Hello.
Politicians are usually the target of untold numbers of unauthorized biography's. They are public figures and often have their lives open to critical interpretation; that is what comes with the territory. Not so in China. The top 8 law makers in the country that effectively govern the entire country are complete unknowns. Sure, brief bio's can be found online or in government controlled newspapers. They all went to University in China, they all studied in disciplines like engineering and political theory; they all seem common enough.
But who are China's leaders really? How did they come to power? Who helped them? Who made enemies along the way? What do their wives and children do? Do they have siblings? Little is actually known, and the Communist Party prefers it like that. So when an author tries to piece together the history of Wen Jiabao, the current Chinese Premier, to produce an unauthorized autobiography, one might expect trouble. And that's exactly what happened to Yu Jie.
Little is known about Wen Jiabao. His history, rise to Premier and family ties are murky; and yet he comes across in a carefully managed PR campaign as being a "Man of the People". Is that the truth? Can he be trusted? Can years of bitterness and writing in a threatening environment make Yu Jie a creditable source of information? Can any writer in China who lives under constant threat be objective?
The current system is so confused and it leaves everyone strained. Below is a New York Times article about Yu Jie's efforts to publish his unauthorized autobiography on Wen Jiabao.
Original LINK
Copyright: New York Times
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Author Is Threatened Over Book on Chinese Premier
By MICHAEL WINES
BEIJING — A best-selling Chinese author and democracy advocate detained by security agents on Monday said Tuesday that the agents threatened to imprison him if he proceeded with plans to publish a book criticizing Wen Jiabao, China’s prime minister.
The author, Yu Jie, said in a telephone interview that he still intended to publish the book, titled “China’s Best Actor: Wen Jiabao,” by autumn. Because his books are banned in mainland China, Mr. Yu said, he is negotiating with a Hong Kong publisher.
Mr. Yu, 36, said he was questioned for four hours on Monday by police officers and agents of Beijing’s public security bureau who specialize in dealing with political dissidents. One security agent “told me that Wen Jiabao is not some ordinary guy,” he said, “and my criticism against him will be considered as harming state security and the national interest.”
“ ‘If you insist on publishing this book,’ ” he said he was told, “ ‘you will probably end up like Liu Xiaobo, who suffered imprisonment of many years.’ ” Mr. Liu, another writer and rights activist, was sentenced last December to 11 years in prison after leading a public movement calling for democratic reforms and an end to Communist Party rule.
Mr. Yu, who was released Monday after the interrogation, said that he was uncertain whether the agents’ threat was serious, but that he willing to go to prison for his principles.
“As a writer, I consider freedom of speech an essential part of my life,” he said. “Without it I will be a walking corpse, with no meaning and no value.”
Mr. Yu, who has written 28 books, once was a best-selling writer in mainland China, but his political views have led to the banning of his works. His new book’s “best actor” title draws on a nickname — a sly reference to the Academy Awards honor — that critics have bestowed on Mr. Wen.
A populist style and expressions of concern for China’s people have made Mr. Wen by far the best liked of China’s leaders, but Mr. Yu and other skeptics contend that the image only masks the authoritarian bent of China’s leadership.
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Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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Friday, July 30, 2010
Friday, July 23, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: My 200th Blog
Hello.
Well, somehow over the last few years I've managed to coordinate my thoughts enough to write 200 blogs. They have been a mix of opinion, sharing new work, announcements and commentary on other people's writing and photography.
I don't have much clue as to how many people follow my blog or view it but for those of you who do write, or take the time to make comments I would like to say thanks. Every bit of feedback helps and I appreciate those who take the time to stop by the blog and read a bit.
Hopefully I can find the time to keep this blog moving along in the next few years. Fingers crossed.
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Well, somehow over the last few years I've managed to coordinate my thoughts enough to write 200 blogs. They have been a mix of opinion, sharing new work, announcements and commentary on other people's writing and photography.
I don't have much clue as to how many people follow my blog or view it but for those of you who do write, or take the time to make comments I would like to say thanks. Every bit of feedback helps and I appreciate those who take the time to stop by the blog and read a bit.
Hopefully I can find the time to keep this blog moving along in the next few years. Fingers crossed.
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Friday, July 16, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: Xinhua Bylines in Newsweek?
Hello,
We all need to be ready for it. This is my warning to us all. Large Chinese media conglomerates have their eyes set on storied western media brands, and they are cash rich and ethics poor. A few weeks back the Southern Media Group, based in Guangzhou, made an unsuccessful attempt to purchase Newsweek.
My heart nearly stopped.
Newsweek are one of my clients, and they are in financial difficultly. There has been no secrete that the magazine is up for sale and there have been many suitors. I think the independent global media needs to be very fearful about Chinese media companies expanding abroad on the backs of western brands. The Chinese suitors bring with them a complete set of journalism ethics and morals than those of the west.
Evan Osnos, a wonderful writer and the New Yorkers man in China, sums it all up wonderful in his blog post below.
The New Yorker
Written by: Evan Osnos
Original LINK
__________________________________________
WHAT IF CHINA HAD BOUGHT NEWSWEEK?
Posted by Evan Osnos
The news that bidders for Newsweek included China’s Southern Media Group—a bid that was rejected—has left all sides a bit insulted. For Newsweek, the prospect of being bought by a company in the world’s No. 2 jailer of journalists (Iran is number one) appears to have been too grim to take seriously. For American journalists generally, the implication that our industry is edging toward a fire sale was not especially welcome. And, for the Chinese bidders, it sounds like they’ve been stung by the sense that they were not treated as legitimate prospects. As Xiang Xi, executive editor of Southern Weekly, part of the Southern Media Group, put it in an interview with an Anhui paper: “[T]he seller genuinely does not comprehend the desires of idealistic Chinese media workers and institutions.” (Translated by Global Voices.) Moreover, he said, “Even though the purchase of Newsweek failed, the search for investments will continue.” He encouraged “any media of global influence” that may be interested to drop him a line. He even provided his e-mail address: xiangxi100@hotmail.com.
The fact is that neither side truly understands the other in this case. The prospective buyers are not wrong that they have a right to bid on an American news organization, but they are wrong that they had the remotest shot of succeeding. For the moment, the spiritual gap between them and American news organizations is larger than even the most sober Chinese media baron probably imagines. A sale of this kind is, for the moment, beyond imagination.
But it’s also true that Xiang Xi is not being cynical when he says that most Americans don’t grasp the “desires of idealistic Chinese media workers.” Much of the discussion about the Newsweek bid has been about the Chinese government’s campaign to project “soft power” abroad, and that is relevant. But that is also losing sight of some nuances in the world of Chinese media. Like every newspaper in China, those in the Southern Media Group are owned by the state, and the party appoints the top editors. But the Southern Media Group is not the People’s Daily, and the differences are worth acknowledging.
The Southern Newspaper Group was an oasis of open-minded thinking in the state’s hidebound media empire, and it was known for pushing the limits within the propaganda apparatus. Its most daring publication, a paper based in Guangzhou named the Southern Weekend was winning readers and inspiring journalists across the country by showing how aggressive reporting and elegant writing could be possible despite censorship. On the Communist organization charts, the Group was part of the propaganda bureaucracy, but it also occupied a special place in the informal web of interest groups that made up the party. Ideologically, it was a camp for the party’s liberal wing. The editors of its newspapers were heirs to a tradition that began in 1957 during the Hundred Flowers Movement, when their predecessors launched a paper that gave voice to opinions that differed from the party line. One of the founders … argued that even if political conditions made it impossible for journalists to always write the truth, they should at least refuse to publish lies. Generation after generation, the editors of the Southern Newspaper Group tried to live up to that standard.”
In 2003, one of the Southern Group’s editors, Cheng Yizhong, dared to publish an investigation into the death of Sun Zhigang, a young graphic designer who died in police custody after a beating—a report that led to the discovery and closure of a nationwide network of seven hundred underground police-run detention camps—an astonishing case of the Chinese press influencing national policy. But, as Pan wrote, Cheng was detained for doing it; he spent five months in a detention center and now works in a low-profile media job. His two colleagues were sentenced to long jail terms. Before he went to jail, he gave a speech to his staff that included this line: “Whatever happens, we must not give up the values and beliefs of the Southern Metropolis Daily. We have reason to be proud.”
It was a courageous sentiment from someone working in a profoundly imperfect system. I wouldn’t want to be owned by them either, and I don’t expect it will happen anytime soon. But, let’s not sneer too much. As colleagues in a business that is tough enough, Chinese journalists deserve our respect.
__________________________________________
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
We all need to be ready for it. This is my warning to us all. Large Chinese media conglomerates have their eyes set on storied western media brands, and they are cash rich and ethics poor. A few weeks back the Southern Media Group, based in Guangzhou, made an unsuccessful attempt to purchase Newsweek.
My heart nearly stopped.
Newsweek are one of my clients, and they are in financial difficultly. There has been no secrete that the magazine is up for sale and there have been many suitors. I think the independent global media needs to be very fearful about Chinese media companies expanding abroad on the backs of western brands. The Chinese suitors bring with them a complete set of journalism ethics and morals than those of the west.
Evan Osnos, a wonderful writer and the New Yorkers man in China, sums it all up wonderful in his blog post below.
The New Yorker
Written by: Evan Osnos
Original LINK
__________________________________________
WHAT IF CHINA HAD BOUGHT NEWSWEEK?
Posted by Evan Osnos
The news that bidders for Newsweek included China’s Southern Media Group—a bid that was rejected—has left all sides a bit insulted. For Newsweek, the prospect of being bought by a company in the world’s No. 2 jailer of journalists (Iran is number one) appears to have been too grim to take seriously. For American journalists generally, the implication that our industry is edging toward a fire sale was not especially welcome. And, for the Chinese bidders, it sounds like they’ve been stung by the sense that they were not treated as legitimate prospects. As Xiang Xi, executive editor of Southern Weekly, part of the Southern Media Group, put it in an interview with an Anhui paper: “[T]he seller genuinely does not comprehend the desires of idealistic Chinese media workers and institutions.” (Translated by Global Voices.) Moreover, he said, “Even though the purchase of Newsweek failed, the search for investments will continue.” He encouraged “any media of global influence” that may be interested to drop him a line. He even provided his e-mail address: xiangxi100@hotmail.com.
The fact is that neither side truly understands the other in this case. The prospective buyers are not wrong that they have a right to bid on an American news organization, but they are wrong that they had the remotest shot of succeeding. For the moment, the spiritual gap between them and American news organizations is larger than even the most sober Chinese media baron probably imagines. A sale of this kind is, for the moment, beyond imagination.
But it’s also true that Xiang Xi is not being cynical when he says that most Americans don’t grasp the “desires of idealistic Chinese media workers.” Much of the discussion about the Newsweek bid has been about the Chinese government’s campaign to project “soft power” abroad, and that is relevant. But that is also losing sight of some nuances in the world of Chinese media. Like every newspaper in China, those in the Southern Media Group are owned by the state, and the party appoints the top editors. But the Southern Media Group is not the People’s Daily, and the differences are worth acknowledging.
The Southern Newspaper Group was an oasis of open-minded thinking in the state’s hidebound media empire, and it was known for pushing the limits within the propaganda apparatus. Its most daring publication, a paper based in Guangzhou named the Southern Weekend was winning readers and inspiring journalists across the country by showing how aggressive reporting and elegant writing could be possible despite censorship. On the Communist organization charts, the Group was part of the propaganda bureaucracy, but it also occupied a special place in the informal web of interest groups that made up the party. Ideologically, it was a camp for the party’s liberal wing. The editors of its newspapers were heirs to a tradition that began in 1957 during the Hundred Flowers Movement, when their predecessors launched a paper that gave voice to opinions that differed from the party line. One of the founders … argued that even if political conditions made it impossible for journalists to always write the truth, they should at least refuse to publish lies. Generation after generation, the editors of the Southern Newspaper Group tried to live up to that standard.”
In 2003, one of the Southern Group’s editors, Cheng Yizhong, dared to publish an investigation into the death of Sun Zhigang, a young graphic designer who died in police custody after a beating—a report that led to the discovery and closure of a nationwide network of seven hundred underground police-run detention camps—an astonishing case of the Chinese press influencing national policy. But, as Pan wrote, Cheng was detained for doing it; he spent five months in a detention center and now works in a low-profile media job. His two colleagues were sentenced to long jail terms. Before he went to jail, he gave a speech to his staff that included this line: “Whatever happens, we must not give up the values and beliefs of the Southern Metropolis Daily. We have reason to be proud.”
It was a courageous sentiment from someone working in a profoundly imperfect system. I wouldn’t want to be owned by them either, and I don’t expect it will happen anytime soon. But, let’s not sneer too much. As colleagues in a business that is tough enough, Chinese journalists deserve our respect.
__________________________________________
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Friday, July 09, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: Tim Hetherington Interview
Hello.
Well, Tim Hetherington is a storied image maker. His new film, his dedication to documenting real life with both still and moving images is well regarded around the globe. I read this blog on the NYT and found it very insightful and important. I hope everyone can give it a read and take something from it. Tim is a real visionary, a passionate image maker and documenter of life. He has crafted himself a very special role. I can't wait to see what he gets up to next.
Original LInk to NYTimes Interview: LINK
________________________________
JJune 22, 2010, 12:00 AM
“Restrepo” and the Imagery of War
By MICHAEL KAMBER
Michael Kamber was covering the war in Liberia in 2003. He had a Hasselblad. A stranger pointed out that another photographer — this one accompanying the rebels — also had a Hasselblad. “I was sure he was mistaken,” Mr. Kamber recalled. ”Two photographers stupid — or impractical — enough to photograph the war in medium format? Impossible. But the stranger turned out to be correct. The other photographer was Tim Hetherington. We met later on, covered the civil war in the Ivory Coast together and have been friends ever since.”
