I wrote a letter to the “NY Times” in response to Tom Friedman’s column last week, Our One-Party Democracy, in which he says, essentially, that because the Chinese have an autocracy they are better at promoting renewable energy. The “International Herald Tribune” had my letter forwarded from the “NYT” and I had hoped they would publish it, but, at any rate, they haven’t yet, so I thought I would share it here.
Thomas Friedman says that China “…is led by a reasonably enlightened group of people.” This statement is, to be kind, scandalous. China is a police state. In Freedom House’s rating for 2009, China scored 6.5 with 7.0 being the least free. China’s leaders have brutally repressed the populations of Tibet and East Turkestan for many decades. They strongly support regimes in Zimbabwe, Sudan, Myanmar and North Korea that have consistently ravaged their own people. China is itself corrupt. Nearly unabated air and water pollution devastates the health of the Chinese people.
Friedman’s argument for the “enlightened” nature of the Chinese leadership hinges on its embrace of renewable energy technology. I have no quibble whatsoever with the importance of this for both the Chinese people and our global struggle to avert a massive climate catastrophe. It should be properly noted, however, that China continues to build scores of new coal-fired power plants annually, is in a headlong rush to put hundreds of thousands of new cars on its new roads, and, for my money, its push to nuclear power does not in the least indicate the requisite thoughtfulness and attention to environmental protection that would allow its leadership to be called enlightened.
Friedman’s advocacy for renewables and clean tech is admirable and welcome. However, he really ought not to lose sight of the big picture. I have been an environmentalist and renewable energy advocate for a damn sight longer than Tom Friedman, but I have also been an activist on Tibet, a researcher on China and trade for a Presidential campaign, and know, after a fair bit of study, who and what the PRC is about.