MCLC: tourism law to punish unruly travelers

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: kirk (denton.2 at osu.edu)
Subject: tourism law to punish unruly travelers
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Source: China Brief, vol. 13, 21 (10/24/13):
http://www.jamestown.org/programs/chinabrief/single/?tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D
=41528&tx_ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=25&cHash=65855c3ba24022ab673af1cd589574ac#.Um
nM-5TwJgI

Soft Power Meets Social Management: New Tourism Law to Punish Unruly
Travelers Overseas
By: Nicholas Dynon

Passed last April, the new China Tourism Law came into effect on October
1, in time for this year’s Chinese National Day “golden week” holiday.
While the main thrust of the legislation is greater regulation of the
domestic and outbound tourism industry and squeezing out unscrupulous
operators, the law breaks new ground by legislating requirements for
civilized tourist behavior.

Following a long run of bad international press about poorly behaved
Chinese tourists, the new law comes as a decisive move by Beijing to reign
in its unruly globetrotting citizens. It also serves as implied official
acknowledgement that the negative press has hurt China’s “soft power”
efforts to bolster its reputation among the world’s publics.

Furthermore, the law includes an ambitious effort to extend China’s social
control strategies beyond its borders, providing a legal basis for Beijing
to manage its citizens abroad just as does at home. Failure to tow the
official line overseas can now land a tourist in hot water back home.

Bad Guests: China’s Outbound Tourism

In the several years since the Beijing Olympics, China has emerged as the
world’s largest source of international tourists. From just over 20
million outbound tourists in 2008, over 70 million Chinese undertook
international travel in 2011. For the past decade, China has been the
fastest-growing tourism source market in the world. And the numbers have
been matched by spending. Chinese travelers spent a record $102 billion on
international tourism in 2012, making China the highest ranked country in
terms of tourism expenditure.

As the number of Chinese nations touring the world has increased, so too
has concern about their poor etiquette and bad manners, a topic which has
engaged media both abroad and at home. Despite this, Beijing has been slow
to respond to the educational and public relations challenge posed by its
travelling citizens. While official sources have paid lip service to the
idea of outbound tourists as “image ambassadors,” their reputational role
has been largely overlooked. Outbound tourism has thus constituted a major
“soft power” blind spot as the poor international reputation of Chinese
tourists increasingly undermines official international public relations
gains.

When a Nanjing schoolboy etched the words “Ding Jinhao was here” (Ding
Jinhao dao ci yi you) on a 3,500 year-old Luxor temple sculpture, he could
not have imagined the magnitude of the backlash he would provoke. Just
hours after an image of the graffiti was posted on micro-blogging site
Sina Weibo on May 24, it had been forwarded more than 83,000 times and had
received over 11,000 comments (Qianjiang wanbao, May 26). Within a day,
Ding’s school’s website was breached by vigilante hackers and subsequently
rendered inaccessible, and his parents approached national media to offer
an unreserved apology.  With merciless speed, the controversy quickly
entered Chinese lexicon as the “Ding Jinhao incident.”

Widely reported in the international media, the act of vandalism received
heavy criticism from social media users globally. But the heaviest
criticism was from outraged Chinese netizens. The incident also sparked an
online firestorm of criticism aimed more broadly at the “uncivilized”
behaviors of Chinese tourists (Modern Express, May 26). Social media users
and press outlets were quick to list other incidents that had reflected
poorly on China’s tourists. There was the case of the Chinese cigarette
butt floating in the waters off Palau, coral stealing in the Maldives,
foot bathing in the Louvre pool, photo scrums in the lavender fields of
Provence and countless incidents involving public urination and other
indiscretions (Xinhua, July 24). According to one Chinese online survey,
respondents voted the six most uncivilized tourist behaviors as littering,
disrespecting local laws and customs, being loud, queue jumping, removing
shoes and socks in public and getting into disputes (Xinhua, August 20).
On August 19, leading Chinese travel service Ctrip published the results
of its survey of 90 million users into uncivilized tourist behavior. The
findings showed that respondents believed that the behavior of individuals
and the state was important in shaping a good national image and enhancing
the country's soft power (Xinhua, August 20).

