【双语阅读】自上而下的考察是靠不住的 / 郭宇宽
A Chinese Government Survey
(Guo Yukuan)
I just read a great story in Nanjing Morning News. In Shiqiao town, Pukou district, Nanjing city, there was a survey of how well-off citizens are nowadays. The various village governments undertook certain extreme measures for this survey. According to the reporter's investigation, the various village residents all received a booklet called "Sample answers for the prosperity survey." There were sixteen questions and answers in this booklet. For example, Q3 was: "In 2008, what was the approximate income of your entire family?" The correct answer was: "More than 8,000 yuan." As another example, Q16 was: "On a scale of 0 to 100, how would you rate your own happiness level?" The correct answer was: "Between 90 and 100." The village cadres also said that those people lucky enough to be selected for the telephone interview will be rewarded with 2,000 yuan if they gave the correct answers.
Even more amazingly, the telephones of many people malfunctioned on that day. Some people were happily waiting at home to wait for the home telephone to ring, but nothing happened. So they used their mobile phones to call their own home telephones: "It sounded like as if nobody was home, but actually the home telephone was not ringing." Some people went down to the Ministry of Telecommunication to complain and found more than 100 people there complaining about the same situation. "Most of those with telephone problems were either poor, or had previously argued with the cadres." Telephone service was restored in the afternoon, by which time the telephone survey had just ended.
One does not know to laugh or cry about this story about the behavior of Chinese officials. Random sampling is a somewhat scientific statistical methodology, and it was a good thing that the Jiangsu provincial government wanted to conduct a prosperity study. But the grassroots cadres in China are infinitely wise and they subverted the survey. On further thought, there is a strong tradition behind this. I have some old books here about rural studies in the 1960's. From reading those books, you will have no idea that hundreds of thousands of people were starving to death at the time. Every single commune reported that production levels rose again and the situation was never better. Even Mao Zedong who came from a peasant background was confounded by the sight of children sitting on the tightly packed crop.
What created this sort of absurdity? Aren't the grassroots cadres afraid of being caught cheating? Which great leader and brilliant emperor in history did not demand their underlings to speak the truth? Yet it is hard to find cases of bureaucrats getting their heads cut off for daring to lie about how great the situation was. Conversely, when people like Peng Dehuai tried to speak the truth, they met with bad endings. Sometimes, the decent folks are worried that the leaders being lied to. Actually the leaders are often only too glad to be lied to. It is the child telling the truth about the emperor's new clothes who creates embarrassment.
So this is how a culture that regularly practices lying and fakery came about. Even more sad in this news report is that a local school holiday was declared on December 20 and the teachers told the students to stay home in the morning to wait for the telephone call and provide the standard answers. I think that there must have been unbearable pressures on the teachers to instruct their students on how to lie.
The only comforting part is that the cadres used rewards to mobilize the people. In the past, it was more likely that brute force was used to coerce the people not to say the wrong things, or smear the image of the local district, or even smear the image of socialism. As a result, people lied out of fear or they chose to maintain silence and let the trained "actors" represent them. But today terrorism is not working as well. People have a choice to some extent, including denouncing the practice to the media without fear of retaliation. It can be said that 30 years after the reforms began, the dignity of the Chinese people as well as the degree of civilization in society have been raised markedly.
One may wonder how much longer will the Chinese phenomenon of the grassroots officials deceiving their superiors persist? How can we completely change things? The most traditional idea is to hope that the leaders are clear-minded people who sometimes travel incognito to observe the actual conditions. But the Chinese people have been waiting for several thousand years without much effect. As long as the source of authority comes from "above," the phenomenon will continue to occur. Only when the source of authority comes from "below" can the situation be changed. The great leader only has one pair of eyes, but the people have innumerable pairs of eyes and they can't all be fooled all of the time.
