Encyclopedia of Contemporary Chinese Culture

ZHONGGUO KEYI SHUO BU

[China Can Say No]

Book

China Can Say No: The Choice Between Politics and Emotion in the Post-Cold-War Period (Zhongguo keyi shuo bu: Lengzhan hou shidai de zhengzhi yu qinggang jueze) is a book of protest against China’s treatment by the West and Japan. It was written by Song Qiang, Zhang Zangzang and Qiao Bian and published in May 1996 by the Chinese Industrial and Commercial Combined Press in Beijing.

The theme of the book is China’s annoyance at the way in which Western powers, especially the United States but also Japan, formed a hostile bloc against China, criticizing it on such matters as human rights, Tibet, Taiwan and world trade.The authors believe this policy to be inspired by a renewal of the containment policy of the past. The Foreword specifies the book’s overarching theme as China’s demand for dialogue in an atmosphere of equality. It denies that the book is nationalist, but its tone is definitely strident. If anything, the feeling against Japan expressed here is even stronger than that against the United States. A fifth reprinting of the book with a total of 160,000 copies appeared in September 1996. Soon after, several other books followed on similar themes, with the phrase ‘China Says No’ included in the titles. The series is part of the general nationalistic trend of the 1990s. Its inspiration comes in part from pride in China’s strategic rise in international affairs, and in part from the perception of an exaggerated Western condemnation of China’s human rights record and of its policies with respect to Taiwan and Tibet.