The documentary “Restrepo,” directed by Mr. Hetherington and Sebastian Junger, will open Friday. Last week, Mr. Hetherington sat down with Mr. Kamber in Midtown Manhattan to talk about the film — and much else besides. Their remarks have been edited for brevity and clarity.
Q. Do you consider yourself a photographer?
A. If you are interested in mass communication, then you have to stop thinking of yourself as a photographer. We live in a post-photographic world. If you are interested in photography, then you are interested in something — in terms of mass communication — that is past. I am interested in reaching as many people as possible.
Q. Right.
A. If we are interested in the outside world and making images of it and translating it and relaying it to as many people as possible, then in some ways the traditional photographic techniques are really not important.
Q. Does that mean we can just Photoshop horses’ heads into a photograph?
A. Absolutely not. Authenticity and making a picture authentic is obviously important. I am not interested in traditional photographic techniques. I am not interested in putting a black border around a photograph as a way of saying that is authentic. You know, “protecting photography.”
Q. There is a whole community of people who are interested in trying to protect the genre’s integrity and the culture of photojournalism.
A. That’s because they haven’t found the answers to their questions.
Q. Which is what?
A. Which is how to make money out of it, to make it pay; how to succeed financially. And how to get it out there and reach an audience.
Q. Do you think they all just really care about money?
A. No, I don’t. But it all depends. We are all interested in the outside world. The heart of every deed is a selfish one. If you have to go out in the world and be effective, you have to make sure you are alive, healthy and strong. Agencies have to make sure that they are financially viable in order to go out and make commentary on the world that is useful to other people. My point about not being a photographer is that we can’t protect photography – forget photography – when we are interested in the authentic representation of things outside of ourselves.
Q. How does your Afghanistan work tie into what you just said?
A. I am interested in visually representing something in as many ways as possible, exploiting as many different forms as possible, to reach as many people as possible.
Q. And how did you do that in Afghanistan?
A. By working across the spectrum, by first saying, “O.K., I’m going to photograph for Vanity Fair.” And that is a platform that has, say, a two or three million readership. Then those images, because I retain the copyright, are syndicated worldwide. They appear in newspapers and magazines worldwide. Great, that’s another valid audience. The image that won World Press Photo gave another spotlight and went global in a way that could lead people to reach my other work. Then I made “Sleeping Soldiers,” which was a digital projection. It was an art piece, meant for galleries – but that’s still a valid audience. Then I made TV. For ABC News, we made two “Nightline” pieces. The first piece, I was told by ABC, reached 20 million people. And then using all that footage and making a feature film out of it. On our own money.
Q. “Restrepo”?
A. “Restrepo.” Working across all these editorial spectrums; not saying, “I am a photographer” or “I am a filmmaker,” just saying: “I am a person who goes out into the world and makes these images. And I want to reach as many different audiences as possible.” To do that, I have to reach into different forms.
Q. And now you have this book?
A. And now I have book coming out in October, with Chris Boot, called “Infidel.”
Q. Can you tell me about that?
A. The first time I went to Afghanistan, in 2007, the world was very much focused on Iraq. People had forgotten – and now we have come to accept – that the Afghan war was going out of control. When I got to the Korangal Valley, and there was lots of fighting going on, it completely surprised me. I was gobsmacked.
Q. Constant combat?
A. Yeah. At the end of October 2007, 70 percent of American bombs being dropped were in that valley, and the casualty rate was at 25 percent wounded. So the images I made were very action oriented. Photojournalism. Reminiscent of classical war photography. I did that because I wanted people to see that there was a lot of fighting going on. Anyway, I go back and the fighting sort of bored me. Because when you are in a lot of combat after a while, a lot of it — you know? If you are inside a base that’s being attacked, like “Restrepo” was, you are in a fairly good position. The likelihood of you being killed was pretty low, unless they put a mortar on you.
Q. Personally, I have yet to be bored in combat.
A. What got me really interested were the interpersonal relationships between the men. It was a facet of war I hadn’t really thought about. It is a big part of fighting and combat, as we know, yet it is rarely ever represented. A lot of the substance of the book brings the idea of male bonding to the front. It is a huge part of the war machine, if you think about it. That really is it. Why war exists is because mankind has worked out: if you take 15 men and put them together, that group, the number in a platoon, is the perfect number, the perfect group. It is like a hard-wired genetic code: if you bring a small group of men together and make them dependent on each other, they will kill for each other.
Q. Tell me what the pictures look like in this book, since we don’t have it in front of us.
A. The pictures show a different image of life in a very small outpost. They are very approachable. I spent enough time that, by the end, the guys were walking around like they were fighting in shorts and flip flops. I was photographing them in a state of undress. You can see the images of the guys, really bonding closely together. There is a lot of play fights and hugging. A lot of the guys would have their bodies tattooed. Part of the book shows you these tattoos. In fact, the title of the book comes from a tattoo. They used to tattoo across their chest the word “Infidel.” The book is about soldiers and their tattoos. You see them playing golf and fighting, and it seems very lighthearted. Then, in the latter part of the book, they go to war and it ends – as war does – in ways that are really upsetting and unpredictable. I totally respect people who go to Afghanistan and document the Taliban, civilian collateral damage and all that. My strategy is different. I thought that the easiest way into the American psyche is to photograph their young men and then subvert that.
Q. Why subvert that?
A. Because otherwise you are being predictable and confirming an idea they have in their heads. I am challenging people with photographs, as I hope the film challenges people.
Q. When does the film come out?
A. The 25th of June.
Q. It will be in theaters around New York?
A. In some theaters around the U.S. We are trying to build the theatrical distribution.
Q. And you really controlled the film; you never turned the footage over to a distributor and let them run with it?
A. No. In terms of the editorial control, we funded it ourselves. A lot of photographers are moving into video and, you know, making images is only part of the business now. It’s not just about image-making. It’s about how do we reach audiences with what we are doing. There is an overproduction of images.
Q. Right. I talked to Joao Silva in Baghdad and I said, “Do you think there are any great images to come out of Iraq, the way there were in Vietnam?” And he said: “The problem isn’t that we haven’t taken that classic image. The problem is that we have taken too many.”
A. We are making so many images, but we aren’t actually connecting these images. We aren’t exploiting what we have made. We aren’t mining it enough to make it into audiences’ minds. A strategy to hit people about this idea of Afghanistan across multiple forms – “Oh, I’ve read Sebastian’s book, “War”; I’ve read the Vanity Fair articles; then I saw the film and the film made me want to see Hetherington’s book” — is a multilayered thing. It is different than the images you see out there that are already lost.
Q. It is sort of a representation of what your experience was in Afghanistan.
A. Yeah. And to make that happen, you have to navigate through the business side of things. That isn’t easy. But if we see ourselves merely as photographers, we are failing our duty. It isn’t good enough anymore just to be a witness.
Q. What it was like to live on that mountaintop with those guys?
A. Being out there was a really unexpected and profound experience.
Q. How many guys were you with?
A. A platoon. So basically about 30 guys.
Q. And you were being shot at?
A. They were patrolling every day. It was continually having to push the enemy back. There were a lot of times there would be contact in the field. Occasionally, the enemy would launch a more direct attack on the camp and main base.
Q. Once, I had a very lucky time with a mortar. I got off a helicopter and put my flak jacket down. For some reason, I wasn’t wearing it. Suddenly, there was a mortar coming up to where you go to get water and stuff. By chance, no one was in there. And it was just shredded. And I was walking around without a vest. You know?
A. It was really basic conditions there. It was like the furthest outposts of the empire. It was on the side of the hill. South of where we were was bad-guy country. This place had no running water or electricity. When we first got there, we used to sleep out in the dirt. It was the edge of the empire. And that was a very interesting place to be.
Q. Tell me about juggling stills and video. How does that work?
A. I have no idea how I actually do it. Hopefully, in the future, we will have only one camera that just does everything. At the moment, I guess I decide that if the event is visually interesting enough, I will take a picture. If the event isn’t visually interesting enough on its own, then it’s probably significant for video, because it is contextualized with sound. So, usually, my default is video. I can be approaching something photographically, then know I’ve made the picture and pick up the video camera. It’s gotten pretty crazy; kind of like John Wayne. I used to attach the two cameras with carabiners to my jacket because then you can drop the camera and it won’t fall. So I would be hooked up and shooting. It’s pretty ridiculous.
Q. But it worked?
A. Yeah, it worked. But there was a lot of video of a camera swinging over my feet in the end of the tapes.
Q. You spent a year?
A. No, Sebastian and I spent about five months apiece, sometimes together, sometimes apart. In terms of coverage, it was about 10 months. The Army didn’t expect us to spend that long with a group of soldiers. When you go to places like Iraq and Afghanistan, if you go into combat with soldiers, you are usually there with them three months maximum. To spend five months with the same platoon is a pretty big amount of time.
Q. Do we need more of this kind of long form?
A. Yeah, we do. The problem isn’t that photographers don’t want to do it. It’s because the media outlets don’t seem to understand. The bean counters don’t understand. People who are being asked to judge quality photographs don’t understand. When you and I look at a photograph or watch a film, it’s all about time. It is the amount of time you spend. That is everything. That is what it’s about. Full stop. No short cut. Eugene Richards does not make amazing work because he is in and out. It’s because he lives it. That’s why the best work — we all know — speaks of time. But when you’ve got people making decisions about what is good and bad photography who haven’t spent the time in the street to know that call, they choose bad images. They don’t really know what they are doing. And they aren’t willing to put the money into it or to spend that time because they think that by filling the front page with a picture, their job is done — rather than asking if there is a better picture. We are all under financial pressure.
Q. Is the direction the business is going these days opposite what you’re talking about?
A. Absolutely and that’s the problem. That’s why when we talk about the vision of the film, we knew we had to carry it on our own. The only people who understood how to make that film was us. We had to make the film ourselves. We had to take control. Up until the point that the film was coming out, everybody else thought it was just not going to happen.
Q. Do you think that America wants to see the film? Is America ready to deal with this film? It’s a hard, hard film to look at.
A. We made a visceral war film; the kind of film that hasn’t been made before. Most of the people who spend a lot of time with soldiers are photographers. There are very few documentary filmmakers who do. We came to making this film after many years as war photographers. We understood what was required to make a good film.
Q. I remember at one point you were really broke and you put everything you had into this film.
A. Yeah. I was in a pretty bad way. I was in debt. It was a crazy thing to do during the recession.
Q. But going back to the question: do you think America wants this film? Or needs to see it?
A. Obviously, I am going to say yes. There are a lot of people out there interested in war. We all know that war sells.
Q. So the next question is: can a documentary film about war sell?
A. A lot of documentary films about war since the start of the “war on terrorism” in 2001 have had political standpoints. By stripping that out of our film, by not having a political standpoint, we ask people to be nonpartisan and experience what those soldiers experienced. As a platform to discuss war, I think that’s useful, because it doesn’t divide people. This country is already so divided about war, I think that’s a good strategy: to build a bridge to people, to get them to engage with the politics about Afghanistan, to see what we are dealing with.
Q. There are people killed in the film.
A. Most people are concerned about whether their wife needs to get the pills from her doctor, or whether they got the dog food, or did they do their health insurance. These are all important concerns. To weigh them down with some heavy guilt trip — “You should be interested in this because this is Afghanistan” — is not a constructive way to engage them. You have to think up more reasonable strategies. My strategy is, initially, to build a bridge to people rather than turn them off with really tough images that challenge them. By making a film about a group of soldiers you get to know — that you are intimate with, that you laugh with and end up crying with — is a way for you to engage with what is really going on. When they awkwardly come across a village where the villagers are all killed, you toss questions out like: How did the villagers die? Were the soldiers responsible? Is that what we are putting our young men through? I think Americans are ready to engage with Afghanistan. They just don’t want to wake up to it. They don’t know how to react to pictures like Abu Ghraib. “Wow. People are out there torturing in our name. This makes me feel bad. Stop reading the newspaper. End of story. I have to go pay for my wife’s health care.” As photographers, as image makers, we have to be realistic about who the people are we are trying to reach, rather than: “I’ve been to Kenya. The ethnic riots are really important. You must have a look at them.” “Well, I don’t have to look at them. I have to figure out how to get my kid to school on time.” I have to think about how I engage the right wing. If I go to them and say, “I’m a liberal and I hate war,” they are going to say, “I’ve got something better to do with my time.” I hope “Restrepo” is the kind of film that does that, that engages people from the left and the right. People have responded very positively to it. Those who have been stirred up are the people who think we should be doing overt political commentary. It makes them angry that we are not. The little bit of criticism we’ve had is from the right — about showing the dead body of an American solider or showing the U.S. military in nonprotocol situations — or the left, who think we should be outright condemning the war. The very fact they are riled up shows you that it is impacting them. They need, perhaps, to analyze why they feel how they do. How they can actually talk about the war in a way that isn’t so cemented? If we can engage each other in a nonpolitical and nonpartisan way, we may actually agree on how to move forward with the war.
Q. What about your personal view? How do you think the war is going?
A. Do I think the intervention in Afghanistan was justified? Yes, I do. I think that al Qaeda definitely was based out there and they went in and they killed 3,000 people here and it was necessary to go in and break up their network – unlike Iraq, which was based on a lie. So, yes. The war in Afghanistan was mishandled. We have seen that less troops have led to the situation now. We have yet to see what there is to see with more troops.
