Awaiting the Freudian Revolution: Chinese Society in Transition 

Jacob FISCH

Perspectives, Vol. 1, No. 3

Tremendous change in China in recent years has galvanized an intense debate among outside observers. One side of this debate champions China's rapid economic growth and social development. An opposing group impugns China's failure to implement political reform and bring about meaningful social change. Unfortunately, the bi-polar nature of this debate has tended to limit the scope of American analysis of China's transformation. Between 1997 and 1998, I lived with a Chinese family in Beijing. Seeing the daily life of a Chinese family made me realize that though social modernization has improved many aspects of life in China, the transition process is difficult and at times confusing and painful. The Chinese family and society now face new problems which, if not properly addressed, will continue to fester and grow.

In 1997 I arrived in Beijing for the purpose of studying the Chinese language. Eager to surround myself with native Chinese speakers, I soon escaped from the foreign student dormitories at Beijing University and moved into the small apartment occupied by Mrs. Hu, her husband Mr. Li, and their fourteen-year-old son, Jing Ming.

It was in the Li family home that I learned the more distasteful side of the Chinese language. The ambient dialogue at home ranged from terse reporting of information, to profanity and insults generally produced by Mrs. Hu and directed at Jing Ming. Jing Ming was a star basketball and soccer player, a popular class wisecrack, and a lousy student. His mother, a rubber-stamping desk-cop, was a brutish woman who ruled both the roost and Mr. Li -- a spineless economist/manager at the Cheng Jian Si Construction Company.

I quickly realized that my expected role was to help Jing Ming rectify his ignominious academic past by tutoring him in English. Jing Ming had attended summer school because he had failed Math and English and performed poorly in his other classes during the past semester. Since Jing Ming lied regularly to shirk his responsibilities, Mrs. Hu would bicycle every day to the home of her son's teacher to confirm his nightly assignment. Often Mrs. Hu would return red-faced from these meetings, bearing reports of Li Jing Ming's unruly class antics.

Confronting Jing Ming, Mrs. Hu would scream, kick and push, her voice rising and falling in the exaggerated tones of the Beijing accent. For the next three hours, she would hover over her son as he worked on his Math, Geography and History. When Jing Ming declared the completion of a subject, Mrs. Hu would seize Jing Ming's workbook and scrutinize the pages. Poorly educated, she had little sense for the content of the material, however she always smelled a rat and felt that Jing Ming was cutting corners. Most often he was. In response to Jing Ming's transgressions, Mrs. Hu would let out a volcano of verbal abuses: "stupid egg," "dumb melon," and the like, all quite insulting in the Chinese language. She would land more kicks and punches. Her attacks were not so much physically punishing -- Jing Ming was a strong and athletic kid -- as they were filled with an aggression that was painful to see directed from mother to son.

During these altercations, Mr. Li would sit in his small bedroom that doubled as the living-room/dining area, listening, but unwilling to interfere with the incidents unfolding in the next room. Mr. Li once reported to me that even when Jing Ming was very young, before he had matured into a failed student, Mrs. Hu would find fault in her son's handwriting or speech or some other more obscure concern. She would light into him then much as she did now. I was told that as a younger child, Jing Ming picked his fingernails until they bled. Now as a fourteen-year-old, he picked his acne so that his face was covered with bloody scabs. I often watched him gouge his face, unconsciously and nervously. Mr. Li said he knew that his wife's behavior was wrong, that her unrelenting negative reinforcement could not possibly be constructive, but he could not stop her. And had he ever tried? I wondered.

By the fall mid-term exams of that year, it was clear that Jing Ming hadn't reformed himself and that my vain attempts to teach him a few basic linguistic concepts had been ineffective. Mrs. Hu's aggression increased. One day she returned from a school meeting, having suffered the embarrassment of finding her son's examination evaluation sheet replete with "red-marks" -- failing grades. Jing Ming, on the other hand, wore an air of complacency. After an evening of yelling, pushing, homework-correcting, and more yelling, Jing Ming was as bouncy and smug as always. He seemed to hold no grudges. He certainly yelled back, even pushed back sometimes, but after the bouts were finished, he would laugh and joke, trying to engage his mother on another level. She responded to his aggressive affection by calling him "stupid egg," kicking him, and (sometimes) smiling after a kick. Despite Jing Ming's mask of indifference and Mrs. Hu's thick self-righteous hide, the situation was visibly trying for both of them. Mrs. Hu often whined unintelligibly to herself. As I headed out to class in the morning, her rising and falling tones would follow me down the staircase, echoing from the apartment, where she stood by herself folding laundry. Jing Ming would chuckle to me that he did not care about any of these: his grades, his future, and his parents. He did not seem resentful. He simply held fast to the facade of an independent and jovial teenager. Once, after animated descriptions of his star role in the day's basketball game, when our discussion turned more serious, he told me that he would not care if he died.

Li Jing Ming also told me during one of these talks that he thought that he was smarter than the other students in his class, but that he had a very difficult time forcing himself to study. I noticed that he was also extremely absent-minded. I wondered if this absentmindedness arose from resentment towards his parents, from daydreaming about Qiaodan (Michael Jordan) or from something else. I watched him bounce back and forth across the room, trying to "strengthen his legs." I wondered seriously whether Jing Ming suffered from Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) and might have benefited from a course of the drug, Ritalin. At least, I thought, if he were living in the U.S. might Ritalin not be prescribed for him?

