Traffic education with Chinese characteristics

Poster at a Chinese motorway service area :: © Heike Schmidbauer

Over the years, the Chinese nanny state has formulated a whole lot of dos and don'ts for its seemingly unmanageable population: 'Don't spit', 'don't litter', 'don't hang out the washing in the streets', 'don't wander around in your pyjamas in public', 'don't swear', 'queue in an orderly manner', 'behave yourself in foreign countries', 'love party and nation'.

The list could go on forever. And in its overall desire to produce civilized model citizens, the party-state certainly does not shy away from drastic actions.

This is nowhere more pronounced than in the area of traffic education. To be fair, safety problems on streets and motorways are indeed very serious concerns to China. According to the 'Global status report on road safety 2013' (pdf) published by the WHO, the country had a reported number of road traffic deaths of 70,134 and an estimated road traffic death rate per population of 20.5 in 2010 (US: 32,885 and 11.4, Germany: 3,648 and 4.7, respectively).

Even given the fact that the numbers have been decreasing constantly in the last couple of years, Chinese traffic death rates still are among the highest in the world. Being a nation of mostly first-generation car owners, that shouldn't come as a big surprise.

Traffic authorities have come up with a bundle of measures to counter the disturbing trend of reckless driving, speeding, alcohol consumption, overloaded trucks and buses, or tired drivers.

One of these is the widespread use of more or less extreme shock tactics. Aspiring new drivers are sometimes educated by being shown gruesome footage of crushed vehicles or by releasing videos of grisly road accidents depicting in graphic detail the dire consequences of lax driving habits.

One illustrative example for traffic education with Chinese characteristics is the photo above.

I came across the poster on the route from Shenzhen to Yangshuo and was stunned immediately. As if the actual mayhem wouldn't be enough, some splatter artist had to add artificial blood spots to highlight the gory effect.

Not being overly squeamish, I nearly had to admire the cartoonish nature of the artwork. Not so my Chinese friend who was the driver (and is far more sensitive). He even refused to have a glance at this inspired piece of education politics. I don't know if there are any impact studies available, but I have some doubts whether the explicit scare tactics by China's traffic authorities actually work.

Oh, in case you are into the gory stuff (and can stomach it), there are hours of video playtime on YouTube and its Chinese equivalent Youku of truly horrible road accidents in different regions of the country.

News from ChinaFile

Screenshot ChinaFile

Maybe I am a little late with this. But for those of you who haven't discovered the fine site yet, let me shortly introduce the notable ChinaFile (Zhongcanguan) to you.

It is a newer English-language, not-for-profit online magazine published by The Center on U.S.-China Relations at the Asia Society. Starting in 2011, the highly productive team around renowned China specialist Orville Shell curates, syndicates, archives, commissions and produces in-depth coverage of China that is rarely found elsewhere.

ChinaFile encompasses an impressive wealth of information on topics as diverse as the arts, business and the economy, education, energy and the environment, health, history, law, media, the military, politics, religion, rural life, science, society, technology or urban life.

The magazine works closely with distinguished partners such as The New York Review of Books, The Atlantic, Caixin or The Hong Kong Economic Journal as well as the web sites chinadialogue, Tea Leaf Nation and CNPolitics or the arts and literature magazine LEAP.

Thoughtful analyses and extensive reports, presentations of important new books with taped video explanations by the respective authors, a wide range of compelling interview material, a vast media section with fantastic photo essays and inspiring video productions allow for a much deeper understanding of this ever-changing entity called 'China'.

In addition, the outlet holds a growing digital archive of regular real-time video discussions on topics that dominate the headlines with some of the leading China experts, ranging from conversations about Xi Jinping's new culture wars to debates over the current state of China's economic reforms.

Overall, the publishers stated aim is to identify subjects that are otherwise underrepresented and to offer an online platform where viewpoints that are both innovative and well-written are most welcome.

For an example of an excellent contribution that goes far beyond the usual topics, try the Q&A on Uighur youth culture and music as depicted in the film 'The Silk Road of Pop' by Sameer Farooq and have a look at the following trailer.

By the way, another interesting sideline of the Asia Society is also worth mentioning. Titled 'the China BOOM Project', the interactive web site features dozens of interviews with people from all walks of life, be it academics, business leaders, politicians or journalists, Chinese and foreign alike, who have closely monitored the ups and downs of the Chinese reform process and thus are able to provide unique insights into China's astonishing boom.