Q. Why didn’t you make the movie with the British?
A. I have never worked with the Brits. I have heard they are more restrictive than the Americans in terms of what you can file and so on. We weren’t really scrutinized by the U.S. press office. It was kind of incredible. We were given a lot of freedom. I was really surprised. Good things can come out of an embed system. In some ways, being an outsider is useful. Blue-collar American soldiers can’t place me. I was this tall British guy. And they were like, “This guy’s kind of weird, but he’s O.K.”
Q. Was it your first time with working-class American culture?
A. Yes, it was. And it’s super interesting.
Q. You get to Middle America and it’s like going to Iraq.
A. Yeah, and it’s probably easier to get around in Iraq than in Wyoming.
Q. What was your impression of America after?
A. If I am proud of the film, it is because it is an honest film. And it is an honest film because you can see that I also like the guys there. I don’t garnish over the awkward bits or bad bits. But I like them as people. The only people who really know about the war are the soldiers. So, of course, I end up respecting them. I had a hell of a lot of respect for them. They are young. They are out there on the American taxpayer dollar. And we ask a lot of them. Not only do we want them to fight, we want them to successfully engage hearts and minds. We are asking an 18-year-old guy from, say, Arkansas, who has never been out of his state before to not only go to Afghanistan, but also to learn Pashtu and Dari, and be empathetic with people who he thinks may be killing his friends. It is a lot for even the most aware person to deal with. We should maybe put some other training procedures into place, and be a little bit more supportive of what they are doing. I have a lot of respect for them, because I think we ask them to do too much.
Q. What do you feel is the future of traditional media? Where is this all going?
A. We who are working in the realm of photojournalism and documentary photojournalism have to focus on whom we want to talk to. We need to know who our audience is. That will help us figure out how to reach them, which language to reach them with. I don’t think enough image-makers do that. We are in flux. Certain contenders are emerging. The Times is still here. It’s been strengthened recently by its online version. It has a lot of viewership, and there are going to be photographers like yourself who have access to an important platform. It’s the equivalent of Life magazine. It is reaching millions of people and it’s an important outlet for what we do.
Q. You don’t think it’s over yet?
A. No, I don’t think it’s over yet. It is about reputation now, and reputation is not just about making stylistic pictures. It is about authenticity; about knowing what you are talking about; showing the ability to reach your audience. By working across the media, you can actually survive. The danger is to go to one area and stay.
Q. So you would encourage young people to do many different things?
A. Not necessarily many different things. I encourage them to look at many different forms. Not to say, “I am a photographer,” but to say: “I am an image maker. I make still or moving images in real-life situations, unfiltered and un-Photoshopped. I am going to look into how I can put this into different streams for different audiences; maybe some on the Web, some in print.”
Q. Earlier you said that traditional photography is dead. These traditional types of straight journalism – you made it sound as if they are becoming passé. But then look at the uproar over Julie Jacobson’s image from Afghanistan of the dying soldier. There are still images that really grab people.
A. But again, they are images. What I am thinking about is this idea that “Photography” is something that has this black border around it and is protected. You know? “I used to develop black-and-white pictures and that’s what photography is.” That kind of old-fashioned thinking is just for an art gallery now. Julie Jacobson shot in digital. What is important in that image is that it is a still picture. As we increasingly have technology that wants us to shoot moving pictures and contextualize with sound, we need to understand the difference. Why am I making a still picture? Why am I making a moving picture? The question you asked me about when I decide to shoot what — I need to be able answer that. Slicing stills out of the video stream means there will be even more images. Which means that the audiences’ expectations are going to change. It’s very difficult for me to know what that expectation will be in 10 years’ time because things are moving so quickly. Do I think people are going to pull 16 megabyte pictures out of video streams and try and print them? Absolutely, that is going to happen. What impact that is going to have on the media, I don’t know. That’s why I think the most important thing for our industry is not style, it is authenticity. It is: “I go to you because I know you have an authentic voice in the work that you have been doing.”
Q. Right. But the trend I am seeing is actually the opposite. What I am hearing is: “We don’t need the media anymore. We’ve got our own photographers because we have cellphone cameras.”
A. But you need to have professional witnesses, people who go out there and do this as a living. What you do – the way that you make an image, the way that you make a story – is different than partaking in that story, like citizen journalism.
Q. The trend seems to be towards citizen journalism.
A. Because it’s cheap.
Q. Even this newspaper is saying, “Send in your readers’ photos.”
A. Again, it’s about profit. It is not about good journalism. We all know that having professionalism in any field is important. We have a weird skill-set. Send us into a difficult circumstance and we will get out there and know how to find a story. That is what we do for a living. That is valuable. It is not part of the problem, it is part of the solution – in addition to citizen journalism, in addition to local photographers. The more, the merrier.
Q. We have a different role?
A. We have a different role.
Q. Are you going to continue to cover war?
A. I have no idea. I have no idea.
Q. Are you thinking about quitting?
A. I am just thinking about getting through “Restrepo.” There are different roles you have to do at different stages of life. Those will change. Maybe I’ll go back in. Or maybe I will be useful to the community in other ways.
Q. Why did you leave Britain? Why did you move to New York?
A. Because it rains all the time and you can’t get a cab and the girls are good looking here. Britain has 60 million people. America has 300 million people. It’s the math. If you are interested in mass communication, you are going to reach more people here. It is still the biggest player in the world. It is a very important audience. To get these people to understand what their military is doing is a natural place to be.
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Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Well, Tim Hetherington is a storied image maker. His new film, his dedication to documenting real life with both still and moving images is well regarded around the globe. I read this blog on the NYT and found it very insightful and important. I hope everyone can give it a read and take something from it. Tim is a real visionary, a passionate image maker and documenter of life. He has crafted himself a very special role. I can't wait to see what he gets up to next.
Original LInk to NYTimes Interview: LINK
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JJune 22, 2010, 12:00 AM
“Restrepo” and the Imagery of War
By MICHAEL KAMBER
Michael Kamber was covering the war in Liberia in 2003. He had a Hasselblad. A stranger pointed out that another photographer — this one accompanying the rebels — also had a Hasselblad. “I was sure he was mistaken,” Mr. Kamber recalled. ”Two photographers stupid — or impractical — enough to photograph the war in medium format? Impossible. But the stranger turned out to be correct. The other photographer was Tim Hetherington. We met later on, covered the civil war in the Ivory Coast together and have been friends ever since.”
The documentary “Restrepo,” directed by Mr. Hetherington and Sebastian Junger, will open Friday. Last week, Mr. Hetherington sat down with Mr. Kamber in Midtown Manhattan to talk about the film — and much else besides. Their remarks have been edited for brevity and clarity.
Q. Do you consider yourself a photographer?
A. If you are interested in mass communication, then you have to stop thinking of yourself as a photographer. We live in a post-photographic world. If you are interested in photography, then you are interested in something — in terms of mass communication — that is past. I am interested in reaching as many people as possible.
Q. Right.
A. If we are interested in the outside world and making images of it and translating it and relaying it to as many people as possible, then in some ways the traditional photographic techniques are really not important.
Q. Does that mean we can just Photoshop horses’ heads into a photograph?
A. Absolutely not. Authenticity and making a picture authentic is obviously important. I am not interested in traditional photographic techniques. I am not interested in putting a black border around a photograph as a way of saying that is authentic. You know, “protecting photography.”
Q. There is a whole community of people who are interested in trying to protect the genre’s integrity and the culture of photojournalism.
A. That’s because they haven’t found the answers to their questions.
Q. Which is what?
A. Which is how to make money out of it, to make it pay; how to succeed financially. And how to get it out there and reach an audience.
Q. Do you think they all just really care about money?
A. No, I don’t. But it all depends. We are all interested in the outside world. The heart of every deed is a selfish one. If you have to go out in the world and be effective, you have to make sure you are alive, healthy and strong. Agencies have to make sure that they are financially viable in order to go out and make commentary on the world that is useful to other people. My point about not being a photographer is that we can’t protect photography – forget photography – when we are interested in the authentic representation of things outside of ourselves.
Q. How does your Afghanistan work tie into what you just said?
A. I am interested in visually representing something in as many ways as possible, exploiting as many different forms as possible, to reach as many people as possible.
Q. And how did you do that in Afghanistan?
A. By working across the spectrum, by first saying, “O.K., I’m going to photograph for Vanity Fair.” And that is a platform that has, say, a two or three million readership. Then those images, because I retain the copyright, are syndicated worldwide. They appear in newspapers and magazines worldwide. Great, that’s another valid audience. The image that won World Press Photo gave another spotlight and went global in a way that could lead people to reach my other work. Then I made “Sleeping Soldiers,” which was a digital projection. It was an art piece, meant for galleries – but that’s still a valid audience. Then I made TV. For ABC News, we made two “Nightline” pieces. The first piece, I was told by ABC, reached 20 million people. And then using all that footage and making a feature film out of it. On our own money.
Q. “Restrepo”?
A. “Restrepo.” Working across all these editorial spectrums; not saying, “I am a photographer” or “I am a filmmaker,” just saying: “I am a person who goes out into the world and makes these images. And I want to reach as many different audiences as possible.” To do that, I have to reach into different forms.
Q. And now you have this book?
A. And now I have book coming out in October, with Chris Boot, called “Infidel.”
Q. Can you tell me about that?
A. The first time I went to Afghanistan, in 2007, the world was very much focused on Iraq. People had forgotten – and now we have come to accept – that the Afghan war was going out of control. When I got to the Korangal Valley, and there was lots of fighting going on, it completely surprised me. I was gobsmacked.
Q. Constant combat?
A. Yeah. At the end of October 2007, 70 percent of American bombs being dropped were in that valley, and the casualty rate was at 25 percent wounded. So the images I made were very action oriented. Photojournalism. Reminiscent of classical war photography. I did that because I wanted people to see that there was a lot of fighting going on. Anyway, I go back and the fighting sort of bored me. Because when you are in a lot of combat after a while, a lot of it — you know? If you are inside a base that’s being attacked, like “Restrepo” was, you are in a fairly good position. The likelihood of you being killed was pretty low, unless they put a mortar on you.
Q. Personally, I have yet to be bored in combat.
A. What got me really interested were the interpersonal relationships between the men. It was a facet of war I hadn’t really thought about. It is a big part of fighting and combat, as we know, yet it is rarely ever represented. A lot of the substance of the book brings the idea of male bonding to the front. It is a huge part of the war machine, if you think about it. That really is it. Why war exists is because mankind has worked out: if you take 15 men and put them together, that group, the number in a platoon, is the perfect number, the perfect group. It is like a hard-wired genetic code: if you bring a small group of men together and make them dependent on each other, they will kill for each other.
Q. Tell me what the pictures look like in this book, since we don’t have it in front of us.
A. The pictures show a different image of life in a very small outpost. They are very approachable. I spent enough time that, by the end, the guys were walking around like they were fighting in shorts and flip flops. I was photographing them in a state of undress. You can see the images of the guys, really bonding closely together. There is a lot of play fights and hugging. A lot of the guys would have their bodies tattooed. Part of the book shows you these tattoos. In fact, the title of the book comes from a tattoo. They used to tattoo across their chest the word “Infidel.” The book is about soldiers and their tattoos. You see them playing golf and fighting, and it seems very lighthearted. Then, in the latter part of the book, they go to war and it ends – as war does – in ways that are really upsetting and unpredictable. I totally respect people who go to Afghanistan and document the Taliban, civilian collateral damage and all that. My strategy is different. I thought that the easiest way into the American psyche is to photograph their young men and then subvert that.
Q. Why subvert that?
A. Because otherwise you are being predictable and confirming an idea they have in their heads. I am challenging people with photographs, as I hope the film challenges people.
Q. When does the film come out?
A. The 25th of June.
Q. It will be in theaters around New York?
A. In some theaters around the U.S. We are trying to build the theatrical distribution.
Q. And you really controlled the film; you never turned the footage over to a distributor and let them run with it?
A. No. In terms of the editorial control, we funded it ourselves. A lot of photographers are moving into video and, you know, making images is only part of the business now. It’s not just about image-making. It’s about how do we reach audiences with what we are doing. There is an overproduction of images.
Q. Right. I talked to Joao Silva in Baghdad and I said, “Do you think there are any great images to come out of Iraq, the way there were in Vietnam?” And he said: “The problem isn’t that we haven’t taken that classic image. The problem is that we have taken too many.”
A. We are making so many images, but we aren’t actually connecting these images. We aren’t exploiting what we have made. We aren’t mining it enough to make it into audiences’ minds. A strategy to hit people about this idea of Afghanistan across multiple forms – “Oh, I’ve read Sebastian’s book, “War”; I’ve read the Vanity Fair articles; then I saw the film and the film made me want to see Hetherington’s book” — is a multilayered thing. It is different than the images you see out there that are already lost.
Q. It is sort of a representation of what your experience was in Afghanistan.
A. Yeah. And to make that happen, you have to navigate through the business side of things. That isn’t easy. But if we see ourselves merely as photographers, we are failing our duty. It isn’t good enough anymore just to be a witness.
Q. What it was like to live on that mountaintop with those guys?
A. Being out there was a really unexpected and profound experience.
Q. How many guys were you with?
A. A platoon. So basically about 30 guys.
Q. And you were being shot at?
A. They were patrolling every day. It was continually having to push the enemy back. There were a lot of times there would be contact in the field. Occasionally, the enemy would launch a more direct attack on the camp and main base.
Q. Once, I had a very lucky time with a mortar. I got off a helicopter and put my flak jacket down. For some reason, I wasn’t wearing it. Suddenly, there was a mortar coming up to where you go to get water and stuff. By chance, no one was in there. And it was just shredded. And I was walking around without a vest. You know?
A. It was really basic conditions there. It was like the furthest outposts of the empire. It was on the side of the hill. South of where we were was bad-guy country. This place had no running water or electricity. When we first got there, we used to sleep out in the dirt. It was the edge of the empire. And that was a very interesting place to be.
