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The Current Transcript for September 30, 2019

Host: Laura Lynch

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

He made brilliant technical arguments about why economically and for jobs and prosperity. It's best to stay in, but I think we didn't make enough arguments to connect with people emotionally.

LAURA LYNCH: Amid the Chaos and confrontation enveloping the United Kingdom over Brexit, former Prime Minister David Cameron. Cameron will admit he failed to do enough to win the referendum that led to three years of tumult. But he won't apologise for deciding to go to the people in the first place despite the division within his country. Our interview with David Cameron is first up today. Then it's the eve of the 70th anniversary of the People's Republic of China. Communist Party leaders have locked down dissent within China's borders ahead of the big day. But Hong Kong protesters are making up for it spoiling the party with their angry demands for freedom. And then in our last half hour.

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We need a framework in which maybe everybody is potentially a hero and it's not exceptional but the ordinary people who change the world.

LL: Essayist Rebecca Solnit on the kind of heroes we need. I'm Laura Lynch and this is The Current.

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David Cameron regrets losing Brexit vote, but says referendum was always inevitable

Guest: David Cameron

SOUNDCLIP

So if in fact the party opposite does not have confidence in the government, they will have a chance to prove it. They have until the House rises. Listen. Listen. Listen-

LL: If you thought things were settling down in British politics, think again. This was the scene last week when parliament reconvened.

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They have until the House rises today to table a motion of no confidence in the government's.

[Chaos]

And we can have that vote tomorrow.

LL: If you've forgotten how all of this uncertainty over Brexit began, we need to go back to former British Prime Minister David Cameron. He was the last to win a majority government and his decision to call a referendum on leaving the European Union has left Britain well in a bit of a mess. David Cameron has written about that and other tough decisions in his new book For the Record. And David Cameron joins me from New York City. Hello.

DAVID CAMERON: Hi. Great to be on your show.

LL: What are you thinking as you watch what is going on now in the British parliament?

DAVID CAMERON: Well I find it extremely painful because we've really had three years of being in a sort of height. The country voted to leave the European Union. I ran the campaign to try and keep us in. But obviously I failed in that endeavour. And obviously having voted to leave we should have left. And to be fair to my successor Theresa May, she did produce a deal for us to leave the EU but people - including those who actually were the most passionate about leaving - voted against it. So we're in this difficult situation. I hope what happened next is that the Prime Minister Johnson goes to Brussels, gets a deal for us to leave and that goes through. But you know it's a very difficult situation, very uncertain, and we have been somewhat stuck for these last the last few months and years.

LL: But let just look at what's happened in the last few weeks with the court ruling going against Boris Johnson, with the tone in Parliament, with female MPs telling Boris Johnson he needs to tone down his language and he's not. Are you in any way surprised by Boris Johnson's performance now in the pursuit of Brexit?

DAVID CAMERON: Well I don't agree with all the decisions that he's made and I've made that clear. But you know I think the crucial thing now is to look at the big picture and to support the prime minister as he goes to Brussels and tries to get a deal. That is the right outcome. I think we're very bad for us to try and leave the EU without a deal. It'll be bad for the economy, it'll be bad for our United Kingdom. It wouldn't be a good idea for the European Union either. So I'm trying not to become a commentator on everyday things in British politics. But the big picture is you know the way to deliver the referendum is to do so with a deal. If we can't then we're going to have to look at a general election or possibly even a second referendum as a way of unblocking a situation that has become badly blocked.

LL: And I know you'd may not want to comment on current events. But this all seems to have cascaded down from your decision to call the referendum. Why did you feel it was necessary?

DAVID CAMERON: Well I believed it was not just necessary but it was inevitable. There wasn't just political pressure for a referendum, because we'd had no treaty after treaty and change after change in our relationship with the EU with referendums often being promised but never being delivered. There was, if you like, a more specific problem which is that the organization we were a member of was changing in front of our eyes as the euro, the currency of some of the euro European community members, was driving change in Britain as the leading financial centre, but outside the euro, needed to find a safeguarded place as it were inside this organization. And that's what my renegotiation and referendum were all about. But I deeply regret the fact that we lost that referendum and in my book I try to reflect all the different things we could have done. Was there a better negotiation? Was there a different timing to the referendum? Were there things we could have done differently? But on the fundamental question I believe that a referendum was coming. And at least mine was an attempt to try and use that fact to get a better situation for Britain in the EU and try and deal with the problem.

LL: Many have said that the real reason behind you calling the referendum was you trying to settle divisions within your own party. It was political self-interest. Why do you say to that?

DAVID CAMERON: Well what I'd say is that every political party, not just the Conservative Party, had a problem with this issue. And every political party between 2005 and 2015 at some stage had stood on a platform at an election promising a European referendum. The Labour Party had done it in 2005. The Liberal Democrats had done it in 2010. The Greens, everybody, had stood on a platform recognising that this issue of Europe was something that ran between parties as well as just within them.

LL: But there was also, when I was living in London, I didn't sense any clamour among the people for a referendum. Did you see them saying we must have won?

DAVID CAMERON: What if there was no clamour amongst people for a referendum. It's hard to explain why every political party felt it necessary to offer one at some stage between 2005 and 2015. One of the biggest problems was that when the European Union came together and had a new treaty a constitutional treaty then turned into the Lisbon Treaty. Tony Blair specifically promised a referendum at the 2005 general election, and then when he got back in and the treaty was changed from a constitution to a Lisbon treaty it was pretty much the same thing. He dropped the pledge of having the referendum. So it was an issue running through British politics, sort of running sore as it were. And then made much worse by the eurozone crisis and the fact that the euro needed some changes to make it work and Britain was being caught up in that. So there was political pressure, political pressure certainly within my own party. I don't deny that for a minute. But political pressure right throughout our system. The organisation we are part of had changed at all recognition when we voted on it in 1975 it was you know eight countries and called the European Community. Now it's a very different organisation.

LL: While people were asked to vote on was whether to leave the EU or not and you were not putting forward any specific proposal to them. What was the main reason you say that the majority of British citizens voted to leave?

