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From the bridge over the neighborhood known as the Bund, Shanghai rises on either side of the Huangpu River like a magnificently plumed bird on the wing. Before me lies a breathtaking vista: the globe-shaped conference center across the river, the restored colonial buildings, shining glass and granite towers in the distance. Think of New York and Paris and Singapore all rolled into one -- but far more impressive. This is my first visit to China, and this will be my lasting impression -- a nation that's literally taking flight. One cannot see this without thinking that maybe the 21st century really does belong to China.
Such feelings aren't confined just to Shanghai. Visit Guangzhou, Beijing, or any one of the innumerable cities that the Chinese have resurrected or re-created, and they all evoke the same sense of wonder. It's hard to even believe another China still exists.
The other China? The millions of citizens who have been displaced by the building of the Three Gorges Dam, or the peasants in the hinterlands who don't have access to medical care, or the students who aren't allowed to protest, or the contemporary writers and artists who are lucky if they don't end up in jail. Gazing upon Shanghai, that China is subliminal. Here's the China that makes the strongest impression on visitors, with its gleaming, explosive growth.
HAUGHTY DISDAIN. I didn't know what to expect before I arrived. Having lived in India for the past five years, I feel I've lost the American sense of renewal, and instead adopted, by osmosis, India's ancient attitude of haughty disdain for the nouveau. Indians think little of China's brand of communism, and highly of their own chaotic democracy and freedom. China, they say, can aspire to be like America, but we will aspire to be more like our glorious ancient past, only with computers, cell phones, and movies.
India is living with that choice. It may have the power of the vote but not the power of investment dollars to fuel significant growth. Direct foreign investment in India is a mere $2.4 billion annually -- compared with $45 billion a year for China. But India is in no hurry. It has a sense of timelessness, and renewal through rebirth in another lifetime is enough consolation. An arguable viewpoint, but an expression of traditional Indian philosophy.
Still, it seems like a day hardly passes without India's competitiveness vs. China coming up on the floor of the Indian Parliament. Last summer, the leading industry association in India, CII, took 10 Indian Parliament members and two union leaders to visit the Middle Kingdom. Indian businesses have been hurting from a flood of cheap Chinese toys, electronic goods, and chemicals that hit the Indian markets in the past year. So industry leaders wanted the politicians and the unions to witness China's economic miracle firsthand.
"BAMBOO EFFECT." It was a smart move. Just seeing what's happening in China with your own eyes is worth a million reports or speeches. In August, Indian Privatization Minister Arun Shourie made a passionate plea for India to stay the course on economic liberalization for fear that China would "overwhelm" it. That, coupled with China's increasing interest in replicating India's software success, has had what Indian economist Surjit Bhalla calls "the Chinese bamboo effect" on India's collective behind.
India has finally woken up to the China challenge. The government has since been on a spree, liberalizing infrastructure and privatizing state companies -- not fast enough, but movement nonetheless.
Seeing is indeed believing. The streets of China's big cities are wide, tree-lined, and pristine. It is First World. Every building and factory I saw was equipped with the latest technology. I saw new factories being built in Guangzhou -- high-quality construction and superefficient, with one floor being built in 3 days, vs. 11 in India.
SNAZZIER THAN PARIS. And Shanghai. I rejoiced for the Chinese people when I saw Shanghai -- they deserved this pride after decades of communist dreariness. The city seemed more fashionable to me than Paris. O.K., Nanjing Road may not be the Rue Faubourg St. Honore, but it sure is dazzling, with five-star hotel chains, malls featuring six-piece orchestras instead of Muzak, and international designer stores such as Fabergé, Ferragamo, and Ferré.
Chinese come to Shanghai and expect to see the world
Shanghai's French quarter has chic Taiwanese art shops and elite schools. On a sunny Saturday morning in February, the streets are filled with smartly dressed young people. The young men are handsome and carelessly casual, the young women are beautiful, elfin-thin, and cutting-edge trendy. Every nook and corner of the commercial district is crammed with goods -- toys, clothes, electronics. Consumerism reigns. A friend explains that because not many Chinese travel the world, they come to Shanghai and expect to see the world there.