Q. Tell me about juggling stills and video. How does that work?
A. I have no idea how I actually do it. Hopefully, in the future, we will have only one camera that just does everything. At the moment, I guess I decide that if the event is visually interesting enough, I will take a picture. If the event isn’t visually interesting enough on its own, then it’s probably significant for video, because it is contextualized with sound. So, usually, my default is video. I can be approaching something photographically, then know I’ve made the picture and pick up the video camera. It’s gotten pretty crazy; kind of like John Wayne. I used to attach the two cameras with carabiners to my jacket because then you can drop the camera and it won’t fall. So I would be hooked up and shooting. It’s pretty ridiculous.
Q. But it worked?
A. Yeah, it worked. But there was a lot of video of a camera swinging over my feet in the end of the tapes.
Q. You spent a year?
A. No, Sebastian and I spent about five months apiece, sometimes together, sometimes apart. In terms of coverage, it was about 10 months. The Army didn’t expect us to spend that long with a group of soldiers. When you go to places like Iraq and Afghanistan, if you go into combat with soldiers, you are usually there with them three months maximum. To spend five months with the same platoon is a pretty big amount of time.
Q. Do we need more of this kind of long form?
A. Yeah, we do. The problem isn’t that photographers don’t want to do it. It’s because the media outlets don’t seem to understand. The bean counters don’t understand. People who are being asked to judge quality photographs don’t understand. When you and I look at a photograph or watch a film, it’s all about time. It is the amount of time you spend. That is everything. That is what it’s about. Full stop. No short cut. Eugene Richards does not make amazing work because he is in and out. It’s because he lives it. That’s why the best work — we all know — speaks of time. But when you’ve got people making decisions about what is good and bad photography who haven’t spent the time in the street to know that call, they choose bad images. They don’t really know what they are doing. And they aren’t willing to put the money into it or to spend that time because they think that by filling the front page with a picture, their job is done — rather than asking if there is a better picture. We are all under financial pressure.
Q. Is the direction the business is going these days opposite what you’re talking about?
A. Absolutely and that’s the problem. That’s why when we talk about the vision of the film, we knew we had to carry it on our own. The only people who understood how to make that film was us. We had to make the film ourselves. We had to take control. Up until the point that the film was coming out, everybody else thought it was just not going to happen.
Q. Do you think that America wants to see the film? Is America ready to deal with this film? It’s a hard, hard film to look at.
A. We made a visceral war film; the kind of film that hasn’t been made before. Most of the people who spend a lot of time with soldiers are photographers. There are very few documentary filmmakers who do. We came to making this film after many years as war photographers. We understood what was required to make a good film.
Q. I remember at one point you were really broke and you put everything you had into this film.
A. Yeah. I was in a pretty bad way. I was in debt. It was a crazy thing to do during the recession.
Q. But going back to the question: do you think America wants this film? Or needs to see it?
A. Obviously, I am going to say yes. There are a lot of people out there interested in war. We all know that war sells.
Q. So the next question is: can a documentary film about war sell?
A. A lot of documentary films about war since the start of the “war on terrorism” in 2001 have had political standpoints. By stripping that out of our film, by not having a political standpoint, we ask people to be nonpartisan and experience what those soldiers experienced. As a platform to discuss war, I think that’s useful, because it doesn’t divide people. This country is already so divided about war, I think that’s a good strategy: to build a bridge to people, to get them to engage with the politics about Afghanistan, to see what we are dealing with.
Q. There are people killed in the film.
A. Most people are concerned about whether their wife needs to get the pills from her doctor, or whether they got the dog food, or did they do their health insurance. These are all important concerns. To weigh them down with some heavy guilt trip — “You should be interested in this because this is Afghanistan” — is not a constructive way to engage them. You have to think up more reasonable strategies. My strategy is, initially, to build a bridge to people rather than turn them off with really tough images that challenge them. By making a film about a group of soldiers you get to know — that you are intimate with, that you laugh with and end up crying with — is a way for you to engage with what is really going on. When they awkwardly come across a village where the villagers are all killed, you toss questions out like: How did the villagers die? Were the soldiers responsible? Is that what we are putting our young men through? I think Americans are ready to engage with Afghanistan. They just don’t want to wake up to it. They don’t know how to react to pictures like Abu Ghraib. “Wow. People are out there torturing in our name. This makes me feel bad. Stop reading the newspaper. End of story. I have to go pay for my wife’s health care.” As photographers, as image makers, we have to be realistic about who the people are we are trying to reach, rather than: “I’ve been to Kenya. The ethnic riots are really important. You must have a look at them.” “Well, I don’t have to look at them. I have to figure out how to get my kid to school on time.” I have to think about how I engage the right wing. If I go to them and say, “I’m a liberal and I hate war,” they are going to say, “I’ve got something better to do with my time.” I hope “Restrepo” is the kind of film that does that, that engages people from the left and the right. People have responded very positively to it. Those who have been stirred up are the people who think we should be doing overt political commentary. It makes them angry that we are not. The little bit of criticism we’ve had is from the right — about showing the dead body of an American solider or showing the U.S. military in nonprotocol situations — or the left, who think we should be outright condemning the war. The very fact they are riled up shows you that it is impacting them. They need, perhaps, to analyze why they feel how they do. How they can actually talk about the war in a way that isn’t so cemented? If we can engage each other in a nonpolitical and nonpartisan way, we may actually agree on how to move forward with the war.
Q. What about your personal view? How do you think the war is going?
A. Do I think the intervention in Afghanistan was justified? Yes, I do. I think that al Qaeda definitely was based out there and they went in and they killed 3,000 people here and it was necessary to go in and break up their network – unlike Iraq, which was based on a lie. So, yes. The war in Afghanistan was mishandled. We have seen that less troops have led to the situation now. We have yet to see what there is to see with more troops.
Q. Why didn’t you make the movie with the British?
A. I have never worked with the Brits. I have heard they are more restrictive than the Americans in terms of what you can file and so on. We weren’t really scrutinized by the U.S. press office. It was kind of incredible. We were given a lot of freedom. I was really surprised. Good things can come out of an embed system. In some ways, being an outsider is useful. Blue-collar American soldiers can’t place me. I was this tall British guy. And they were like, “This guy’s kind of weird, but he’s O.K.”
Q. Was it your first time with working-class American culture?
A. Yes, it was. And it’s super interesting.
Q. You get to Middle America and it’s like going to Iraq.
A. Yeah, and it’s probably easier to get around in Iraq than in Wyoming.
Q. What was your impression of America after?
A. If I am proud of the film, it is because it is an honest film. And it is an honest film because you can see that I also like the guys there. I don’t garnish over the awkward bits or bad bits. But I like them as people. The only people who really know about the war are the soldiers. So, of course, I end up respecting them. I had a hell of a lot of respect for them. They are young. They are out there on the American taxpayer dollar. And we ask a lot of them. Not only do we want them to fight, we want them to successfully engage hearts and minds. We are asking an 18-year-old guy from, say, Arkansas, who has never been out of his state before to not only go to Afghanistan, but also to learn Pashtu and Dari, and be empathetic with people who he thinks may be killing his friends. It is a lot for even the most aware person to deal with. We should maybe put some other training procedures into place, and be a little bit more supportive of what they are doing. I have a lot of respect for them, because I think we ask them to do too much.
Q. What do you feel is the future of traditional media? Where is this all going?
A. We who are working in the realm of photojournalism and documentary photojournalism have to focus on whom we want to talk to. We need to know who our audience is. That will help us figure out how to reach them, which language to reach them with. I don’t think enough image-makers do that. We are in flux. Certain contenders are emerging. The Times is still here. It’s been strengthened recently by its online version. It has a lot of viewership, and there are going to be photographers like yourself who have access to an important platform. It’s the equivalent of Life magazine. It is reaching millions of people and it’s an important outlet for what we do.
Q. You don’t think it’s over yet?
A. No, I don’t think it’s over yet. It is about reputation now, and reputation is not just about making stylistic pictures. It is about authenticity; about knowing what you are talking about; showing the ability to reach your audience. By working across the media, you can actually survive. The danger is to go to one area and stay.
Q. So you would encourage young people to do many different things?
A. Not necessarily many different things. I encourage them to look at many different forms. Not to say, “I am a photographer,” but to say: “I am an image maker. I make still or moving images in real-life situations, unfiltered and un-Photoshopped. I am going to look into how I can put this into different streams for different audiences; maybe some on the Web, some in print.”
Q. Earlier you said that traditional photography is dead. These traditional types of straight journalism – you made it sound as if they are becoming passé. But then look at the uproar over Julie Jacobson’s image from Afghanistan of the dying soldier. There are still images that really grab people.
A. But again, they are images. What I am thinking about is this idea that “Photography” is something that has this black border around it and is protected. You know? “I used to develop black-and-white pictures and that’s what photography is.” That kind of old-fashioned thinking is just for an art gallery now. Julie Jacobson shot in digital. What is important in that image is that it is a still picture. As we increasingly have technology that wants us to shoot moving pictures and contextualize with sound, we need to understand the difference. Why am I making a still picture? Why am I making a moving picture? The question you asked me about when I decide to shoot what — I need to be able answer that. Slicing stills out of the video stream means there will be even more images. Which means that the audiences’ expectations are going to change. It’s very difficult for me to know what that expectation will be in 10 years’ time because things are moving so quickly. Do I think people are going to pull 16 megabyte pictures out of video streams and try and print them? Absolutely, that is going to happen. What impact that is going to have on the media, I don’t know. That’s why I think the most important thing for our industry is not style, it is authenticity. It is: “I go to you because I know you have an authentic voice in the work that you have been doing.”
Q. Right. But the trend I am seeing is actually the opposite. What I am hearing is: “We don’t need the media anymore. We’ve got our own photographers because we have cellphone cameras.”
A. But you need to have professional witnesses, people who go out there and do this as a living. What you do – the way that you make an image, the way that you make a story – is different than partaking in that story, like citizen journalism.
Q. The trend seems to be towards citizen journalism.
A. Because it’s cheap.
Q. Even this newspaper is saying, “Send in your readers’ photos.”
A. Again, it’s about profit. It is not about good journalism. We all know that having professionalism in any field is important. We have a weird skill-set. Send us into a difficult circumstance and we will get out there and know how to find a story. That is what we do for a living. That is valuable. It is not part of the problem, it is part of the solution – in addition to citizen journalism, in addition to local photographers. The more, the merrier.
Q. We have a different role?
A. We have a different role.
Q. Are you going to continue to cover war?
A. I have no idea. I have no idea.
Q. Are you thinking about quitting?
A. I am just thinking about getting through “Restrepo.” There are different roles you have to do at different stages of life. Those will change. Maybe I’ll go back in. Or maybe I will be useful to the community in other ways.
Q. Why did you leave Britain? Why did you move to New York?
A. Because it rains all the time and you can’t get a cab and the girls are good looking here. Britain has 60 million people. America has 300 million people. It’s the math. If you are interested in mass communication, you are going to reach more people here. It is still the biggest player in the world. It is a very important audience. To get these people to understand what their military is doing is a natural place to be.
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Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Friday, July 02, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: Global Times Interview
Hello,
I was contacted a while back by a reporter from the Global Times, an English language daily newspaper in China. They wanted to do a story about what it was like being a photographer based in China. I thought it would be an interesting story and the reporter seemed genuinely interested in knowing about what life was like for freelancers in China.
The interview lasted about thirty minutes. And the article was posted in the weekend edition of the paper a few weeks back. I never saw a hard copy, but below is the online version I found on SINA.com. It's not too exciting but I thought it would make a semi-interesting read and blog post.
The original story on SINA.com can be found HERE
______________________________________
When we think of how the 20th century's most important events are best remembered, it's usually as images as opposed to stories. Be it a starving African child covered in flies, a girl fleeing a napalm attack, or a destitute family of the Dust Bowl, each of these epoch-defining images were captured by photojournalists in the field. Our perception of such people can be clouded by romantic notions of daring, intrepid risk and adventure. To find out about real life in the industry, the Global Times sat down with two of Shanghai's most prominent foreign photojournalists to discuss their lives reporting on China through a lens.
Romantic? Think again
Ryan Pyle from Toronto has been working in China as a freelance photojournalist since 2001. Despite having no formal training, the 31-year-old has worked with publications such as the New York Times, News Week and the Sunday Times. During his time in China, Pyle has covered major events such as the Sichuan earthquake, an experience he describes as "very emotional." But he is quick to dispel any preconceived notions about his job. "A lot of people think this job is romantic because you get to travel and see interesting things. But believe me it's not. Not many people realize just how tough it is."
One of the most demanding aspects of the job is having to remain on alert day and night and to be ready to take off whenever a news story breaks. "You might just be given a day, a few hours, or even just half an hour before having to set off." He went on to say that, "we usually stay in cheap hotels where the KTV is on downstairs and you don't get a wink of sleep. I've had many nights like this although hotels in China are getting better."
In addition to being vigilant, Pyle's working hours are often irregular because many of the publications he works for are based outside China. "I wake up at 6 am and deal with people from the US. In the daytime I shoot pictures and then in the evening I talk with publications in Europe. At night I'm back dealing with people in the US again."
Stiff competition
According to Paris-born Tim Franco who works for the French newspaper Le Monde, competition is becoming ever more fierce among photojournalists in China. Franco, 27, believes this is a result of China being increasingly placed under the media spotlight, and as more and more journalists pour into Shanghai every year, assignments are harder to come by.
