Eric's Beijing Diary

Got the news about the China Development Brief. Their publication was shut down by the government, supposedly for making "unlawful surveys." In 2004, I went to the office of the China Development Brief to check on the process of setting up a nonprofit organization in China (see July 14, 2004). I decided, after that meeting, to put the matter of setting up an organization on the "back burner," so I have not had any contact with the China Development Brief since then, but I was impressed with the work they were doing in helping folks to understand the nonprofit sector in China.

In any society, there must be a mechanism for redistribution of wealth, because, as Jesus said, "The poor ye have always with you." There will always be a divide between the rich and the poor, and so there will always be a need to establish some means to transfer wealth for the purpose of more equal distribution. No society can survive without this mechanism. At the risk of over simplification, let me say that there are basically two ways to do this. The first, is to establish a system of taxes to confiscate the wealth of the rich and distribute it to the poor through a network of government agencies. The second is to keep taxes low to stimulate the development of wealth, and then transfer this wealth voluntarily through a network of nonprofit organizations. In the United States, these two approaches are represented roughly by the Democratic and Republican parties respectively. In China, on the other hand, there is a political need to pay lip service to socialism, which is often touted as support for the pour, while, in fact, government social programs are actually quite underdeveloped. There is no national "safety net," so to speak. At the same time, what has developed after the demise of traditional communism (although in China, the one-party system still carries the name, "Communist"), is a very "Republican" economic system, except that the nonprofit sector is also quite underdeveloped.

So in America, although there is heated debate about which of the two approaches mentioned is best for the country, in fact, both kinds of functions are quite well developed. There is a broad safety net called, "Social Security" that no serious politician, Democrat or Republican, would question. At the same time, there are many nonprofit organizations (such as the Salvation Army) that are dedicated to meeting the needs of the less fortunate through voluntary contributions. In China, on the other hand, neither are very well developed. Granted, China is a developing country, and this should be taken into consideration when judging these matters. Still, it is troubling to see the government cracking down on an organization which was doing a good job of maintaining awareness of the developing nonprofit sector in China.

So what was the government's problem? Supposedly, they were concerned about the China Development Brief making unlawful surveys in violation of the Statistics Law of 1983. I have read this law, and still cannot imagine what the China Development Brief could have done that violated it. But it must be stated that China is very sensitive about any information that could make China look bad. In America, espionage charges can be filed against anyone working in government (such as a CIA agent) who divulges secret information to another country, thus threatening national security. But in China, the definition of "state secrets" is broadened to include any information that could be embarrassing to the government.