Some friends in Shanghai tried to bring me back to reality. The city is window dressing, they caution, a stage set. The real China is nothing like this. In rural areas, joblessness is common -- as are 12-hour days for those lucky enough to find work. Dissent isn't allowed. Traditional Confucian values of obedience have made adapting to Chinese-style communism easier, say local market analysts. Family rules are very strict, obligations and ties to parents are strong, much like India.
NEW BREED. It's slowly changing. China's youth may not participate in political protests, but a sexual revolution is under way. Young Chinese have become more casual about sex, and pairings not leading to marriage are becoming more common. What's important now is money. And an education -- plus a grasp of technology and English -- beget money.
Indian companies have certainly figured out that China means money. Indian info-tech-education companies NIIT and Aptech are already in the Middle Kingdom. On Jan. 22, software developer Satyam opened its first office in Shanghai, and a week before that, while on a trip to India, Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji granted permission to top Indian software company Infosys to hang a shingle in China.
Visiting the Indian consulate was my most depressing moment in China
Stultified Chinese bureaucrats have given way to a new breed that act as if they were ardent entrepreneurs. Professor Hu Hongliang, whose last posting was in China's consulate in New York, is now in charge of setting up software parks across the Middle Kingdom. He's charming, persuasive, accommodating, smart-suited. His officer, Robert Lai, is an American-educated professional who has returned to his native Shanghai after a decade. He has memorized all the statistics about China's infrastructure, and what he doesn't know he finds out in minutes.
Hu and Lai were a refreshing change from my meeting with Indian diplomats in Shanghai. Sad to say, but visiting the Indian consulate was my most depressing moment in China. The office is stark, adorned with a hidden magazine rack that holds issues of India Perspective -- whatever that is. Hanging on the wall was a framed picture of the Taj Mahal, the 16th century Mughal monument to love, and another picture of Indian village belles.
BEYOND THE TAJ MAHAL. This bothered me: The Chinese who come to India to learn about Indian tech and pharma companies are opening new offices and factories in China -- and all one sees at the office of the Indian government in Shanghai is a picture of the Taj Mahal? Dare to mention this dissonance to Indian diplomats, and you're likely to get your head bitten off. "What's wrong with the Taj Mahal?" asks an Indian official with self-righteous hauteur. "Are you trying to deny your heritage?"
Of course not, I thought wearily. Nor am I denying India the glory of the Taj Mahal. But the new India is much more. It's exportable, Oscar-worthy Bollywood movies, it's a vibrant pop and youth culture, it's IT, its pharma, its great companies like Hero Honda, it's dedicated companies like Tata and Birla, it's ambitious upstarts like Reliance Industries, it's cyberabad Hyderabad.
Many representatives of that new India are applying their expertise to China's benefit: The head of Coke in China is an expatriate Indian, the head of ICI Paints is Indian, Indians dominate the senior management of Sara Lee and Danone -- the list goes on. India is more than village belles and the Taj Mahal.
India needs China's vision. And China needs the kind of people India has
So while the Chinese government embraces change, and takes a dressed up, bejeweled Shanghai to the global ball, official India is putting a traditional chador on its most beautiful maidens and making sure Cinderella never makes it out the door. The investment numbers show the winner: Suzie Wong outshines the Taj Mahal any day.
WHERE THE HEART IS. On the flight home, I review my three days in China. I think of my native city of Bombay, Shanghai's counterpart in India. It's old, it's grubby and crumbling -- but it's also cosmopolitan, pulsating, and vibrant. India's soap-box politics are venal but vital. The chaos is creative. That's where the software miracle comes from. Bombay, I think, has heart and soul.
And then I realized something: I felt little heart and soul in Shanghai. Shanghai was all head, and the head works. The soul may be there, but to a first-time visitor the glitter and consumerism dominate.
India needs a forward-looking attitude like China's -- the vision of the future that shows, through the construction of great cities and efficient factories, what heights the Middle Kingdom can reach. And China needs people like India's -- willing to sleep without electricity at night in houses without running water in sole exchange for the right to criticize their government and exercise their vote.
Maybe someday, in both countries, the two great strengths of Asia -- heart and head -- will meet.
Kripalani is Bombay Bureau Chief for BusinessWeek Edited by Douglas Harbrecht
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Copyright 2002 , by The McGraw-Hill Companies Inc. All rights reserved.
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