Monthly Archives: January 2014

theorizing shenzhen speed

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If it takes twelve hours for one person to lay so much concrete, for example, there are several options for speeding up the result. One person can work 1.5 eight hour days or one person can work one twelve-hour day and work has “sped up”. If cooperation is introduced, then two people could complete the task in 6 hours or three people could each work .5 days. Anyway, the Marxian point is clear: “speed” is a result of changing work conditions, increasing either individual hours of labor or increasing the number of laborers.

The ongoing question, of course, is: what makes exploitation acceptable? Why did early Shenzheners (and the rest of the country) celebrate Shenzhen Speed as a good thing especially when it meant exponentially increasing exploitation in terms of both individual work hours and numbers of workers?

Consider, for example, that it to a country to build Guomao (忆改革：曾经中国第一高楼. The Hunan Provincial Geological Survey Company was responsible for surveying the site. Hubei Provincial Industrial Architecture Design Institute Designed the building. And the Corps of Engineers worked “day and night (日夜不停)” for two months to put in the foundation. The Number 2 Guangdong Construction Company built the frame. The Chinese National Number 3 Construction and Engineering Bureau constructed the actual building.

Shenzhen speed was defined as building one story of a building in three days, and maintaining that pace for 53 stories (Guomao building). The the KK 100 the broke that record. But the pace of what an individual can do hasn’t actually increased. What’s increased is the speed at which results happen, which in turn, usually leads to increased exploitation.

At the time, this collaboration to achieve nationally symbolic goals was not new. Nor was the fact that Municipal Secretary and Mayor Liang Xiang approved Municipal land for the project. What was new was that the justification for this speed was to demonstrate the SEZ’s internationalism (read — willingness to do capitalist style business).

So Shenzhen speed was generated for national goals. At the time it started, this exploitation was a sign of patriotism and national commitment. Today, however, Shenzhen speed has come to refer to the speed at which people burn out, a taken for granted law of the market.

Sigh.

futian district, report on

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Shenzhen rushes forward, or keeps rushing forward. The Districts also hurry along toward goals that change with a shift in leadership. And yet the meetings drag. Even an hour. Drag.

Day before yesterday, Futian District invited me to observe their report on the work of the government. Wang Qiang presented. Highlights? The speed at which the economy continues to lurch upward. Futian per capita GDP hit US$32,700 surpassing that of South Korea. Indeed, the report of government work began with economic statistics and just kept pounding home the point — the business of government is, well, business. Futian fixed assests grew at 8.5 percent, exports surged 50%, and tax revenues grew at 7.7% surpassing all other districts. Futian has developed something called a “building economy” that is basically tax revenue from specific buildings. In 2013, five more buildings were added to the list of 68 buildings generating more than 100 million yuan in annual tax revenue. The economic focus is high-end industry and includes what is apparently called “headquarters economy (总部经济)” whereby a government attracts multinational companies to locate their headquarters in a particular territory. Apparently three Fortune 500 companies also invested in Futian.

Futian holds shopping festivals, electronics consumption festivals at Huaqiangbei, and is promoting commerce growth. The District has introduced six international or state level innovation centers, including the Cisco R&D Center and the Functional Materials Research Institute under the Chinese Academy of Engineering Physics. Futian is promoting intellectural property rights service intustries and a pilot zone for “technology plus finance development”. Intensive development of industrial land (Futian has many older industrial parks), online interface between the public and government, and more sophisticated forms of urban management — all are projects forwarded in 2013… anyway, you get the idea. Information dump. Drag.

But. There was a point (from the translated report):

Our achievements over the past year can be attributed to the correct leadership of the municipal committee of the CPC, the municipal government and the district committee of the CPC, as well as the efforts by the people of Futian.

The District’s English portal introduces Futian and its charms. To illustrate the ongoing transformation of Futian, I offer photographic impressions from the subway installation at Huaqiangbei.

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impressions from urban fetish

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A few shots from the performance! From handpuppets through sandcastles to silver models of buildings that landed like science fiction extraterrestials, urban fetish was a a celebration of creativity, desire and excess.

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tangtou and southern daily

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The Tangtou row houses are finally empty. My favorite family has moved elsewhere, leaving behind butterflies, flowers, and a stencil that reads “Southern Weekly, Southern Weekly, Southern Weekly”. The father earns his living by selling advertizing space for the print edition of Southern Weekly. All in all a poignant reminder of how vulnerable civil society and debate remains.

