Zheng Wang Cross-Cultural Negotiations Expert; "U.S. China relationship is a Shakespearean Tragedy"

Zheng Wang [00:00:00] When we say Shakespeare tra tragedy is that we know something bad going to happen, but there's no way to stop it. It's both side being manipul, motivat weighted, manipulated is the wrong word, motivated by nationally, the populism by some extreme ideas, and both side has the same type of top leader.

Vance Crowe [00:00:32] I'm Brian Mos, a farmer living in Florence, South Dakota, and you're listening to the Scroll podcast. Welcome back to the podcast. I'm glad you're here today. We talked with Dr. Jang Wong, who was my professor in graduate school. He's one of those people that I encountered and I had no idea how big of an impact he would have on my life. But after taking his introduction to negotiations class, I realized this is the type of skill that if you can hone it, you can actually change the world. And so I spent hours and hours with Dr. Wong. We became very close, we had many lunches together. We would edit articles together. We even, we worked on a book, well, he wrote a book and I gave him a lot of feedback on it over the years. It gave me an opportunity to elevate my education far beyond just what my graduate degree was. I was able to have somebody that I could bounce ideas off of somebody that saw the world in a slightly different way than I did, and somebody that was always open to asking, what do you think about this? And can you think harder about it? So we're gonna get to that interview in just a second and I'm really excited about it. But during the interview, you'll hear us mention the Articulate Ventures network. This is a place I set up for people that wanted to support the podcast and people that wanna be meeting other people that listen to the podcast or maybe getting some classes on how to become a tangibly better communicator. If you're interested in joining this group, just know that you can join and immediately start doing things like the book club or virtual reality experiences that we're trying out.

Vance Crowe [00:02:05] All of this is an experiment to figure out how can we create a space where people can come practice, get new ideas, and become the type of communicator that allows them to express their full humanity, whether that's in the professional context or all the way out into just having better conversations with the people around you. So if you're interested, join the Articulate Ventures network link below. And now let's get to the interview with Dr. Jang Wong, director, professor of the Center for Peace Studies at the Seton Hall University School of Diplomacy. Dr. Jang Wong, welcome to the podcast.

Zheng Wang [00:02:44] Thank you. Very happy to join you. Really.

Vance Crowe [00:02:48] So this is a great reunion because you were my mentor and teacher in graduate school, somebody that had a profound impact on the way that I understood how people interacted with one another, another, how they shared information, how they cooperated and what happens when it breaks down. And so we could talk about anything going on in the world, but you actually have a very specialized knowledge, not just of negotiations in conflict, but also with US China relations. And we were having a conversation before we got started about the difference between the perception of masks in the US and China. And I thought that this would be a very interesting place because I think most Americans imagine that the Chinese wear masks because they live in a dictatorship that tells them they have to, and that they're very compliant. And so they see that and they think, well, we want the opposite of that. What's your take on this?

Zheng Wang [00:03:39] Okay, first I'm very happy to join you. And it's, nothing is happier than that to join a former student and saying, you are doing very well. And to some extent, I think now we are kind of like co we, because we work on something very similar. We are both of our, our work is trying to happen, other peoples to be better understood. Right. So like you mentioned, my, a big part of my job is to help the people in the US and China better understand each other. So the face mask is a very interesting question. Wes, do you mind if I ask you, so do you wear face mask regularly, recently, or when, if, if that, if you do so, when was your first time to wear face mask during the coronavirus?

Vance Crowe [00:04:33] I am deeply resistant to wearing the face mask because, you know, I believe that you see so much of people's emotional reactions by their faces. So I have avoided going to all places where I don't have to go. And then if I'm in a place where there's somebody that asks me like they own a business, I wear one. So probably three times in the last four months. But I'd never leave my house. I'm, I'm almost always here or meeting people outdoors.

Zheng Wang [00:04:57] Okay, okay. Yeah. But do you agree that face masks or from your reading, from the information you get, that wearing face mask is really actually helpful and has been effective? Especially if we talk about some of the East Asian countries, they are doing better. If we are trying to compare then PE in, in the US European countries, one of the reason, maybe it's because wearing face mask is most people wearing face mask.

Vance Crowe [00:05:35] Yeah. I think that a lot of people are, and I find myself thinking, on the one hand, I really want to wear a mask if I thought that it was healthier. I want my people that are around my wife who's pregnant to wear one, but I have this like deep seated feeling that I'm doing something wrong. If I submit to wearing a mask, it feels like it's going against some principle of liberty. That's very important to me.

Zheng Wang [00:05:59] Yeah. So I think that is, I trying to understand this very special phenomena because actually many of my Chinese friends, family members, one, the question they keep asking me that they could, they cannot understand why people in the us, so many of them don't wear face masks, even though the, the situations already got quite bad. I think culture play quite important, Joe. And also another important thing, like when we talk about cultural misunderstanding is that people always get used to, if they trying to end something new, something, you know, it's never happened before. If they trying to understand it, they need a reference. And for the Chinese people, for the Taiwanese Korean people, it's much easier for them to, when the coronavirus broke out, it's much easier for them to make reference because all the Chinese people, Taiwanese, Hong Kong, Japan, they suffered sa in 2003, it's even that was even worse than coronavirus. So they had a memory about that and they, they, they remembering about the, the damage. And also at that time, the people got used to wearing face mask. And for the current people, their reference is me.

