Jottings from the Granite Studio

At 3:42 local time on July 28, 1976, a massive earthquake struck the Hebei industrial town of Tangshan, destroying the city and damaging buildings in neighboring Beijing and Tianjin.  The official figure issued by the Chinese government (Read: The number the politicians pulled out of their ass) was 242,000 killed.  Other estimates, including initial reports, place the number of casualties as high as 655,000.

China refused international aid and the internal response was hindered by government infighting, bureaucratic incompetence, and the incessant prioritizing of politics over all else.  Chairman Mao was on his deathbed that summer, and the political ramifications of a natural disaster striking as the Helsman lay dying were hardly lost on his bevy of lackeys and supporters.  It was after all the final years of the Cultural Revolution, Zhou Enlai had died that spring, and an impromptu memotial service for the fallen premier grew into a series of massive demonstrations in Tiananmen Square.  Zhou’s protege Deng Xiaoping, who once again had been removed from power, was biding his time, knowing the political winds were shifting, and waiting for the right moment to stage his umpteenth comeback. Mao’s wife Jiang Qing allegedly said regarding Tangshan: “So what? there were several hundreds of thousands of deaths, but the campaign to denounce Deng Xiaoping affects 800 million.”

The recent earthquake in Sichuan is a good sign of just how far the PRC has come in thirty-odd years.  The decision to allow foreign aid and, initially at least, media access was a demonstration of the CCP’s willingness to respond to a major crisis in a responsible manner.

It’s little wonder that disasters are so closely linked in Chinese political philosophy with regime stability and the Mandate of Heaven.  Are there really ‘natural’ disasters?  For example, listening to engineers and investing in better management of the New Orleans levees could have saved countless lives and homes in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.  If a few more Sichuanese bureaucrats had been as concerned with safe school construction and building codes than with lining their man purses and singing KTV with their “Er Nai,” perhaps fewer children would have had to pay the price for a system that does little to discourage official corruption.

In the final years of the Qing, droughts and floods brought a wave of misery that affected large swaths of the empire.  Such problems had occurred before, but by the 19th century, the official and extraofficial systems for thingsl ike levee repair and emergency grain storage had broken down.  What had been crises before became catastrophes.

Even with the vast improvements in the official (and extraofficial) response to crises between Tangshan and Wenchuan, it is telling that one of the subjects domestic media and commentators were cautioned against was any linkage between disasters and politics.

Ah well, speaking of portents, be sure to check the skies this Friday.  A solar eclipse will be visible for those of us in Northern China…that is, if the skies are sufficiently clear enough for us to see the sun at all.