Writer discusses Chinese culture

Nicholas Kristof remembers the Chinese students who died fighting against their own government. He said he cannot forget Tiananmen Square, where over a thousand students were killed by the Chinese army. The New York Times journalist won the Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the event. Yesterday he traveled to the University to promote his new book and speak about his experiences in China to a crowd of over 100 students in Vance Hall. Kristof said he and his wife, Sheryll WuDunn, wrote their new book China Wakes: The Struggle for the Soul of a Rising Power to emphasize the importance of China's economic reforms and increasing political power. "We wanted to write the book because we think the most important event in the world right now is the rise of China," he said. Kristof said China's political system, although authoritarian, will not be a deterrent to the country's continued economic progress. "It's not true that if a country has a nasty political system, it can't maintain an economic boom," he said. "What determines growth isn't repression but?things like savings rates, and China has one that is seven times that of the U.S." But with this economic prosperity, China practices political repression of its people as well. Kristof said he saw it best at Tiananmen Square five years ago. The writer also described the detention of Chinese dissidents and their treatment in Chinese prisons. He said Chinese citizens were arrested for simply being in contact with foreign journalists. Kristof said China will soon face an unstable political situation after the country's 90-year-old leader, Deng Xiaoping, passes away. He offered his prediction of what would happen following the leader's death. "I think there will be a power struggle," Kristof said. "You might have a military coup." Kristof said communism's future in China is limited. "It is hard to find a person [in China] who believes in communism, including the Communists," Kristof said. "It's more a quasi-fascist country than a Communist country." He said China was slowly becoming a more civil society and was slowly moving toward improving its human rights record. Kristof said he received much of his information from Chinese friends by gossiping with them over dinner. But some students, especially Chinese students, took offense to Kristof's views on China and methods of obtaining information. "All the stories he got [were] from gossip," said a Chinese graduate student who wished to remain anonymous. "He truly believes [he received] the true picture of China from gossip. Is that the true image of China?" Wharton MBA student Mei Levin, who is from mainland China, said Kristof's comments were biased. "I think he's very arrogant in his mindset?It was an extremely Western opinion," he said. "I don't think a Westerner can come in and say what is good and bad." But Wharton MBA student Lydia Gizdavcic said she enjoyed Kristof's speech. "I thought he gave an insight you can't get," she said. "I thought the discussion gave insights that you can't get from reading the newspaper." Kristof's speech was sponsored by the Wharton Asia Club.