Ssangyong Failure Sours China and South Korea Ties

A dispute between workers of South Korea’s Ssangyong Motors and the company’s largest shareholder in China has escalated, after Korean workers protested in front of the Chinese Embassy in Seoul against illegal transfer of technology.  Chinese media responded by rallying public support for the Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation (SAIC) to put pressure on the South Korean government to bail out Ssangyong.  Nationalist sentiment triggered by the dispute has the potential of destabilising diplomatic ties between China and South Korea.

Unintended Consequences 101: An Australian Response to China’s Arrogant Display of Nationalism at the Canberra Torch Relay

Update

Since this story was published, I received another tip-off from a reader who alerted me to some personal accounts of three Canberra residents who were present at the Canberra torch relay.  Their unpleasant encounters with the pro-China thugs were published on 26 April 2008 in The Canberra Times.

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The arrogant display of nationalism by visiting Chinese during the Canberra Torch Relay may have invoked some unintended consequences that will yield perverse effects contrary to what China originally intended.   The propaganda exercise orchestrated by the Chinese Embassy in Canberra showed little respect for Australia’s social values and national integrity.  The damage they have inflicted on Australia-China relations is nearly catastrophic.

The extent of the damage can be seen from the following comments to the latest Crikey Report about the Canberra Torch Relay:

Tibet, Olympics and Chinese Nationalism

One of the hot topics of debate in the last couple of days has been: whether the protests directed against China at torch relays in London, Paris and San Francisco have been used by the Communist regime in China to ignite a sense of nationalism among its people.  Are we witnessing another round of anti-foreign sentiments?  Is this going to put a break on further political liberalisation in China?  In short, as John Kennedy at Global Voices Online has succinctly put it: have the pro-Tibet protestors made the silencing of many liberal voices within China acceptable collateral damage for their successful campaign?

Shen Hua at Radio Free Asia Mandarin Services conducted an interview with Ling Cangzhou and Ran Yuefei in order to find out their view on these questions.  Ling is a Beijing-based media expert.  China Digital Times has translated one of Ling Cangzhou’s open letters where he expresses concern about grassroots elections in China.  Ran is an independent analyst from Chengdu.  The following is my translation of the interview.  You can listen to the recording of the interview here.

 

Patriotism and coming home to Australia.

George Orwell said patriotism and nationalism are entirely different things.    Nationalism is a pseudo-religion, a toxic substitute substance of spiritual nourishment for otherwise vacant hearts, a counterfeit “love” of an abstract “community”.     Patriotism, in contrast, is authentic personal love of a land, a landscape, and the land’s traditions and the peculiar ways of the people who live and have lived there.     Patriotism has nothing to do with “national glory” and even less to do with superiority to any other countries or peoples – because as patriotism is love, and love is inseparable from charity, there is no room for hatred in patriotism.   And not much room for “glory” either.