Word: zhao
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...Cultural Revolution hardened his own resolve, Zhao says, it taught the nation a lesson. "The ultraleft line was carried to its logical conclusion and was thoroughly discredited in the eyes of the people," he says. "The Cultural Revolution paved the way for the current reforms." He disagrees with those who believe that revenge alone is what powers current policies. For example, Zhao argues, the trial of the Gang of Four is a reassertion of the authority of written law after a period when "the top leaders' words were law." "It's very easy to gain vindication," he says, dismissing...
...trial is also part of a reevaluation of Mao, Zhao explains, with a frankness that several Harvard Sinologists say is unusual for a Chinese today. "It's really cutting [Mao] down to size." Zhao believes. "He was deified. In his late years, when there was obvious senility, he made mistakes...
...those mistakes--one which Zhao believes will haunt PRC leaders for some time--is economic imbalance. Despite recent decentralization efforts, Chinese leaders' attempts to correct the economy's heavy industry and urban biases have not yet been successful. Citing a steel plant, which has already cost the regime more than $20 billion, Zhao says, "It's like sitting on a tiger. You can't give it up because you've sunk so much money into it, and you can't continue it because it's costing more and more...
...Zhao supports the current leadership and predicts that state power will "mellow in time." But he does not believe that economic decentralization means, as many observers have said, that China will become a "capitalist" nation, with increasingly democratic tendencies. Like most nations, he believes, China will develop a mixed system. Economic improvements will raise the standard of living, which in turn will spur people to ask for greater freedom. In his own field, he notes that "in the past, either you towed the party line and wrote about, things you didn't want to write about, or you didn...
Long-term political change, he believes, will be difficult to implement. "Any reform will hurt the vested interest," Zhao contends. "Bureaucracy abhors change and present policies are running into a stiff resistance." If Deng's policies fail, Zhao warns, the nation will either revert to following the Soviet Union or become "something like Iran, neither pro-Western nor pro-Eastern, but internally confused and chaotic...