Han Shaogong

In 1999, the Hainan Writers’ Association in China and Tianya magazine hosted an international symposium in Hainan on the theme of “Ecology and Literature.” More than 20 years later, Han Shaogong, the original conference organizer, reflects on its theme and significance and shares his thoughts on the ethics of environmental development in China and beyond. The following is the English translation of Han Shaogong’s reflection, which was published in Beijing Cultural Review. Please see here for the Chinese version of this piece. 

The 1999 symposium produced an influential Nanshan Memorandum, which was published in 2000. Its Chinese version can be found in the link provided above. For the English translation of the Memorandum, please visit: https://muse.jhu.edu/article/168420

Han Shaogong is a prominent contemporary Chinese novelist, essayist, and cultural critic, widely recognized as one of the leading figures of China’s “root-seeking” literary movement of the 1980s. He first gained national attention with his 1985 novella “Pa Pa Pa” (《爸爸爸》), which explores language, myth, and rural consciousness in a fictional Hunan village, and is often cited as a landmark of post-Mao experimental fiction. His later works---including A Dictionary of Maqiao (《马桥词典》, 1996), an internationally acclaimed novel---continue to investigate questions of language, identity, and cultural memory, often blending ethnographic observation with philosophical reflection. He remains a central voice in contemporary Chinese literary and cultural discourse.

In China, environmental and climate concerns remained largely unfamiliar to many until the 1990s. At one point, PRC writers convened a meeting with their Taiwanese counterparts in Shandong province when a prominent Mainland novelist made a striking claim: “Don’t preach to us from a moral high ground. Development comes with pollution. In Northwestern China, people worry about no pollution or too little pollution, and they feel that industrial growth and pollution are not coming to them fast enough!” He did not sound as if he was joking, which stunned the Taiwanese writers: Are Mainland intellectuals so hopelessly backward and crude in their views?

As the influence of works like The Limits to Growth gradually took hold, enthusiasm for environmentalism grew in China, though its tone remained intriguing. In 2010, a prominent CCTV journalist defended a markedly unfair global emission reduction plan championed by Western nations, dismissing a scientist’s objections as a “political interpretation” that betrayed humanity’s “universal values.” To the journalist, even if China had to pay exorbitant sums to purchase carbon emission credits from the West, this was justifiable—merely the price of China’s delayed development. Such views were hailed by many intellectuals at the time as a breath of fresh air in public discourse, seen as a natural step toward “aligning with the international community.”

It is clear that the two perspectives in the above differed significantly, yet both implicitly accepted the zero-sum dilemma of development versus environmental protection. The narrative seemed to suggest that late-developing nations like China faced a stark choice: abandon development or sacrifice the environment; lose economically or lose morally; and if not a total defeat, at least one side must suffer. “Accept your fate,” it implied. According to reports from certain Western institutions, when measured by country rather than per capita and focusing on current rather than historical emissions, China was indisputably the world’s top carbon emitter. If accountability were based on this metric, China would be cast as the primary villain, destined to be condemned in the court of global climate justice and vilified by the global community.

The alarming reality is that these accusations were not entirely unfounded, and many Chinese citizens shared this discontent. The Yellow River frequently ran dry, the Yangtze faced abnormal flooding, the Huai and Pearl Rivers had turned black, pesticide residues in food and medicine were shockingly high, desertification in the Three-North region was rapidly worsening, smog and sandstorms in North China surged, acid rain repeatedly alarmed neighboring countries, lead levels in the blood of urban youth exceeded safe limits, and foreign waste continued to flood through China’s borders. All this unfolded during the early stages of China’s economic surge, when many citizens had only just achieved basic subsistence. According to preliminary estimates from national authorities, environmental pollution losses once accounted for 6.75% of GDP, effectively offsetting the vast majority of economic growth.

What should we do? This was such a burning conundrum that even Marx’s guidance would be of no avail.  This is not surprising, as thoughts are often the products of the material conditions of a given society. Marx, facing capitalism in its early stage, experienced an industrial scale that was not comprehensive enough to deteriorate the global environment. It is only expected that issues now being heatedly debated, such as global warming, did not fall into his purview of analysis. This stands true for both his sympathizers and opposers.