Ryan Pyle told the Global Times that missing just one phone call from a newspaper can make the difference between getting and losing a job as there is always another photographer instantly available. "Unless you are 60 years old or have won 10 World Press Photo Awards no-one is going to wait for you. Even though I'm 31 years old and fairly experienced, newspapers won't wait for someone like me all the time."
Unfortunately, even for those established in the industry, earnings are relatively low and the work is irregular. While waiting for work, many photojournalists do corporate photography to make ends meet.
"Photojournalism is not a lucrative career - if anything it's a dying profession," said Tim Franco. "Publishing has been squeezed by the recession and photojournalists are the first to be dropped. Clients can use cheaper photo agencies instead. I know people who are published regularly in Time Magazine and they still can't pay their bills. Even the top guys will do advertising work. They have to."
Ryan Pyle agrees, but insists that corporate work isn't necessarily the "cop out" it's painted to be. "It is much more highly paid than editorial work and it can often take you to more interesting places than news assignments. I've been inside the Three-Gorges dam, for example, doing corporate work."
Teamwork
A key element to the work involves collaboration with writers as newspapers prefer the photographer and the writer to share the experience in order to achieve a balanced, coherent narrative. Franco told the Global Times that this bond can be one of the most rewarding aspects of the job. "I love the relationship between myself and the writer. It's like a voyage of discovery." Ryan Pyle said of this alliance between writer and photographer, "When you're on assignment, it's the writer who controls the schedule, but most of the writers I work with are very understanding about the photos. It's mostly an easy-going, collaborative experience."
Photogenic China
Despite the hardship and stiff competition, working as a photojournalist in China presents many attractive opportunities. "It is probably the greatest country in the world to do photography in right now," said Ryan Pyle. "I think the changing social economy of China makes for such rich imagery.
I feel really lucky to be here at this time because in 30 years I don't know what China will look like so I want to document it now. China is such a fascinating country; the diversity of people here alone is probably greater than anywhere else on earth."
______________________________________
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Friday, June 25, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: Work Conditions & Suicides
Hello,
I few months back I was speaking at Columbia University and a professor sitting in on my talk asked me, "What are the labor conditions like in China at the moment?"
It was a tough question. There are, two sides to the story - and Howard W. French, who was moderating, assisted in answering this question based on his wealth of experience in Central America, Asia and Africa. Some ideas that we both generated during that talk are below.
Working conditions in China have caught a lot of headlines the last few weeks because of a spurt of suicides at Foxconn and a workers strike which has shut down Honda for several days. So, what are China's factories really like? I'll split my answer in to two overly simplified categories, the good and bad.
A) The Good
Manufacturing work, although tough, does allow people from the countryside to move off the land and find work opportunities in cities, suburbs and industrial centers that they wouldn't otherwise have the chance to visit. It allows many to earn a living and explore and have "an adventure" in some cases. This might sound naive to some of the most skeptic readers out there; but I've been to textile factories where a lot of the male workers play basketball after work and workers travel off the factory in the evening to meet friends at other factories and go out for dinner. I have met factory workers who make a decent wage and don't complain too much about working hours and who know that the work is hard but they won't be doing this forever - as they just want to save a bit and return back to the countryside and buy a home. These are some of the more positive stories I've heard in the last few years of visiting factories across China.
B) The Negative
While the "sweat-shop" idea is truly a rarity in China, there are many other factors of obtaining employment and maintaining employment that place significant psychological stress on workers. After years of visiting factories in some of China's most industrious locations I have come across some trends and common situations. Some of these situations are looked at below:
1) The Big Move
All migrant workers have to move. By the very nature of their employment, all migrant workers have to leave their homes, break ties with family and friends and move to a distant location; often without promise of employment. Many have to borrow money in order to leave in the first place; this is the first instance of incurring debt - which may happen often.
2) Agents
Once they arrive in manufacturing areas like Dongguan or Shenzhen they end up in "flop houses" which are full of migrants looking for work, they are not nice places. Some times weeks are spent in places like this while looking for employment at "job fairs" or through "private agents". Job fairs are difficult and exploitative in nature,and ofter jobs at very low salaries because they know that often jobs are in demand. The "private agents" on the other hand often charge potential migrant workers 3-6 months of their future salary to obtain jobs at highly sought after manufacturing companies. Assuming a migrant uses an agent, they may be borrowing money to cover living experience before employment and then have to pay back their "fee's" for up to six months after their first day of work. This is another cause of indebtedness.
3) Work Conditions
The work conditions are grueling, there is no doubt about it. But, with that being said they are humane; and in many cases conditions have improved ten-fold over what working conditions were like in the 1990s. While workers have to work for long hours performing the same tasks again and again, it is understandable that the pressure on the worker can mount and that they become isolated and feeling as though their work is meaningless and that their life is worthless - but this is the minority I feel. Workers safety is still an issue at many factories and many workers do get hurt and killed on the job. This continues to happen and is also a serious issue but I don't believe it is the cause of worker unrest, suicide and strikes.
4) Living Conditions
The living conditions for many migrant workers are not great, and much of the reasons for this are out of their control. For example, migrant workers are often forced to rent accommodation from the factory they work for at inflated rates, many workers are forced to eat at factory cafeteria at inflated rates and purchase snacks and food from company shops at inflated rates; thereby eroding spending power and savings. Yet another form of indebtedness. Social lives vary greatly, many find friends and engage in happy social lives, others fall through the cracks and live in isolation, often feeling estranged; it is these people who can often end up taking their own lives or getting themselves hurt on the job.
5) The Trap
A lot of you out there must just be thinking, why not just quit the job and move back home. It is just not that easy. Many migrant workers feel trapped in their employment for many reasons, the first is often family pressure. Many migrants borrow money and leave home with promises to deliver wealth to the family - but that is more often fantasy than fact. Also remember that for a migrant worker to obtain employment often they are already in debt to various people before their first day of work; and to complicate matters, often workers have their salaries held for at least three months by factories, so they are continuously owed three months salary. This is seen as an insurance policy for the company, forcing workers to return to work after the "Chinese New Year Holiday" where many workers return home and never come back to the factory. All of these pressures build up, and it's easy to see how a young 17, 18, 19 year old migrant, who is not very well educated, could become overwhelmed by negative feelings and hopelessness.
6) The Solution
To be honest, there is no solution. The problem is not always the job, but the system around finding and maintaining employment. There are too many middle-men and too many people out their making huge profits off of China's migrant classes. Basketball courts, swimming pools, better housing, better food, increase in salaries may not help the situation much. It is the infrastructure around finding employment and holding employment are improved.
Expect more suicides and more workers strikes. Sad but true. But that's just my two cents.
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
I few months back I was speaking at Columbia University and a professor sitting in on my talk asked me, "What are the labor conditions like in China at the moment?"
It was a tough question. There are, two sides to the story - and Howard W. French, who was moderating, assisted in answering this question based on his wealth of experience in Central America, Asia and Africa. Some ideas that we both generated during that talk are below.
Working conditions in China have caught a lot of headlines the last few weeks because of a spurt of suicides at Foxconn and a workers strike which has shut down Honda for several days. So, what are China's factories really like? I'll split my answer in to two overly simplified categories, the good and bad.
A) The Good
Manufacturing work, although tough, does allow people from the countryside to move off the land and find work opportunities in cities, suburbs and industrial centers that they wouldn't otherwise have the chance to visit. It allows many to earn a living and explore and have "an adventure" in some cases. This might sound naive to some of the most skeptic readers out there; but I've been to textile factories where a lot of the male workers play basketball after work and workers travel off the factory in the evening to meet friends at other factories and go out for dinner. I have met factory workers who make a decent wage and don't complain too much about working hours and who know that the work is hard but they won't be doing this forever - as they just want to save a bit and return back to the countryside and buy a home. These are some of the more positive stories I've heard in the last few years of visiting factories across China.
B) The Negative
While the "sweat-shop" idea is truly a rarity in China, there are many other factors of obtaining employment and maintaining employment that place significant psychological stress on workers. After years of visiting factories in some of China's most industrious locations I have come across some trends and common situations. Some of these situations are looked at below:
1) The Big Move
All migrant workers have to move. By the very nature of their employment, all migrant workers have to leave their homes, break ties with family and friends and move to a distant location; often without promise of employment. Many have to borrow money in order to leave in the first place; this is the first instance of incurring debt - which may happen often.
2) Agents
Once they arrive in manufacturing areas like Dongguan or Shenzhen they end up in "flop houses" which are full of migrants looking for work, they are not nice places. Some times weeks are spent in places like this while looking for employment at "job fairs" or through "private agents". Job fairs are difficult and exploitative in nature,and ofter jobs at very low salaries because they know that often jobs are in demand. The "private agents" on the other hand often charge potential migrant workers 3-6 months of their future salary to obtain jobs at highly sought after manufacturing companies. Assuming a migrant uses an agent, they may be borrowing money to cover living experience before employment and then have to pay back their "fee's" for up to six months after their first day of work. This is another cause of indebtedness.
3) Work Conditions
The work conditions are grueling, there is no doubt about it. But, with that being said they are humane; and in many cases conditions have improved ten-fold over what working conditions were like in the 1990s. While workers have to work for long hours performing the same tasks again and again, it is understandable that the pressure on the worker can mount and that they become isolated and feeling as though their work is meaningless and that their life is worthless - but this is the minority I feel. Workers safety is still an issue at many factories and many workers do get hurt and killed on the job. This continues to happen and is also a serious issue but I don't believe it is the cause of worker unrest, suicide and strikes.
4) Living Conditions
The living conditions for many migrant workers are not great, and much of the reasons for this are out of their control. For example, migrant workers are often forced to rent accommodation from the factory they work for at inflated rates, many workers are forced to eat at factory cafeteria at inflated rates and purchase snacks and food from company shops at inflated rates; thereby eroding spending power and savings. Yet another form of indebtedness. Social lives vary greatly, many find friends and engage in happy social lives, others fall through the cracks and live in isolation, often feeling estranged; it is these people who can often end up taking their own lives or getting themselves hurt on the job.
5) The Trap
A lot of you out there must just be thinking, why not just quit the job and move back home. It is just not that easy. Many migrant workers feel trapped in their employment for many reasons, the first is often family pressure. Many migrants borrow money and leave home with promises to deliver wealth to the family - but that is more often fantasy than fact. Also remember that for a migrant worker to obtain employment often they are already in debt to various people before their first day of work; and to complicate matters, often workers have their salaries held for at least three months by factories, so they are continuously owed three months salary. This is seen as an insurance policy for the company, forcing workers to return to work after the "Chinese New Year Holiday" where many workers return home and never come back to the factory. All of these pressures build up, and it's easy to see how a young 17, 18, 19 year old migrant, who is not very well educated, could become overwhelmed by negative feelings and hopelessness.
6) The Solution
To be honest, there is no solution. The problem is not always the job, but the system around finding and maintaining employment. There are too many middle-men and too many people out their making huge profits off of China's migrant classes. Basketball courts, swimming pools, better housing, better food, increase in salaries may not help the situation much. It is the infrastructure around finding employment and holding employment are improved.
Expect more suicides and more workers strikes. Sad but true. But that's just my two cents.
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Friday, June 18, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: Honda Workers Strike, and the NYT
Hello.
A few days back there was a workers strike at a Honda car manufacturing plant in southern China. This occurred in late May. Of course thousands of news stories rushed to cover the news, and there was much mis-represented of what was really happening on the ground.
Enter Keith Bradsher and David Barboza. If you don't know who they are, all you need to know is that they are two of the best. Keith and David, both whom I've worked with and have a lot of respect for, are Business correspondents for the New York Times. And they co-wrote an article towards the end of May that I believe cut through and delivered the hard facts about what was happening at the Honda plant in southern China; a story that delivered news and facts that went well beyond that of the other publications.
A few points to keep in mind:
1) Yes, there is a workers union in China. It is considered to be an arm of the Communist Party and is mainly in charge of watching over workers not bargaining with companies for better working conditions. There are no explicit rules about striking.
2) It's true. Nothing in China is allowed to happen without the blessing of The Party. This strike may have first occurred on whim, but it continued because people high up in the food chain thought it was a decent move. Reasons why might include: that it is time for China's manufacturing migrants to earn more income and become part of the consumer economy; that it is time for China's manufacturing class to obtain better working conditions and better workers rights; that China needs to maintain awareness that the gap is growing between the rich and poor; the recent suicides at Foxconn might end up driving home the point that migrant workers in the manufacturing industry are vulnerable and need further employment protection through government regulation; and lastly that Honda is a Japanese company. Had this strike occurred at a GM or VW Joint Venture you can bet it would have been shut down in a matter of moments. There is a still a lot of personal, and government driven, anti-Japanese feelings throughout China.
3) The most interesting point is that this was allowed to carry on for several days. Meaning that there was debate amongst the top leaders about how to address the situation. We are seeing this more often in China; where the leadership is forced to make quick decisions about situations occurring (riots in Tibet / Xinjiang, or workers strikes) and the government goes very quiet, and local officials go in to hiding until they get their directions from higher up the food chain. One of the common mis-conceptions is that the Communist Party is a homogeneous one party entity where people all agree on the same basic plan for country development; well, that couldn't be further from the truth. The "Party" is a mix-mash of people with a mix-mash of ideas and ideals. A friend of mine who has a lot of government dealings told me that for every person in the government leadership who wants China to develop in to a modern economic global powerhouse, there is another person who wants to drive China back in to the Communist dark ages of the 1960s. While I don't know if that's exactly true, it does pose an interesting argument and can be used as a basis for understanding some of the "ying and yang" policy moves that the Chinese leadership continues to pull out of their hat.
The story by Keith and David is below. The link to the original story online is just below. Enjoy the read.
LINK to Original STORY.
