Learning about the Real World

Last week, I got an interesting look at three different sectors through which foreigners interact with China. The three experiences gave me a lot to think about, and many comparisons to ponder.

Last Monday, CIEE arranged a lecture by a guy who has made his career helping multi-national corporations with risk management in China (Enterprise Risk Management: Mitigating the Risks of Globalization). Beforehand, I was a little worried that this would be a very, very boring two hours (I mean, “risk management” sounds about as exciting as tying your shoes before getting on an escalator…). However, our speaker entertained and informed us, regaling us with the details of how companies deal with (or try to deal with) the vagaries of Chinese government policy, corruption, fraud, and intellectual copyright infringement, and how they adapt to the more benign but no less impactful differences in culture and perspective. He (I’ve forgotten his name…fail) seemed like someone with tons of firsthand experience, and he showed a respect for both the good and bad aspects of the Chinese and American ways of doing business. One moment that struck me, though, was when he said that “foreign companies are teaching China how to modernize.” Probably true, to a certain extent—but it also feels like a comment right out of early-20th century China; at best, if felt at least a couple decades out of date. Right now, it feels like the Chinese have a pretty good handle on where they want to go as a country and how to get there, at least economically. They no longer need hand holding from Western companies. The next comment that gave me some pause was when he described how all foreign companies in China have a couple expats stationed here to oversee operations, but hire local Chinese for almost all other positions—from management positions, to office workers, to laborers. Yet, because of the language barrier, the expats really just have to trust that their ideas and rules and orders are being followed and understood, as they’re basically totally excluded from the inner culture and workings of their own company (he was especially citing foreign companies’ efforts to communicate their anti-corruption and non-compete policies to their workers).

Both of these aspects of what it means to be a foreign company doing business in China seemed incredibly retro to me, right out of 19th-century Shanghai. From the 1840s until 1949, foreign companies in China had a couple of taipans (rich, largely useless managers who spent all their time and money on food and Western leisure pursuits) stationed in Shanghai, who did basically none of the work—everything was done by a Chinese comprador (a Portuguese term that became universal), who actually ran the company’s day-to-day affairs and managed investments. Now, of course, Chinese workers do high-level professional work as well as labor-intensive low-level work; companies put significant effort into thinking about how to best structure and deploy their Chinese staff. But it just seems funny to me. It’s not that it doesn’t make sense; it’s clearly the most efficient way of doing things. And clearly it works, or companies wouldn’t still be doing it this way. But still. How much has changed since a century ago? So much. But also, weirdly enough, in some ways not so much.

Wednesday night, I went to a reception for American students at the US consulate. Notable lessons: 1. Working in a consulate sounds very, very boring, and 2. Americans can ALWAYS have a great BBQ, no matter where they are in the world. Think hamburgers and hot dogs, potato salad, gooey chocolate chip cookies…I’ve been loving the Chinese food I’ve been eating here, but even so, that hamburger was freaking amazing.

Now, I don’t wish to disparage the State Department and the consulate when they showed me such great hospitality. There are certainly some interesting aspects of their work; they police fraud by both American and Chinese companies, and are working very closely on executing the American Pavilion at the World Expo which will be in Shanghai from May-October of 2010 (Better City, Better Life!). There are certainly some very boring aspects of their work; they spend a lot of time and staff on citizens services (replacing passports, birth and death certificates for Americans who are born or who die in Shanghai, etc.), and probably an equal amount on issuing visas for Chinese who wish to go to America. Apparently Shanghai issued the 5th largest number of US visas in the world last year. Lucky them. I also met some interesting Americans, such as this group from a program called “Global College”…basically they spend each year of college in a different place, and they’re all (there are like 30 in each grade) basically international relations majors, with a sub-specialty of their own. To be honest, I was a little weirded out by this group, I think mostly because they were so down on the traditional American college experience (although, really, how would they know?). Clearly I believe in study abroad and different types of learning…but I also believe that at some point you need to be in a classroom, learning a wide variety of things, even some things you don’t really like (one girl told me that a major reason she chose the program is that she wouldn’t have to take math ever again…this girl is running a long way from math…). I think I just don’t like feeling like the most conventional, stodgy person in a conversation. Which I guess is probably a daily reality if you work at a US consulate…kidding…that was mean. They gave me a hamburger, after all. If I ever lost my passport, the last couple sentences will be summarily deleted and will never have happened. But until then, I need something to provide some levity to this monstrosity of a post, and, I mean…the US Diplomatic Corp is known for being a great source of levity. Right?

