as the national appetite for resources swells. Despite the surge in renewable energy supplies, China is more dependent on coal than ever. As well as mining record amounts of the fuel, it has also become a net importer.
Rhetorically, “Scientific Development” sounds a little less Mao and a little more Tao but in practice, it is another attempt to manufacture a solution to China’s problems. Political engineers rather than natural scientists call the shots. Their approach focuses on the acute environmental symptoms of pollution and energy inefficiency. Meanwhile, they often neglect the chronic problems of resource depletion, heavy-metal accumulation in the soil, and the rising clouds of carbon in the air. The overall trend is that of a dozen small, dirty chimneys being replaced by a single towering smokestack. The result is that local pollution improves but more emissions than ever are pumped into the global atmosphere. China’s greenhouse gas output will more than double between 2005 and 2020, despite the government’s promise to reduce the carbon intensity of the economy by more than 40 percent.
Instead of constraining demand for natural resources, the government puts more effort into increasing supply. At times its measures appear reckless, even desperate. How else to see the building of dams near seismic fault lines, the development of coal liquefaction facilities, the expansion of genetically modified crops, and the expensive ecological gamble of the South-North Water Diversion Project? There is clearly a strong willingness to experiment, despite frequent failures. Almost none of the eco-cities, eco-villages, eco-cars, and even eco-toilets I have seen are operating successfully on a commercial basis. Several are a disaster. But who would bet against China leading the way in future global experiments in cloud whitening, ocean fertilizing, and genetic modification?
Hopes for a green future are premature. Fears of a red past seem outdated. If any single color predominates in today’s China, it is the gray of smoke and ash and concrete, of horizon-blurring smog, of law-obscuring vagueness, and of color-stifling monotony. More species are dying out, more forests are emptying, fish stocks are declining, water shortages are growing more severe, deserts are encroaching on cities, glaciers are shrinking, and the climate is becoming more hostile. Countless millions die each year of environment-related disease. Yet the government is choosing farm animals over wildlife, monoculture over biodiversity, concrete over earth, and weather modification over truly ambitious moves to tackle global warming.
It is difficult to be dispassionate, still harder to claim the truth. Different baselines clearly produce very different expectations. Amid the smog, dust, and algae, I have felt at times that China portends an environmental apocalypse. Yet, more often that not, local people tell me, “Life is getting better.” That is probably the refrain I have heard more than any other during the past seven years, often prompting me to wonder which was coloring perceptions more: my western, liberal, middle-aged prejudices or the communist propaganda of the Chinese government.
Whatever the political label, I sympathize with President Hu and Premier Wen. Environmental triage is particularly difficult in China, which can be afflicted by drought, floods, dust storms, and pollution disasters in a single week. That is not the only reason this is no ordinary developing nation. China is a 3,000-year-old civilization in the body of an industrial teenager; a mega-rich, dirt-poor, overpopulated, underresourced, ethnically diverse mass of humanity that is going through several stages of development simultaneously; a coal-addicted powerhouse attempting to pioneer new energy technologies, and a communist-led, capitalist-funded economic giant traveling at unprecedented speed. If that is not enough of a challenge, environmental pressures have forced the leadership to attempt something unprecedented in the world’s history: to reengineer an economy before it has finished industrializing.
I doubt they have the authority to achieve this. Despite the politburo’s nominally dictatorial powers, it is either reluctant or unwilling to impose any measure that might constrain growth. Indeed, it often punishes those who try to do so. Environmental activists who expose pollution scandals are sometimes beaten up, locked away, or censored. Religions, unions, journalists, lawyers, universities, NGOs, aristocracies, and other independent sectors of society that resisted untrammeled economic expansion in other nations have either been abolished or kept under tight control.
