3 JUNE 1989, Page 8

ANOTHER VOICE

China: the cruellest practical joke ever played on the human race

AUBERON WAUGH

Hong Kong hen mainland China first opened its borders to distinguished parties of selected guests, just before Mao unleashed the forces of mass hooliganism in the period of anarchy between 1966 and 1976, it was fashionable for these previleged people to end their tour in Hong Kong. Almost invariably, they compared its crude com- mercialism unfavourably with the purity they had found in mainland China: the delightful kindergartens where pupils danced entrancingly for the visitors; the absence of crime, prostitution and tipping; the general air of politeness, honesty and optimism. We were given to understand that socialism in China had abolished poverty, substituting a benign welfarism such as Beveridge himself might have planned. Having disposed of the oppres- sive landlord class (you can't make a cake without breaking eggs) and freed women from millennia of bondage, they had cre- ated a sort of Hampstead Utopia, where there was no class differences, everybody had his (or her) iron bowl of delicious rice and most of them had their own little bicycles. How sweet! Of course it might not work in Britain, which is rather a hilly country, but how wonderful it would be if Britons could be persuaded to take bicycles for the most part, leaving cars to those who really needed them. No more greenhouse effect, and wonderfully clear roads! Then, we were told that after 1979 China had engaged in a serious programme of capitalist reading. We were all a bit fed up with socialism by then, and it seemed a good idea, although after a visit to Taiwan at the end of last year, felt a twinge of anxiety. If 20 million Taiwanese could produce quite so many plastic dolls and quite so much pollution by taking the capitalist road, what would happen to the world if over a billion Chinese did the same? There seemed a strong case for sending Margaret Drabble to Peking in a sealed compartment to discuss her interest- ing idea that everybody should be paid the same wage. China seems wide open to such exciting ideas, with the difference that in Peking they are not just discussed in sentimental, morally righteous tones over elegant dinner parties between Drabble and Ascherson. They are put into effect. Let us have a great industrial Leap For- ward, they cry, and bonk! two million dispossed peasants drop dead from starva- tion. Isn't it bloody well time these people stopped breeding, cries some Chinese equivalent of Prince Philip, and bonk! six million abortions are performed overnight, 20 million married couples are forcibly separated and one-child families are proc- laimed the rule, subject to severe economic penalties for any infringement. China is such people's idea of heaven. 'Can't you see,' I remember Vanessa Redgrave once shouting out at a meeting, 'China has solved the problem of underdevelopment.' It was only in China that I understood how socialism is not just a silly idea to be discussed by empty-headed, guilt-ridden middle-class Englishwomen, nor is it mere- ly an opportunity for sly, fat peasants like Roy Hattersley to coin populist platitudes with an eye to the main chance: 'Ea bah goom, 'appen t' broadest backs should bear t' greatest burden.' It is the cruellest, most sadistic practical joke which has ever been played on the human race.

Hong Kong should not be seen, perhaps, as the definitive repudiation of Marx's theory that by abolishing surplus value or profit you make resources available for social welfare. For that proof, you must visit mainland China where, after 40 years of socialism, neither medicine nor educa- tion is free. On four or five visits to Hong Kong, I have never found it a particularly sleazy place, despite a certain amount of research in that field — certainly not more vice-ridden than London or Manchester, or even Singapore. The chief fact about Hong Kong is that it is a miracle of sensible government and good orientation.

My chief reaction, on revisiting it after four weeks in mainland China, was one of outrage that it should be handed on a plate to the communists. Those huge modern buildings, many of them beautifully built and all in tip-top working condition, are worth billions and billions of pounds. The investment over 100 years in such gigantic engineering projects as the tunnel under Hong Kong's mountainous interior, the Harbour tunnel (and a second one about to open), the entire delicately contrived apparatus of the second most prosperous society (after Japan) in Asia, all these are being handed over as a gift to the most incompetent, corrupt and insecure tyranny in the continent.

My arrival in Peking, with a small group of English country landowners, coincided with the first massive student demonstra- tion in Tiananmen Square. Although we saw similar demonstrations in all the towns we visited, I was not much impressed by them for the simple reason that they seemed to have official approval, despite Li's speech to the contrary, and Deng's later gesture in declaring 'martial law' in Peking, although I never quite understood what sort of martial law was being enforced with no troops on the spot to enforce it. Even Deng's news black-out seemed calcu- lated to attract attention rather than dis- courage it. There could be no mistaking the popular support for the students, but I fancy that was a product of popular resent- ment at inflation, running at 35 per cent (and itself a product of Deng's liberal economic policies) rather than enthusiasm for student participation in government.

I arrived in China as a tourist on holiday, determined not to interest myself in its politics, even less to try to understand the Chinese character. My purpose was to visit such sites and monuments as had survived the Cultural Revolution. The demonstra- tions were a minor distraction, their dis- locating effect much exaggerated by the wishful thinking of the world's press. The only serious inconvenience they caused was to one member of our group — a marquess of recent inheritance whose peculiarity it was to go jogging in shorts every evening. Bitten severely in the bot- ton by a savage guard dog, he was denied access to anti-rabies serum for several hours by students demonstrating outside the hospital. Scarcely history-making. It is true that the new influx of rich tourists, particularly from Taiwan, may have given some Chinese pause for thought about the advantages of socialism, but they do not dare express them. When my wife complained about the condition of some pandas in Peking zoo, she was told: 'The Chinese have so little freedom, why should pandas have more?' Economic liberalisa- tion has resulted in the appearance of private stalls, but, stall-holders are subject to a steeply rising progressive tax on turnover. 'Appen t' broadest backs should bear t' greatest burden, eh, Hattersley? The purpose of socialism remains the same as ever, to keep the people as poor, miserable and frightened as possible and allow the fatties as much power as they like. Far better give Hong Kong to the Triads, whose rule over Kowloon's walled city will seem benign by comparison.