DAVID CAMERON: Well I think that the issue that caused my side to lose because of course we were putting a specific proposition which is to vote to remain in a reformed European Union, because I'd secured some important changes; getting us out of ever closer union, safeguarding the pound and the position of the financial services and City of London, making sure that new arrivals into Britain could instantly access our welfare system. So the proposition I was putting was specific I think the reason we lost was that there was a very strong sovereignty argument about control allied to this sense that immigration hadn't been properly controlled. And those two issues coming together I think was a powerful case that persuaded a lot of people to vote to leave.

LL: Immigration was a big issue during the referendum. Do you do you feel that it was portrayed fairly by the Leave campaign?

DAVID CAMERON: Certainly there were unfair elements in that they said that you know Turkey was definitely going to join the European Union. They even claimed at one stage there was no way any country could veto that from happening when of course no country can join without unanimity from the existing members. So I think there were some unfair points made, but there was a fundamental point that the Leave campaign were making which was that there is free movement of people within the EU. And so people can come and live and work in your country. And I think that was a problem because Britain had created more jobs than the rest of the European Union put together. And we saw very high numbers of net migration into the UK. And I think frankly the government I led, and previous governments, hadn't done enough to persuade people that the overall immigration situation was under control and that the overall immigration system was clearly in our national interest. I mean this is a point that's often made about the Canadian situation as you know you have as a country quite high levels of immigration. But I think your politicians have worked hard to try and explain that the system in place is fair and works in your national interest. We need to do more.

LL: But there's one other aspect I want to ask you about. Do you ever think about whether the cuts that your government made in the name of austerity after the 2008 financial crash alienated many in the UK who are already struggling, making them more ready or vulnerable to accepting the idea of blaming Europe and supporting Brexit?

DAVID CAMERON: Well I think when you look at the economic program we pursued I mean it was ultimately very successful. We had to make very difficult decisions and I expect that there were painful for some people. But I inherited a budget deficit that was forecast to be 11 per cent of GDP, the biggest anywhere in the world at that stage. But the choices we made and the decisions we made in the program we put in place actually led to the creation of 2.5 million new jobs, a million new businesses. By 2015 we were the fastest growing country in the G7. And crucially having carried out this programme we got re-elected with a majority government not a coalition government but we went from minority to majority. So I don't accept that a difficult economic program that was ultimately successful inevitably led to a Brexit vote. I don't think the evidence is there.

LL: Well let's talk about the fairness of the vote itself. There have been questions about the role of Cambridge analytics and data collection and how leave money was used in the boat. Why did you feel you were up against in the campaign?

DAVID CAMERON: I don't look back at it and say that inherently this was an unfair campaign. I mean I- The government's position was not a sort of on the one hand on the other hand position. The government was 100 per cent behind remaining in a reformed European Union. I spent millions of taxpayer pounds delivering a leaflet to every single house in the country. And in that leaflet I set out and agreed every word of it in terms of case for staying in. So I'm not sort of sitting here now and saying it was all unfair and it has to be rerun because the first one wasn't a fair process. There were tough arguments made on both sides. There are some specific complaints. I think one can overdo the this issue of data. Both sides were using modern data analytics and techniques and the rest of it. I mean fundamentally I think that my side of the argument we made brilliant technical arguments about why economically and for jobs and prosperity it's best to stay in. But I think we didn't make enough arguments that connected with people emotionally and then we have to learn from that. But I would say though we've now had three years where a lot of the claims made by those who wanted to leave; they said it would be the easiest deal in history. They said that we would hold all the cards. The negotiation was very straightforward. A lot of those things have not turned out to be the cases as I argued they wouldn't be. But I don't sit here and say that somehow the referendum campaign was unfair. It was a robust campaign but one which my side lost.

LL: Right now we're hearing some push from some quarters for a second referendum before any non-deal Brexit. Where do you come down on that idea?

DAVID CAMERON: Well as I said I think that the first answer is for the Prime Minister to go to Brussels, get a deal, parliament to vote through that deal. And for us to leave the EU on the basis of a deal.

LL: You make it sound so simple, but the negotiations for the deal has been so snagged up obviously over the backstop. What are you going to do?

DAVID CAMERON: It is complicated in many ways. But actually countries like Norway demonstrate it is perfectly possible to be a friend, a neighbour and a partner of the European Union but not a member. And Britain could have chosen a model like that and made it work and maybe if we'd done so we would have left by now. But my argument is the best thing to do is to leave with a deal. If we are stuck and the deal can't get through Parliament. By definition, in many ways, you have to either have a general election or you have to have a second referendum. The disadvantages with the general election is of course lots of issues will be discussed in a general election and there's no guarantee that a new House of Commons will be able to dispatch this item with any more certainty. So I wouldn't rule out a second referendum if I was Boris Johnson or Jeremy Corbyn or any other of the players on the stage at the moment, because it may be necessary to unblock the situation that we're in. But the first thing to do to unblock it is to try to find that deal.

LL: Would you be out there campaigning again?

DAVID CAMERON: Well we're not remotely at the point of a second referendum, one may never happen because I still think that the first thing that needs to happen is that deal and the Prime Minister has my support as he tries to get one.

LL: Before the Brexit referendum there was the Scottish referendum for independence that your side won. But there is fear now that a no deal Brexit could cause Scotland and even Wales to eventually break from the United Kingdom. How real do you think that threat is?

DAVID CAMERON: Well I think it's worth rewinding and thinking you know why did we have a referendum on Scottish independence. And the truth was that Scotland elected a parliament with a majority of Scottish nationalists and whose policy was to have a referendum. And as prime minister again I could have said no we're not going to have this and just leave the problem for my successor. I think the more responsible and less risky thing to do was to actually say that you voted to have a referendum. This is a United Kingdom built on respect. We'll respect your decision give you that referendum but it is a decisive referendum. And the person who led the campaign for Scotland to separate from the United Kingdom, Alex Salmond, said after the result this is a decision for a generation potentially for a lifetime. And I took him at his word for that and don't believe it's necessary to have a subsequent referendum. And of course when the Scottish referendum took place the legislation for a or rather the proposal that we would be having an EU referendum was already out there. So I don't think we have to have a second Scottish referendum. We've had it. We decided it and the situation should be clear.

LL: I'm not sure that the SNP would agree with you on that. They've made it quite clear.

DAVID CAMERON: The SNP are nationalists. They want to break up the United Kingdom. [cross talking] I'm not surprised that they keep coming back with fresh proposals. But the question is, is it necessary to have another Scottish referendum? My answer is that it is not.