Zheng Wang [00:07:31] It's coming from Middle East in 2015. So I think that's probably one of the reason because they have this reference. But for the people in the us in the European country, they don't have this kind of reference is the reference. So for them, the reference is flu. So every year, every winter, so many people get caught by flu, but it's normally you just get bad, you know, after a couple of weeks or even shorter. So people not, not really take it very serious. And also I think if we talk about face mask, one of the very important reason is that people here, just like you mentioned, if you are wearing a face mask, you somehow saying, I'm sick, right? I'm not doing well, I, I got problem. But, so that is make a little bit difficult for hasi people to, to wear a face mask. But a face mask is very widely used in East Asian countries. You know, sometimes if you go to Japan for example, you will say, you know, even in the normal time there's no any, you know, disease or not the flu season, most people or majority people wearing face mask, they wearing face mask for multiple purpose and they, they get used to that. So that is also another example. That culture played quite important job. Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:09:00] Well, and I think that like the, the concept of Americans looking at the Chinese or Asian cultures and saying they're wearing masks almost reinforces the liberty concept that I'm talking about. Because the American perception of Asian behavior or the, or the behavior of many people living in a place like China is that they don't have choices. They just do what they have to do. And so like people look at that and I think they internalize it as well. I don't wanna be in a position where I am told what I have to do. So it's like almost reinforces that divide by seeing Asian countries use masks a lot.

Zheng Wang [00:09:39] Yeah, I heard about a lot of this kind of discussion, and it's true. You, you, you look at that, one of the reason may be that the, you know, east Asian countries, they're doing better in terms of fighting with coronavirus is that they have a strong government or the government, like in China, they can force people to do a lot of things, which is difficult to imagine for people here in this country. So the government indeed have some very strong measures, which people here, many of them, most of them were considered this is a violation of human rights. But during the pandemic, this kind of interventions might be also effective. But we have to, I think what I'm trying to explain to many of my CO is that even you have a powerful, also retiring government, it's not possible. You, we cannot just exaggerate the, the power of this type of garment. Still the people are willing to following the instructions. This part is actually coming from culture. The confusion culture is actually played quite important role because one of the con you know, the, the, the key feature of the Confucian culture is collectivism. We talked about collectivism when we're in the school.

Zheng Wang [00:11:13] And so in the collectivism culture, people are more kind of like a group. They, they, they're trying to be a good member of a group and they are willing, they're more willing to sometimes even sacrifice a little bit of their own rights or privilege of, of freedom to trying to work as a team, as a team member. So that kind of confusion culture, collectivism culture is actually, you can say, you know, in Japan, Korea, Singapore, you know, people are, they are different types of government. So it's not just because of the government. It's also one of the important reason is actually this common culture they sharing people, the community members are more willing to follow in the instructions. And while another reason I think I probably need to mention is that in the confusion culture and the collectivism culture, people are more kind of like respected opinions from professionals. So you can say it's very interesting during this pandemic, the, in China, the couple of people became very famous in China are actually all doctors. So they became kind of like, somehow it's like, you know, people respect them.

Zheng Wang [00:12:45] So it's like they following all the instructions these doctors told them to do. And here people normally I think they don't have this kind of, even though people normally also respecting professionals, but they don't think that they have to following all the instructions a doctor telling them. So that's probably also another, you know, reason, you know,

Vance Crowe [00:13:10] Well, is there, so you know, my impression of China is that if I were there and I decided I wanted to put a YouTube video up that said I don't wear a mask, that that would be treated very harshly. That the, that the ideas that you would be surrounded with in your day-to-day culture, what you read in the newspaper, what you see on YouTube, what's just in the general news would give you no other expert opinion other than what the doctor says. Is that an accurate representation? Do they have counter ideas in China?

Zheng Wang [00:13:45] Yeah, I know that many people think about this way, especially, you know, China has a very different types of government and different politics, but we have to think this way. Chinese also is, you know, currently there's no much difference. People are also not get them most of the information from social media rather than from the official media or newspaper. Most of the young people, they never really read the hard copy of newspaper or printed by the government. They also get the news from the, the social media. And there's also many different various opinions being presented. So they have the information, also they have the information from overseas. But the, if we talked about the coronavirus, I think that actually the social media and the information they got is actually to some extent also reinforce people that, you know, some of the behaviors so important, like the wearing mask and following the instructions, stay at home, this kind of information, you know, it's not only just coming from the, the, the government, it's also coming from the media, from the, especially from the social media. So it's also, you know, happen to creating such kind of environment is that in China, if you are not wearing a face mask for example, you consider this is kind of like a duty.