Power resides not at the top or bottom of society, but in the bulging middle band of local party chiefs, factory owners, foreign investors, and outsourcers who have profited most from the lack of environmental regulations. As I saw in Guangdong and Heilongjiang, these Mini-Maos in regional governments do not take kindly to any measure that curtails their expansion. They are the reason the government, despite its authoritarian reputation, is less able to rein in polluters than dissidents.
To counter this, it is often argued that China needs more democracy and a bigger middle class. But people power alone will not solve all of the country’s environmental problems. A swelling middle class could make things much worse unless beliefs and lifestyles also change. In this case, the West has set a dire example in dealing with the biggest threat of our age: consumption.
Pollution was yesterday’s priority. Climate change is tomorrow’s. Both are symptoms of a bigger, more immediate malaise: the unsustainable consumption pioneered by advanced, wealthy democracies, and now increasingly replicated by rich citizens of developing nations like China.
Having visited almost every province in the country, I am far more concerned about Shanghai’s friendly shoppers than Henan’s snarling polluters. The latter are a recognized problem that can be cleared up with sufficient time, money, and government effort. The former, however, are hailed as potential saviors of the global economy. Nobody wants to stop them. Indeed, businesses spend a fortune encouraging consumers to spend more. Their advertising campaigns have proved devastatingly successful. The energy use of the average person in Shanghai has surpassed that of Tokyo, New York, and London and is now 50 percent higher than the global norm.
The rest of the country has some way to catch up, but that is what the government wants. To provide everyone in China with a Shanghai lifestyle, factories will need to churn out an extra 159 million refrigerators, 213 million televisions, 233 million computers, 166 million microwave ovens, 260 million air conditioners, and 187 million cars. Power plants would have to more than double their output. The demand for raw materials and fuel will add enormously to global environmental stress and security strains.
The story of China is changing. On one hand, it is still partly the heart-warming tale of a poor nation catching up with the West. But it is also increasingly the threat of wealthy individuals and megacities that are gobbling up resources and producing waste at a rate that is as destructive and unsustainable as almost anyone and anywhere overseas. The cultural and economic line between “them” and “us” has blurred. But our shared environmental reflection could hardly be more clear or less flattering.
Faced by the resource depletion and climate change, the world community needs to shift away from nationalist competition to consume, and toward an internationalist cooperation to conserve. If the planet’s resources were priced properly for their long-term value to future generations, rather than their immediate accessibility, mankind might just be able to avoid a disastrous fight for what’s left. I am not holding my breath. It’s a big “might.” As the Copenhagen climate conference showed us, no government—of whatever political stripe— wants to raise prices or tell citizens to consume fewer resources.
For China, that is particularly difficult. The leadership has no electoral mandate. It relies on economic growth and nationalism for legitimacy. How can Hu or Wen possibly say to their people, “You cannot eat as much or buy as much as citizens in rich nations”? How can consumers in wealthy countries have the temerity to complain if they do?
Strictly in terms of equality, China should have the same scope to damage the planet in the future as rich nations have done in the past. It should also have the same right to consume. This would be completely fair and utterly calamitous. It would allow China to increase its emissions beyond 2050. By that time, the atmosphere will increasingly resemble an Inner Mongolian stew, presuming nations have not gone to war before that over scarce energy supplies or the right to shop for luxuries.
A better environment needs better values. It is unreasonable to ask China to save the world, but the country forces mankind to recognize we are all going in the wrong direction. Technological progress is essential, but it is not enough. Before we retool our economies, we need to rethink our fundamental beliefs. In this regard, China has much to contribute.
The country’s environmental and philosophical history should be more deeply mined. The world’s longest- enduring civilization offers lessons in how to sustain, such as the Taoist appreciation of “useless trees” or the growing academic skepticism toward “foolish old men who move mountains.”
Ethnic, social, and cultural diversity is likely to be another source of new ideas. Antidotes to materialism can be found in the nature worship of Tibetan and Mongolian Buddhism. There are traces of sustainability in the day of rest practiced by the country’s Muslims and Christians. Temples nationwide have some of the best-protected