________________________________________
May 28, 2010
Strike in China Highlights Gap in Workers’ Pay
By KEITH BRADSHER and DAVID BARBOZA
FOSHAN, China — After years of being pushed to work 12-hour days, six days a week on monotonous low-wage assembly line tasks, China’s workers are starting to push back.
A strike at an enormous Honda transmission factory here in southeastern China has suddenly and unexpectedly turned into a symbol of this nation’s struggle with income inequality, rising inflation and soaring property prices that have put home ownership beyond the reach of all but the most affluent.
And perhaps most remarkably, Chinese authorities let the strike happen — up to a point.
In the kind of scene that more often plays out at strikes in America than at labor actions in China, print and television reporters from state-controlled media across the country have started covering the walkout here, even waiting outside the nearly deserted front gate on Thursday and Friday in hope of any news. All the Chinese reporters disappeared on Saturday morning, however, as the government, apparently nervous, suddenly imposed without explanation a blanket ban on domestic media coverage of the strike.
A worker at a factory dormitory said on Saturday afternoon that the strike continued, and police were nowhere in sight at the factory or the dormitory. The authorities have been leery of letting the media report on labor disputes, fearing that it could encourage workers elsewhere to rebel. The new permissiveness, however temporary, coincides with growing sentiment among some officials and economists that Chinese workers deserve higher wages for their role in the country’s global export machine.
And without higher incomes, hundreds of millions of Chinese will be unable to play their part in the domestic consumer spending boom on which this nation hopes to base its next round of economic growth.
“This is all because there is a major political debate going on about how to deal with the nation’s growing income gap, and the need to do something about wages,” said Andreas Lauffs, a lawyer at Baker & McKenzie who specializes in Chinese labor issues.
If wages do rise, that could bring higher prices for Western consumers for goods as diverse as toys at Wal-Mart and iPads from Apple.
The Chinese media may also have found it a little easier, politically, to cover this strike because Honda is a Japanese company, and anti-Japanese sentiment still simmers in China as a legacy of World War II. Certainly, the strike is hitting Honda hard, as the resulting shortage of transmissions and other engine parts has forced the company to halt production at all four of its assembly plants in China.
Honda has an annual capacity of 650,000 cars and minivans in China, like Jazz subcompacts for export to Europe and Accord sedans for the Chinese market. Because Honda’s prices in China are similar to what it charges in the United States, the cars tend to be far out of reach financially for most of the workers who make them.
A Honda spokeswoman declined to discuss specific issues in the strike negotiations.
The intense media coverage may evoke historical memories of the 1980 shipyard strike in Gdansk, Poland, that gave rise to the Solidarity movement and paved the way for the fall of Communism in Eastern Europe. But the reality here is much different.
Instead of tens of thousands of grizzled and angry shipyard workers, the Honda strike involves about 1,900 mostly cheerful young people. And the employees interviewed say their goal is more money, not a larger political agenda.
“If they give us 800 renminbi a month, we’ll go back to work right away,” said one young man, describing a pay increase that would add about $117 a month to an average pay that is now around $150 monthly. He said he had read on the Internet of considerably higher wages at other factories in China and expected Honda to match them with an immediate pay increase.
Many workers at other factories in southeastern China already earn $300 a month, but they do so only through considerable overtime. And even that higher income is not enough to embark on the middle-class dream in China of owning a small apartment and subcompact car. Officially, though, the government is discouraging heavy reliance on overtime, and workers here said that Honda was not assigning much.
The strikers said that Honda mainly hired recent graduates of high schools or vocational schools. And so, most are in their late teens or early 20s, representing a new generation of employees, many of whom had not been born when the Chinese authorities suppressed protests by students and workers in Tiananmen Square in 1989 — a watershed event whose 21st anniversary falls next Friday.
The profile of striking workers seems to run more along the lines of slightly bookish would-be engineers — perhaps without the grades or money to attend college — rather than political activists. Besides their low wages, the workers seem focused on issues like the factory’s air-conditioning not being cool enough, and the unfairness of having to rise from their dormitories as early as 5:30 for a 7 a.m. shift.
Workers said that in addition to their pay, they also received free lodging in rooms that slept four to six in bunk beds. They also get free lunches, subsidized breakfasts for the equivalent of 30 cents and dinners for about $1.50.
The striking employees said that some senior workers, known as team leaders, had allied themselves with management. But they insisted that the rank-and-file workers were solidly in favor of walkout — a claim impossible to verify.
Although China is run by the Communist Party and has state-controlled unions, the unions are largely charged with overseeing workers, not bargaining for higher wages or pressing for improved labor conditions. And they are not allowed to strike, although China’s laws do not have explicit prohibitions against doing so.
Workers at the Honda factory dormitory said that the official union at the factory was not representing them but was serving as an intermediary between them and management. Li Jianming, the national spokesman for the All China Federation of Trade Unions, declined to comment.
The workers here have been on strike since May 21, with no resolution in sight. But the strike did not come to broader notice until Thursday and Friday as Japanese media began reporting the shutdown of Honda assembly plants, and as Chinese media and Internet sites were allowed to report extensively on those activities.
The unusually permissive approach of the authorities toward media coverage of the strike follows a decision to tolerate extensive coverage this month of suicides by workers at the Taiwanese-owned Foxconn factory complex in nearby Shenzhen that supplies Apple and Hewlett-Packard.
The official China Daily newspaper ran a lead editorial on Friday that cited the Honda strike as evidence that government inaction on wages might be fueling tensions between workers and employers. The editorial criticized the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security for not moving faster to draft a promised amendment to current wage regulations because of what the newspaper described as opposition from employers.
Zheng Qiao, the associate director of the department of employment relations at the China Institute of Industrial Relations in Beijing, said the strike was a significant development in China’s labor relations history and that “such a large-scale, organized strike will force China’s labor union system to change, to adapt to the market economy.”
Keith Bradsher reported from Foshan, China, and David Barboza from Shanghai. Bao Beibei contributed research.
________________________________________
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
A few days back there was a workers strike at a Honda car manufacturing plant in southern China. This occurred in late May. Of course thousands of news stories rushed to cover the news, and there was much mis-represented of what was really happening on the ground.
Enter Keith Bradsher and David Barboza. If you don't know who they are, all you need to know is that they are two of the best. Keith and David, both whom I've worked with and have a lot of respect for, are Business correspondents for the New York Times. And they co-wrote an article towards the end of May that I believe cut through and delivered the hard facts about what was happening at the Honda plant in southern China; a story that delivered news and facts that went well beyond that of the other publications.
A few points to keep in mind:
1) Yes, there is a workers union in China. It is considered to be an arm of the Communist Party and is mainly in charge of watching over workers not bargaining with companies for better working conditions. There are no explicit rules about striking.
2) It's true. Nothing in China is allowed to happen without the blessing of The Party. This strike may have first occurred on whim, but it continued because people high up in the food chain thought it was a decent move. Reasons why might include: that it is time for China's manufacturing migrants to earn more income and become part of the consumer economy; that it is time for China's manufacturing class to obtain better working conditions and better workers rights; that China needs to maintain awareness that the gap is growing between the rich and poor; the recent suicides at Foxconn might end up driving home the point that migrant workers in the manufacturing industry are vulnerable and need further employment protection through government regulation; and lastly that Honda is a Japanese company. Had this strike occurred at a GM or VW Joint Venture you can bet it would have been shut down in a matter of moments. There is a still a lot of personal, and government driven, anti-Japanese feelings throughout China.
3) The most interesting point is that this was allowed to carry on for several days. Meaning that there was debate amongst the top leaders about how to address the situation. We are seeing this more often in China; where the leadership is forced to make quick decisions about situations occurring (riots in Tibet / Xinjiang, or workers strikes) and the government goes very quiet, and local officials go in to hiding until they get their directions from higher up the food chain. One of the common mis-conceptions is that the Communist Party is a homogeneous one party entity where people all agree on the same basic plan for country development; well, that couldn't be further from the truth. The "Party" is a mix-mash of people with a mix-mash of ideas and ideals. A friend of mine who has a lot of government dealings told me that for every person in the government leadership who wants China to develop in to a modern economic global powerhouse, there is another person who wants to drive China back in to the Communist dark ages of the 1960s. While I don't know if that's exactly true, it does pose an interesting argument and can be used as a basis for understanding some of the "ying and yang" policy moves that the Chinese leadership continues to pull out of their hat.
The story by Keith and David is below. The link to the original story online is just below. Enjoy the read.
LINK to Original STORY.
________________________________________
May 28, 2010
Strike in China Highlights Gap in Workers’ Pay
By KEITH BRADSHER and DAVID BARBOZA
FOSHAN, China — After years of being pushed to work 12-hour days, six days a week on monotonous low-wage assembly line tasks, China’s workers are starting to push back.
A strike at an enormous Honda transmission factory here in southeastern China has suddenly and unexpectedly turned into a symbol of this nation’s struggle with income inequality, rising inflation and soaring property prices that have put home ownership beyond the reach of all but the most affluent.
And perhaps most remarkably, Chinese authorities let the strike happen — up to a point.
In the kind of scene that more often plays out at strikes in America than at labor actions in China, print and television reporters from state-controlled media across the country have started covering the walkout here, even waiting outside the nearly deserted front gate on Thursday and Friday in hope of any news. All the Chinese reporters disappeared on Saturday morning, however, as the government, apparently nervous, suddenly imposed without explanation a blanket ban on domestic media coverage of the strike.
A worker at a factory dormitory said on Saturday afternoon that the strike continued, and police were nowhere in sight at the factory or the dormitory. The authorities have been leery of letting the media report on labor disputes, fearing that it could encourage workers elsewhere to rebel. The new permissiveness, however temporary, coincides with growing sentiment among some officials and economists that Chinese workers deserve higher wages for their role in the country’s global export machine.
And without higher incomes, hundreds of millions of Chinese will be unable to play their part in the domestic consumer spending boom on which this nation hopes to base its next round of economic growth.
“This is all because there is a major political debate going on about how to deal with the nation’s growing income gap, and the need to do something about wages,” said Andreas Lauffs, a lawyer at Baker & McKenzie who specializes in Chinese labor issues.
If wages do rise, that could bring higher prices for Western consumers for goods as diverse as toys at Wal-Mart and iPads from Apple.
The Chinese media may also have found it a little easier, politically, to cover this strike because Honda is a Japanese company, and anti-Japanese sentiment still simmers in China as a legacy of World War II. Certainly, the strike is hitting Honda hard, as the resulting shortage of transmissions and other engine parts has forced the company to halt production at all four of its assembly plants in China.
Honda has an annual capacity of 650,000 cars and minivans in China, like Jazz subcompacts for export to Europe and Accord sedans for the Chinese market. Because Honda’s prices in China are similar to what it charges in the United States, the cars tend to be far out of reach financially for most of the workers who make them.
A Honda spokeswoman declined to discuss specific issues in the strike negotiations.
The intense media coverage may evoke historical memories of the 1980 shipyard strike in Gdansk, Poland, that gave rise to the Solidarity movement and paved the way for the fall of Communism in Eastern Europe. But the reality here is much different.
Instead of tens of thousands of grizzled and angry shipyard workers, the Honda strike involves about 1,900 mostly cheerful young people. And the employees interviewed say their goal is more money, not a larger political agenda.
“If they give us 800 renminbi a month, we’ll go back to work right away,” said one young man, describing a pay increase that would add about $117 a month to an average pay that is now around $150 monthly. He said he had read on the Internet of considerably higher wages at other factories in China and expected Honda to match them with an immediate pay increase.
Many workers at other factories in southeastern China already earn $300 a month, but they do so only through considerable overtime. And even that higher income is not enough to embark on the middle-class dream in China of owning a small apartment and subcompact car. Officially, though, the government is discouraging heavy reliance on overtime, and workers here said that Honda was not assigning much.
The strikers said that Honda mainly hired recent graduates of high schools or vocational schools. And so, most are in their late teens or early 20s, representing a new generation of employees, many of whom had not been born when the Chinese authorities suppressed protests by students and workers in Tiananmen Square in 1989 — a watershed event whose 21st anniversary falls next Friday.
The profile of striking workers seems to run more along the lines of slightly bookish would-be engineers — perhaps without the grades or money to attend college — rather than political activists. Besides their low wages, the workers seem focused on issues like the factory’s air-conditioning not being cool enough, and the unfairness of having to rise from their dormitories as early as 5:30 for a 7 a.m. shift.
Workers said that in addition to their pay, they also received free lodging in rooms that slept four to six in bunk beds. They also get free lunches, subsidized breakfasts for the equivalent of 30 cents and dinners for about $1.50.
The striking employees said that some senior workers, known as team leaders, had allied themselves with management. But they insisted that the rank-and-file workers were solidly in favor of walkout — a claim impossible to verify.
Although China is run by the Communist Party and has state-controlled unions, the unions are largely charged with overseeing workers, not bargaining for higher wages or pressing for improved labor conditions. And they are not allowed to strike, although China’s laws do not have explicit prohibitions against doing so.
Workers at the Honda factory dormitory said that the official union at the factory was not representing them but was serving as an intermediary between them and management. Li Jianming, the national spokesman for the All China Federation of Trade Unions, declined to comment.
The workers here have been on strike since May 21, with no resolution in sight. But the strike did not come to broader notice until Thursday and Friday as Japanese media began reporting the shutdown of Honda assembly plants, and as Chinese media and Internet sites were allowed to report extensively on those activities.
The unusually permissive approach of the authorities toward media coverage of the strike follows a decision to tolerate extensive coverage this month of suicides by workers at the Taiwanese-owned Foxconn factory complex in nearby Shenzhen that supplies Apple and Hewlett-Packard.
