The Myth of “Chen Gong Ren Shi”

The Myth of “Chen Gong Ren Shi”(“Successful Men”)

WANG Xiaoming 

July of 1998,Shanghai                     

The change of the state ideology has been evident since the middle of 1980s: now it offers, to the public, the promise of being rich instead of the call of revolution. The “Reform towards Market Economy” is pushing mainland China into a new social formation: an mixture of centralized, and totalitarian, political system and capitalistic economy.

Also since the middle of 1980s, under the guidance of the official policy of “Let some ones rich first”, has been growing, especially in the cities, an new social stratum – someone called it “New Citizens” -- which is out of the state system and includes various “Ge Ti Hu”(“Self-employed Laborer”), the bosses, managers and workers of the enterprises owned by foreign and local capitalists, and those making living as prostitutes.

At the same time, a so-called “New Rich” stratum is rapidly growing in mainland, which is formed by almost 10 millions of people whose private property worth more than millions, even 10 or 20 millions, yuans (RMB) on average.

It is particularly worthy to pay attention to that the members of the “New Rich” are, in the most part, not the same ones of “New Citizens”, and the different part is expanding more and more.

Thus, appeared the new complex relations between these two new stratums and the old ones -- working class, peasant class, ordinary official clerks, teacher and so on: the conflicting of economic benefits, the diverging for politics, education and public security, and the diverging, also the identifying, of the views on living and morals …

Also, these two new stratums are gradually influencing the contemporary culture: the new views of consumption, law and politics, the new patterns of interpersonal relationships, and the new senses of social estate, time, space and so on.

It is already the most urgent and important for the intellectuals to describe and analyze the above obvious changes of economics, politics and culture, and to understand the deep significance of these changes in the social transition of contemporary China. In a great degree, the new development of the whole humanity and social sciences in China depends on whether the intellectuals gain enough inspirations, insight and theoretical creative ability.

So some new research topics have emerged: the mutually effective relations between Globalization and locals in China, the collaboration of the transnational capitals and the local powers, the growing of the new ruling patterns, the changes of, and the contradictions in, the state ideology, the operation of the so called "mass media" , and so on …

Among these topics there is a one worthy to particularly pay attention to, that is the myth of "chen gong ren shi (successful men)" which has been quickly spread especially in the cities and the east, and the south, of the mainland China since 1992.

The outline of the "chen gong ren shi" is: usually a slight fat man of 40 years old or so, well-educated, with a beautiful young wife and a son of about 10 years old, riding a famous brand car, living in a magnificent house of "European style", stepping in luxurious hotels, clubs and grand theaters and, of course, being fond of golf …

Such an image and the myth around it have being made mainly by the media and advertising since 1992. It has been made also by some stories and novels, pop music, decoration of shops, hotels, restaurants and bars, even some theoretical discussions in the academic circles …

Certainly the image can be seen as the portrait of the New Rich, but the portrait has only half face: it shows only how they enjoy the luxurious living, and at the same time, it hides how they want, and are doing, in -- for example -- supporting the authority, plundering the national property and so on.

Some ones called the image and the myth as "white collar culture" or "middle class culture". I think it's wrong. The "chen gong ren shi" in contemporary mainland China is very different from either "white collar" or "middle class" in the west, Japan and Hong Kong. It will cause serious ignorance to the "Chinese characteristic" of the "chen gong ren shi" if you use only those concepts, which were made in the western social histories, to understand "chen gong ren shi". 

The myth of "chen gong ren shi" gives a false promise to the public: all persons can be "chen gong ren shi". Thus, it produces a popular fancy and in fact covers, with the fancy, a lot of the harsh reality: the workers are, on a large scale, losing their jobs, the national property is being quickly plundered, the conditions of education are being worse and worse, and the ecocide, the corruption …

But now the myth of "chen gong ren shi" is becoming an new leading ideology in the mainland China, at least in the cities and the east and the south of China. It became the most important consultation with which the New Riches and New Citizens understand themselves. It also became the most attractive model according to which the young people design their life styles. So, it maybe become the strongest power   of culture in the formation of the new leading culture in contemporary mainland China.

It should be stressed that the reason why such a myth of "chen gong ren shi" comes into being, and why it spreads so widely and influences the public so deeply, is that not only it is the production of the cooperating of the state power and the transnational, and local, capitals, but also it is a timely response to, and thus also a strong power to form, the collective desire and public imagination of rich life, which can be thought as being of some "historical rationality" since Chinese people had a so poor life before 1990s.