Much of the recent media and online chatter argued that China’s tourist
etiquette problems are damaging the country’s international image (Xinhua,
August 31). Just two weeks before the Ding Jinhao incident dominated news
headlines, Vice Premier Wang Yang slammed the poor behavior of China’s
tourists as a soft power liability.

Good Hosts: China’s Inbound Tourism

In time for the implementation of the new law, China's National Tourism
Administration (CNTA) in September issued an illustrated 64-page Guidebook
for Civilized Tourism. It had been seven years since the publication of
the previous edition. The 2006 guidebook had been published as part of a
massive campaign to promote etiquette and politeness in time for the 2008
Beijing Olympics, when a wave of international media and tourists were
expected to expose China to the world like never before. At that time, the
focus was squarely on the behavior of citizens within China’s borders
rather than those travelling beyond them.

Years before the first foreign guests took up their seats in Beijing’s
Birds Nest stadium, “Welcome the Olympics, stress civilization and
cultivate a new style” (ying aoyun jiang wenming shu xinfeng) had become
the catch-cry of preparations for the games. Indeed, a Chinese Communist
Party (CCP) Beijing Committee publication had called for raising moral
standards and implementing of an “Olympic Action Plan” as far back as 2001
(Beijing Evening News, December 27, 2001). Hosting the Olympics created a
need—or, as Anne-Marie Brady has argued, an excuse—for a sustained public
morality propaganda campaign (The China Quarterly, March 2009).

As the Olympics drew near, a proliferation of propaganda activities
promoted civilized behaviors such as queuing, placing rubbish in bins,
volunteerism and not spitting. At the neighborhood level, community
“compacts” provided enforceable guidelines stipulating correct behaviors
not otherwise covered by the state legal apparatus, such as looking after
the environment, stressing hygiene, and avoiding “unhealthy” tendencies
such as feudal superstitions. The “Civilized driving compact,” for
example, launched January 2008 and endorsed by the Beijing Organizing
Committee for the Olympic Games, called on Beijing’s drivers to “create a
good environment” for the Games (Shenyang Daily, January 23, 2008).
Another, the “Construction workers Olympics civilization compact,”
prescribed behavioral standards for migrant workers involved in the
pre-Olympics building boom (People.com.cn, March 6, 2007). In the lead-up
to and during the Games, compliance with these compacts was monitored and
enforced like never before.

For the duration of the Olympics, Beijing’s migrant workers were packed
off back to their hometowns, and tougher visa restrictions kept out
potential foreign troublemakers. City blocks surrounding the Olympic Park
were sanitized of nightclubs and other venues of questionable repute.
Beijing’s remaining residents and visitors were kept under watch by an
army of over 600,000 Olympics security/surveillance volunteers. It was,
writes Jules Boykoff, “a Foucaultian fantasy, a panoptic web whereby
people policed themselves while also policing each other” (Celebration
Capitalism and the Olympic Games: Routledge, 2013). Even while attending
Olympic events, spectators were urged to modify their behavior by shouting
an officially endorsed “civilized cheer.”

A similar approach to promoting civilized behavior would be reprised in
Shanghai as it prepared to host the 2010 World Expo. The “World Expo
civilization compact” (Shibo wenming gongyue) promoted civilized driving,
stopping and queuing and attempted to persuade residents not to wear their
pajamas in public, aiming to put forward a civilized image of the World
Expo host city (Xinhua, April 1, 2010). Activities such as “customer
service day” (held on the 5th of each month) carried out under the
“Welcome the Expo, stress civilization and cultivate a new style” banner
stressed the importance of playing the good host.

Both the 2008 Beijing Olympics and 2010 Shanghai World Expo were widely
regarded as qualified soft power wins for China, and both events have
contributed to China’s rapid rise as an international tourist destination.
In 2012, China received 57.7 million tourist arrivals, up from 31.2
million in 2000, making it the third-most visited country behind France
and the United States.

But playing host is one thing, and playing guest is evidently something
quite different.

