Clever headline too ...

It's not a pure nation of craziness though. Here's a great blogpost: 'My Motherland is not my Mother', from my Chinese friend?

how do the chinese demonstrators reconcile living in NZ with their chinese nationalism? is it something like kiwis living in london, but doing a haka in westminster park? (sorry, trite, but?

but every conception of nationalism depends on a selective and conscious retelling of history

and that statement is right on. the retelling creates the national imagination, and that in turn creates a "national conversation" that ends up dominating the way a nation projects itself overseas.

for?

strong stuff. i wonder if a generic kiwi whitey could've written this article without being accused of being xenophobic.

I think a kiwi whitey who could read the banners and place the whole thing in a nuanced historical context would still have been on fairly strong ground.

Keith, is there?

I was having a discussion with a Japanese journalist this week about this issue. He had been to Canberra to cover the torch relay and he noted that the pro-China demonstrations in Australia had also sparked fear and unease amongst the Australian public.

I?

The only message that rallies like last week's send is: "We are upset." It can change actions, up to a point, but it does nothing to change people's opinions. It might have made those?

But at the heart of the demonstrations is a persecution complex that many overseas mainland Chinese have developed about the way their country is perceived internationally. This made them ready and willing to participate in these counter demonstrations.

i think that's an important point. we often seem to be a?

It isn't a particularly productive public relations strategy that will win many friends around the world.

But is that the aim? Judging PR success depends on the audience it was aimed at. Maybe footage of pro-China demonstrations abroad plays very well in China?

But yes, Stephen, you're probably right. The counter-demonstrations were likely aimed with the Chinese domestic public in mind.

Perceptions of China will certainly improve over the next few decades – but the ambassadors are going to be authors, filmmakers, pop-stars, super-models, consumer brands, luxury goods and so on. I think the state has to recognize?

The only message that rallies like last week's send is: "We are upset."

But when a super power becomes upset what then? That was the more chilling message and I am sure the Chinese?

But when a super power becomes upset what then? That was the more chilling message and I am sure the Chinese Government and many of those involved in the rallies knew they were sending it.

my thoughts exactly.

sure, the protesters were out there for a chinese domestic market, but?

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/04/29/america/29student.php

I think the Chinese government has a very poor understanding of public relations.

...I think the state has to recognize that the Chinese Communist Party is never going to be wildly popular in the west and try to keep as low a profile as possible.

They should probably start by?

Its a little like the time I was trapped in my flat for a good half hour because my skanky neigbour was having intimate relations against my front door

You don't *have* to live in Christchurch..

strong stuff. i wonder if a generic kiwi whitey could've written this article without being accused of being xenophobic.

Yeah, I think I'm shielded from that to an extent, but at the same time, I'm also vulnerable to being called an Uncle Tom, banana, etc. Still, I think I can?

my question is how you see this "unified motherland" projection effecting little places like new zealand?

do you think this type of reaction is only because of the olympics? or could you imagine another situation where china mobilises its non-resident citizens to voice the party's position?

I don't think the?

Is there any sense in Chinese nationalism of an equivalent to American exceptionalism — of manifest destiny? Is China supposed to be destined to save the world? Or just China?

No – and perhaps manifest destiny was the term I was looking for in my post. Towards the end of?

'Your invasion and annexation of Tibet is reprehensible, and your ongoing colonisation of the territory with your own people, swamping its original inhabitants and suppressing their culture, is?

http://bunnyhugs.org/2008/05/01/ugly-nationalistic-chinese-demonstration-in-auckland/

Seamus, Tim Kong already posted a link to your post about the demos on Public Address. It is in the thread in the Hard News post about the Homegrown music festival. It's really interesting!

I differed in that I didn't have any serious expectation that Chinese would think too deeply about democracy and freedom right?

what do others think?

i vote for Seamus's blog post to be made into a PA Speaker post.

what do others think?

I think it has a home already, but I'll link to it too. I'm also paying for a Chinese translation of Keith's post.

