Still fretting over our failure to penetrate the growing business opportunities in China? Personally I blame Blue Peter. Yes, the wholesome children’s TV programme which ( inadvertently I am sure) may have left a couple of generations of us so daunted by the rigour of Chinese etiquette and protocol that we hesitate to try and do business there.
If this strikes a chord with you, an forthcoming event organised by the England China Business Forum, with the support of intellectual property lawyers Barker Brettell, may just be the remedy you seek – more of that anon.
Blue Peter is of course defined by the presenters and pets who starred in it - a bit like geological eras - and I go back to the pre-Shep / Christopher Trace period. Then the programme regularly featured little history lessons - and the one that may continue to blight Chancellor Osborne’s efforts to orientate us to China focused on George MacCartney and the infamous kowtow.
Back in 1793 - even before Blue Peter started to be broadcast – Lord George MacCartney led the first trade delegation from Britain to China. Judged as a business event it did not go too well. After the delegation returned home, the Chinese Emperor Qianlong wrote to George III - who had despatched the ‘embassy’ - advising him “ I set no value on objects strange or ingenious, and have no use for your country's manufactures.”
We can take a deep local hurt from the Emperor’s rebuff because prominent within the inventory of goods that the delegation took to China were articles proudly described as ‘Birmingham goods’ – no other guarantee of reputation being needed. It also included ( from lesser cities, no doubt) a planetarium, globes, mathematical instruments, chronometers, a telescope, measuring instruments, chemical and electrical instruments, window and plate glass, carpets, and Wedgwood pottery.
What the party didn’t take with them – a rather telling omission perhaps - was someone who spoke any form of Chinese. This was largely redressed en route through lessons in Chinese from some Jesuit priests for the 12 year old son of the delegation’s second in command. He was described as being a ‘page’ ( late eighteenth century jargon for intern, maybe).Although he is reported to have accounted himself well one couldn’t expect him to manage the myriad subtleties of Chinese court life - which is where the problem arose.
From the Chinese perspective, the British were bringing their gifts in tribute due to the Emperor on the occasion of his eighty third birthday; the British hoped they were initiating a trade relationship. . The Chinese were warily appreciative of our presence but mystified as to its purpose. Commerce was a matter far beneath the Emperor’s concerns. To give the misalignment of views a more comprehensible slant in today’s terms imagine the response if the Chinese set up a market stall on Horse Guards Parade in the midst of the Trooping of the Colour ( though the Chancellor may well, as I write, actually be considering this).
But it was the kowtow that excited concern then - and also 150 years later when Blue Peter broke the news to me. The kowtow was a ritual whereby the bringer of gifts to the emperor prostrated himself as part of the ceremony. MacCartney jibbed somewhat at this – not the done thing for the representative of an emerging power. His gout and rheumatism probably didn’t predispose him to the idea either. In the event, experienced diplomat that he was, compromises were explored and in the event a classic one emerged. MacCartney deferred as he thought appropriate while the formal court record ( in Mandarin) reported him as doing something much more acceptable to Chinese custom.
In the event however the unwillingness to kowtow became – to coin an expression – the face saving device, through which the failure of the mission itself was excused back in England. The notion of a China wreathed in archaic ritual where offence might be unwittingly given and never forgiven circulated to percolate eventually through channels as innocent as Blue Peter. And maybe continues to have its effect to this day
It shouldn’t need saying but even on the occasion where I inadvertently managed to find myself together ( accompanied by only about 1500 other people) with the current number two man in China no kowtow was expected. In fact I have been – as a matter of course - always embarrassed by the warmth, friendliness and hospitality they my Chinese business partners have lavished upon me.
But as the continuity announcers earnestly advise after more harrowing shows than Blue Peter – ‘if your possible relationship with China has been damaged by anything in the programme’ then get yourself along to the ECBF/ Barker Brettell event at the Chinese Community Centre on 8 October for some helpful insight into the real nuances of Chinese business etiquette today ( see http://www.eventbrite.co.uk/o/england-china-business-forum-ecbf-3050323840 for full details)