自上而下的考察是靠不住的 / 郭宇宽
2008-12-26
刚看到《南京晨报》报道了一条好新闻，为了迎接上级的全面达到小康的检查，南京浦口区的石桥镇，在给各村布置任务上可谓挖空心思，根据记者的调查，各村民家里都有“小康验收电话访谈样本”。这个样本共有16道问题和答案，其中第三题问的是：“2008年，您全家人均收入大概是多少元？答案是8000元以上。”第16题问的是“如果把幸福用100分来表示，您认为自己能打多少分？ 答案是90到100分。”据说村干部还口头宣传，当天被抽中电话的群众，如果按照标准答案回答，将可获得2000元的奖励。
更神奇的是，有一批人家电话在调查当天出现故障，有人兴致勃勃地等在家里准备中彩，却发现，用手机拨打自家电话：“好像是没有人接听，其实电话铃就没有响。”而且群众到了电信局才发现，家里电 话出现和他家一样情况的群众有100多人。“这些电话出问题的人中，大多数是家里经济不好的，或者平时和村干部闹过意见。”而且电话到了下午才通，而这个时候，小康电话调查正好结束了。
这则看起来让人哭笑不得的故事，有中国新官场现形记的意味。随机抽象调查本来在国际上算是比较科学的一种统计方式，我想江苏省设计了这样一种方式来评比小康，本来出发点也是好的，结果没料到中国基层干部的智慧是无穷的，最后调查给搞成这样。仔细一想，这确是有深厚历史传统的。我手边有一些从旧书摊上淘来的旧书，让人感慨地是，其中有几本在60年，60年关于农村工作的调查报告，从这些调查报告中，你完全不会感受到那个年代的中国正在发生饿死上千万人的大饥荒。所有的社员的讲述，都是今年又增产了多少，形势如何一片大好。农民出生的毛泽东，到农村视察都会被糊弄，小孩能坐在密不透风的庄稼垛上。
是什么造成了这种荒诞呢？这些在下面造假的人，难道不怕犯欺君之罪么？历史上的伟大领袖和明君们不是一直号召大家要讲真话么？但是在史书上找一找，好像很少有听说因为营造大好形势的“欺君”而掉脑袋的，而彭德怀式的实事求却反而大多不得善终。有时候善良的老百姓总是很担心，“上面”被蒙蔽了，怎么办啊？其实很多时候，作为一条潜规则，“上面”是乐于被蒙蔽的，倒是被说真话的孩子，点破了皇帝的新装，会更加尴尬。
就这样的循环造就了一个说谎和造假习以为常的文化传统，让人痛心的是，在这条新闻中，当地学校也在12月20日当天宣布放假，学校老师通知学生，在20日上午呆在家里根据村里下发的标准答案接听
小康验收电话。为人师表的老师也在教学生撒谎，我想一定有不得已的压力和苦衷。
唯一让人感到有一些欣慰的是，这次干部让老百姓撒谎是用奖励的方式调动积极性，而在过去我们了解到的更多是赤裸裸的恐吓，让老百姓谁也不许“乱说乱动”，让老百姓不能给地方形象抹黑，甚至扣个大帽子不能给社会主义形象抹黑。老百姓出于恐惧不得不说假话，或者保持沉默，让那些训练好的“演员”代表他们。而今天恐吓不那么管用了，老百姓有了一定程度上选择的权利，包括有的有正义感的村民向媒体揭发，也敢真名接发，理直气壮，不那么担心可能的打击报复。见微知著，这可以说明改革开放30年，中国老百姓的尊严水平和整个社会的政治文明程度确是实实在在的提高了。
有人还会问，那这种“下面”糊弄“上面”的中国国情，和让孩子从小撒谎的文化要一代代传承下去么？要彻底改变出路在哪里呢？最传统的思路是寄希望于青天大老爷的明察秋毫，确实电视剧里那些清官戏的微服私访，体察民情，让人看着非常激动人心，但我想中国人期盼青天大老爷，企盼了几千年没什么结果，再期盼下去也不会有什么效果。只要权力的来源依然来自于“上面”，对“上面”的糊弄就必然会发生。当权力的来源来源于“下面”，这种情况才可能扭转，因为即使青天大老爷也只有两只眼睛，而老百姓的无数双眼睛，没那么好糊弄。
