity, but also spread the Western knowledge of mathematics, medicine and astronomy, enriching hugely China’s knowledge in science and philosophical thinking. At the same time, Western priests admired the Chinese culture and values. Ricci once sighed that the ideals of The Republic of Plato defining justice and order of the city-state, and just man, had already been realized in China.
Joachim Bouvet, who was a French priest and Sinologist, is worthy of notice. In 1688, after Bouvet had arrived in Peking as a French royal mathematician, he took over as Emperor Kangxi’s teacher of western studies.He made a thorough study of the Chinese Classics and concluded that a certain period in the Chinese history does not belong to the Chinese only, but to all of mankind.
From the Book of Changes, Yijing, Bouvet felt a close correlation between the Chinese primitive eight trigram and the Western binary numeral system proposed by Leibniz. In 1701, he wrote to Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, a German philosopher, creator of infinitesimal calculus and regarded as the Aristotle of the 17th century, showing the diagram of the Fuxi 64 Gua Sequence and Pixel. Leibniz was surprised at the discovery of the proof of his self-invented binary numeral system in Yijing from China. Indeed, all digital products evolving from the binary numeral system that we are using today could have been embedded with the wisdom of Yijing.
This was the first attempt by the Western civilization to come into contact with China mediated through religion, philosophies and sciences. In the late Kangxi era, however, mandarins were still enthralled in their own cultural refinement and did not feel challenged at all. Following a lengthy dispute over religious protocol between China and the Vatican, the door for cultural exchange was callously closed, leading to a state of mutual isolation.
Second “Knock” on China’s door
In the 18th century, Britain’s Industrial Revolution, America’s War of Independence and France’s Great Revolution dramatically changed the face of Western civilization. Modernization of human society became an irresistible historical trend, but the Chinese – still complacent at that time in national peace and splendor -- were completely unaware of the misfortune about to befall them. Western countries, aiming to enrich themselves with natural resources through their military supremacy, forcibly expanded colonialism to the East. .
For a long time, China's Foreign Trade had focused on exporting tea and agricultural products, fine silks and porcelain, which the West purchased with silver. Following the Industrial Revolution, Britain, desparately trying to recover the huge amounts of silver it had paid China, flooded China with opium and so were able to plunder over one and half million kilograms of silver in the following four decades.
In response, and painfully aware of the hazards of opium , the Chinese Government decided to prohibit opium smoking, seized the drug, and destroyed it. In 1840, Britain, prompted by the British opium merchants, invaded China and launched the First Opium War. China then, as the main Power in the East, enjoyed about one-third of global GDP, and had military forces of 800,000. The British had just 7,000 men in their expeditionary force. China lost the war. Hardly had the Qing Government negotiated grossly unequal treaties with Britain and the other invaders than the Second Opium War had started in 1860, when China’s GDP was 1.6 times that of Britain. China lost again.
Beset with troubles internally and externally, the Chinese Emperor, in 1860, ordered that the advanced military technologies of the West must be learned.
The first Westernization Movement saw the initiation of new industries to improve military hardware. A new navy and land forces were established. More schools were built and the students were sent overseas.
The disastrous Sino-Japanese War broke out in 1894 when China’s GDP was five times that of Japan. And China lost the war.
Throughout the recent 2,000 years of Chinese history, GDP of China ranked first globally. Even following the two Opium Wars, in 1840 and 1860, when China lost to the British, China’s GDP constituted one-third of the world’s total volume. When China lost the First Sino-Japanese War in 1894, China’s GDP was five times higher than that of Japan. China then realized that its GDP represented prosperity and not proportionate national strength. China was big and prosperous, but not healthy and strong.
Ever since 1840, for more than 100 years, after being brought to its knees at gun point by the West, China was awakened, suddenly realizing that it had to catch up with the Western world, and has since strived successively to strengthen its military, economy and political developments. The Self-Strengthening Movement in 1861 attempted to introduce military reforms but failed. In 1898, the Hundred Days’ Reform, aimed to set up a constitutional monarchy, was crushed by the Royal Court after one hundred days. Sun Yat-sen was successful in overthrowing the Ching dynasty ending Imperialism in China in 1911, but the reformed governing structure that was put in its place did not last long. The May Fourth Movement which took place in 1919 was a cultural revolution in nature with adoption of Western values of democracy and science for strengthening the country. China, taken to task by the West, began to question whether the traditional core values of its ancestors were still applicable to manage the cogent problems of the modern time.
Such a debate leading to the reforms and self-renewal movements that followed throughout the various stages of China’s modernization process in the last century, embraced the ideals of inheriting the past and ushering in the future. Even into the formative stages of the new People’s Republic after 1949, China has been preoccupied with one major task- modernization through a series of process of self-reflection, self-renewal, and self-fortification trying to re-endow the traditional core values with new meanings and applications. Because of the unfavorable international environment and domestic limitations, repeated reforms and movements failed to provide a forlorn and war-torn China with all-round modernization. The traditional cultural core values, however, which had, for many times, been on the verge of being forsaken and denounced, had provided the very necessary cohesive spiritual force to hold and bind the Chinese people together through these periods of trial and tribulation.
The Third “Knock”
The third “knock” on the door of China came in the 1970s.
In the midst of the cold war and international events, in 1972, US President Richard Nixon visited China, offering an olive branch to China to integrate into the global economic system of the era. When Deng Xiaoping came into power, China began walking down the path of development of a socialist market economy with Chinese characteristic. With rapid economic advancement, China moved towards a moderately well-off society.
Over the past 40 years since Nixon’s visit to China, the Chinese people have created one miracle after another as the country basically resolved the problem of feeding its 1.3 billion populations. The wish for a moderately well-off society has begun to be fulfilled.
This was perceived as the third attempt of opening up China by the West. Unlike the previous two attempts, China was introduced to Western social systems and concepts of market economy and international trade. Nixon’s visit kicked off a string of multifaceted social contact between China and the West. This was of vital importance to China’s modernization as it was conducive to integrating such an ancient giant civilization into the modernized international system.
Different Past, Common Future
Chinese and Americans are two very different peoples in terms of historical backgrounds and cultural core values, and that speaks volume of the importance of dialogue in facilitating mutual understanding. Dialogue is the only means through which disputes could be settled and mitigated. We each have a different past, but together, we have a common future.
Ladies and gentlemen, today, we live in a time of considerable uncertainty. How do we hold onto our innate culture on the one hand, and keep abreast of the times while preserving harmonious coexistence on the other? This is a question that we will be discussing these two days.
We shall explore the roots of the problems affecting the two countries: What are our respective core values? What are the similarities and differences in respect of the world outlook, concept of time, social regulation and political system? How do we define justice, happiness, success and beauty? What is the ultimate goal of a nation? What is the ultimate pursuit of an individual? How do we interpret “self”? How are the core values be made pertinent generation after generation? How do core values get established as core values? Are ancient civilizations and modernized nation states compatible? Is the liberal democratic system of government of the West applicable to all countries? Can Asian cultures and values have a foothold in the world? Will the future international order likely to become uni-polar or multi-polar? Can China rise peacefully? Can any country rise peacefully? Is mutual trust a term of convenience or does it really comes into the equation of international relationship? What kind of US-China relationship is possible and is desirable to everybody? How do we construct a new form of US-China relations? Why is China-bashing still a favorite hobby for politicians during election times and for the US news media all the time?
Ladies and gentlemen, I am all ears.
Thank you!