Clearly, if ADD was a problem, it was far from the only problem. I spent marathon evenings speaking to Li Jing Ming's parents about confidence, positive reinforcement, depression, psychiatry and ADD. They accepted all, and seemed especially keen on the concept of Li Jing Ming having ADD, pleased with the easy medical answer that it offered (I quickly regretted having mentioned ADD, least of all because Ritalin was probably unavailable to them). They even admitted their own short-comings, although it was more Mr.

Li than Mrs. Hu who was open on this front. Mr. Li bemoaned his non-participation, but promptly blamed it on his piles of work and his constant weariness. Mrs. Hu, likewise, accepted my input, and agreed that positive reinforcement was important. But a few days after one of our discussions, she said that she had tried my newfangled "western" method of encouragement (I can only imagine the form that this took), but Jing Ming had not reformed. Mrs. Hu concluded from this brief but enlightening interlude that she simply needed to hit harder and check his homework more carefully.

I did understand the concern of these parents. Already Jing Ming's poor academic record most likely would preclude him from attending university. Moreover, unless he quickly rectified his studies, he would have a difficult time entering any sort of reputable senior high school. In China, tuition for weaker students is greater if they wish to attend the better schools. Meanwhile, only students from the better schools have any hope of continuing to university. Pressure is high. Jing Ming reflected this tension, bearing a complex mix of self-directed frustration resulting from his poor school performance, bundled with the anger and wounded feelings generated as a result of the strain with his parents.

Many issues compounded the acuteness of the situation. First, Jing Ming was a fourteen-year-old boy experiencing the effects of hormonal changes: rebelliousness, interest in girls, and sports. He was naturally unable to stomach the demand to spend most of his non-school time cramped with his parents in this 350 square feet apartment. Second, he might have had ADD. Third, Jing Ming was the only child, a product of the one-child-policy, without any sibling to mitigate his parents' relentless pressure. Only a television turned on at dinner time allowed the family to shift their attention from Jing Ming's failures. I suggested that they take a stroll together and spend some time as a family outside of this den of bad feelings. But at this suggestion, the stale excuses poured forth: Mr. Li didn't have the time and, of course, Jing Ming needed to study.

Even during the six months I was present in this household I witnessed the conflagration intensify. Family life revolved around a vain attempt to find some way to "repair" Jing Ming before it was too late. I suggested a psychiatrist for the whole family and Mr. Li and Mrs. Hu were interested (a point to which I credited their courage). However, psychiatrists are far from abundant in China, not even in Beijing, and most certainly not included under the Danwei (work unit) health care coverage. Although Mrs. Hu found the name of a psychiatrist through an advertisement in the newspaper, she rationalized her ultimate decision not to investigate further by explaining to me that the doctor's office was too far.

On television and on the radio, talk shows addressing depression, family issues, and even teen-rebelliousness aired with relative frequency, although their content seemed cautious. These programs did little to help the Li family sort out their own problems. A New York Times article published this past year notes that the suicide rate in China is three times that of the world average. Recently, the American media has been awash with reports focusing on China's increasing problems of unemployment, income disparity, internal migration, and other social difficulties resulting from China's rapid modernization. Likewise, the compounded issues at the root of the strife in the Li household seem products of the same process. In major cities where the "one child policy" is enforced, pressure on children to succeed in the face of tremendous competition is immense. At the same time, these children, enticed by popular western culture epitomized by Michael Jordan, Nirvana, Arnold Swartzeneger, are increasingly estranged from their parents' ideals and from traditional stress on family unity and hierarchy. A rising tide of school dropouts, hooligans, drug addicts and alcoholics reflects modern teen angst and a society of parents "who just don't understand." Of course, the pernicious effects of modern social change are not unique to China. Indeed, Western communities continue to wrestle with similar problems. However, China seems comparatively ill-equipped in dealing with these problems. One explanation might be that Western society has had a century to assimilate Freudian theory into mass culture and consciousness. Though outside the academic sphere, Sigmund Freud is not read widely, the Freudian psycho-theory has become a fundamental pillar of the Western culture, even if it is not popularly recognized as such. Today, practically every edition of Reader's Digest or People's Magazine contains at least one article that addresses issues of "self-confidence," "self-awareness," "happiness" or other similar issues. This vocabulary has transcended academic circles, and is today in the West familiar to people at all stages of life and in all types of relationships, largely as a result of Freud's contributions.

Although similarly afflicted by many negative influences of the modernization process, the Chinese society seems, however, bereft of what has become an important cultural component and social salve in the West. Today, Chinese families are left to face their difficulties with limited guidance and few reference points. The example of the Li family and what I observed as the fragile condition of the interpersonal relationships within that family seem to reflect this reality. Until China begins to educate its population in earnest and bring social understanding into line with its burgeoning economy, I'm afraid that the traditional Confucian social unit, the Chinese family, is in danger.

(Jacob Fisch is a Research Associate for Asia at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.)