What's to stop the Chinese student replying, 'Well, it seemed to work pretty well for your ancestors coming to New Zealand in the 19th century,?

Mao was a sociopath

and the agreement wasn't titled Agreement of the British Crown and the Local Tribes of NZ on Measures for the Peaceful Liberation of New Zealand

That was a bit of a giveaway.

In the long run it could be more about how much of Tibet culture?

What's to stop the Chinese student replying, 'Well, it seemed to work pretty well for your ancestors coming to New Zealand in the 19th century, didn't it?

There's an interesting exchange in Dissent between Michael Walzer and Daniel Bell about making these sorts of analogies.

They are also a group that's not usually involved in public demonstrations ? so the fact that so many turned out showed just how much this matters to them.?

I think their chant ?What do we love? Friendship! What do we hate? Protestors!? is illustrative of your point: they protested?

I have never taken a huge interest in Tibet personally. However, I must have met more?

applies to the Tibetan protesters around the world as well?

The most interesting – and confusing – part of this is that the action takes place in the subtext. A group of Tibetans waving Tibetan flags sends a completely different message from a group of Chinese waving Chinese flags.

Just?

First, the t-shirt was invisible since my jacket was buttoned up the whole time I was in Aotea Square. In the photo on my blog you can see me standing in the background, with only the white collar of the t-shirt visible.?

Economically, China seems to have achieved the impossible by rising so quickly from such a low base to where they are now. It's hard to think of any historical comparisons to this meteoric rise in fortunes.

Post WWII Japan springs immediately to mind, but no others.

And of course, the "Tibetan brand" carries a lot of weight, thanks for the Dalai Lama...

It's interesting how some liberation movements have gotten a tremendous boost because a prominant figure is marketable – for want of a better term. The Dalai Lama, Mandela, Ghandi, even Castro when he didn't?

I know someone who showed up to that rally simply for the sing-along to classic patriotic songs experience.

Slightly more serious:

Borrowing a page from Obama's "bitter small town" analysis – these international students might as well be just channeling their dissatisfaction from the mismatch between?

You ask if perspective X is any more nuanced/balanced/objective than perspective Y. If perspective X gives appropriate consideration to information that perspective Y ignores, then surely the answer?

What's to stop the Chinese student replying, 'Well, it seemed to work pretty well for your ancestors coming to New Zealand in the 19th century, didn't it?'

(The counter-argument would be that they brought parliamentary democracy with them. The counter-counter argument is that they also brought Peter Brown)

Well no.?

Post WWII Japan springs immediately to mind, but no others.

Kyle,

i don't think even Japan's rise is in the same league.
sure, in 1945, the country's urban centres were reduced to ashes.
but Japan was one of the world's industrial powerhouses in the 1930s.
the population had a very?

On the Tibet issue itself, given the virtual impossibility of getting news out of there at the moment, I'd recommend the Channel 4 documentary at the link below as essential viewing!

http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2008/05/video-dispatches-undercover-in-tibet/

On the Tibet issue itself, given the virtual impossibility of getting news out of there at the moment, I'd recommend the Channel 4 doco at the link below as essential viewing!

http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2008/05/video-dispatches-undercover-in-tibet/

I was surprised to read in your blog that you felt it necessary to write that Chinese nationalism exists. I can't see how someone could think it doesn't exist unless their so blinded by their own preferred worldview they keep walking into their own reflections.

I also found?

I was surprised to read in your blog that you felt it necessary to write that Chinese nationalism exists. I can't see how someone could think it doesn't exist unless their so blinded by their own preferred worldview they keep walking into their own reflections.

you might be right, but?

Just briefly, I'd like to consider the different tack taken in Autonomous Inner Mongolia. Rather than try to Han-norm the place, the Chinese seem to have deliberately played to the Mongolian identity, paying for the Mausoleum of Genghis Khan

Yes I was wondering about that too. But I see that?

– Chinese like to claim Mongol achievements as their own. The Mongol Yuan were a powerful dynasty that controlled a large territory, and despite not really being?