LL: I hear that I am what I'm asking is, is the spectre of no deal Brexit going to fuel that desire for Scotland to break away because the party in power has made it very clear that they want to remain in the EU.

DAVID CAMERON: I think no deal Brexit is a bad idea all round and as I said in my earlier remarks, it's bad for the economy. It's also potentially bad for the United Kingdom. I think the House of Commons has legislated to take it off the table. So I don't think it's an outcome that should happen or that will happen.

LL: All right let's look back. What was your biggest accomplishment as prime minister?

DAVID CAMERON: Well I think the biggest task I have was to turn the British economy around. You know we came in with this huge budget deficit with the British economy, having suffered the biggest banking collapse in the world. We had the biggest budget deficit in the world. We'd had one of the deepest recessions anywhere in Western Europe. And we did make very difficult decisions of cutting some public spending and even putting up some taxes and restoring a sense of fiscal discipline. And it did work. We created 2.5 Million jobs a million new businesses you know. And actually we did so at a time while inequality was also falling and the number of people in poverty declining so the economic record was the most important thing. But I'm proud of some of the other steps we took. I think I was one of the first centre right Prime Ministers anywhere to initiate the issue of gay marriage and we passed that through parliament and many thousands of people have taken advantage of that and that is something that makes me very proud. We also kept our promise to the poorest people in the poorest countries in the world. All of the G8 countries signed up to nought point seven percent of GDP in overseas aid payments back in 2005. But actually Britain has been the one country that's kept its promise and delivered and we did that even as a time of difficult economic decisions. And that has saved countless countless lives in some of the poorest countries on Earth.

LL: And your greatest regret.

DAVID CAMERON: My greatest regret is losing that EU referendum and there isn't a day that goes by when I don't think what could we have done differently to secure a different outcome. As I say though, while Brexit is not my choice, Britain is the sixth biggest economy in the world. It's a legitimate option for us to be friends and neighbours and partners of the EU. We can make it work. And I believe that if that's the path we go down we will make it work. But today we're just dealing in a world where there's great uncertainty in the UK and I fear that's going to continue at least for the coming weeks.

LL: Are you resigned to Brexit being your legacy?

DAVID CAMERON: Well I think historians get to decide what your legacy is, you don't. I've written a book because I think while on the whole prime ministers that resign should let their successors get on with it, and I've certainly done that for the last three years. I think you also have a duty to write down what were you thinking, what were you trying to do, what are your reflections now. It's not a history book. It's not a political potboiler. It's your attempt to explain what you're trying to do and I try to be as frank as I can about mistakes that were made along the way, but also mentioning some of the things that I'm proudly managed to achieve.

LL: David Cameron thank you.

DAVID CAMERON: Many thanks for having me on.

LL: David Cameron was prime minister of Great Britain from 2010 until 2016 and his new book is For the Record. He was in New York City.

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LL: Well the CBC News is coming up next. Then:

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PRESENTER: The expulsion of three Canadian employees from China. That's the topic of our big story this week. The three parliamentarians say they told their hosts they wanted to check into the human rights situation. But when they met with the relatives of some dissidents, the Chinese government threw them out of the country.

LL: That diplomatic incident over human rights violations in China took place in 1993. Now as the country marks its 70th year, some are calling on Canada to take even more of a stand. We'll delve into that tense international relationship in our next half hour. I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

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The West needs 'collective action' to push China on human rights: expert

Guests: Lynette Ong, Gorden Houlden, Teng Biao

LL: Hello I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

[Music: Theme]

LL: Still to come feminist writer Rebecca Solnit on why we need to stop putting trust in heroes and instead trust each other. But first the sleeping giant is wide awake.

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LL: Officially it's time for celebration. October 1st marks the seventieth anniversary of the People's Republic of China. There will be a massive military parade, fireworks and tens of thousands of people out in the streets. But not everyone is celebrating the rise of China as a superpower. Certainly relations between Canada and China have been complicated over the years.

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VOICE 1: Canada's minister for external affairs Mr. Pearson told the House of Commons in Ottawa yesterday that the question of recognition of the Communist government in China was being considered along with other countries.

VOICE 2: From the Asian point of view the acceptance of China and the United Nations symbolizes the fact that there is now an Asian superpower.

VOICE 3: This is how Mr. Trudeau is meeting with Chairman Mao Tse tung was seen on Chinese television.

[Indistinct language]

VOICE 4: China has been edging closer to the major Western powers but no one predicted this overnight embracing of the capitalist concepts of freedom and modernization.

VOICE 5: First to China and Beijing where it's already Monday morning. The city is in shock. The military is in control. They're merciless storming of Tiananmen Square has cost many lives.

VOICE 6: The expulsion of three Canadian aeroplanes from China. That's the topic of our big story this week.

VOICE 7: Take a walk through Shanghai today. [Street noise] The pursuit of wealth is everywhere. Walkways.

VOICE 8: The crush of camera crews surrounded Meng Wanzhou as she arrived in an underground parking beneath Vancouver's long court.

LL: And then there are the now familiar protests in Hong Kong which have morphed into a protracted political storm over Beijing's attempts to exert more control over the semi-autonomous region. Three people join me to talk about the future of China and its relationship with Canada. Lynette Ong is an associate professor of political science at the University of Toronto and a China specialist. She's in our Toronto studio Studio. Teng Biao is a Chinese human rights activist and lawyer living in exile in the United States. He is in Cape May, New Jersey. Gorden Houlden is a former diplomat who has worked in Beijing and Hong Kong. He's now the director of the China Institute at the University of Alberta and he is in our Edmonton studio. Hello to you all.

GORDEN HOULDEN: Good morning.

LYNETTE ONG: Thanks for having me.

TENG BIAO: Good morning.

LL: We will get to the Canada China relationship quickly very soon but I just want to talk about Hong Kong because it's back in the news the protesters are back in the streets, clashes, confrontations Lynette Ong how would you describe the present moment for China and Hong Kong?

LYNETTE ONG: You know it's the seventieth anniversary is supposed to be an opportunity for China to celebrate its success and its arrival on the world stage like you have mentioned. But I think a lot of things are on President Xi Jinping is mine at the moment. For one thing Hong Kong, you might have military parade showcasing China's achievement in Beijing, but you have protests and lot of dissatisfaction going on in Hong Kong .on top of that economy is not doing well. Unemployment is rising with a trade war at the back of his mind. A lot of things for him to worry about.