Zheng Wang [00:15:23] So that is a very special social discourse. So we can say that in each country that the domestic narrative actually played quite important role. And people knowing, you know, it's giving people a very strong, you know, suggestion about what kind of behaviors, good behavior. Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:15:49] When you and I first met, I had done some traveling and I had had experiences out in my life, but when I encountered you, we had this very interesting bond because I had still been seeing everything from a western set of eyes. And when you and I encountered one another, we were looking at the same thing. We're living just outside of New York City. But you came to it from the Chinese perspective of a person that's been living in the United States, I think by 10 years by the time you and I had met.

Zheng Wang [00:16:17] Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:16:18] One of the questions that you asked very early in our, in our friendship, our teacher student relationship was, what do you think that the Chinese want? And I have used this question many, many, many times with people, if I've been out in Iowa or in the mountains, I've met people and they start talking about China. And I say, what is it that you think the Chinese want? When you have asked that question over the years, what do you hear Americans say and how is that different from what you think the Chinese people want?

Zheng Wang [00:16:49] Yeah, actually it's interesting because I'm currently working on a new book and the initial title of the book is Make China Great again. So it's somehow, it's like the, the same slogan I actually published the article to compare the president Donald Trump's make ch Make America Great again and the Chinese president's slogan of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.

Vance Crowe [00:17:21] That's their slogan right now.

Zheng Wang [00:17:23] Yeah. It's the, it's even earlier than Make America Great again. Yeah. So it's, it's very similar. So to some extent, I think if you ask me what Chinese want, it's, it's similar. Like people here, it's like what people, American people want, they, they want their country to be good, to be wealthy, to be strong. They, they want to have a good life, good education, good healthy team. It's the same. But you probably remember that I, I published a book that during the time you were at city hall, the book is never Forget national humiliation. Yes,

Vance Crowe [00:18:09] It's right on my bookshelf. It's always there.

Zheng Wang [00:18:11] Yeah, yeah, yeah. So what this book telling people is, is basically, I made the argument, I said that if you're trying to understand Chinese people, you need to understand their historic memory. And historic memory is kind of like the secret key to open the inner world of the Chinese people and one particular national experience. We know that national experience played a very important role for each country and you know, the, their word will, how do they understand their relationship with the word? And also maybe played also a fundamental role for people answering the question what we want. So for the Chinese people I argued in that book is that they got a very special national experience that was from Oke war in 1840 until the end of World War ii. The end of the war China with Japan, 1945. During this 100 years, China was suffered a lot of foreign invasions. And they considered this 100 years is kind of like, they call it national humiliation.

Vance Crowe [00:19:27] Americans have no idea about this. And I remember that you and I were writing articles at the time because the Beijing Olympics were going on. Yeah,

Zheng Wang [00:19:35] Exactly.

Vance Crowe [00:19:36] And we were watching the torch move throughout the United States and you would see people come out to protest Chinese human rights Americans, and then you'd see Chinese college students show up and be counter protestors that were pro Chinese, which to an American was like smashing us against the wall because the Americans thought, Hey look, we're trying to help you, we're trying to make sure you have human rights. Why are you trying to protect the torch and celebrate China when we all know that it's this dark place according to the Americans.

Zheng Wang [00:20:08] Yeah. So that's also like when we talk about like both of us, our work is trying to help the people to be better understood and to to improve understanding. I think one of the major misunderstanding very often people have with each other is that we get used to understand another country from our own national experience, from our own institutional experience, from our own cultural framework. So when people trying to understand China, we, you know, because historic memory like you mentioned, and I totally agree that it doesn't play very important role for American identity. You know, people here is more kind of like looking forward rather than looking backward. So, so it's a little bit difficult for people here to understand China and understand Chinese by using the framework of historic map. But like I wrote the article, I said the title of the article is in China, history is like a religion. So history plays some those religion because you know, one of the major difference between China and the US like we talked before, is majority people here in the US they believe in God or they have a religion beliefs and the majority of Chinese people, they don't have any religion beliefs.

Zheng Wang [00:21:42] So that make difference, they have different worldview, they say things differently and in China, because there's no like strong religion beliefs among the people. So history sometimes played the joos kind of a religion and the historic memories partially about this trauma. Just like anybody, if you, you know, for any people, like one of my friend told me that for him a car accident, it's such a trauma for him played such important role to influence that his life after the accident. And for the Chinese people, this century of humiliation, this national experience is also like the trauma is like the car accident for my friend. So it's played a so important role to shaping Chinese people. How do they say the outside world

Vance Crowe [00:22:45] And Americans and like I would include myself in on this. The only reason I got outside of my view that I had before was because I met you and then it made it much easier for me to get outside of it. But I think most of Americans could not describe any of the tragedies that you're talking about happen to the Chinese people. They have no concept of the how the opium wars played out. They have no concept of how the Japanese came in and the different war treatments that happen, no idea at all. So these concepts, when they hear about the Chinese having a hundred years of national humiliation being a central theme of the childhood's education in the same way that

Zheng Wang [00:23:24] Yeah,

Vance Crowe [00:23:25] Washington had his cherry tree and Abraham Lincoln, you guys have that, but we don't understand or know anything at all about that perspective.