In October 1999, the Hainan Writers’ Association, where I belonged, along with Tianya magazine, hosted a major seminar in Hainan themed “Ecology and Literature” to foster discussion and resolve doubts on this pressing topic. Attendees included writers such as Zhang Wei, Chi Zijian, Ge Fei, Su Tong, Ye Zhaoyan, Li Rui, Fang Fang, Wure’ertu, Jiang Yun, Jiang Zidan, Kong Jian, and Li Shaojun, as well as scholars like Huang Ping, Li Tuo, Dai Jinhua, Wang Xiaoming, Chen Sihe, Nan Fan, Chen Yangu, Wang Hongsheng, Geng Zhanchun, and Shan Zhengping. The event also welcomed peers from France, the United States, South Korea, Australia, and Hong Kong, totaling about fifty participants. The seminar spanned a full five days, yet this proved insufficient, sparking sub-meetings within the main event, with smaller discussions nested inside larger ones. Intellectual debates raged day and night, as participants passionately exchanged ideas, reluctant to pause. A scholarly presentation by American academic Arif Dirlik, translated extemporaneously by Huang Ping, had to be scheduled on a beach at night, with listeners—some shirtless, others wrapped in bathrobes—sitting on the sand to engage. A document titled The Nanshan Memorandum: Why We Discuss Environmental Ecology emerged from a spontaneous late-night effort, drafted collaboratively by Chinese scholars to reflect the group’s broadest intellectual consensus, with some foreign scholars observing.

The ten-thousand-word memorandum was published in the first issue of the Tianya magazine in 2000 and made a significant impact on intellectual circles. It was translated into more than ten foreign languages and circulated internationally.  

Its main content can be summarized as “two critiques and one outlook.”

The First Object of Critique: Developmentalism

The Nanshan Memorandum argues that ecological degradation stems from profound social, political, and cultural causes, far beyond a problem solvable by technology and funding alone. In many regions, severe water shortages coexist with the proliferation of lavish hotels and other water-intensive enterprises—so what meaning does a vague claim of “water scarcity” hold? The relentless expansion of multinational corporations’ acquisitions has led to overgrazing in fur-producing regions, degrading grasslands and threatening biodiversity. Who bears the ecological costs, and who reaps the excess profits? Clearly, the possession, use, and distribution of natural resources occur within specific social systems and ideologies, rendering moralistic pleas insufficient. As a knowledge framework, the post-World War II developmentalist discourse, propelled by institutions dominated by developed nations, employs abstract terms like “humanity,” “growth,” and “modernization” to conflate legitimate development needs with growth-at-all-costs, GDP-centric ideologies, and the unchecked expansion of capital, repeatedly obscuring the jungle-like laws of globalization. As a 1999 UNDP report highlights, the per capita income gap between rich and poor nations widened from 30:1 in 1960 to 74:1 in 1995, with ecological degradation merely a facet of this broader trend.

The Nanshan Memorandum acknowledges that Japan and the “Four Asian Tigers,” as rare success stories of developmentalism, offer valuable lessons in effective science, technology, and management practices. However, for most developing nations, lacking the first-mover advantage in industrialization, the risk of being marginalized or “suburbanized” in the vortex of global markets is far greater. These countries are often compelled to sell resources at low prices, accept high-consumption, high-pollution “sunset industries,” and endure the hemorrhaging of talent through emigration. Such dynamics deepen poverty and further devastate fragile ecosystems. Ironically, GDP figures fail to signal this danger; instead, they are inflated by environmental degradation. Polluted water drives sales of bottled water; air pollution fuels demand for air purifiers, masks, and plane tickets to vacation destinations. Thus, the so-called “good life” is perversely reproduced, boosting GDP while masking the underlying crises.

The Second Object of Critique: Consumerism

The Nanshan Memorandum also places significant emphasis on literature. It argues that the portrayal of “successful individuals” in many contemporary literary and artistic works serves as a form of modern brainwashing, promoting an idealized vision of the “good life.” This vision—marked by private car ownership, multiple mink coats, weekly golf outings, frequent visits to upscale clubs, and annual retreats to vacation hotspots—is a construct woven by advertisements, films, news, entertainment, and bestselling books. Such a lifestyle reflects the “middle-class” ideal fabricated by the modern cultural and media industry, embodying the mass aesthetics of transnational capital. This narrative artificially inflates material desires, exacerbating tensions between humanity and nature while distorting human values by sidelining emotion, dignity, safety, and aesthetic needs. Furthermore, its exclusionary logic in resource distribution marginalizes the majority who are not “successful” or only marginally so, depriving them of resources and suppressing their desires, often stripping away basic necessities like clean air, water, sunlight, and food. 