Southern Daily was the one newspaper that has been vocal about evictions and the rights of migrant workers. However, on December 27, 2013 it undermined its credibility by giving the police the names of protesters who had supported the newspaper during January 2013 protests. The newspaper’s decision to cooperate with the police has angered and disgusted many who are calling for the publishing house to release the names of the leaders who have betrayed the people who came to their defence. As with last January’s Southern Weekly Incident, the public learned of this incident because staff broke ranks to blow the whistle on them. Details gathered in the article “Southern Weekly, it would have been better for you to have died, then to have lived to commit today’s shame (南周 恨不当年死 留作今日羞)

Sigh.

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the right to depend on one’s son

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In Xintang, Baishizhou, this 60-year old gentleman has been protesting for a month. His demand? He wants the right to depend on his son for his old age care.

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In Shenzhen, parents can transfer their hukou from hometowns to the SEZ based on their children’s hukou status. Once they have this hukou, they can take advantage of subsidized medical care from their 65th birthday. The problem? This gentleman’s son does not have a Shenzhen hukou. In addition, he does not own a house and is facing eviction upon the completion of negotiations to raze Baishizhou (admittedly at least two or three years in the future). At such time, he will loose his shop, and without equity in the building, will not receive compensation. So he is facing a perilous retirement.

The wording of the protest is of interest. 投靠 (tóu kào) literally means “throw oneself to depend upon”. It can also be translated as “become a retainer of”. Within the rhetoric of this protest, this gentleman is demanding the right to become his son’s retainer.

The form of his demand is similarly coached in feudal language; indeed his banners function as petitions to leaders rather than as social demands. He asks Xi Jinping, for example, if the General Secretary realizes that although in Beijing old people have welfare, the old people in Shenzhen have a different situation. He then asks Xi Jinping to visit Shenzhen and see the situation. Likewise, he asks Shenzhen Secretary Wang Rong and Shenzhen Mayor Xu Qin where the Communist Party is.

The moral economy of noblesse oblige gives these questions their oppositional force. The question put to Xi Jinping implies that if the General Secretary understood the true situation in Shenzhen, he would rectify it. The question put to Wang Rong is even more pointed: has the Communist Party abandoned its responsibility to take care of the people?

In order to make this moral claim, the gentleman also demonstrates that he has upheld his end of the moral contract between government and the future. First, he followed the one child policy and only gave birth to a son. Second, he came to Shenzhen twenty-three years ago to make a better life for himself and his family. During that time, his son was back in his hometown to go to school. Third, he never broke any other laws.

Shenzhen has been at the forefront of reforming its pension system. In practice, this has been the commodification of services. For those with Shenzhen hukou, there are still some benefits. However, as this gentleman reminds us, in the present real security comes through family ties and home ownership.

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2013 in review

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The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2013 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 34,000 times in 2013. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 13 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

urban fetish / baishizhou

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Fat Bird premieres another play!

This Saturday and Sunday afternoon at the Value Factory, Fat Bird will perform Urban Fetish / Baishizhou. After the performance, I will lead a discussion about “Life, Labor and Desire” in and around the Shenzhen Dream. The show and discussion begin at 2:30 and will end between 4:30 and 5:00, depending on how lively the discussion gets.

Here’s the curatorial statement from Yang Qian (urban fetish baishizhou curatorial statement english):

Discussion Theater
URBAN FETISH / BAISHIZHOU
A Historic Interlude that did not, will not and cannot Exist

Sun up; work
Sundown; to rest
Dig well and drink of the water
Dig field; eat of the grain
Imperial power is? and to us what is it?

The fourth; the dimension of stillness.
And the power over wild beasts.
– Canto 47, Ezra Pound

The life that Ezra Pound described was once quite close, with memories only three generations away from the present.

However, today we live in a world where you are what you own. This is a material era, transforming fetishism into poetic theater.

At 2:30 p.m. on the fourth and fifth days of January 2014, during the Fifth Edition of the Shenzhen Hong Kong Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism/ Architecture, in Venue A, Fat Bird Theatre invites each member of the audience to travel to a future Baishizhou. As one of the lucky property owners, you will experience unimaginable luxury from your seat in the theatre. Indeed, this surreal, poetic experience will make your neighbors – homeowners in Portofino, Shenzhen’s most expensive real estate development – envious because their future has already been built. But you are about to create a future that can only belong to you. Compared to them, you are successful.