The official China Daily newspaper ran a lead editorial on Friday that cited the Honda strike as evidence that government inaction on wages might be fueling tensions between workers and employers. The editorial criticized the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security for not moving faster to draft a promised amendment to current wage regulations because of what the newspaper described as opposition from employers.
Zheng Qiao, the associate director of the department of employment relations at the China Institute of Industrial Relations in Beijing, said the strike was a significant development in China’s labor relations history and that “such a large-scale, organized strike will force China’s labor union system to change, to adapt to the market economy.”
Keith Bradsher reported from Foshan, China, and David Barboza from Shanghai. Bao Beibei contributed research.
________________________________________
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Friday, June 11, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: A Real Use for Butts
Hello.
In the land of 1.3 billion people is it amazing to believe that there are 300+ million smokers. Apparently some 60% of all Chinese men smoke, which if you've travelled in the countryside you'll know that the number is more like 90%.
But alas, someone has figured out a use for cigarette butts. The chemicals found in a cigarette butt are so toxic that they can kill fish, but those same chemicals are also great for protecting steel pipes from rusting.
Finding a practical use for cigarette butts sounds great. But how does one go about collecting them and keeping them off the streets and out of the water system and out of the landfills?
More research needed. You know, I've been trying to visit to photograph a Tobacco plant for years now; the problem is that they are all government owned :(. It may never happen. Original story below:
________________________________________________
Copyright: Reuters
Title: China scientists find use for cigarette butts
Original Story LINK
HONG KONG (Reuters) - Chemical extracts from cigarette butts -- so toxic they kill fish -- can be used to protect
steel pipes from rusting, a study in China has found.
In a paper published in the American Chemical Society's bi-weekly journal Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research, the scientists in China said they identified nine chemicals after immersing cigarette butts in water.
They applied the extracts to N80, a type of steel used in oil pipes, and found that they protected the steel from rusting.
"The metal surface can be protected and the iron atom's further dissolution can be prevented," they wrote.
The chemicals, including nicotine, appear to be responsible for this anti-corrosion effect, they added.
The research was led by Jun Zhao at Xi'an Jiaotong University's School of Energy and Power Engineering and funded by China's state oil firm China National Petroleum Corporation.
Corrosion of steel pipes used by the oil industry costs oil producers millions of dollars annually to repair or replace.
According to the paper, 4.5 trillion cigarette butts find their way into the environment each year. Apart from being an eyesore, they contain toxins that can kill fish.
"Recycling could solve those problems, but finding practical uses for cigarette butts has been difficult," the researchers wrote.
China, which has 300 million smokers, is the world's largest smoking nation and it consumes a third of the world's cigarettes. Nearly 60 percent of men in China smoke, puffing an average of 15 cigarettes per day.
(Reporting by Tan Ee Lyn; Editing by Miral Fahmy)
________________________________________________
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
In the land of 1.3 billion people is it amazing to believe that there are 300+ million smokers. Apparently some 60% of all Chinese men smoke, which if you've travelled in the countryside you'll know that the number is more like 90%.
But alas, someone has figured out a use for cigarette butts. The chemicals found in a cigarette butt are so toxic that they can kill fish, but those same chemicals are also great for protecting steel pipes from rusting.
Finding a practical use for cigarette butts sounds great. But how does one go about collecting them and keeping them off the streets and out of the water system and out of the landfills?
More research needed. You know, I've been trying to visit to photograph a Tobacco plant for years now; the problem is that they are all government owned :(. It may never happen. Original story below:
________________________________________________
Copyright: Reuters
Title: China scientists find use for cigarette butts
Original Story LINK
HONG KONG (Reuters) - Chemical extracts from cigarette butts -- so toxic they kill fish -- can be used to protect
steel pipes from rusting, a study in China has found.
In a paper published in the American Chemical Society's bi-weekly journal Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research, the scientists in China said they identified nine chemicals after immersing cigarette butts in water.
They applied the extracts to N80, a type of steel used in oil pipes, and found that they protected the steel from rusting.
"The metal surface can be protected and the iron atom's further dissolution can be prevented," they wrote.
The chemicals, including nicotine, appear to be responsible for this anti-corrosion effect, they added.
The research was led by Jun Zhao at Xi'an Jiaotong University's School of Energy and Power Engineering and funded by China's state oil firm China National Petroleum Corporation.
Corrosion of steel pipes used by the oil industry costs oil producers millions of dollars annually to repair or replace.
According to the paper, 4.5 trillion cigarette butts find their way into the environment each year. Apart from being an eyesore, they contain toxins that can kill fish.
"Recycling could solve those problems, but finding practical uses for cigarette butts has been difficult," the researchers wrote.
China, which has 300 million smokers, is the world's largest smoking nation and it consumes a third of the world's cigarettes. Nearly 60 percent of men in China smoke, puffing an average of 15 cigarettes per day.
(Reporting by Tan Ee Lyn; Editing by Miral Fahmy)
________________________________________________
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Friday, June 04, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: PDN Photo Annual Finalist
Hello.
I am a bit late on getting around to this, but I just wanted to make you aware of some great news. Some of my work has been included in the PDN Photo Annual 2010. I was a finalist, or received an honorable mention, for two bodies of work: The Chinese Infrastructure project of the Baling River Bridge and the my Black and White work on Chinese Turkestan or China's western Xinjiang region.
For a wider edit of my work on Chinese Turkestan you can view a photo essay that was recently published with PDN Magazine in their photo blog section. While many of you may have seen my images from Chinese Turkestan previously, what is new is the multimedia slide show that I've prepared (hosted on Youtube) to showcase more of the photography combined with audio that I recorded in the region. I hope you enjoy the work and thank you for your time.
1) PDN Photo Annual Gallery: LINK
2) China Infrastructure: BaLing Bridge Gallery
3) Personal Work: Chinese Turkestan Gallery
PDN Photo of the Day Blog: LINK
Chinese Turkestan Multimedia Slide Show LINK
Resolve Blog: My commentary on Multimedia LINK
Thank you,
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Friday, May 28, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: Russians Bribe to Solve Problems
Hello.
I don't often put up blog posts about other countries unless it somehow directly relates to China, and when a topic like bribery comes up it's always a hot topic.
Now, I've never been to Russia but from what I've heard it is full of blatant bribery, so much so that many Russians actually believe they need to pay bribes to get problems solved. Research shows that Russians still need to pay bribes to get better health care, get drivers licenses, bribe police when they get traffic tickets, get children out of military service or a place at the right school.
The Chinese usually have to pay similar bribes they usually come in the form of gifts and are most often both socially acceptable and expected.
Russia is ranked 146th out of 180 nations in the Transparency International ranking for Corruption Perception. China is ranked 79th. India is ranked 84th. Food for thought. Original article is below:
__________________________________________________________
Copyright: Reuters
Title: Half of Russians believe bribery solves "problems"
Original Story LINK
MOSCOW (Reuters) - More than half of Russians think bribing officials is the best way to "solve problems," according to a new poll.
Fifty-five percent of respondents to a Levada Centre poll of 1,600 Russians said they believed that "bribes are given by everyone who comes across officials" in Russia.
President Dmitry Medvedev, halfway through his four-year term, has pledged to fight Russia's all-pervasive graft and build a law-abiding state, where everyone observes the rules rather than looking for ways around them.
But findings by the Levada Centre showed that Russians still pay bribes to obtain better medical services, prefer to "buy" their driving licences, bribe police when caught violating traffic rules, or pay to ensure that their child can dodge the draft or get a place at the right school.
Ten percent confessed they had even paid to arrange funerals for relatives or loved ones.
Only 10 percent of those polled believe that only "cheats and criminals" bribed officials and 30 percent said that those offering "cash in envelopes" are in fact "ordinary people who have no other way to solve their problems."
Watchdog Transparency International last November rated Russia, a G8 country, joint 146th out of 180 nations in
its Corruption Perception Index, along with Zimbabwe, Sierra Leone, and five other developing nations.
(Reporting by Dmitry Solovyov; Editing by Paul Casciato)
__________________________________________________________
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
I don't often put up blog posts about other countries unless it somehow directly relates to China, and when a topic like bribery comes up it's always a hot topic.
Now, I've never been to Russia but from what I've heard it is full of blatant bribery, so much so that many Russians actually believe they need to pay bribes to get problems solved. Research shows that Russians still need to pay bribes to get better health care, get drivers licenses, bribe police when they get traffic tickets, get children out of military service or a place at the right school.
The Chinese usually have to pay similar bribes they usually come in the form of gifts and are most often both socially acceptable and expected.
Russia is ranked 146th out of 180 nations in the Transparency International ranking for Corruption Perception. China is ranked 79th. India is ranked 84th. Food for thought. Original article is below:
__________________________________________________________
Copyright: Reuters
Title: Half of Russians believe bribery solves "problems"
Original Story LINK
MOSCOW (Reuters) - More than half of Russians think bribing officials is the best way to "solve problems," according to a new poll.
Fifty-five percent of respondents to a Levada Centre poll of 1,600 Russians said they believed that "bribes are given by everyone who comes across officials" in Russia.
President Dmitry Medvedev, halfway through his four-year term, has pledged to fight Russia's all-pervasive graft and build a law-abiding state, where everyone observes the rules rather than looking for ways around them.
But findings by the Levada Centre showed that Russians still pay bribes to obtain better medical services, prefer to "buy" their driving licences, bribe police when caught violating traffic rules, or pay to ensure that their child can dodge the draft or get a place at the right school.
Ten percent confessed they had even paid to arrange funerals for relatives or loved ones.
Only 10 percent of those polled believe that only "cheats and criminals" bribed officials and 30 percent said that those offering "cash in envelopes" are in fact "ordinary people who have no other way to solve their problems."
Watchdog Transparency International last November rated Russia, a G8 country, joint 146th out of 180 nations in
its Corruption Perception Index, along with Zimbabwe, Sierra Leone, and five other developing nations.
(Reporting by Dmitry Solovyov; Editing by Paul Casciato)
__________________________________________________________
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Friday, May 21, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: AP Taking Assignments
Hello,
This story broke a few weeks ago and it's taken me a bit of time to come up with a reaction to it. The Associated Press is now taking editorial assignments.
Their online advertisement can be view HERE.
"Our new Editorial Assignments Service offers the power of AP's award-winning photojournalism and global access. Hire AP's elite staff photographers, now available for your next editorial project. AP will capture your vision with depth and authenticity and offer unsurpassed vision and on-point delivery. Book your assignment today."
So the big question is why does a wire service need to start taking assignments. It's true, the AP have some very talented and dedicated image makers, and if those photographers were freelancers they would get a lot of assignments; but this just feels wrong.
Perhaps it's timing. While the career options for a "freelance photographer" are dwindling, we now have another competitor to deal with. The industry is shrinking. Everyone is offering everything and rates are dropping. The future can't really be this bleak, can it be?
I still believe the still image is the most powerful form of communication and story telling there is, but do I have to earn a negative income, spending more money than I make, to pursue my career as a photographer?
Only time will tell.
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Monday, May 17, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: Arta Gallery Show
Hello.
I just wanted to share some details about my Gallery Exhibition (A Group Show) at the Arta Gallery in Toronto, Canada for the Contact Photo Festival. It opened on May 15th and will run until May 27th. I hope if you are in the area you can swing by. Some new work from Chinese Turkestan is on display. Sadly I will not be there. Check out the link below. Cheers,
LINK: Arta Gallery
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
I just wanted to share some details about my Gallery Exhibition (A Group Show) at the Arta Gallery in Toronto, Canada for the Contact Photo Festival. It opened on May 15th and will run until May 27th. I hope if you are in the area you can swing by. Some new work from Chinese Turkestan is on display. Sadly I will not be there. Check out the link below. Cheers,
LINK: Arta Gallery
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Friday, May 07, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: Ryerson Journalism School Questions
Hello.
I enjoy lecturing and earlier this year I spoke about being a freelance photographer at the Ryerson University School of Journalism in Toronto, Canada. It was a very enjoyable and I feel that my experiences can offer people a lot of insight in to how to get your freelance career started.
Just a few weeks ago a Ryerson student wrote me asking if I could answer a few questions for them; as they wanted to profile my career for a project they were working on. Below are some of those questions and answers. I thought they may be suitable for my blog.
1) What is your impression of the state of the journalism industry today?
I think the state of the journalism industry is in decline. Saying that though, people know more about remote parts of the world, and people generally consume more information now, and in different formats, than they did twenty years ago. Journalism, especially non-professional journalism, is expanding rapidly as the internet and blogging continue to change our lives - and the way we consume media.
But, while non-professional journalism, in general, is proliferating and expanding; professional journalism and career journalism is shrinking and retreating, mainly because advertising revenue's have forced many magazines and newspapers to reduce pages and close up all together. The big question going forward, for people like me who earn a living as professional journalists, is whether the news consumers out there will pay for high quality professional journalism. There are too many bloggers and non-professional journalists out there that are spreading news and information that may not fully understand the ethics and morals of good journalism, and this hurts the industry over time. But there doesn't seem to be much interest for consumers to pay for high-quality, reliable journalism content. The next five years will be very interesting to see what happens.
2) What is it like to be a freelancer right now?
Being a freelancer is very difficult at the moment. Magazines and newspapers, my clients, are cutting back their pages and their assignments. The cutbacks are widespread and everyone is affected. The downturn in the advertising industry for traditional (print) media is the main reason for this, as more advertising spending drifts towards online venues. There are less pictures in magazines, there are less freelance stories and when you do get an assignment they are often shorter and often the pay is less. But while the jobs may be fewer and the pay may be less I still find documenting China visually incredibly rewarding and important. Even though I was able to win some awards in 2009, it is safe to say that last year was my worse income earning year of my career. I'm pleased to say that 2010 is looking better, hopefully the upward trend continues.