LL: All right. Gorden Houlden what do you say?

GORDEN HOULDEN: Well your question is about Hong Kong. I have a foreboding sense that things may not end well there. The Chinese government has been quietly increasing the number of their forces there, i n particular People's Armed Police, who in extremis would be authorized by Beijing to intervene. The demonstrations do not show any sign of ending. I think that Beijing really would like to slip through the October 1st holiday without any action that would spoil their great celebration. But going looking forward I think there is this risk that they will eventually have to, in their eyes, grind down the protest movement to establish tranquillity in Hong Kong which I think is their longer term goal.

LL: And, Tend BIao, you're someone who's challenged the Chinese government on human rights. When you watch what is happening in Hong Kong right now. Does it give you hope.

TENG BIAO: Yes. Kind of. Hong Kong people took his relationship to a protest against Beijing because [unintellible] broke his promise of one country to a state and then and wanted to take away their rule of law from Hong Kong. But the protest in Hong Kong really turns to the typical scenario, not only Hong Kong but also in mainland China. And so some scholars and observers think that what's happening in Hong Kong may give hope to the political change of men in China.

LL: And I'm wondering what this seventieth anniversary means to you personally?

TENG BIAO: For me I can't go back to China because of my human rights work. And when it was in China because of my political activities and political opinions I was banned from teaching and eventually fired. I was put under house arrest and kidnapped and disappeared and tortured. So I know many human rights defenders and lawyers and dissidents like me in China still in prison and suffering. So for me I think the most fundamental task and the most important achievement for a country is people's freedom and dignity. But I think nothing to celebrate in China because Chinese people are deep [unintelligible] of the fundamental freedom and dignity.

LL: Okay. Lynette, how would you characterize China's place in the world right now?

LYNETTE ONG: Tough, very tough. I think there is a huge expectation on President Xi as well as some of the elite leaders that China has arrived. It has bided his time. But China is also in a world that is facing enormous enormous challenge. And I agree with Teng Biao that you know short term it doesn't- Hong Kong situation doesn't bode well. But I think over the medium and longer term this could actually be an opportunity to crack open the regime. It might actually bring about very very optimistic, cautiously optimistic, democratization.

LL: Over the long term, how long are you talking?

LYNETTE ONG: I'm not sure 10 and me maybe 10 and 15 years. Because you know Hong Kong today is not like Beijing in 1989. You know everyone's eyes on Hong Kong and the amount of international media investors money and staying home in Hong Kong makes it very very different. Different place and all those young people were doing the rounds in Washington D.C. last week. So the Beijing authority must be feeling a lot of pressure. I mean it is difficult to reconcile, I think, liberal economic reform capitalism with very close authoritarianism and increasingly saw an increasingly repressive regime that we have been seeing in the last five to seven years. I don't think this model, coexistence of the two, is actually sustainable.

LL: Well that's interesting because this is exactly the position that the Chinese President Xi Jingping sits astride. This idea of economic liberalism and still authoritarianism. I'm wondering Gorden Houlden, how do you how do you think China has changed and is Xi Jinping's rule?

GORDEN HOULDEN: Definitely has been a toughening of internal policies. There's been a reassertion of control over state enterprises, not to fundamentally eliminate the market dimension of the Chinese economy, but rather to reassert state power. There's also been a tougher line on internationally on China standing in the world. South China Sea is one example. China's power seems to be wielded with somewhat more comfort and ease than was the case abroad prior to the sea's ascension. So I think there is a more powerful China that is now more willing to exert its strength and to feel less of a need to play a subordinate role in international affairs.

LL: Well Lynette I want to come back to you again because I'm wondering how those clashes with the Trump administration over trade have changed the storyline for China.

LYNETTE ONG: I think trade war provides you know opportunities as slow as threats and risk for China. I think President Xi has been able to rally in nationalism it's an opportunity for him to rally nationalism to fight against foreign foreign forces. But at the same time and I think domestic economy is really feeling kind of the threat of prolonged trade war. A lot of companies and industries - I was in China two months ago. People are talking about it moving the entire value chain out of China to Southeast Asia. Even though that might not happened immediately but if these things continues for another six to nine months I don't see any end in sight. People will think about leaving and I think once industries left, once you move all the entire value chain, very difficult to see it coming back.

LL: Okay. I just want everyone to have a listen now to Jia Wang. She's the deputy director of the China Institute at the University of Alberta. She says things have changed a lot since her childhood in Beijing.

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I clearly remembered when I was growing up back then and you'd go to a store there may be only a few items you can buy, and you may still not be able to buy it because back then there was rationing of pretty much everything from pork, eggs, to even clothing. So I still have vivid memories. Nowadays there are so many supermarkets and when you walk in it's just pretty much everything. The choices are endless. So there's definitely abundance of consumer goods.

LL: Teng Biaong, I'm interested in your view on this. How much of that increased economic prosperity has translated into greater personal freedom for people in China?

TENG BIAO: Yeah that you know 30 years ago at most China watchers and diplomats thought that the economic liberalisation that marketization that turn a country to global economy will automatically lead China to political [unintelligible], but that didn't happen. And China has become the second largest economy and a lot of Chinese people, I think, have become richer than 30 years ago. But the political system, China still remains a one party rule and their human rights situation is even deteriorating. So the real story is more complicated than people have imagined. And I think that's the reason why the Western countries adopted a wrong policy towards China. It’s called our engagement policy. But in my opinion as it's very similar very close to the policy of appeasement.

LL: OK appeasement. Gordon Houlden, what do you think about that, that the Western nations are appeasing China when they shouldn't be?

GORDEN HOULDEN: Well certainly the previous comments that there was a great hope that there would be political liberalisation accompanying the economic growth. That has not been proven to be the case. However in the long time that I've been working on Canada China relations. I've not been convinced and still not convinced that an attempt to isolate China to somehow not deal with the government in a fashion not to speak to them would yield any particular utility. I actually believe in this time China has a greater influence over Canada than we do over them. Even the United States and the Western countries, the G7, let's say cannot dictate what's happening in Xinjiang, a place of particular concern, given the very large number of detainees. I think still that there has to be a way to speak to China to pursue our trade interests, there but also to be concerned about human rights. I don't think it's a one formula will work for China. Trying to put it in a box to contain it and isolate it won't work particularly in 2019.

