Hidden Harmonies China Blog

I have long maintained that boycotts rarely work well as a tool of political protest.  Even when mobilized as a collective national action like a trade embargo, history has not shown much effectiveness in causing political change, other than merely increasing bitterness (like the Embargo against Cuba).

Against a much larger target, with even broader scope, such as “boycott China”, the sheer size of lunacy of such a proposition is immediately apparent.  Chinese economy is not pinned down in a few special economic sectors, it’s large and diverse, and most importantly international.  It produces final products and components and material.  It’s not merely economical for businesses, it’s necessity of businesses to buy Chinese products.

But even more interestingly, the increase in the internet economy has shown that it’s not just companies like Walmart that dictates the improbability of “boycott China”, it’s increasingly the end user purchasers who are making it impossible to “boycott China”.

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Note: This is a translation of an essay published in the Chinese Youth On-Line (中青在线). This translation is meant to bring to readers’ attention some of the diverse opinions publicly expressed in today’s China. I came across it because it was highlighted as the number one piece in Sina’s (新浪) opinion section.

[UPDATE]: ESWN also has a translation of this article and some more. Interestingly, the version translated at ESWN is from the author (廖保平) Liao Baoping’s blog directly. It is somewhat different than the one I found and contains some more colorful words. In particular, the Chinese Youth On-Line version misses one paragraph at the very end which sets the tone rather differently.

Xinhua reported the news of Sarkozy’s meeting with Dalai Lama in this way: “The French President Sarkozy, despite patient and repeated efforts [by the Chinese side], went ahead to meet with Dalai Lama on 6th. This was an unwise move that seriously hurt the feelings of the Chinese people and damaged the Sino-Franco relationship. The Chinese people’s reaction is evident in the form of angry calls on the Internet for boycotting French goods to defend our national dignity.”

I understand some of the emotions expressed online in China. And I wonder if this is going to result in pretests in the streets. But for me personally, I won’t boycott French goods.
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H/T to David Peng for pointing out this article written by Assaf Lichtash and published in the Jerusalem Post. David also pointed out an interesting discussion thread on this article in Chination Report. Read more…