To describe China in terms of a nation-state, thus, is largely to miss the point. ‘ China is a civilization pretending,’ Pye argues, ‘to be a nation-state.’ [608] The consequences of the fact that China is really a civilization-state are manifold. [609] The civilization-state generates, as we shall see later, a very different kind of politics from that of a conventional nation-state, with unity, rooted in the idea of civilization rather than nation, the overriding priority. As a civilization-state, China embodies and allows a plurality of systems, as exemplified by Hong Kong, that is alien to the nation-state, which demands and requires a much greater degree of homogeneity. The civilization-state has engendered distinctively Chinese notions of race and ethnicity, with the Han race regarded as more or less coterminous with ancient Chinese civilization, as we shall see in the next chapter. The civilization-state embodies a far more intimate relationship not simply with China’s relatively recent history, as in the case of the average nation-state, but, most strikingly, with at least two millennia of history, such that the latter is constantly intervening in and acting as a guide and yardstick in the present. And it is the civilization-state which serves as a continuous reminder that China is the Middle Kingdom, thereby occupying, as the centre of the world, a quite different position to all other states. The term ‘civilization’ normally suggests a rather distant and indirect influence and an inert and passive presence. In China ’s case, however, it is not only history that lives but civilization itself: the notion of a living civilization provides the primary identity and context by which the Chinese think of their country and define themselves.
Table 2. Characteristics of China’s provinces in 2005.
If the notion of civilization helps to explain how China ’s past bears on its present, the fact that it is a continent in size and diversity is critical to understanding how the country functions in practice. There is an essential coherence to the life of the great majority of nation-states that is not true of China. Something major can happen in one part of the country and yet it will have little or no effect elsewhere, or on China as a whole. Major economic changes may appear to have few political consequences and vice versa. The traumatic events in Tiananmen Square in 1989, for example, had surprisingly little impact on the country as a whole. Of course, there are always effects, but the country is so huge and complex that the feedback loops work in strange and unpredictable ways. That is why it is so difficult to anticipate what is likely to happen politically. [610] It also perhaps helps to explain a particularly distinctive feature of modern Chinese leaders like Mao and Deng. Whereas in the West consistency is regarded as a desirable characteristic of a leader, the opposite is the case in China: flexibility is seen as a positive virtue and the ability to respond to the logic of a particular situation as a sign of wisdom and an indication of power. Such seeming inconsistency is a reflection of the sheer size of the country and the countless contradictions that abound within its borders. It also has practical benefits, enabling leaders to experiment by pursuing an ambitious set of reforms in a handful of provinces but not elsewhere, as Deng did with his reform programme. Such an approach would be impossible in most nation-states.
Instead of seeing China through the prism of a conventional nation-state, we should think of it as a continental system containing many semi-autonomous provinces with distinctive political, economic and social systems. There are huge variations between what are, in terms of population, nation-sized provinces. The disparity between the per capita incomes of different provinces is vast, the structure of their economies varies greatly – for example, in their openness to the outside world and the importance of industry – their cultures are distinct, and the nature of their governance is more diverse than one might expect. [611] In many respects, the provinces should be seen as akin to nation-states. [612] In fact China ’s provinces are far more differentiated than Europe’s nation-states, even when Eastern Europe and the Balkans are included.
Map 9. China’s Provinces