LL: And Lynette Ong, what are you thinking on that?

LYNETTE ONG: You know I agree that you know China's humans human rights record is dismal and is getting considerably worse on the presidency. But I do not see engagement as one of appeasement. You know I think to be fair Chinese people have acquired its enormous economic freedom in the last 40 years and I think that is not to be ignored. I mean with economic freedom it doesn't mean that your political liberties will not be curtailed. But with a generation difference people are able to pursue things that were unimaginable 20-25 years ago. You know I think the Western policies right now cannot be the same 40 or 20 years ago because we are in a different time. I believe in continuous engagement but I think we also need to push very very hard on human rights and this is not something that Canada or the United States could actually do alone. And on that front you know I think the way to go about it is collective action.

LL: Do you not see that happening now? There is not a united front on this right now?

LYNETTE ONG: There is united front in rhetoric. I'm not sure whether there's any unilateral inaction. And I think a united front inaction would be what means that you actually have to put money on the table, which I think a lot of Western democracies despite its lip service, still lack the courage to do so.

LL: And money for what?

LYNETTE ONG: Well trade is at risk. You know you see China using politics as a leverage to punish countries that relies on China on certain industries.

LL: Canada certainly seen that recently.

LYNETTE ONG: Australia, Norway, a bunch of other countries.

LL: Okay. Teng Biao, why don't you think a softer approach of engagement and also calling out human rights like what we've heard here? Why wouldn't that be effective in changing China's behaviour?

TENG BIAO: I don't think engagement is necessary appeasement but if you engage in the economic growth in China. I'm sure the WHO and the UN [unintelligible] Council- But at the same time they didn't get much pressure in terms of human rights violations. That's really close to appeasement. So for the past three decades or more, what their Western democracies and their Western enterprises did is to kind of ignore human rights, promoting human rights and democracy in China. And they prioritized earning money from China. So if this kind of engagement policy continues that will make make political decisions even worse. And what is even worse is that Western countries and especially the western enterprises are even facilitating totalitarianism in China. Many high tech not even companies like like Google, Apple, Microsoft practice self-censorship. And some tech firms like Yahoo and Cisco are even helping Chinese in to establish their quest for Washington to tighten its surveillance and the censorship.

LL: But let's talk about business a little bit more. Gorden Houlden as we've seen in Canada throughout the hallway controversy, the arrest of many Meng Wanzhou, the detention of Canadians in China, countries can pay a price for crossing China. So how do countries do that balancing act to advocate without poisoning trade relations?

GORDEN HOULDEN: It's never going to be easy. And that can cross contamination is always going to be there i.e. when you speak out you criticize China, particularly for a smaller country like Canada, they have many many ways to retaliate. And we've seen that in the case of the Meng Wanzhou case the way in particularly that are canola and pork exports have been curtailed imposing real hardship on Canadian agriculture workers farmers. That's there's no simple way around that. But on the other hand we are far more dependent on international trade than the United States for example than China itself. We have to maintain our prosperity. And the idea that we cannot be economically involved with the second largest economy, the largest trader, soon to be perhaps the largest economy on earth, simply isn't sustainable. So how to walk and chew gum at the same time? How to promote human rights but also promote our economic benefit and development for Canada for Canadians? There is a challenge. It's not easy. It has never been easy. But the idea that you could have only one or the other to me is mistaken.

LL: It sounds like you don't really have an answer right now to that question.

GORDEN HOULDEN: There's no quick fix. Unfortunately, there's no quick fix because try and tell Western farmers or Eastern lobster fishermen who are doing very well right now. They're trying to trade that they should ignore all that. On the other hand try and tell your listeners that we shouldn't care about human rights. It's one of those conundrums, those challenges that is not going to be easily undone or fixed.

LL: Lynette, have you got an answer to that tough question?

LYNETTE ONG: Let me have a go. I don't have an answer but you know China is supposed to be our diversification from U.S. market. So it now seems that you know putting eggs on two baskets is not enough. So we need to further diversify our market from the U.S. and as well as from China.

LL: That sounds like further isolation of China than if you're going to just turn away from it not.

LYNETTE ONG: Not necessarily. You know I think the first best approach is always free trade but if the first best approach doesn't work we can think about regional trading agreements. That is reduce the cost of negotiating with individual countries and be able to to trade with a bunch of countries. And I think there is more work. There's more work to be done on that front and I'll just drive home the point. And I think on being tough on China this is not something that Canada or any single country can do on its own. We collectively, Western democracies, must think about some effective solution.

LL: Teng Biao, I want to come back to you because you're someone who has suffered for speaking up for human rights in China and I'm wondering what you think of Lynette Ong's suggestion that perhaps things might change in about 10 to 15 years. How hopeful are you that China's future will be more democratic?

TENG BIAO: I didn't say that we should isolate China. But it's a choice if there's a whole international environment is in favour of democratization in China with isolation policy we should do that. But what I argued for the past three decades, the policy towards China is kind of a failure. The [unintelligible] price or any meaningful pressure to the Chinese the government in terms of improving human rights. They didn't talk about Xi Jiang or [unintelligible] or Hong Kong. But most of these statements are kind of firm lip service. They didn't give effective pressure to China. So my idea is we should, the international community, especially the Western democracies should link human rights to anything that Beijing cares most. Like Beijing wants to host the Olympics, a few years later they're their host base Beijing Winter Olympics. And they will host a panel G20. And they want to become a member of Human Rights Council of UN. So we should link human rights issues to the issues that Beijing cares.

LL: But I'm still wondering how hopeful are you that China's future will be more democratic.

TENG BIAO: For long on and I'm optimistic, but within 10 or 15 years I'm pessimistic. Chinese is now authoritarian, but my term is high tech totalitarianism, and it's very difficult and risky for the people who want change in Chinese politics to organize to mobilize. The international pressure is not enough.