New sounds from the Middle Kingdom

Second Hand Rose at the Modern Sky Music Festival in Central Park / New York City, October 2014
© May S. Young / Flickr / CC BY-SA 2.0

Ever heard of Duck Fight Goose, P.K.14, Carsick Cars, Wu Tiao Ren, White+, Hedgehog, Wang Wen or The Gar?

Most probably not - and you are surely not alone. On the global map of highly successful music industries outside national borders, the PR China remains a blind spot (if you choose to neglect the not so small Chinese diaspora).

Generally, the Chinese mainstream music market has been heavily dominated by Cantopop, Mandopop, K-pop and J-pop since the country opened-up to the outside world at the end of the 1970s, and artists from Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea and Japan continue to make the big bucks.

But beyond the enormous mainstream market, a vibrant and very diverse independent music scene has carved out a niche for itself in the last decades. (For an overview of the specifics of the Chinese music business, see this piece.)

Without any question, the major power behind the gradual emergence of a flourishing independent music industry was (and still is) the Beijing-based record company Modern Sky (Modeng Tiankong) Entertainment.

Founded in 1997 by the lead singer of the then widely popular Brit pop band Sober (Qingxing), Shen Lihui, the legendary label has been the motor of the so-called 'New Sound Movement (Xinsheng yundong)' that emerged at the end of the 1990s.

The first two waves of Chinese rock music (yaogun yinyue) in the 1980s and 1990s were strongly linked to famous elder statesman and pioneer of Chinese rock, Cui Jian, whose song 'Nothing to My Name (Yi wu suo you)' became the unofficial anthem of the rebellious youth protesting at Tian'anmen in 1989.

Other influential bands at the time included the heavy metal band Tang Dynasty, the glam metal group Black Panther as well as the first all-female rockers Cobra.

The younger generation of artists that featured prominently in the New Sound Movement, however, were an entirely different breed. Musicians such as the punk pop band New Pants (Xin kuzi) or the Flowers (Hua'er) challenged the older guard by adopting whole new musical genres, different attitudes and a distinctly global outlook. In general, they were a lot more hedonistic, began to value technical questions and endorsed an unhinged individualism.

Little by little, Modern Sky Entertainment has been able to build a small empire that has diversified in all fields of creative industries.

Nevertheless, managing the record label still is the main endeavour of Shen Lihui and his crew, in line with efforts to organize ever-bigger open-air music festivals. Typically, the company puts on around 25 festivals in China each year.

In 2013, a large crowd of 260,000 enthusiastic music fans attended the venues in Beijing and Shanghai. And last month, the Modern Sky Music Festival celebrated its debut overseas in New York's Central Park (the Chinese line-up included Re-Tros, Queen Sea Big Shark, Zhang Xuan, Second Hand Rose, Omnipotent Youth Society and Shetou).

In addition to the Modern Sky Music Festival, the firm oversees ca. twelve editions of another highly acclaimed outdoor event, the Strawberry Festival, which is held in various cities, including smaller ones, all over China. (For an extensive interview with mastermind Shen Lihui, see here.)

Naturally, Modern Sky is not the only outfit that heavily promotes interesting new sounds at the fringes of the mainstream market.

Another important cornerstone in the sphere of progressive music is the independent record label Maybe Mars that is also based in the Chinese capital. Over the years, Maybe Mars has signed numerous exciting new bands from very different backgrounds and origins that have become household names in Chinese alternative music circles. Overall, Beijing still is the undisputed centre of independent music of all imaginable genres and styles, but other cities are catching up fast.

Reports about China's diverse underground music industry are notoriously rare in Western publications and more often than not written in a rather condescending tone as if Chinese artists were completely disconnected from wider global developments.

To catch a glimpse of the current state of Chinese indie music and to stay informed about the latest trends, I recommend the following sites: China Music Radar, BeijingDaze, ChengduMusic or the Caoker video platform.

If you are interested in more comprehensive, academic discussions of Chinese popular music, its genesis, socio-political and economic contexts, have a look at the books by Nimrod Baranovitch: 'China's New Voices: Popular Music, Ethnicity, Gender, and Politics, 1978-1997' (2003) (Amazon) or Jeroen de Kloet: 'China with a Cut: Globalisation, Urban Youth and Popular Music' (2010) (Amazon), to name just two authors with proven expertise.