Zheng Wang [00:23:35] Yeah. So that is, you know, the, one of the major differences of missing sometimes I think that that because this, you know, people, they don't understand each other's the major reference they use the Chinese so often use history as a reference, but Americans, they don't have this kind of tradition. So that very often cause the many of the misunderstandings between them. You know, for example, like, you know, I'm currently working on facilitating a dialogue between the Chinese scholars and American scholars over South Chinay. And I found this very interesting is that very often the dialogue is becomes the Chinese people always talking about history. They're talking about based on the old map, based on the history, you know, and American people not really consider his, you know, history is really a important part of the reference for them to understand the current situation of South China Sea. So they keep talking about, for example, the un conventional law of the sea and those kind of legal documents. So I, in my one, my article trying to, you know, describe this, this is kind of like a, a dialogue over the different things for the Chinese, it's about history for the Americans, it's about the, it's, it's kind of a dialogue between historic reality and a narrative reality and the legal reality.

Zheng Wang [00:25:19] They are not on the same reality. So it becomes much difficult for them to communicate. Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:25:26] How do you bridge that? What do you do in order to make it, I mean, because it's not like all of the Americans are gonna take Chinese history lessons and come to the same conclusions. And it's not like the Chinese will say, oh, okay, these documents that are clearly in someone else's favor we're going to agree to. So how do you get people to come to the table and come to a different decision?

Zheng Wang [00:25:45] Yeah, first I think even just get people sitting together, it's a success. They can talk, they can understand each other better. But I have to tell you that for my own experience, it's also a lot of frustration. It's really difficult to, for them to, to to understand each other. And also you will find, for example, you have conducted, you know, several conferences and people are just repeating the same kind of narrative and it's so hard for them to really to, like we always say that you have to try other people's shoes and you can save from their eyes. And I found this so difficult for the Americans and Chinese to try each other's shoes. They not even like to try. So, and there's also a strong assumptions, I think on the both side, sometimes American participants were assuming you just use history as excuse you just trying to,

Vance Crowe [00:26:56] That's what I feel right now. That's exactly what I feel. Yeah, you

Zheng Wang [00:26:58] Just trying to use an old map for your interest. And the Chinese has a strong belief that Americans just use the law or international UN convention law of the, say we call unclos, you just use unclosed as six Qs because the United States actually not ratify on close. So the Chinese has strong belief that international law for use just another tour you use for entering other country. So they refuse to consider even to listen to each other's opinion. So that's the major, I think the major difficulties we have as a, when we facilitating the dialogue. But I think it's important that we trying to help them to understand, you know, it's really important to each other. Just like I trying to telling American people that if you really, if you disagree, Chinese assumption that American just use international law, excuse, you should also considering the Chinese are also not just using history as an excuse. They really believe it. They, and you have to think another way is for any country we know there are some fundamental tax like bible, like constitution, like the Chinese side, they have confusion them, they have something

Vance Crowe [00:28:34] That makes you and us, right? Like something that binds you together. Yeah, yeah,

Zheng Wang [00:28:38] Yeah. But besides that, education played a very important role. So one of my argument I have keep talking about this for over 10 years is that I don't think South China thing can find a solution until, you know, if until the countries involving the dispute they consider change their domestic textbooks. If they don't change their textbooks, I don't say the possibility for them to reach agreement because almost each of the country involved the conflict. If you go to their, you know, middle school, high school, if you read their geography book history textbook, each country, China, Vietnam, Philippines, Indonesia, they're telling their own people. Like the Chinese textbook I did, I did the research on Chinese tech textbook and Vietnam textbook. They're telling exact same thing to their people. South Chinese, they belong to us and we are the ocean state. We have been used it since the ancient times and the other countries, they are just in invades. So if we don't change this education, think about the group of people that growing up, you know, after receiving this kind of education, it's difficult for them to change this mentality, to change their understanding.

Zheng Wang [00:30:09] Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:30:09] But it is extremely difficult in the US to change education, to to be some monolithic thing. I mean I think there are a lot of people that look at the US system and say, well our strength is in the fact that you have local control over curriculum. Now it's not always the way that it plays out, but there's definitely at least 50 curriculums that are different. And anytime a national standard gets put in, everybody's gonna fight to the death over what it can and can't say. So it ends up saying almost nothing at all. Whereas in the Chinese system, because it's more centrally managed, it probably doesn't change as often, but when it does, it changes everywhere all at once. Is that right?

Zheng Wang [00:30:47] Yeah, yeah. Actually you point out a very important is this is also another thing that sometimes the course misunderstanding because like you said in the US maybe the education textbook not playing that important role in compared with many other countries. Because in the US like I often ask my students how what, what your history textbooks telling about this or telling about that event. And I found that they very often, they found they using the totally different textbooks. But you have to think it for American friends. You know, when you're trying to understand China, you have to think this way. In China for many decades, not from, not just right now people are using one single official textbook. So there's all the school, all the school in China, except some, you know, very small amount of the private international school, all the school using the same textbook published by the same official publication house. So the textbook is playing much, much more powerful role to shipping people's identity and understanding, especially like subject like history and geography compared with us when people are using many different textbooks. And also in many of the, even we talk about Japan, like I did the research about to compare the Chinese history textbook with Japanese textbooks.