LL: We have to leave it there. We are running out of time. I thank all three of you for a really interesting discussion. Lynette Ong is an associate professor of political science at the University of Toronto and a China specialist. She was in our Toronto studio. Teng Biao is a Chinese human rights lawyer now living in exile in the United States. He's in Cape May New, Jersey. Gorden Houlden is a former diplomat who's worked in Beijing and Hong Kong and he's now the director of the China Institute at the University of Alberta. And he was in our Edmonton studio. Well, coming up in our next half hour.

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LL: For Rebecca Solnit David Bell gets the idea of heroes right. We can all be heroes. It's not just up to the stereotypical strong saviour figure. Writer and feminist Rebecca Solnit is my guest.

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'We are in this incredible era of changing the story': Rebecca Solnit on who controls the story of our society

Guest: Rebecca Solnit

LL: I'm Laura Lynch and you're listening to The Current.

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VOICE 1: [From Terminator 2] Hasta la vista. Baby.

VOICE 2: [Dr. No. Connery as James Bond] Bond. James Bond.

VOICE 3: [Maverick from Top Gun] I feel the need. The need for speed. Whoo.

VOICE 4: [Dirty Harry form Sudden Impact] Go ahead. Make my day.

LL: Some classic lines of cinema from some classic heroes tough, manly, hard working. But singer Liz Phair gives a different impression of the classic hero in her song Soap Star Joe.

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[Song: Soap Star Joe by Liz Phair]

LL: He's just a hero in a long line of heroes looking for something attractive to save, she thinks. And author feminist and historian Rebecca Solnit agrees. She says we need to rewrite the idea of the hero and, on a bigger scale, of who gets to tell their story and that's sometimes one lone hero isn't what we need at all. Her new book,Whose story is this: Old Conflicts New Chapters, looks at the struggle we're seeing today over who controls the story of our society and why some of those who have held the podium for so long are reluctant to share that microphone. Rebecca Solnit is with us from San Francisco. Hello.

REBECCA SOLNIT: Hello.

LL: So what's wrong with heroes?

REBECCA SOLNIT: The whole framework suggests first of all that the rest of us are not heroes, that we're passive or wicked or helpless or confused and need to be saved. That exceptional beings are what makes the difference. And if you actually look at the most beautiful parts of our histories it's mass movement. It's collectives. It's ground swells. And we need a framework in which maybe everybody is potentially a hero. And it's not exceptional but the ordinary people who change the world.

LL: Why do we need that?

REBECCA SOLNIT: Because that's first of all how it actually works. Most of the time and second of all I think it makes people aware that they are powerful that what they do matters, that we're not here sitting around waiting for someone to save us, that we're part of the process.

LL: We played a little bit of that Liz Phair's song and you include that in your book. Why does that song speak to you?

REBECCA SOLNIT: Oh man it's an old song but when it came out I just love the hell out of it. And the Hollywood movie medley you did was so perfect because these heroes are all kind of like 'look at me. I'm awesome. I'm better than other people. Nobody can do what I do'. There's a kind of egotism to heroism and also a set of stereotypes. The hero's usually a male, usually a straight white guy, usually has enormous musculature, even though most of what it takes to change the world involves all kinds of skills that are not muscles and are not physical violence and are not car chases and are not beating people up. And I feel like all that stuff. And I love watching it some of the time. I'm a big fan of Hong Kong action movies in particular. But it really does not tell us what we need to know which is what is the nature of power? How does the world get changed? What's our role in all this?

LL: Well would having more women as cinematic heroes help solve the problem?

REBECCA SOLNIT: You know there's a bunch of Hollywood movies and other movies now. And for me they're super fun to watch Katniss Everdeen or Furiosa in the new Mad Max movie, newish Mad Max movie, do their thing. But they're essentially masculinized, exceptional individuals with great talents at violence leaving a trail of mayhem behind them and that just doesn't really have that much to do with how you get abortion rights or same sex marriage or action on climate change or immigrant rights. You know we don't really have actual examples outside of hand-to-hand combat in war, where that's what happens. And so it's a big distraction that becomes, when people believe it hard enough, a big delusion.

LL: Well there's also the end of the Hunger Games film series where the hero Katniss Everdeen retires from her life of fighting to perhaps where people think she should be you know.

REBECCA SOLNIT: And what prompted this particular essay about the problem with heroes was an Icelandic movie about a lone eco saboteur that didn't really seem to understand at the outset, how you actually achieve environmental change, environmental protection. And by the end of it didn't really care at all because it turns out what women really want is babies. And Katniss Everdeen seemed to plot spoiler fall into the same trap. Because, part of this suggests that the people who change the world are those very special people over there and the rest of us don't really, A, have the power to change the world, B, the desire. All we really want is personal stuff. My younger brother actually intervened in a movie about the Seattle World Trade Organization action in 1999, where they were trying to suggest why do people want to change the nature of global geopolitics and economics. And it was because they have daddy issues seemed to be the script that he jumped in on. Not because actually they care about the people and the environment that are suffering. I've been an activist my whole adult life. I know people actually care about these things. They care about people they haven't ever met. They care about the ocean. They care about the forest. They care about the climate. They care about refugee kids. You know we're not these purely privatized personal beings that Hollywood tends to think we are. We're bigger than that. And that's also what falls out of the story when we're all sitting around being pathetic waiting for the hero to ride in on the back of a pickup.

LL: Well not everyone is riding around but there has been a rising and what I would say some see as female heroes in real life. And I'm thinking of Greta Thunberg on the environmental front, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on the political left. Even Laura Ingraham or Tomi Lahren speaking for the political right. They become targets for their opponents and I'm wondering how you see that.

REBECCA SOLNIT: Let me see. Well I wouldn't have included the last two, but Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Greta Thunberg are remarkable people. But if they're surfers we should look really hard at the wave. What great change has made it possible to elect this young Latina. What shift made her the voice of our times who speaks for a lot of people. What changes have the climate movement made to make powerful leaders and the media ready to hear a teenager speak up about climate change. I know there's been First Nations and all other kinds of teenagers all over the world speaking up about climate change for decades. Why? I think Greta is wonderful and amazing but I think that she was in the right place at the right time. And what made it the right place? What made it the right time? I's a groundswell. It's a collective engagement that created this space for her to be heard. And it's the people ready to listen to her. We don't really have a language. Maybe other languages, maybe indigenous languages, let you speak about the individual and all the things that surround them that make them effective. So we always talk about these people as though they're doing it all themselves but it's so systemic.

