Ralph JenningsContributor
I cover under-reported stories from Taiwan and Asia.full bio →
Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.
FORBES ASIA 15,194 views
One Lesson Taiwan Can Learn From China
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Taiwanese comparing themselves to people in China argue they’re healthier, wealthier, more polite and better off as a democracy than a Communist state. A foreigner who points out something amiss in Taiwan, perhaps traffic danger or environmental degradation, risks the rebuke that things are worse in China. The two sides have a natural rivalry because both are predominantly ethnic Chinese with the much larger, more powerful China claiming sovereignty over Taiwan since the island became self-ruled in the 1940s. China also tries to curb Taiwan’s foreign relations and, occasionally, economic growth.
But China normally changes fast while in Taiwan you meet people who return after 30 years saying they recognize every shop on a given block. Taiwan could stand a few changes as China chews into its lifeblood high-tech contracting, leaving the island economy with little new direction. There are short lessons: Try adding yards, sidewalks and setbacks between flats and roads. Those measures common in China’s cities would ease urban density in Taiwan and increase breathing space (even if China’s air is filthy). Taiwan might also follow China’s lead in stoking pride in traditional culture, for example brewing pots of loose leaf tea in public teahouses instead of writing it off as an “old people’s” drink just for home consumption.
But the toughest lesson — an answer to the growing grumble among Taiwanese about lacking direction – comes down to ambition.
I talked this month to a 50-year-old Taiwanese computer vendor in China who was ready to pack up his Shanghai sales office after 12 years. Unlike when he started, the mainland Chinese understand now the technology he sells and the courtesies required to build a customer base. There’s no more gee-whiz value in saying, “I’m from Taiwan.” He doesn’t know what to do after returning home. “I’m part of a group of people who have been eliminated,” says the ex-salesman, Jeff Wu. “We are not useful for any kind of work involving sales.”
Shortly after I talked to him I met a friend from Beijing on a visit to Taipei. In Beijing people are watching their backs while stabbing others to get higher salaries, bigger apartments and status-symbol cars, she griped. The tricks people use to get ahead and a sense that authorities won’t protect their victims expose the excesses of ambition. But at least ambition is pulsating in China. It will take an ethos of ambition to get ahead as people such as Jeff Pu fall behind.
But today Taiwan’s college graduates prefer safe white-collar jobs to starting their own firms, keeping wages low because of that labor glut and limiting “innovation” to lexicons of cheerleading politicians. Parents encourage the search for safe jobs to ensure their children don’t risk the hardships of fishing, farming or other tough labor common in pre-modern Taiwan.
Change should start from early education, you hear Taiwanese say. Elementary schools focus now on rote learning and following the authority of a teacher who talks through a microphone for hours with no class discussion. I’ve heard the same about schools in China. But when I taught writing at a mainstream university in Beijing 10 years ago, students experimented freely with new storytelling devices and a lot didn’t mind talking in class. I’ve taught a weekly university journalism class in Taipei for almost two years and must beg or threaten local students to participate. The brightest find ways to skip as many lessons as possible and still pass the class.
My students from Beijing would turn up a year or two after graduation in the country’s top media jobs, watching or stabbing backs as needed to build careers. Or they might be getting an MBA with an import-export business brewing in the background. A lot went overseas for advanced degrees or professional jobs, not easy given visa restrictions. Rack it up to ambition.
Beijing student expresses herself at classroom blackboard
Some left China for the money or the degree. Others went to study a new country, using personal experience to replace the pro-Communist fairy tale version of the world taken from Chinese textbooks or local media such as the inflammatory Global Times. (Every Taiwan media outlet is intensely local.) Ambition to know the world allows Chinese to make sense, and friends, at international events, to brand companies beyond China and know what consumers want in a list of markets. Otherwise they would be stuck, like a lot of the best Taiwanese firms, relying on outdated business formulas such as “just give me a few good OEM contracts.”
A few Chinese may return with the drive to make China healthier, wealthier and better governed. “People desire to live abroad to experience other countries, gain new experiences, gain degrees, live in better environments,” notes Scott Kronick, Beijing-based author of The Lighter Side of China.
Ralph JenningsContributor
I cover under-reported stories from Taiwan and Asia.full bio →
Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.
FORBES ASIA 1,867 views
Backdoor Entry Past China's Visa Barricades
I’m sitting in a clean, bright hotel with a glass-paneled bathroom and a mini bar can of Pearl River beer. Gmail doesn’t work, but that’s China. I will go out later to look at Coolpad smartphones, seldom found outside China, and a mall here in Guangzhou where 400 vendors sell bulk tealeaves.
It took me just short of five years to arrange this two-day trip because I’m an American journalist living in Taiwan. Last month I discovered a backdoor to the usual Great Wall of visa V -1.1% barricades. Those landing in China en route to a third international stop can stay for 72 hours, I learned. If you go with a half-page passport stamp — no consulates, letters, questions or payments.
These visa waivers in force since January 2013 and open to citizens of 51 countries could bring planeloads of Westerners who might otherwise avoid China. Visitors looking to browse for antique furniture, go clubbing with resident expat friends or do a city landmark tour can handily complete their missions in 72 hours.
China visa exemption stamp in a US passport
China’s Ministry of Public Security does not explain why the country with notoriously few visa waivers has quickly expanded the 72-hour transit exemption to airports in eight cities (or why it’s so critical to fly onward to a third location). But the cities involved, including Beijing and Shanghai, wanted it this way, one source told me. Their merchants get income from food, hotels and shopping. China is steering the economy away from investment toward consumption, and additional foreign spending power would advance the cause.
For Guangzhou, more 72-hour stays should bring foreign business people to see local colleagues for a day and may allow thousands of African merchants keen on Guangzhou (easy air transport) to speed up commerce in stuff such as erasers or beauty salon equipment. Guangzhou is also looking for ways to sell visits to the twice-a-year Canton Fair, a general merchandise trade show that brought about 24,500 people to the most recent event in April. The 460-room Pullman Guangzhou Baiyun Airport, a monstrous transit hotel across the street from the terminals, may find a market in servicing tight turnarounds.
China normally limits inflows of Americans and Western Europeans by requiring tourist visas. The visa process can take up to a week and cost easily more than $100, depending on a tourist’s country of origin. Foreigners in Taiwan must either pay an agent about $200 for a visa via courier or fly first to someplace with a Chinese consular mission, adding time and money to their trip. (China and Taiwan don’t recognize each other as countries, hence the lack of consulates.) As a former China-based journalist, I was guaranteed no visa either way and was rejected in 2012.
This time Guangzhou will see me drop about 1,200 yuan it wouldn’t get otherwise.
