As we complete this chapter, Ellen and I are again overwhelmed with images of a country and a people exerting themselves to put the sordidness of the past behind and establish lives of security and happiness for themselves and those around them. This effort is handicapped by the paucity of good, participatory models in the Chinese tradition and a moment in history when the neo-liberal cant of the past thirty years is finally being discredited and the new models have yet to emerge. There is no doubting the enormity of the task in front of all of us, and for the [View Full Entry]

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The collapse of world markets has been a wake up call for the Chinese leadership, one they thought they would never have to hear. The pre-crisis narrative had been that with their “socialism with Chinese characteristics”, the boom and bust cycles characteristic of capitalism had been tamed once and for all. The experience here during the Asian economic crisis of 1997 only reinforced this belief; China not only weathered that storm well, but also provided a backstop to the imploding economies of the region. This notion has been quickly discarded as the factory closings and job lo [View Full Entry]

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2008-11-19 Blog November 5 Eli and I went to the China Hotel (a 5-star Marriott locale) this morning to watch the election results. This was an event sponsored by the American Chamber of Commerce here in Guangzhou and one of the few public places where CNN was available. All the rooms in high-end, Western-oriented hotels in China will have access to CNN via satellite, but the content is too unpredictable relative to China to permit a wider audience. Satellite reception is not easily blocked by the authorities when objectionable material is broadcast. By contrast, Hong Kong stations (Chin [View Full Entry]

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10/20 Today we made our visit to the Prosperous Company where we had been invited to assist it helping management reduce employee dissatisfaction as indicated by a very high rate of turnover. We were accompanied by four colleagues from social work here, including two 4th year undergraduates who had completed a field experience in an industrial social work position in Shenzhen. We were met at the train by the corporate van and proceeded through a typical Chinese industrial landscape of broken pavement, rows of small shops selling phone cards, noodles, and the ever essential ball bearings [View Full Entry]

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101708 Blog (Pictures this week taken on the mobile, quality suffers) Last week I spent parts of two days getting our absentee ballots and sending them back to the City Clerk in Montpelier. On October 3rd both Ellen and I received an email with an attached ballot. (BTW, we are both on the ballot this election, running for one of 15 slots as Justice of the Peace, all told there are about 30 people running for the positions in Montpelier; this is Ellen’s inaugural run for public office, I have my State Senate race of 1992 behind me). More important were [View Full Entry]

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Several years ago, the national leadership here embarked on a campaign to promote a “harmonious” society. This effort, recalling Confucian ideals that still pervade everyday life here, has been used to both suppress dissent from the policies that have devastated rural life as well as take steps to ameliorate those ravages by addressing the growing inequality here. With instances of social disturbance nearing 100,000 annually (according to official figures) there is fear that China’s national unity, re-established only 60 years ago (and still waiting on the eventual re-integr [View Full Entry]

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We arrived back in Guangzhou a week ago after a long and uneventful flight. We went non-stop from Newark to Hong Kong, a long 15 ½ hours in all. I had a bad case of the “legs” and had decided to not take an Ambien in an effort to minimize jet lag (not completely successful). I did a bit of squirming in my seat but once we were on the ground it was all quickly forgotten. It was a short 28 minute hop to Guangzhou where we were met by two of our colleagues and a driver and we were dropped [View Full Entry]

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December 5, 2007 blog Well, we have put our foot into the fifth month of our visit and we have begun to turn our attention to what happens once we return to the US. As most of you know, we have left or jobs and rented our house until August, so it looks to be a peripatetic life for the next seven months or so. We took a vocational/recreational/necessity trip to Hong Kong over the weekend; vocational as Ellen managed to get in a meeting with some of the panjandrums of the Hong Kong labor federation, recreational because we got to [View Full Entry]

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Among the post-1949 changes in China has been the tremendous improvement in people’s health and well-being. People live longer, are not dying of infectious diseases, and one important cause has been the great increase in the availability of food, especially since the economic opening starting in 1979. As with all things in nature, there is another side of the story. People are eating much more, they can afford meat, a former luxury item that was only sparingly enjoyed, and their intake of refined foods has multiplied. A once rare sight has become common, that is people eating while th [View Full Entry]

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October 30, 2007 A common first impression about China focuses on the rapid change. In fact, this might qualify as a pre-impression because foreigners come here primed, by Western media reports, to see a society undergoing dramatic transformation. Evidence is all around; that nearby city block, that last year housed restaurants, small retail stores, a traditional pharmacy and a middle -aged man squatting on his haunches and hand sewing shoes in need of repair? Gone. The area is now surrounded by a 6’ high concrete block wall and preparations are underway for yet another luxury housing [View Full Entry]

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