Extending the Long Arm of the Law Overseas

During a State Council teleconference on the new China Tourism Law, Vice
Premier Wang Yang slammed the poor standing of China’s tourists, stating
that their uncivilized behavior and poor “quality and breeding” was
harming China’s image (Xinhua, May 16). As was the case with certain
aspects of its pre-Olympics civilizing campaign, the new China Tourism Law
constitutes a coercive shadow to Beijing’s international charm efforts.

Article 41 of the new law stipulates that tour guides are to “abide by
professional ethics, have respect for tourists” customs and religious
beliefs, inform and explain to them norms of civilized behavior, guide
tourists” healthy and civilized travel and discourage them from violating
socially ethical behavior” (National Tourism Administration, April 26).
Elsewhere, the legislation places responsibility squarely on tourists’
shoulders: “Tourists shall observe public order and respect social
morality, respect local customs, cultural traditions and religious
beliefs, care for tourism resources, protect the environment and abide by
the norms of civilized tourist behavior.” Article 66 states that travel
agencies will be allowed to revoke their contracts with tourists who
“engage in activities that violate social ethics.”

The title of a Xinhua media report, “Enhancing soft power depends on hard
boundaries,” describes the new law in terms of its role in regulating
Chinese outbound tourists (August 28). It suggests that with the law,
Beijing is building clear strictures around the role that Chinese tourists
abroad play as “image ambassadors” of their country. But while tourists
are being called to account, it appears that the onus will be on tour
guides and operators to ensure compliant behavior from their clients. Tour
operators arranging activities that breach laws or public morality, for
example, can be fined up to 200,000 RMB ($32,900) or have their business
license suspended. According to National Tourism Administration head Shao
Qiwei, implementation of the new law “requires travel agencies, tour
guides, tour leaders and tourists to consciously abide by regulated
civilized behavior and guide tourists’ travel civilization" (Wenming wang).

Just how the new law will work in practice and to what extent it will be
enforced by relevant tourism authorities is yet to be seen. After all,
prior to the law “s existence, expectations relating to tourist behavior
had already been prescribed in outbound travel guidelines and the “Chinese
citizen domestic tourism civilization compact,” albeit to little evident
effect. But with the law comes penalties, which will serve to promote
increased compliance. Accordingly, it is likely that we will see an
emerging quasi-compliance and surveillance dimension to the role of tour
operators as they seek to keep their noses clean.

There is also the issue of the catch-all nature of the term wenming
(civilized) within the Chinese policy and social management setting.
Within its official-use definition are several elements that make it
distinct from how the English term “civilized” is commonly understood. The
various civilization compacts and awards systems operating in post-Mao
China have tended to stipulate requirements reflecting official policy
preoccupations of the time.  Consequentially, being “civilized” has
invariably meant being patriotic, maintaining stability and national
harmony, abiding by family planning (the one-child policy), working hard
to get rich, loving the Party and changing established (“feudal” and
“backward’) customs. “Civilization” is also closely liked to official
discourse on “population quality” (renkou suzhi), which calls for “a
correct political stand and correct lifestyle and consumption choices”
(Pal Nyiri, China Journal, July 2006).

Given that “civilized behavior” and “civilized travel” are not defined in
the new law, it may assumed that such terms inherit the catch-all
characteristics of the term wenming, and will thus remain subject to
shifting policy and political concerns about citizens’ behavior.

Conclusion

How enforceable will the new law’s vague behavioral stipulations be? What
sanction would a future Ding Jinhao, his parents or his tour guide most
likely face under the legislation? If “civilized” means having a “correct
political stand,” what might the law mean for those expressing contrary
views abroad?

As a response to the issue of poor tourist reputation, the law is late
coming, and Beijing now faces an uphill battle to change what have become
hardened international perceptions. Nevertheless, the law may well benefit
China’s international public relations offensive in the long term,
allowing Beijing to more effectively manage this grassroots—and more
unruly—aspect of soft power it had hitherto ignored.

For Chinese tourists interested in the temporary freedoms associated with
overseas travel, the new law means increased surveillance and the
possibility of punishment. What happens on tour won’t necessarily stay on
tour.