LIFE IN SHANGHAI

Evening Star, Issue 20999, 13 January 1932, Page 11

LIFE IN SHANGHAI

WATCHING THE WORLD GO BY THE INTERNATIONAL SETTLEMENT This city furnishes a telling argument against the Chinese demand for the abolition of the “ unequal ” treaties and for the return of the concessions to the Chinese nation. And the curious thing about it is that it is the action of the Chinese themselves in so flocking to Shanghai as to make of it one of the greatest of Chinese cities instead of merely a foreign settlement of limited population that makes the argument convincing. For despite—or rather because of—the fact that it is governed by an international board, Shanghai is, in fact, a great native city. A row of stately financial buildings of granite along the Bund serves as a facade or screen to the crowded and colourful streets behind that are purely Chinese (writes Willis J. Abbot, in the ‘ Christian Science Monitor ’). Nearly three million .people are massed in this urban district, which in 1842 was a mere mud bank, with a small Chinese walled town in one corner of it. The native city is still there, its walls torn down and converted into broad streets. But it is enveloped and overwhelmed by the international settlements in which live many times as many Chinese as foreigners. The reason they are there is because they believe that under foreign rule they will enjoy a protection to life and property that no Chinese Government can afford.

Shanghai would have been a great city whatever its form of government. It is at the mouth of the deep and muddy Yangtse, which drains one-half of China proper. A thousand miles upstream ocean-going steamships collect the produce of China for export. Three years ago Shanghai ranked first among the great ports of this hemisphere, and now is third among the ports of the world. An imaginative writer has said that its importance as a shipping port could only be paralleled by Now York, if the Mississippi and St. • Lawrence brought their traffic to the docks of the American city. To me, however, the interesting thing about this city is the way in which the Chinese use it as a refuge from themselves. They denounce its existence as a blot on their national escutcheon; they insist that it is the result of a treaty forced upon them by duress; they declare its international government an insult to the sovereignty of China, and they insist that in due time it must all be given _ back. And the very Government which preaches this doctrine keeps its balances in the banks of Shanghai, knowing that only

here will the funds/be safe from some war lord, while the people who are stirred to frenzy by the politicians’ demands for the surrender of the concssions flock here by millions to live in a security from banditry and extortion which their own Government is unable to assure them.

The degree of peace and order maintained under the international government of Shanghai is such that it cannot fail' in time to .impress the rest of China. The idea that laws are made to be observed, not evaded, is spreading as a result of the example of Shanghai. As a great, self-governing city, it cannot fail to affect by example other towns in China, and to help establish the conviction that popular government must rest on law. Not that Shanghai , has the simple and orderly life of a nice New England village. For from it. . Its rapid growth in wealth and population has attracted to it great numbers of criminals and shifty people who live by their wits. Opium and its attendant evils are strongly intrenched. The old native city is a rabbit warren wherein criminals ply nefarious callings in defiance of the police. But their incursions into the international settlements are infrequent, and usually result 'in disaster to themselves. Few cities seem so thoroughly policed as Shanghai. Perhaps the presence of the defenders of the peace is made more apparent and impressive to the western mind by their exotic appearance and picturesqueness. Bearded Sikhs, imported from India, patrol many of the streets and serve as traffic officers. Swarthy of countenance, black bearded, with turbans wrapped about their heads, and standing out amidst the slender Chinese with’ their stalwart, six-foot bodies, these officers convey a very real sense of protection. lam told the Chinese do not like them, and I can readily credit the report. It does not contribute greatly to a people’s self-respect to have members of an alien race set ostentatiously to keep the peace among them. An American city would hardly tolerate a Tartar police force, for example. Moreover, the Sikhs go to no trouble to conceal their utter contempt for the people around them. Courteous in the extreme to a Westerner, dignified and pleasant of countenance when in conversation with a white citizen, their whole demeanour changes when they accost a native. Several times I. have noticed officers of this race checking or rebuking some Chinese coolie or ricksha man. The savagery of facial expression, the contemptuous gesture or blow, showed the tyrannical nature lurking beneath a demeanour which at ordinary times was irreproachable. However, their language was probably no more abusive than that which American “ traffic cops ” are permitted to employ in addressing motorists luckless enough to fall under their displeasure. The Sikhs, though, have stout clubs, and do not scruple to use them. As we came up the river the other day on our arrival from Hongkong, I counted fifteen American destroyers at anchor, as well as a first-class cruiser, the Houston, and two other naval vessels, apparently of the gunboat class. Not far away were a British airplane carrier and two cruisers. Largo Italian and French cruisers were within sight. This powerful Western naval force probably does not portend any apprehension of trouble on the part of the powers, but does add greatly to the feeling of security among foreign residents. The latest figures give about 40.000 foreigners in the International .Settlement and French Concession to 1.400.000 Chinese, while in the .‘‘old city” and in “the Chinese municipality of G'feater Shanghai,” there are as manv more natives.

It is not necessary to ascribe to tbe Chinese any . very persistent or deeprooted hostility to foreigners to make these figures significant. The fact is that at almost any time agitators might lash this great Oriental mass into a frenzy of hate. It is no wonder, then, that the police force—which, by the way, contains several companies of Russians—is organised and equipped on a military basis, with machine guns, artillery, tanks, and airplanes, that there is a citizen army in which all foreigners of military age are expected to serve, and that the citizens generally are happiest when there are plenty of foreign warships in the turbid waters of the Whangpoo. It is only three years since the International Settlement was Surrounded by barbed wire, barricades blocked its streets,’ and all male citizens were enlisted for defence. There is no reason to apprehend any early return of the menace of those days, but while Chinese politicians persist in pointing to Shanghai as an enemy settlement within their country, and while the spoil of the city is so tempting to looters, danger cannot be wholly absent. And yet, Chinese the world over are manifesting in no uncertain way their confidence in the permanence and safety of the International Settlement. Their money is sent for deposit in the twenty branches of foreign banks, the thirtynine modern Chinese banks, and the seventy “ native ” banks—a greater number of financial institutions than is to be found in all China elsewhere. Building is going on to an amazing extent, and land values are soaring because the Chinese feel that investments here are safe from the extortions of tuchuns, war lords, or even the established government. And hero taxes are collected according to law. The Press is free and able to criticise and expose official incompetence or dishonesty. Alone among the cities of China, Shanghai gives to its people good order, sanitation, freedom, financial security, bodily safety. The Chinese hate it, denounce it as an affront to their nation, demand that its government be abolished and the city turned back to the native control which has reduced most of China to practical anarchy. And having thus saved “ face ” by denouncing the barbarians in their midst, they pour their money into Shanghai, flock there themselves, and, in the opinion of many observers, are likely to make it the most populous city in the world within a quarter of a century.