Zheng Wang [00:32:27] You know, we know that that Japan is different with China, but still even in Japan there's only like seven or eight different textbook being used. It's not like, like you mentioned in the US maybe 50 or more than that. So the textbooks play very important. Yeah,

Vance Crowe [00:32:46] I think the American perception is that everyone else is susceptible to propaganda, but we don't have it here. And I think in particular the perception is that the Chinese people themselves either are not allowed to, to deny the prop like propaganda, but but also like kind of embrace it, just kind of see it that it's there and they believe everything.

Zheng Wang [00:33:11] What

Vance Crowe [00:33:11] Did the Chinese people think about the way that Americans get information? Do they think we are just as propagandized as we think they are?

Zheng Wang [00:33:22] Yeah, they are. I think that actually the Chinese people are very interested in the US so they know a lot of things in the us like they're very familiar with the NBA, they're very familiar with Hollywood movies. So very often people even including scholars will say the Chinese people are knowing much more about us than general Americans knowing about China. But you know that I often, you know, almost every spring semester we have a study tour and we often go to China and very often my American students, the first time when they arrive China, they will find it's so different, so different with what they saw before they come in. And also because, you know, for example, before the trip, very often we have the preparation meeting and I'm telling them that, that you, you, you should know that you are not able to use YouTube, you are not able to use Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, you weren't able to use all the social media in China. So I think most of students, after they knowing about they, they sort of vow what kind of country it is. And they even have some, some kind of concern of personal safety or something that all the special kind of like excitement of visiting a very different country.

Zheng Wang [00:35:00] But after this, you know, they put their food on China and they will find it is so different, different than what they saw. Of course, yes, the people are, they're not allowed to use this social media I mentioned, but they still have many of their own channels of communica channels of information. So they know a lot of things about the word and they are also, you know, they don't have the, you know, a lot of freedoms to do a lot of things, but they also have a lot of freedoms that to do many things they like to do. So the young people, there is no big difference compared with young people here. And also I think many of Chinese people also think that because, you know, people in China, they knowing about the information they get from the official media or the other channels might be dropped, like you said, might be propaganda. So they always being mindful, so they're more sensitive to that. So when they hear a news, when they get information, they're trying to not believe it first. But people here, people in the China, sometimes they think that maybe American people, they don't have this level of mindfulness. So they probably also being easily being influenced by, by me, by certain opinion leaders or by some, you know, narratives.

Zheng Wang [00:36:43] The domestic narratives played such important role for them because they normally, you know, not questioning about the, you know, this like the Chinese young people, they may be more mindful about that. So there's this kind of discussion, I heard a lot about this kind of discussion. Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:37:04] You know, it's kind of natural for people to, when they go to a place, they view their people as the good guys and the new place where they're at at first it's novel and exciting and then it becomes really confusing and kind of isolating when, when the newness is done and you're tired that you can't speak the language or, or that people can carry on conversations without you. All these other things are going on. Yeah. But eventually you can start to come up on the other side and say, okay, I, I understand where these people are coming from or what they're doing. But in the back of your mind you kind of always have the narrative of like, my people are the good guys and these are something else. You live in a very weird environment because you grew up in China, you spent part of your professional career there and then you came to the United States, became a professor, had a family, and you're here. Do you have that switch of good guys and bad guys? Will your children have that same switch of good guys and bad guys or good team, bad team, my team, the other team? How does that work if you've integrated and moved to another place?

Zheng Wang [00:38:12] For myself, I don't think I have this identity crisis. And for many years, actually I think we talked before, I'm kind of quite comfortable of being like you, you described that I, I grew up in another country and moving to a new country and I I for now, I almost spend the same amount of time in both countries. So I'm familiar with both side. So I'm quite comfortable my job, whether as a educator, a researcher, you know, to play the role somehow is like a bridge between the two culture or sometimes, like I mentioned to my class, I think I, I put it in my teaching philosophy statement is that I consider myself, my job is to some extent as a cultural interpreter, you know, the two countries they might need when they communicate, like when I organize my conference on such China say, are always got trying to get the best interpret because that is so important for the scholars from the two countries to understand,

Vance Crowe [00:39:36] Explain the difference between a translator and an interpreter. Because most people don't have that subtle knowledge of the difference.

Zheng Wang [00:39:43] Yeah. So, so like in the, in the conference they, we need the interpreter to have people to understand the, the other people's, what they're saying. So we, we sometimes do the spontaneous simultaneous translation. Simultaneous translation. So, so people sometimes assume that it's, you know, the, the, the translation is easy, but actually it's not, especially when we have some cultural concepts.

Vance Crowe [00:40:13] So yeah, that's the difference between a translator and interpreter is that an interpreter is given the power, the social license to say he's saying these words, but the concept when it gets translated to another culture means this other thing. And there's sometimes when you hire a translator and you say, just say exactly what I'm saying to him.

