For Americans living and working in China, what Nicholas Kristof is reporting is troubling, particularly to those of us who are also journalists and authors and are admirers of Mr. Kristof's writing and his journalistic integrity. I say this because every word he writes must be true; he is an unimpeachable source of observation and insight into what he observes. He is not a newcomer to China. Therefore, when he reports abuses of freedom that we "Foreign Experts"--that is what academics teaching in Chinese universities are officially categorized as on visas and resident permits--have not experienced, it causes us to seriously doubt our faculties of observation. It is true that we receive special privileges, and in our classrooms are allowed to discuss any topic we choose--even the most controversial ones. I can only conclude that I need to dig deeper and travel farther afield and talk to more Chinese citizens. It would also help if I expedite my learning of the language; that is surely a benefit to Mr. Kristof in his work here. It is a splendid column, told almost entirely in dialogue with telling narrative devices. I am going to post it in its entirety because I want it as a permanent record on these pages.
"China is a country of laws," explained one of the three government officials who accosted me here outside the home of Yao Fuxin, an imprisoned labor leader. "We must go somewhere else to talk."
"But I don't want to talk to you," I protested. "I want to talk to Yao Fuxin's family."
"China is a country of laws," the man repeated, politely but sternly. "And we are the government. Come with us."
"I don't want to speak to the government," I replied. "I want to speak to Yao Fuxin's wife."
"China is a country of laws," said the man, who refused to show any identification. "Come with us."
I had come to this gritty industrial city, 375 miles northeast of Beijing, to investigate labor unrest, potentially one of China's biggest challenges. Last year, thousands of workers from 20 factories took to the streets in Liaoyang, protesting official corruption and demanding unemployment payments, pensions and back pay.
Last May, the authorities sentenced Mr. Yao to seven years, and another protest leader, Xiao Yunliang, to four years. Presumably because of beatings, Mr. Xiao appeared to be blind at the sentencing and was unable to recognize family members.
So I dropped in to visit the families of Mr. Yao and Mr. Xiao. But the wives are apparently kept under some kind of house arrest. When I arrived, I tried phoning Mr. Xiao's wife; she spoke one word before a man took the phone and hung up. A few minutes later, the three officials nabbed me outside Mr. Yao's home.
To their credit, they were very polite. I was traveling with a colleague from The New York Times on the Web, Naka Nathaniel, and my intrepid 9-year-old son, and we were all taken to a nearby hotel. They let us use the bathroom — under careful escort in case we tried to break out.
"China is a country of laws," the leader explained, after offering us cigarettes. "So your interviews must go through State Council rules and local officials. You must go through the procedures for this to be legal. So interviews now are impossible. But you are welcome to come back to Liaoyang any time as a tourist."
"Well, then," I suggested, "I'll go and talk to Yao Fuxin's family about the local tourist spots."
They didn't even crack a smile. Instead, they put one goon in my taxi and sent another carload to escort us to the Shenyang airport and wait there until we boarded a plane to Shanghai. My son was tailed in the airport as he went to get an ice cream. (For a Web accompaniment to my China trip, go here.)
The Chinese government is worried about labor problems. Americans are resentful about job losses that they blame on the Chinese export behemoth, but China is also full of millions of laid-off workers — and they are getting angrier and bolder.
Last month alone, according to China Labor Bulletin, 1,000 taxi drivers took to the streets in the city of Dazhou, protesting the cancellation of taxi permits; some 10,000 workers blocked roads and rail lines in Xiangfan to protest job losses arising from privatization; and 2,000 teachers in Suizhou rallied to demand salary increases.
The Chinese government is right to close inefficient factories and nudge workers into more productive employment. But Beijing is going to have to tackle labor issues with openness, rather than repression. It will have to learn that strikes and protests can be a sign of a country's strength and freedom, not weakness and chaos.
China is emerging as one of the world's great powers, a status that it has earned with shrewd management and increasingly mature diplomacy. But a great power cannot go around crushing peaceful protests and torturing labor leaders. It is disgraceful that "People's China" goes around locking up people like Mr. Xiao and beating his wife unconscious at his sentencing hearing — and holding family members of labor leaders incommunicado.
"This is not the China of the 1970's or the 1980's," I complained to the men who nabbed me. "China has reformed. It should be open enough now to allow foreigners to speak to family members of prisoners."
