The Washington Post editorial board not only can’t be bothered to correct inaccurate columns, but actually says that false claims become true when made by George Will. So it’s hard to know how to assess the factual content of claims that appear on their pages. But I have independent verification that Hillary Clinton is Secretary [...]
The Washington Post editorial board not only can’t be bothered to correct inaccurate columns, but actually says that false claims become true when made by George Will. So it’s hard to know how to assess the factual content of claims that appear on their pages. But I have independent verification that Hillary Clinton is Secretary of State and that she’s traveling to Asia. So now all that’s left is their argument that it’s a mistake not to raise human rights issues in a high-profile way:
No doubt there is a predictable rhythm both to U.S. protests and to Beijing’s responses. That hardly makes them unimportant. By publicly stating its objection to the imprisonment of peaceful dissidents or the crushing of opposition in places such as Tibet, the United States reinforces the principle that such practices are unacceptable anywhere in the world. It gives hope to those who are bravely fighting for change and causes average Chinese to question their government. It also can produce results — as has been demonstrated time and again when Chinese political prisoners have been released thanks to American pressure.
Ms. Clinton’s suggestion that U.S. advocacy for human rights might “interfere” with cooperation on other issues is equally misguided. Over many years China has proved ready to work with the United States on issues where it sees an interest in doing so, regardless of disputes over human rights. Playing down those concerns won’t change Beijing’s stance on North Korea or increase its willingness to reduce carbon emissions. But it will cause the regime to feel less restrained in cracking down on movements such as the newly formed Charter 08, whose manifesto in favor of democratic change has been signed by more than 8,000 Chinese from all walks of life.
I definitely agree with the second paragraph here. There’s very little evidence for a downside trade off to raising concerns about Chinese human rights. The PRC leadership makes policy that it sees as being in its interests and that’s true on trade, carbon, North Korea, and all the worst. Sticks and stones may break their bones, but names can never hurt them, so this isn’t going to be that big a deal.
On the other hand, I think there’s a similar lack of evidence for the first proposition. It’s not crazy to think that the morale of Chinese democracy activists is boosted by American support—it really could be. I’ve heard Vaclav Havel say something along these lines about his situation as a Czech dissident.
But at the same time, I don’t think Americans should take lessons from Eastern Europe and just assume they apply to Asia. There are lots of Americans who campaign for universal health care, but I don’t think any but a tiny fraction of us had our morale boosted when Fidel Castro condemned the immorality of the U.S. health care system. And I think you’d be hard-pressed to say that Jacques Chirac’s vocal opposition to the invasion of Iraq in 2002 and 2003 was a boon to the anti-war movement in the United States. It actually turns out that Americans are quite nationalistic and that criticism from foreigners is hugely unwelcome. As regards China, this is an empirical issue that deserves real consideration rather than armchair speculation. It’s also possible that things work differently for different issues. In the United States, Tibet issues tend to get lumped into a broad “China human rights” basket. But from inside China, the valence of those issues is probably quite different from issues related to governance of China proper. It’s possible that some kinds of words could be hugely helpful and important while others could be counterproductive.
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