Zheng Wang [00:40:32] Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:40:33] But in this case, you've gotta have somebody with a lot more nuance. There's a lot less interpreters than there are translators.

Zheng Wang [00:40:38] Yeah. And sometimes I'm telling my participants from both sides that not assuming you are, you are saying anything, and the translator or interpreter can translate 100% to the other side. And you have to think about, you know, you, you need to sometimes the, the speakers yourself need to have the other side to better understand you. And also when I say cultural interpret, cultural interpreter for myself is that I'm not working. My profession is not, I'm not serving as any kind of translator or interpreter though, but I'm trying to happen the two country to better understand the other sides, their frame of reference, their mentality, their world, their culture, their frames they used. So for many years, I think I'm quite comfortable with this kind of role. I'm not, I I never really say the things like bad guy, good guy, I'm just saying try, they have the difficulties to understand each other. Maybe I could provide some help to, to, to make them easier, to make the things easier for them to understand each other. Because very often misunderstanding caused by miscommunication. But in recent years, like I, we talked earlier before that we, I mentioned I'm, I became more and more frustrating and I found that, you know, the, the, the understanding becomes more difficult and it's becoming

Vance Crowe [00:42:21] More difficult between China and us. Yeah. Why?

Zheng Wang [00:42:26] It's, it's a tragedy. It's really a tragedy because if we think about the, when US and China established a formal diplomatic relations in 1979, it's almost, you know, 40 years ago, it's over 40 years ago. So at that time that, like my professor told my professor in the US in the US University told him that he was, she was the first group, the us you know, state department sent to China. So when she was a PhD student, when she studied China at that time, they have to rely on the, you know, the newspaper they got from China to understand about China. And the newspaper normally come in one week late. So like today you got the Chinese newspaper one week ago and they learn China this week. But today, the reason I said it's a tragedy is that today we have, we have internet, we have so many channel of communication, but the understanding and communication became so difficult between the two countries. So that's the reason I said it's a tragedy. Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:43:53] What do you think is causing the difficulty to understand one another? Is it the fact that there's so much information that it's all noise and we don't know what to pay attention to, or, I mean, I think there are a lot of Americans that think many of our current problems are, because China is pushing these problems into our social media. They're, they're trying to create the divisions that, that, that Americans have by over expressing them. Is this going on on both sides? Do both sides perceive that the other one is doing this to them?

Zheng Wang [00:44:25] Yes, it's true. They blame each other. They consider a lot of bad things is coming from another country. They believe that the other country is taking aggressive behavior. And my side, my country is just responsive. So this is very interesting. This they actually has a quite very similar, you know, understanding to each other is that they can say that the other side is aggressive and my country, we are just making our responding to the other country's bad aggressive behavior. And there's many reason to cause this tragedy. So sometimes, like I said, this is like a Shakespeare tragedy. We all know the reason, we all know something bad to happen, but there's no way for us to stop it. I think one of the fundamental misunderstanding of fundamental reason is probably that each side they have some major judgment about another country's intention. And to some extent I consider that both country is making the biggest strategic mistake for both countries because they are making some misjudgment about another country's intention.

Zheng Wang [00:45:57] So for example, many people in the US consider China's national strategy is to replace United States to be a dominant power of China, of the world. And many Chinese believe United States has a master strategy, a master plan to, you know, to over sue the Chinese garment and to, you know, to, to contain China. So both side have this kind of a, a major big judgment about another country, but they probably, you know, can find a lot of each side can find a lot of evidence to support their assumption. But I think it's, it's too early to make this judgment for both of them. And also it's, you know, you can find evidence like you can, the American people can find some Chinese indeed to make this kind of argument. And Chinese side can also find some Americans maybe really think that way. But you have to make the difference between whether it's individual, small group of people's opinion, or whether this is commonly accepted by the general public or the majority of people and became a national strategy.

Zheng Wang [00:47:31] I think that make big difference. Yeah,

Vance Crowe [00:47:36] Yeah. The, the, the, and that leads back to the question that I was talking about in the beginning, the question where you can ask somebody, and they will al always give you an interesting answer, which is, what do you think the Chinese people want? Because the more news that you read, the more you'll say things. Well, they want a new silk road so they can cut us outta trade. They are in war with India, they're killing people at the border. The, the Uyghur problem that's going on, like the, the Americans believe there's a major human rights conflict there and they have similar things that they perceive of us doing in the same way.

Zheng Wang [00:48:12] Yeah, like I mentioned, I'm organizing the, the scholar discussions between us and China. So a few, several weeks ago we had some interesting discussion about what re recently happened in the us We know that recently that there's, in some cities of the US there's demonstrations, protestings and about the, you know, racial injustice, this kind of things. And these issues, this recent happenings has been widely reported in China. So for example, like myself, I got a lot of my, you know, friends or people I know, the family members, we actually, we are not really, you know, very often, regularly in context, but they concerned about my safety. So they would write to me and ask me, are you okay? Are you safe? Because for many of the Chinese people from reading this, this news, from watching it on the tv, they believe the entire United States now is somehow in revolution. And one of the, the Chinese participants of my dialogue, he asked the question to the American scholars is somehow to make the capris of what happened now in the US with cultural revolution in China in 1960s.