Now, everything of any importance or interest must come in threes, and the best thing is always last, so now we come to the Baby Bear event that was “just right” for me.

The event was an evening of speakers about environmental entrepreneurship and action in China. I was invited by Elizabeth Campbell, the Milton and Yale grad with whom I had a very enjoyable lunch a couple weeks ago. Elizabeth was one of the speakers at the event, along with a woman who founded a “social business” called Greenovate that seeks to “integrate sustainable concepts into traditional business and community practices”, two Chinese university students who volunteer for Greenovate and spent their summer teaching rural schoolchildren about sustainable practices and the environment, the founder of the progressive design company Frog Design, the founder of Naked Retreats, a resort company, and the founder of Eno, a clothing and accessories company that seeks to promote environmental awareness and action among China youth while selling them nifty fashion items. All of the companies spoke of their “bottom-up” approach to creating social change by promoting environmental awareness in China; they all had different approaches and products, but similar philosophies. Let me report: Greenovate highlighted its MaGiC (Made Green in China) public awareness and action program which they launched this weekend (www.joinmagic.org). The Frog Design founder said that “The ultimate challenge for Design is to create objects which are useful art, and to inspire spiritual values…,” adding that “Waste is the product of bad design.” The Naked Retreats guy said that China represents an “enormous opportunity to educate individual communities” on how to live more sustainably, and also said that his company planned to build the first LEED Platinum resort with more than 100 rooms in the world—in China. That was pretty cool. Eno said that their mission was to “inspire China youth to make a difference through fashion and fun.” The lady who founded Eno with her husband also remarked that Chinese consumers are starting to be willing to pay more for a product because it’s “green,” and she thinks there is a huge and very profitable niche for the company or companies that first manage to craft an image of being “green companies” in China. Elizabeth represented her organization, JUCCE (Joint US-China Collaboration on Clean Energy –www.juccce.com), which uses a more “top-down” approach to promoting sustainable practices by working with the Chinese government and businesses. Elizabeth called JUCCE a “convener, with an eye to action.”

OK so enough exposition. Basically, this event was SO COOL and gave me an inside look at some of the stuff that is going on here in regards to the environment. It also brought home to me that part of why I’m learning Chinese is that I’d love to be involved with this sort of “social business” or non-profit work in China. As was emphasized throughout the evening, a little bit of change by a mass of individuals is a powerful idea in China, where the mass of individuals is bigger than anywhere else.

Something that both the Chinese students and Elizabeth’s presentation touched on was the Chinese idea of pursuing an “environmentally harmonious society.” In the US, the idea of ‘harmony with nature” seems like a very hippy-dippy crunchy goal to espouse, and would certainly never be the basis of a government public service campaign. But here in China, such a principle is ancient and seems to work as a motivator, or at least it seems that way from how I’ve seen and heard it used while I’ve been here. I was also interested that both of the Chinese students highlighted water pollution as a motivator for them; one girl said that her dream is that her children will be able to swim in the lake in her home city. Environmental destruction is such a concrete reality here; in the US, it often seems like somewhat of an abstraction, with all the focus on emissions and less on pollution. You can’t see or taste or smell carbon dioxide, and its effects on the environment are not at all cut and dry. A lake or river so clogged with debris and spoiled by chemicals that humans can barely go near it is a whole other ballgame.

So things are happening here. Maybe on a small scale, maybe too small. But think about this: 5 years ago, Greenovate, Eno, and JUCCE didn’t exist (that might be true for Naked Retreats, too, not sure). And now they’re established organizations and companies that are starting to make an impact. And think about this: in 5 years in China, the equivalent of 10 New York Cities are constructed in new development. So yes, there is a ton to do here. But the pace of change is also so fast that social change can take root quickly. My fingers are crossed.

Not a lot of other goings on, and this post is getting so long. I’m going to Beijing on Thursday for 8 days, and probably won’t bring my computer, and probably won’t post unless I get super inspired by all the National Day fervor.

One last thing…last Thursday, one of the CIEE college students here, a senior at UPenn, died in an accident in his dorm room. His name was Kenny, and I’d appreciate if you could send out a prayer or a moment of silence for him and his family and friends. We Gap Year students don’t really interact with the college students here, so I had never met him, but it’s still really sad and scary.

See you in a couple of weeks, and be well! Peace.