LL: Then the story as you write should really be about the story of a group that is coming together, connecting, holding meetings, persuading people. But it's kind of hard to make that into a sexy story.

REBECCA SOLNIT: I don't agree with you. You look at journalism movies like spotlight and all the President's Men. This new book out about how the Me too stories got broke in 2017, and detective work finding things out putting things together is pretty exciting. The movie about the Selma to Montgomery march across the Pettus Bridge was pretty exciting.

LL: But you had a Martin Luther King leadership role in that.

REBECCA SOLNIT: Yes but still I think that we don't have much of a tradition and recognition that you know there is something very exciting about being in a group about being part of something bigger than yourself. Hollywood which is a star system hasn't really tried to capture that but that doesn't mean it isn't exciting and engaging. It just means that we need better storytellers.

LL: You're also pushing for change though and you just sort of led into it in the storytelling sense and who gets to be the hero in terms of who gets to tell the story. First of all what do you mean by the story here?

REBECCA SOLNIT: You know something happens and there's a lot of different ways to tell it. One thing we see over and over in the U.S. is stories about gender violence men against women are often framed as 'but how does this affect the men?' We still have old white male judges who will treat a rape as how it affects the boys future rather than the girl he raped. And so much of Me Too was framed around well how does this make men feel? Does this make men uncomfortable? And it's like hey women have been uncomfortable for thousands of years. Maybe this makes them feel a little more comfortable for the first time in millennia. Why don't you think about that? And you see over and over again, for example, the story of immigrants is focussed not on the desperation and terror that makes people become refugees, but how it is for the people when they arrive, the mild discomfort or annoyance of strangers in your community. And so who do we centre the story on? Whose needs and feelings matter? How do we excuse perpetrators were ignored or in silence victims? These are a tremendous political questions and they're so built into how the news and entertainment and everything else has been told. And you could probably go back to the Bible. You know we are in this incredible era of changing the story. The police shooting the unarmed black woman is going to be about the woman and not about the cop. Maybe. Maybe. You know the oil pipeline is not going to be about the corporation. It's going to be about the indigenous people whose land it desecrates. So we're changing the stories and it's a tremendous battle. I think we're winning in a lot of ways but it's very intense very heated and the outcomes are not guaranteed. We're in the middle of it not at any finish line.

LL: We talked about heroes but you also talk about something you call human alarm clocks. What do you mean by that?

REBECCA SOLNIT: Well one of the fun annoying pop culture words you hear all the time is woke about. Who's really woke about racism or something like that. In the introduction to this book, Whose Story is this, I wrote about the people I call human alarm clocks suggesting maybe those of us who are supposed to be really woke should remember it's not part of our inherent awesomeness. Somebody woke us up. Black Lives Matter made us much more aware of police brutality and racism. I wrote about an extraordinary Indigenous man in the U.S. who became a powerful figure in the National Park Service reframed how to historic sites were portrayed employed Native Americans made Native American stories part of the place, as part of a huge shift in the U.S. in recognizing that native people were here. The continent was not empty. Nothing was discovered. It was invaded. And so you see these people, these extraordinary projects waking us up. So it's about being less self-congratulatory that I'm still awake and more grateful that historical phenomena that these human alarm clocks have woken us up.

LL: You mentioned me too just a little bit earlier and I want to look about a little bit more because there is a gap between telling people what happened to you and being believed. And I'm wondering if you see that as being different this time than when told their stories before.

REBECCA SOLNIT: Absolutely. And that's actually a perfect sort of pick up from where I left off with gratitude Greta Thunberg. Why did these stories have consequences why did they get heard in ways they did not before and really me to is just sort of the latest wave of feminism. And I actually think it's because of feminism because more women were in positions of power to decide who to listen to what story mattered. More men have been transformed by feminism. A huge amount of work had been done in the five years preceding to break a lot of rape myths, to educate people that actually not a lot of women actually lie about being raped. But rapists lie routinely that it's not what she drank or what she wore that caused rape that rapist caused rape. And so old stories, because people like Bill Cosby had been perpetrating their crimes for decades because women were not audible, which doesn't mean that woman didn't speak up it means that people weren't willing to listen, willing to believe them, willing to follow up. And so the women were not silent. They were silenced by a system that didn't want them to be audible. And then something changed. And that's a colossal systemic change in how listening happened not how speaking happened so much. So it was a systemic collective thing that happened not a lone individual thing, much though I respect the woman who spoke up and the journalist who broke the stories.

LL: But I wonder if if even now there are only certain women who are able to get their story out there and be believed, that there are so many others who are perhaps less advantaged position in our society who still really have no recourse.

REBECCA SOLNIT: Absolutely. But I think one of the exciting things that happened after all these very famous movie stars came forward is it did open up space. Woman who worked as janitors were able to use the platform. Farmworkers in California wrote an extraordinary letter about what they experience as sexual harassment and violence in the agricultural fields. They wrote a letter of solidarity and then there was some reciprocity/ Emma Watson in the UK and some of the movie stars in the U.S. set up organizations to fund resources for poor women who want to report sexual harassment. And I also think one of the consequences of things like this isn't just the very concrete intangible thing of women speaking up. I think a lot of men have seen what happened and are probably thinking oh my chances of getting away with this, my chances of making her shut up and making sure no one believes her or no one cares are not what they used to be. Maybe I'm not going to get to rape this person or grope this person or sexually exploit this person with threats about her career. And so I think the most important things that might be happening are the things that aren't happening because of this. And I have seen in a lot of different arenas women who aren't so powerful also reporting this.

LL: You talked about being sexually harassed when you worked in a diner as a teenager. Remind us what happened.

REBECCA SOLNIT: Yes I was 18. I was a bus girl in a diner in Sausalito tourist place on the waterfront. There's a bleary eyed old alcoholic chef almost three times my age who had grabbed me from behind unexpectedly, which was disconcerting and disgusting and kind of degrading. And it was 10 years before Anita Hill spoke up and before sexual harassment in the workplace began to be taken mildly seriously. And I did not feel at that time that I could either tell him directly to stop or I could complain to my boss and my boss would tell him to stop. Because in those days we were told to suck it up it didn't matter just do you know it's just a joke it didn't really happen. You're exaggerating you're too sensitive, all that stuff most women listening probably know. And when you don't have a voice you have to use underhanded means. So I made sure the next time he grabbed me after it happened several times I was holding a big tray of clean glasses and I yelped and dropped them and the glasses broke with the tremendous sound of about 40 breaking glasses. And my boss came over to see what happened, and I doubted he cared about the integrity of my ass but he did care about losing 40 glasses. So he told off the cook and the cook knew that I had set him up and that he you- But I felt like that's the only way I could make it stop that it wasn't something where I had the power and the value to just say I have a right to not be grabbed by creepy guys.