Zheng Wang [00:49:50] So he thinks this is very similar.

Vance Crowe [00:49:53] Oh,

Zheng Wang [00:49:54] And I know that many, many people in China actually consider what happened now in the US is kind of like a culture revolution. So the American scholars disagree, said no, how can you compare with that? This is totally different. But you know that just like going back what we, when we talk about wearing a face mask, we mentioned about the importance of reference. So for the Chinese people, they make the reference with cultural revolution for them. It's much easy to understand. And a lot of American people, when they think about today's China, they make reference with Soviet Union. But you have to know China and today's China with Soviet Union in 1960s, 1970s is totally different.

Vance Crowe [00:50:50] So tell me about that. When you say it's totally different, what do you mean?

Zheng Wang [00:50:55] So for example, at that time, the Soviet Union is highly ideologic. They have a strong ideology knowledge today. Many people, they probably assume China also has Chinese people, or Chinese society is also highly ideologically, or there is a communist socialism ideology. I think that is one of the major misunderstanding between the two sides. And if you visit China, I think many of my students, they noticed that the, the market economic and how the people, the people focus, most of the people they focus not really about ideology issues, but also, but really about how to make, you know, make money, how to have a better life. It's, it's no difference with people here. So,

Vance Crowe [00:51:51] You know, that is fascinating because I've been reading a lot about the Soviet Union and how it came about and your assessment about that, where they be, the people became ideologically possessed by saying, we want equality and we want to take the people that have too much and take it away from them and give it to other people. But what you're saying is the new China, the China that exists today, those people aren't sitting there talking about equality all the time. They're instead saying, how can I get my family ahead? How can we make business decisions make, so what happened in between the 1960s to today that made it so, because this, the concept of the free market does not appear to be a natural one. It seems to be one that must be cultivated.

Zheng Wang [00:52:34] Yeah, it's, it's actually after the, you know, many people when they discussing about today's China, they very often they forgot about, you know, what China has experienced during these 40 years or during the recent three or four decades. So for example, I often ask my students this question, do you know the per capto GDP for China in 1989? Can you guess? I can tell you today's per capto, GDP of China is 10,000, 10,000 US dollar.

Vance Crowe [00:53:15] So what was it, 5,000?

Zheng Wang [00:53:18] It's 304.

Vance Crowe [00:53:21] Wow.

Zheng Wang [00:53:22] Yeah. So that, I I think when you make this reference, you understand better about China's national experience in 1989 per capto. GDP for Chinese is 3 0 4 Chinese, one of the poorest country in the world. I remember why I was a OSC student in England, in my master program, my professor asked me a question about China's per captive, GDP. He didn't know about that and I was not willing to tell him because it's too low. I think it's, it's quite, you know, so I said, I I don't remember. Yeah. But from 1989, from 3 0 4 to 10,000, it's happening.

Vance Crowe [00:54:16] It's staggering. It's, it's not, it's not, it's not even one that a regular person could understand. I mean, that'd be like taking a Kenyan villager and giving them an apartment building to be living in and running water and electricity and is huge.

Zheng Wang [00:54:28] Yeah, yeah. So you have to think about these two numbers. When you think about China, this is the real China that, you know, the recent 30 years, the country is actually focused mainly on economic development. They focus on s they focus on economy. They focus on making their life better. They, you, you know, like my students, they, the most exciting thing for them is to visiting the ninth, you know, in the evening to visit the market, the ninth market in the evening and say so many people are shopping or selling something or doing business. So the lively, you know, life of the people, local people there. So until now, China is a country that, like I said, is a focus on economic development. Of course, if you pay attention only the official newspapers, the official media or some of the narratives, the reports from the, you know, from the, some of the international media people may be believe that people there because it's still communist party, just still the, you know, the socialism, Marxism ideologies, still the official ideology. But the reality is quite different. Of course, today's the, the current administration is more ideological compared with the formal administration five years ago or seven years ago.

Zheng Wang [00:56:08] It's true, but there's the major difference, like compared with today's China, with Soviet TU yeah. Even in compar with the economic development, what's the ordinary people, the general public, what they're doing, what's their focus? What's the, you know, the, their life, their daily life looks like. You can say there's a major difference. Yeah.

Vance Crowe [00:56:34] So when you think about the two powers believing that the other side is, you know, not playing by the rules, and you've referred to it as a Shakespearean tragedy, where do we go from here? Is this something that unfolds and the two countries actually fight each other? Does this mean that we have some sort of more economic fallout? Where do you see this going?