The Nanshan Memorandum respects writers’ fascination with human nature but rejects the notion that desire constitutes its entirety or that there exists a purely natural, sacred essence of humanity. If the instinct to eat enough is a universal biological drive, what constitutes eating well is invariably shaped by culture, manifesting in diverse ways. Moreover, the settings, utensils, attire, music, and company that define a “good” meal are often products of consumerist culture, laden with ideological seasonings. This is a commonplace example. In this vein, the Memorandum does not advocate for a regressive suppression of desire, hostility toward consumption, or denial of the self. Instead, it opposes the hijacking of desire by greed, the definition of consumption through wastefulness, and the inflation of the self through cold indifference. It also critiques certain “green writing” that risks becoming another act in the theater of cultural consumption: one person who embraces vegetarianism while indulging in luxury cars, another who adores penguins yet detests their parents, or a group of trendy activists using drones and rockets to combat industrial pollution. Such “politically correct” green posturing raises suspicions about its feel-good allure and conceals underlying fractures and confusion in values.  

One Outlook: A New Method of Quantifying Value

The Nanshan Memorandum underscores the critical need for intellectual innovation, particularly in reimagining and upgrading the concept of GDP. As a standard metric for measuring economic growth, GDP assumes all production is for sale, must have a price, and holds no value unless it enters the market, ideally converted into dollar-based exchange rates. At best, this is a narrow-gauge quantification. It consistently excludes the immense costs of ecological degradation and health impacts. Similarly, non-monetizable contributions such as housework, volunteer services, mutual aid among friends and family, and subsistence agriculture are routinely disregarded. Moreover, values that resist material quantification—ethics, familial bonds, dignity, freedom, and happiness—which cultural anthropologists hold dear, represent “incalculable values” that remain a glaring blind spot in GDP’s framework.

If we prioritize human-centered values over capital-centered ones, overcoming and transcending the developmentalist knowledge system to multidimensionally restore the truth of human existence, can we find a better metric than GDP? Is it possible to identify a more rational “large-caliber” or even “full-caliber” measure? If not, how can new values be established and articulated?

More than two decades have passed since the Nanshan Conference. Remarkably, through persistent effort and against all odds, China has quietly emerged from its ecological predicament, with environmental indicators showing significant improvement and a positive trajectory. Over the past decade, driven by robust national strategies, legal frameworks, and industrial policies, sustainable development has taken root in public consciousness. Ecological civilization initiatives have surged from all directions, gaining unstoppable momentum, while green industries have taken a global lead. The “new trio” of electric vehicles, lithium batteries, and photovoltaic energy exemplifies this progress, embodying both environmental protection and economic development, soft power and hard strength. This dual triumph of ethics and profit dismantles the entrenched binary of development versus environmentalism. Coupled with industrial intelligence, it holds the potential to spark a new industrial revolution, devaluing traditional resource-rich nations and manufacturing powerhouses alike, and reshaping the global economic structure and civilizational paradigm. Truth be told, this transformation of production and lifestyles has caught many by surprise. The skepticism and resistance toward “car consumption fever” voiced by Nanshan Conference participants, along with their anxieties about depleting oil and gas resources, now seem like unwarranted fears. Does The Limits to Growth, once revered as a bible in environmental circles, also require reevaluation by future generations?

Of course, alongside the surprises, there are also regrets. In 2006, China’s State Environmental Protection Administration and National Bureau of Statistics jointly released the first “Green GDP” accounting research report, with reportedly ten provinces piloting “green accounting.” The efforts and advocacy of experts like Hu Angang, Niu Wenyuan, and Pan Yue around this time drew significant attention. The new accounting tool anticipated by the Nanshan Conference—a cornerstone of alternative economics and a novel method for quantifying value—seemed on the verge of realization. Unfortunately, the complexity of this innovation may have been too great. Capturing and precisely representing all elements of human activity that resist monetization or materialization is a monumental challenge, far from achievable overnight, and its success remains uncertain, like an unopened mystery box. For the foreseeable future, stagnation, hesitation, setbacks, and incomplete development in this intellectual pursuit may be inevitable. The entrenched authority of the GDP concept—despite its increasingly evident flaws—remains unshaken for now, continuing to dominate global news, financial reports, classrooms, and street conversations. We must approach this reality with patience and the resilience to press forward.