LL: If that happened today and you were 18 today how do you think you would react?

REBECCA SOLNIT: You know I think it depends on the person that some people have been brought up to believe that they have inalienable rights and they matter and some people haven't. But I did mention in the footnote to this piece seeing a waitress on video, close circuit camera, in her workplace get grabbed by a customer and without hesitation she turned around and threw him to the ground. It which was just amazing, speaking of action heroes that I can get excited about. And then she apparently reported to her boss. Her boss called the cops. The cops charged him. And this was partly about she must have felt I am in a world where my bosses actually is going to take this seriously. Maybe I'm even in a world where the police are going to treat this as assault, rather than like 'hey babe you shouldn't have been wearing that. What's the big deal'. Which is what I think you would have gotten in 1980 or 81 when it happened to me and I was kind of shocked that I was shocked to see it because it was such a marker of how much the world has changed, not perfectly not everywhere not all the time but sometimes because I don't think that would have happened anywhere in 1980 or 81.

LL: Now are all these movements that we talked up. Me Too, Black Lives Matter, Standing Rock protests that they faced a lot of backlash too. What stories are they telling?

REBECCA SOLNIT: You know they're stories about who matters. They're stories about who decides. They're stories about broadening and deepening equality, justice, democracy to include people who've been historically excluded because they're not white. They're not male - and I also write about because they're not straight they're not cisgender and it's happening in so many ways in your country and in mine by taking down old monuments and putting up new kinds of monuments, changing the public landscape, changing who we honour, changing our language, changing who's audible, changing what stories make the news. But also practical things on the ground. I mean with climate change recognizing the unequal impact and the vulnerable who are people in the tropics, in the Arctic, indigenous peoples, people close to the land, poor people and recognizing that this is a fact the climate movement just scaling up so excitingly this last little while and with the big climate strike has always been a human rights and justice movement too.

LL: But is changing the stories we tell and listen to really enough to change the world?

REBECCA SOLNIT: It's not the end but I think it's the beginning, if you tell the same old story there's no opening to change the outcomes. If the same old stories are being told the same old people are being heard. You're hearing from the rapists and not the victims .you're hearing from the cops and not the families of the victims. So changing the story is never the end. But it's I think it's almost always the beginning. It's where we start and it's a power that all of us have to look at breaking this story to0 -which is a term journalists use for starting a new story. But I use for breaking up an old story that covered up devastation, destruction, injustice, a story that rape is not a real problem on campuses, that women always lie about rape and men never do, that refugees are all criminals and- you know all those old stories.

LL: Well Rebecca Solnit and I thank you for your thoughts and for your new book. I think maybe you have another chapter in there called that you need to write called 40 smashed glasses because it's just a great title for your memories. I thank you very much for your time.

REBECCA SOLNIT: My pleasure. Thank you.

Rebecca Solnit is an author feminist and historian. Her latest book is Whose Story is this: Old Conflicts New Chapters. She was in San Francisco.

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LL: And that is our program for today stay tuned to CBC Radio One for Q. On the 30th thirty fifth anniversary of the hit TV show Murder She Wrote, Tom Power talks to his star Angela Lansbury about the series and her time on Broadway. Now if you've used Google today you might notice some Canadian content. The doodle today is honouring track star Harry Jerome. He would have been 79 years old today. He died at the age of 42 of a brain aneurysm. Jerome was in his prime, back in the 60s breaking world records in the 100 meter and 100 yards sprints. His career wasn't easy, though. He faced many injuries and discrimination as a black athlete. We'll end today with memories of Harry Jerome from another Olympian, someone who knew him best. I'm Laura Lynch. Thanks for listening to The Current.

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VALERIE JEROME: My name is Valerie Jerome. My brother is the late great Harry Jerome a three time Canadian Olympian and was the holder of many world records, most famously of course his hundred metres world record at ten flat in 1960 when he was 19. We were selected to Canada's Olympic team and we went to the Rome Olympics. But Harry was heading into that Olympics with quite a bit of pressure on his head in as much as he had equalled the world record for the 100 meters at 10 flat. And you know Canadians not having an Olympic medal for a very long time expected him to come home with a medal or not at all type of attitude. In Terry's semi-final heat he tore his hamstring and limped off the track.

COMMENTATOR: Jerome is down the middle of the track. He is pounding his fist into the centre, he is now getting some help and coming over to the infield. It's all over for Harry Jerome. A very ovbious...

VALERIE JEROME: [Unintelligible] as Canadians of course, he couldn't stand the pressure and he quit. Many members of the press just considered him, and some of the coaching team on that Canadian squad, just felt that he was an uppity black kid who had overstepped himself and was now faking an injury. When he came back from those Olympics in 1960 , there were people who would get up from their tables in restaurants - and this happened of more than one occasion - and come and tell him he was the lowest thing in Canadian society, and that he was a dreadful person and it was, I believe, much easier to tie this loser name to him because of his race. We were already somewhat in contempt of a held in contempt by so many people. So yeah it wasn't easy. One of the really remarkable things about Harry that I just found so incredibly admirable was that when he was being taunted, tormented, people attempted to humiliate him, he never lashed back. What he tended to do was to take the energy from a very unpleasant encounter. As he who would say he'd lay it out on the track. He used it as motivation. His favourite saying was be tough sort of you know me a little puncture on the arm and take him on [unintelligible]. Be tough, be tough. When the going gets tough the tough get going. And I draw courage from that. I draw strength from that. I think that's been one of the really positive residuals that I have in my life. I know in Harry's heart he would have been so pleased to be honoured because there wasn't a lot of it forthcoming from him all the time during his lifetime. So I know that he would have been proud.

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Wednesday September 30, 2019 Full Episode Transcript

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