A few days ago I posted on the banning of eight books in the PRC, how it resonated with the Legalist practices of the Qin emperor and how the the resistance of some writers suggested that China was no longer a Legalist society.
Well, the plot has thickened.
Danwei today runs a post entitled, GAPP: books criticized, but not banned. The General Administration of Press and Publications seems to be dissembling. Here are some excerpts from the Danwei post (which, in turn, is quoting from a Singapore newspaper, the Lianhe Zaobao):
The representative said that there was no so-called "eight banned books" situation. However, five books were indeed subject to criticism at the meeting, including The Family History of an Ordinary Chinese because readers complained that it whitewashed the Japanese invasion force. Hunan Literature and Arts Press was also criticized at the meeting for publishing Past Stories of Actors.
The representative repeated GAPP deputy-director Wu Shulin's words to the meeting: "How and what an author writes is part of a writer's creative freedom. We don't scrap people because of books, or scrap books because of people; however, publishers should respect the country's legal stipulations regarding publishing...."
Here we have one of China's top censors talking about a "writer's creative freedom." Has he suddenly become a liberal? I figured that when a book is banned, it is banned, and that the full force of overblown communist rhetoric will be invoked to defend the ban. You know: "defending the revolution;" "struggling against degenerate bourgeois influences;" "protecting the motherland;" "holding high the red banner of somebody's thought;" dig tunnels deep, store grain everywhere, and never practice hegemony" (always one of my favorite slogans). What happened to "eradicate spiritual pollution"?
Let's just say that I was a bit surprised at the sudden soft-peddling of the ban. Are they backing off? Roland suspects it might be something like a retreat in the face of negative public opinion. Perhaps. That would be nice. But the more I think about it, the more I realize it might be another chapter from the Legalist play book.
Remember, Legalists like Taoism because it suggests that the ruler should "do nothing," which Han Fei Tzu takes to mean the ruler should not reveal his preferences or plans:
Hence, it is said: The ruler must not reveal his desires; for if he reveals his desires, his ministers will put on the mask that pleases him. He must not reveal his will; for if he does so his ministers will show a different face. So it is said: Discard likes and dislikes and the ministers will show their true form; discard wisdom and wile and the ministers will watch their step. Hence, though the ruler is wise, he hatches no schemes from his wisdom, but causes all men to know their place...
Han Fei Tzu (Burton trans.), p. 16.
When Taoists talk about "dark enigma" and "murkiness," Legalists take this as a strategy for the ruler to draw out the intentions of his ministers so he can better dominate them. Not quite what Taoists have in mind, but that is what happens when philosophy is merged with power.
In a sense, then, there is in Legalism a notion of what we might call "strategic ambiguity," at least when talking about the ruler's power v. his ministers. This is analogous to the US stance toward Taiwan. Will the US actually go to war should the PRC attack the island? The US is not bound by treaty to do so and, usually, (unless Bush is fumbling at the mouth) it is US policy to be rather vague about what it would really do if China attacked Taiwan. The belief (hope?) is that if the PRC is uncertain whether the US will actually intervene or not, it will exercise prudence, on the assumption that the US might act.
Now, I don't want to debate the efficacy of this sort of stance; just note its existence.
I know that this idea runs counter to the Legalist emphasis on clear laws and harsh punishments. But Han Fei Tzu's use of Taoism suggests some role for strategic ambiguity (at least in the relationship between ruler and ministers), which might be extended by modern-day Legalists to other issues and circumstances.
Maybe that is what is going on with the book banning that is not really a book banning, or is it?
Jennifer Chou, in an article in the Weekly Standard, notices the ambiguity involved:
Of the eight books on the list, seven were blackballed because their contents "stepped over the line." Wu did not specify where the that line was, but the message to writers could not have been more clear.
The "line" was not specified but it was "clear." Obtuse is transparent. Sounds like that line from passage 15 of the Tao Te Ching I quoted below:
Who's murky enough to settle slowly into pure clarity...
Legalists using Taoism as a means of power. Is that what is going on here? Or does that make the censors out to be too smart by half? Maybe they're just fumbling bureaucrats unable to get their story straight. Or, maybe they really are caving in to popular pressure. Whatever the case, the ambiguous ban doesn't seem to be working. The books are reportedly still available in Chinese stores and, as Roland suggests:
"Public opinion on this matter was completely one-sided -- there is nobody arguing for the correctness of the 'ban' or even 'criticism." (Confucian-Communist Kong Qingdong, who originally appeared to back the ban, has backed off).
Political leaders might be coming up with ever more obtuse Legalist political tactics, but China is no longer a Legalist society...
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