In the theater, you will see a community buried, and on its ruins a dreamlike city emerge, and you and others like you will own this new world. You will see a place where 140,000 migrant workers once lived. Like you, they came to realize the Shenzhen Dream: wearing designer clothing, luxury housing, and lazy shopping mall days. But you are the lucky one; they have been pushed aside. Compared to them, you are successful.

You own a car, but sometimes you walk the streets of Shenzhen, and when you do, you see the posters that read, “When you arrive, you are a Shenzhener”. But in this theater you are sure of one truth: “Arriving you live in an urban village, when you get out, you are a Shenzhener”. So your experience in theater will tell you – the urban village is not Shenzhen. Urban village residents are not Shenzheners. Compared to them, you are successful.

If this theatrical experience confirms your belief in objects, your desires, and your optimism about the future then you should have no doubts about what you do and will obtain.

The discussion theater Urban Fetish / Baishizhou is a symbolic exploration of architecture and its objects, urban forms and what it means to create an environment. It is a meditation on the meaning of the urban village, a historically specific artifact. It is part of a search to discover the meaning and problems of urbanization.

After the performance, Dr. Mary Ann O’Donnell will lead a discussion with the audience on the topic, “Life, Labor, and Desire”.

the winners of the mistress awards have been announced!

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The results of the “National Awards for Mistresses (全国包二奶大奖赛)” spoof the time and money and presumably effort that some of China’s leaders have expended on accumulating mistresses. The results indicate that many have crossed that fine line between peforming masculine virility and paradoy, which in turn slides into corruption charges because no one actually believes these old men are achieving sexual satisfaction, let alone satisfying their young mistresses — the numbers are just too high. Indeed, the results seem more like baseball cards than gossip; we’re trading statistical representations of performance, rather than vicariously participating in the realization of desire (or actually enjoying a sunny afternoon game). I’m also wondering about how many of these leaders were simply pimping their way to business deals and higher political ranking because these statistics are invariably linked to corruption charges and convictions. Consequently, when available I’ve also linked the offenders’ names to English language reports about these cases.

Results of the National Mistress Awards

1. Quantity Award: Jiangsu Province Department of Construction, Xu Qiyao Director, Xu Qiyao (徐其耀) who has had 146 mistresses;

2. Quality Award: Chongqing Municipal Party Committee Department of Propaganda Director, Zhang Zonghai (张宗海)for having kept 17 beautiful co-eds in five star hotels;

3. Scholar’s Award: Hainan Province Textile Bureau Chief Li Qingshan (李庆善) for his collection of 95 sexual diaries and 236 illustrated guides;

4. Youth Award: Leshan Mayor Li Yushu (李玉书 Sichuan Province) for keeping 20 mistresses between the ages of 16 and twenty;

5. Management Award: Xuancheng Municipality Party Secretary Yang Feng (Anhui Province) for using his MBA to effectively manage 77 lovers;

6. Expense Award: Shajing Credit Union Manager Deng Baoju (邓宝驹 Bao’an District, Shenzhen), also known as the “5 mistress youth” for spending 18.4 million yuan over 800 days on mistresses, this averages to 23,000 perday or almost 1,000 per hour;

7. Solidarity Award: Zhouning County Head Lin Feilong (林龙飞 Fujian Province) for organizing a dinner for 22 mistresses and awarding a 300,000 prize for best mistress;

8. Harmony Award: Lingao Municipal Administration Chief Deng Shanhong (邓善红 Hainan Province) for having 6 children by 6 mistresses and a wife who says she doesn’t believe the gossip;

9. Effort Award: Hunnan Province Telecommunications Bureau Chief Zeng Guohua (曾国华) for guaranteeing that before he turns 60, he will have sex three times a week with each of his 5 mistresses.

a new year, a renovated seaworld

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January 1, 2014. Shekou is preparing for the 30th anniversary of Deng’s 1984 visit to Shenzhen and Zhuhai, January 24-29. At the time, the tour was also an explicit celebration of Shekou, a different model of reforming and opening the Maoist apparatus. Images below are of renovations as of December 31, 2013. Yes, there is a light show. Yes, the transformers flash and when you ride the stationary bikes they blast a Beyond song that was popular in the mid-1980s. And yes, the Ming Wah is now in the water even as the coastline extends beyond Nuwa. Impressions of the upgrade, below:

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