Chinese Crackdown

After a few Chinese sources delivered unsafe products, the Chinese government has decided to take action, by saying that American products are bad.

From the Washington Post:

Investigative reports in the state-run media delve into the case of an exploding cellphone purportedly made by U.S.-based Motorola that allegedly killed a young man. They warn consumers not to use contact-lens solution produced by U.S.-based Advanced Medical Optics, which has been linked to rare cases of blindness. And they play up recalls of U.S. beef.

Faced with mounting international concern over the safety of some of the products it exports, the Chinese government -- often perceived as defensive and clumsy in how it handles public relations -- is firing back.

In Washington, China has put together a team of lobbyists who have been practically living on Capitol Hill for the past few weeks. In Beijing, the government has taken the unusual step of seeking advice from outsiders, including public relations powerhouses Ogilvy and Edelman, about how to get positive messages out to Chinese and American consumers.

Of course, because the Chinese government has not altogether abolished communism in China, it makes sense that the government would concern itself with PR. But yeah, that's the setup. Then there's this paragraph right after it:

The result has been an aggressive campaign to save the "Made in China" label by presenting an alternate view on consumer safety and globalization. The message is that China isn't the only country that has had problems with the products it exports. China, as government officials have been pointing out in recent days, rejects U.S. imports at a rate that is just a little less than the 1 percent of Chinese products rejected by the United States.

But look at this. The Chinese government is trying to argue that their products are safe because the US makes stuff that gets rejected too. The question of safety, though, is not which ones are rejected, but rather which accepted products cause harm, if one is concerning themself with product safety. Here, it seems that China is stating that they are better at regulating imports than the US, although I don't think they're offering to scrutinize their own exports further.

Then a professor said this later on in the article:

On the other hand, Shi Anbin, an associate professor of media and cultural studies at Tsinghua University in Beijing, said that trying to turn the tables and focus attention on problems with U.S. products is "not a wise strategy."

"We need to face our own problems rather than pointing an accusing finger at a scapegoat," Shi said. "I believe Chinese officials still need to learn some PR and communication skills."

Yes, that is correct that what the Chinese government did does not address the initial problem. I'm glad that Ariana Eunjang Cha was able to get an expert to state the painfully obvious.

Right after, there was this bit:

Sen. Charles E. Schumer, chairman of the Joint Economic Committee, which has been pushing for punitive trade legislation against China, described the execution of the former head of the Chinese food and drug administration and the country's new ban of a chemical that was mixed in toothpaste as "surreal actions."

These "prove that China just doesn't understand the real problems," the New York Democrat said

Senator Schumer, your advocacy for punitive trade legislation against China proves that you don't understand the real problem. That would make Chinese products more expensive for consumers, so to compete, they'd have to get cheaper and take more shortcuts. And to be technical, that doesn't prove that China doesn't understand the problem, only that China is not interested in solving the real problem. And that the communist method of dealing with problems - killing people - is stupid.

But I'm going with the Chinese government being stupid, especially after reading this gem.

Nevertheless, the incident has brought out hostility in some Chinese consumers. The headline on one online bulletin board posting blares, "America's Motorola is following Bin Laden's example, killing Chinese with explosion." It quotes from the official New China News Agency in giving examples of past quality problems, though its main purpose seems to be complaining about Motorola's after-sales service.

Yes, an accident where someone died in an explosion makes someone like Bin Laden, but firing squad, that's just how you take care of business. But if you want to know how bad the Chinese government is at defending themselves in an argument, this one guy states, perhaps rightly, that this is an improvement.

Dan Harris, a U.S.-based attorney who runs a popular China law blog and represents small to mid-sized companies doing business with China, said the shift in the government's public relations strategy "is definitely smart on their part. They are not going to convince Americans that everything is okay just by denials."

Heh. They're trying to distract people, but at least they aren't completely denying problems, and they don't have to fix anything. An improvement, but barely.