Zheng Wang [00:56:56] Yeah, that's the reason IIII use the term Shakespearean tragedy is that I really not say, I'm not really, you know, saying, you know, very, I probably pessimistic, but I think many people in the field also like me with, you know, it's, when we say it's Shakespeare tra tragedy is that we know something bad to going to happen, but there's no way to stop it. It's both side being motivated, manipulated is the wrong word, motivated by nationalism, populism by some extreme ideas. And both side has the same type of top leader ambitions. And, and trying to just like we talked about their slogan,

Vance Crowe [00:57:59] Even Wait, wait, wait. You, you're saying like, this is, this will be shocking. So you're saying there are parallels between Xi Jinping and, and Donald Trump.

Zheng Wang [00:58:09] Yeah. There are a lot of similarity. Yeah, there are a lot of similarity.

Vance Crowe [00:58:14] This would, I don't be something completely not understood by other people. Like this is a shocking statement to me.

Zheng Wang [00:58:21] I I, I didn't expect you, you think this way. Yeah. But they indeed, they have a lot of similarities, just like we said, that they have the very same slogans and, and also I think that the many things between these two countries, so I think some of the scholars of international relations already made the students statement saying that many of the today's problems between the two countries are actually caused by the two leaders. So if it's different president, things might be different. So, but of course it's not, we cannot just blame this specific leader for each society. They have the reason coming out. They have the reason became the president. They have their domestic logic, domestic, you know, reasons for that

Vance Crowe [00:59:23] Also. Well, we used to talk a lot about Putnam's two level games where if you wanna be a president, whether it's President Xi or or President Trump, you have to get the domestic board to agree with you. Yes. So you're playing a chess game there, but every piece you move on, the domestic board moves a piece on the international board and you begin to forget that those people have to do things to play on both boards at the same time. So if you're watching them play them, it seems like completely bizarre behaviors, but it makes sense. But to me, the, the Chinese president is nearly silent. I never see him in a place where he's speaking. I, I never watch his speeches translated to me, he's almost mute.

Zheng Wang [01:00:02] Okay. So that's also the reason I think very often, we, we have the misunderstanding about another country is that we hear more about our own leaders. There's activities there, speech, their, you know, their point of views. We, and actually the Chinese leader is actually very, they, he made a lot of comments, a lot of, you know, he changed the China very, you know, both institutionally and also in terms of the policy. So he made a lot of difference. So, you know, the leaders they have, they play quite important in any society, any types of the government, their personal preference, especially their personal ambitions. You know, sometimes it's also a tragedy when you got the leaders, they, especially the major powers and you got the two leaders at happen to be the same time. They are, both of them has a very strong personal agenda, a very strong ambitions. And then the clash of ambitions becomes difficult to award

Vance Crowe [01:01:30] The clash of ambitions. I, I think that's a very good title. Well, it, it's, it's very interesting to call you Dr. Wong. We've been so close for so long. This has been great for us to start this up. I would like to have you on more frequently. I think there's always going to be news between these two cultures and it took us a little while to get this started, but now that we've had you on, I'd love to have you on more to talk about this, this and negotiations and what else is going on in the world.

Zheng Wang [01:01:58] You are welcome. And I, I'm happy to, to talk just like we talk the, you know, when we're, when you were in at City House. So we have a lot of dialogue about the two countries and we are helping each other to understand better about another country.

Vance Crowe [01:02:13] So, yeah, and you know, you, you know, you had mentioned something about the, the, we thought that the internet was going to make it much easier for if we're gonna go to war with Saudi Arabia or Iraq or China, that we would be able to get on the phone and, and talk with people from there. But it doesn't happen. So conversations like this, I think are the first step towards making those kinds of things happen.

Zheng Wang [01:02:33] Yeah, it's true. And also because the internet emerge of the internet that, and social media people, you know, at the social media, you notice that people normally follow someone, they have similar opinion or similar interests like you. So that makes people, you know, your source of information became very selective. So people with the same opinions, they actually reinforce each other and they, they, they don't have the opportunity to take the alternative opinions. So that's also the important reason that we need to do dialogue more often. Yeah.

Vance Crowe [01:03:14] Well you'll love this. I started a network from people that listened to this podcast, and basically it's to come in and people can practice their communication skills. So if they wanna practice for, you know, a job interview or they want to put up a speech, but the craziest thing that's happened is that none of these people came knowing each other. So their opinions are all different. And so you see these people having conversations about topics that you're like, oh, I never thought about that. And it's just that they, they come from slightly different orientations and it makes a big difference in the ideas that you come across.

Zheng Wang [01:03:48] Yeah, yeah. So it's, it is always interesting when you speak with people, they have different background. Yeah.

Vance Crowe [01:03:55] So if people wanted to get ahold of you, if they wanted to hear more about your China work or read some of your books, what's the best way to look you up?

Zheng Wang [01:04:05] Actually, I don't use much, you know, a lot of social media. But yeah, I think the best way is that, is to sing my publications. And I, I hope this book will coming out soon. But yeah,

Vance Crowe [01:04:18] As soon as your book is published, we'll do another interview again. That'll be great.

Zheng Wang [01:04:21] Sure, sure.

Vance Crowe [01:04:23] Alright. It was good to see you.

Zheng Wang [01:04:25] Yeah. Great. Thank you. Ah, mm.