China more relaxed, says professor

Press, 29 November 1978, Page 16

China more relaxed, says professor

r China is more relaxed and less politicised than it has been for more than 10 years, according to Professor Ross Terrill, an Aus-tralian-born authority on China who has just paid his fifth visit to the country. Dr Terrill, whose fluency in Chinese allows him to take the pulse of the country better than most foreign visitors, compared the atmosphere in China today with the atmosphere he found there on his first visit in 1964, before the Cultural Revolution. It was now possible to enjoy an evening at the theatre in China without any echo of current politics intruding. A revealing detail. Dr Terril) suggested, was provided by a shooting gallery in a Canton park. In 1971, the targets in this gallery had been United States soldiers; in 1975, soldiers of no definite origin: tn 1978 the targets had been changed to animals. Dr Terrill noted also a strong emphasis on economic production in today’s China. Workers were being rewarded for the quality and speed of their work with bonuses of up to 20 per cent of their basic wage This gave a very “commercial” aspect to the country. Professor Terrill was cautious about whether China would achieve its new economic aims China had great strengths, he said. Among them were excellent natural resources. greater national unity than might have been expected so soon after the death of Mao Tse-tung, and an educated workforce Universal highschool education was responsible for this. The country’s universities he found still in a “mess.” partly because thev aoneared still to be positions of strength for 1 those opnosed to China’s new policies The inof the universities were partly. Professor Terrill suggested, why

Chinese students were being sent abroad in unprecedented numbers. But China also had weaknesses. The country was deficient in managerial skills and had a weak transport system, in spite of much-heralded new road and rail construction projects. One weakness was a shortage of motor vehicles and the inability of Chinese factories to make up the shortage. The result was that China had had to import large numbers of vehicles from Japan. Most city taxis were now Japanese cars China could, Dr Terrill said, probably meet its target of a rate of indus♦rial growth of 10 to 11 per cent a year but might be hard pressed to meet its goals for agricultural production. Trade would certainly, expand; it had already increased from last year’s SUS 14 billion (for two-way trade) to SUS2S billion. The imports were to be mostly hightechnology goods. although some foodstuffs, among them grain and sugar, would orobably be imported also. These imports would be paid for bv exports ol oil. New discoveries of lowwax oil in western China were suitable to Australian and New Zealand needs. Australia saw this oil as a promising way of redressing the balance of its trade with China, which is at present heavily in Australia’s favour A political backlash a°a ; nst China’s new. pragmatic policies could upset China’s economic nlans, but Dr Terrill thought maim political upheavals unlikelv, in large measure because Chairman Mao was no longer on the scene 'fan had been responsible for the zig-zags Chinese nnlicv f'nrn the Great Leap Forward' ts-, ~„h Cult”rai Revolution. Now that Chm, h ac j i ns) jt s “crazy genius ” such violent . o f noijcv were less Jikelv. Dr Terrill suggest“d. He found a surprising readiness among Chinese

officials to criticise Mao. The phrase "hoist high the flag of Mao Tse-tung’s thought” would probably be used to justify hoisting Maoism so high that noone could read exactly what was written. Maoism was likely to become a general ethic rather than a guide to immediate policy. Mao had not been, in recent years, a positive force in China, in Dr Terrill’s pinion. Another Mao, he suggested, would be like having a sculptor on an assembly line — someone unsuitable to the tasks of the moment. “Ultra-Leftism” still, however, had it advocates in high places One of them. Dr Terrill suspected, was a party vice-chair-man, Wang Tung-hsien, who had had a long persona) association with Mao. Wang’s fate would be a strong clue to the direction of Chinese policy: another would be how Teng Hsiao-ping, the VicePremier largely responsible for China’s new policies. and Chairman Hua Kuo-feng adjusted their positions relative to each other. < hairman Hua’s role in recent years had been to turn against the far Left from a position Left of Centre. He was likely 'to be either edged aside or to move to the' Right himself. What he might do Dr Terrill found it hard to suggest, in part because Chairman Hua was much less frequently spoken of in China than Mr Teng. In international affairs, Dr Terril! said there w>as a real prospect that the Sino-Soviet split would become less pronounced. Policy towards the Soviet Union was the only area of policv in which China had refused to adopt a more pragmatic stand But the confrontation was undnubtedlv economicallv and politically costly to China and was likely, for this reason alone, to become muted. Reduced foreign aid by China, as competition with the Soviet Union became less intense, was one firm prediction Dr Terril would make.