3) How much do you (or can you) make per photograph?
My pictures sell for a wide range of prices. In the photo industry the "price" of a picture is determined by the "usage". For example, if HSBC - a global bank - wants to use your picture from a hospital in China for an advertisement then that sale might be USD 10,000. But if the New York Times wants to buy that same picture to illustrate a story about health care in China, you may only earn USD 250. The key is in the usage.
4) What are the greatest challenges of being a freelance photographer?
The greatest challenge of being a freelance photographer is running a small business. Yes, taking lovely pictures is crucial, but if you can not earn a living and pay your bills your freelance career will end very quickly. In every course on journalism they need to have an optional class for those who want to be freelancers, and that class needs to teach people how to manage their costs and understand basic accounting. I know a lot of photographers who make beautiful images, but they don't freelance anymore because they couldn't make a living at it. Another massive challenge is managing contacts and networking but all of that doesn't matter much if you can't keep your books in order.
5) What are the greatest advantages of being a freelancer?
The greatest advantage of being a freelance photographer is that I am FREE. I can work on projects that I think are important. I can take jobs and turn down jobs as I see fit. I am my own boss, my own editor and my own accountant. That might intimidate people but I thrive on it. I enjoy having complete control over the direction of my career and control over the projects I work on. It helps me stay sharp and motivated.
6) And finally, what advice do you have for any journalism students who are looking towards the freelance career in the future.
Freelancing is tough and it will challenge you. It will test your perception of what is normal and what you are capable of. With no stable income and no benefits you have to use your wit and your ingenuity to generate income, and interest in your work. You have to create a following among editors and you need to sustain a comfortable lifestyle. All of this seems near impossible when you first start out. But remember, no one builds a profitable company over night. And you shouldn't expect to build a profitable freelance career over night. It takes time. I've lived in China since 2001. My first five years, yes - 5 years - were very difficult. It is possible, and if you have the ability to tough it out then there will be rewards down the road.
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
I enjoy lecturing and earlier this year I spoke about being a freelance photographer at the Ryerson University School of Journalism in Toronto, Canada. It was a very enjoyable and I feel that my experiences can offer people a lot of insight in to how to get your freelance career started.
Just a few weeks ago a Ryerson student wrote me asking if I could answer a few questions for them; as they wanted to profile my career for a project they were working on. Below are some of those questions and answers. I thought they may be suitable for my blog.
1) What is your impression of the state of the journalism industry today?
I think the state of the journalism industry is in decline. Saying that though, people know more about remote parts of the world, and people generally consume more information now, and in different formats, than they did twenty years ago. Journalism, especially non-professional journalism, is expanding rapidly as the internet and blogging continue to change our lives - and the way we consume media.
But, while non-professional journalism, in general, is proliferating and expanding; professional journalism and career journalism is shrinking and retreating, mainly because advertising revenue's have forced many magazines and newspapers to reduce pages and close up all together. The big question going forward, for people like me who earn a living as professional journalists, is whether the news consumers out there will pay for high quality professional journalism. There are too many bloggers and non-professional journalists out there that are spreading news and information that may not fully understand the ethics and morals of good journalism, and this hurts the industry over time. But there doesn't seem to be much interest for consumers to pay for high-quality, reliable journalism content. The next five years will be very interesting to see what happens.
2) What is it like to be a freelancer right now?
Being a freelancer is very difficult at the moment. Magazines and newspapers, my clients, are cutting back their pages and their assignments. The cutbacks are widespread and everyone is affected. The downturn in the advertising industry for traditional (print) media is the main reason for this, as more advertising spending drifts towards online venues. There are less pictures in magazines, there are less freelance stories and when you do get an assignment they are often shorter and often the pay is less. But while the jobs may be fewer and the pay may be less I still find documenting China visually incredibly rewarding and important. Even though I was able to win some awards in 2009, it is safe to say that last year was my worse income earning year of my career. I'm pleased to say that 2010 is looking better, hopefully the upward trend continues.
3) How much do you (or can you) make per photograph?
My pictures sell for a wide range of prices. In the photo industry the "price" of a picture is determined by the "usage". For example, if HSBC - a global bank - wants to use your picture from a hospital in China for an advertisement then that sale might be USD 10,000. But if the New York Times wants to buy that same picture to illustrate a story about health care in China, you may only earn USD 250. The key is in the usage.
4) What are the greatest challenges of being a freelance photographer?
The greatest challenge of being a freelance photographer is running a small business. Yes, taking lovely pictures is crucial, but if you can not earn a living and pay your bills your freelance career will end very quickly. In every course on journalism they need to have an optional class for those who want to be freelancers, and that class needs to teach people how to manage their costs and understand basic accounting. I know a lot of photographers who make beautiful images, but they don't freelance anymore because they couldn't make a living at it. Another massive challenge is managing contacts and networking but all of that doesn't matter much if you can't keep your books in order.
5) What are the greatest advantages of being a freelancer?
The greatest advantage of being a freelance photographer is that I am FREE. I can work on projects that I think are important. I can take jobs and turn down jobs as I see fit. I am my own boss, my own editor and my own accountant. That might intimidate people but I thrive on it. I enjoy having complete control over the direction of my career and control over the projects I work on. It helps me stay sharp and motivated.
6) And finally, what advice do you have for any journalism students who are looking towards the freelance career in the future.
Freelancing is tough and it will challenge you. It will test your perception of what is normal and what you are capable of. With no stable income and no benefits you have to use your wit and your ingenuity to generate income, and interest in your work. You have to create a following among editors and you need to sustain a comfortable lifestyle. All of this seems near impossible when you first start out. But remember, no one builds a profitable company over night. And you shouldn't expect to build a profitable freelance career over night. It takes time. I've lived in China since 2001. My first five years, yes - 5 years - were very difficult. It is possible, and if you have the ability to tough it out then there will be rewards down the road.
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Friday, April 30, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: The Shrinking Path
Hello,
Well, it appears that being a photographer is actually as bleak as everyone says it is. Even house wives are able to earn an income from Getty Images. Read below. Time to dust off that degree in accounting.
Please follow this LINK to the original story.
The article is also posted below.
Copywrite: New York Times
__________________________________
March 29, 2010
For Photographers, the Image of a Shrinking Path
By STEPHANIE CLIFFORD
By the time Matt Eich entered photojournalism school in 2004, the magazine and newspaper business was already declining.
But Mr. Eich had been shooting photographs since he was a child, and when he married and had a baby during college, he stuck with photography as a career.
“I had to hit the ground running and try to make enough money to keep a roof over our heads,” he said.
Since graduation in 2008, Mr. Eich, 23, has gotten magazine assignments here and there, but “industrywide, the sentiment now, at least among my peers, is that this is not a sustainable thing,” he said. He has been supplementing magazine work with advertising and art projects, in a pastiche of ways to earn a living. “There was a path, and there isn’t anymore.”
Then there is D. Sharon Pruitt, a 40-year-old mother of six who lives on Hill Air Force Base in Utah. Ms. Pruitt’s husband is in the military, and their frequent moves meant a full-time job was not practical. But after a vacation to Hawaii in 2006, Ms. Pruitt uploaded some photos — taken with a $99 Kodak digital camera — to the site Flickr.
Since then, through her Flickr photos, she has received a contract with the stock-photography company Getty Images that gives her a monthly income when publishers or advertisers license the images. The checks are sometimes enough to take the family out to dinner, sometimes almost enough for a mortgage payment. “At the moment, it’s just great to have extra money,” she said.
Mr. Eich and Ms. Pruitt illustrate the huge shake-up in photography during the last decade. Amateurs, happy to accept small checks for snapshots of children and sunsets, have increasing opportunities to make money on photos but are underpricing professional photographers and leaving them with limited career options. Professionals are also being hurt because magazines and newspapers are cutting pages or shutting altogether.
“There are very few professional photographers who, right now, are not hurting,” said Holly Stuart Hughes, editor of the magazine Photo District News.
That has left professional photographers with a bit of an identity crisis. Nine years ago, when Livia Corona was fresh out of art school, she got assignments from magazines like Travel and Leisure and Time. Then, she said, “three forces coincided.”
They were the advertising downturn, the popularity and accessibility of digital photography, and changes in the stock-photo market.
Magazines’ editorial pages tend to rise or fall depending on how many ad pages they have. In 2000, the magazines measured by Publishers Information Bureau, a trade group, had 286,932 ad pages. In 2009, there were 169,218 — a decline of 41 percent. That means less physical space in which to print photographs.
“Pages are at a premium, and there’s more competition to get anything into a magazine now, and the bar is just higher for excellent work,” said Bill Shapiro, the editor of Life.com, who ran the print revival of Life before Time Inc. shut it in 2007. And that is for the publications that survived — 428 magazines closed in 2009 alone, according to the publication database MediaFinder.com, including ones that regularly assigned original photography, like Gourmet, Portfolio and National Geographic Adventure.
And while magazines once sniffed at stock photographs, which are existing images, not original assignments, shrinking editorial budgets made them reconsider.
“When we began, stock photography or licensed images, preshot images being licensed, was perceived as the armpit of the photo industry,” said Jonathan Klein, the chief executive of Getty Images who helped found the agency in 1995. “No self-respecting art director or creative director would use a preshot image, because it wasn’t original, it hadn’t been commissioned by them, it wasn’t their creativity.”
At the same time, the Internet has made it easier for editors to find and license stock photos — they can do it in seconds with a search term and a few clicks, rather than spending seven weeks mailing film transparencies back and forth.
Concurrently, digital photography took off. “It used to be you really needed to know how to use a camera,” said Keith Marlowe, a photographer who has worked for Spin and Rolling Stone. “If you messed up a roll, you couldn’t redo the concert.” Now, though, any photographer can instantly see if a shot is good, or whether the light balances or other technical aspects need to be adjusted.
That meant a flood of pretty decent photographs, and that changed the stock-photography industry. In the last few years, stock agencies have created or acquired so-called microstock divisions. They charge $1 to $100, in most cases, for publishers or others to rerun a photo, often supplied by an amateur. And Getty made a deal with Flickr in 2008, permitting Getty’s photo editors to comb through customers’ images and strike license agreements with the amateur photographers.
“The quality of licensed imagery is virtually indistinguishable now from the quality of images they might commission,” Mr. Klein said. Yet “the price point that the client, or customer, is charged is a fraction of the price point which they would pay for a professional image.”
In 2005, Getty Images licensed 1.4 million preshot commercial photos. Last year, it licensed 22 million — and “all of the growth was through our user-generated business,” Mr. Klein said. That is because amateurs are largely happy to be paid anything for their photos. “People that don’t have to make a living from photography and do it as a hobby don’t feel the need to charge a reasonable rate,” Mr. Eich said.
With stock-photography payments declining and magazines pulling back on original assignments, some Web sites like Life.com and BurnMagazine.org have popped up as homes for original photography. Life commissions about two projects a month — it sent Mr. Marlowe to Haiti after the earthquake, for instance, and the entertainment photographer Jeff Vespa to cover the European news media tour by the “Avatar” cast.
There seems to be an audience for professional photography on these sites. The average number of photos each visitor viewed for “Michael Jackson: The Memorial” at Life.com was 41, for example, and for “Oscars 2010: The Best Dresses,” it was 38 images.
Still, the pay, compared with print, is “less, for sure,” Mr. Shapiro of Life.com said, since some professional photographers “are really more excited for the exposure than they are to drive a hard bargain.”
But it is hard to live on exposure alone. And some professionals worry that with ways to make a salary in photography disappearing, the impact will be severe.
“The important thing that a photojournalist does is they know how to tell the story — they know they’re not there to skew, interpret or bias,” said Katrin Eismann, chairwoman of the Masters in Digital Photography program at the School of Visual Arts in New York. “A photographer can go to a rally or demonstration, and they can make it look as though 10 people showed up, or 1,000 people showed up, and that’s a big difference. I’m not sure I’m going to trust an amateur to understand how important that visual communication is. Can an amateur take a picture as good as a professional? Sure,” Ms. Eismann said. “Can they do it on demand? Can they do it again? Can they do it over and over? Can they do it when a scene isn’t that interesting?”
But amateurs like Ms. Pruitt do not particularly care. “I never followed any traditional photography rules only because I didn’t know of any — I never went to photography school, never took any classes,” she said. “People don’t know the rules, so they just shoot what they like — and other people like it, too.”
__________________________________
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Well, it appears that being a photographer is actually as bleak as everyone says it is. Even house wives are able to earn an income from Getty Images. Read below. Time to dust off that degree in accounting.
Please follow this LINK to the original story.
The article is also posted below.
Copywrite: New York Times
__________________________________
March 29, 2010
For Photographers, the Image of a Shrinking Path
By STEPHANIE CLIFFORD
By the time Matt Eich entered photojournalism school in 2004, the magazine and newspaper business was already declining.
But Mr. Eich had been shooting photographs since he was a child, and when he married and had a baby during college, he stuck with photography as a career.
“I had to hit the ground running and try to make enough money to keep a roof over our heads,” he said.
Since graduation in 2008, Mr. Eich, 23, has gotten magazine assignments here and there, but “industrywide, the sentiment now, at least among my peers, is that this is not a sustainable thing,” he said. He has been supplementing magazine work with advertising and art projects, in a pastiche of ways to earn a living. “There was a path, and there isn’t anymore.”
Then there is D. Sharon Pruitt, a 40-year-old mother of six who lives on Hill Air Force Base in Utah. Ms. Pruitt’s husband is in the military, and their frequent moves meant a full-time job was not practical. But after a vacation to Hawaii in 2006, Ms. Pruitt uploaded some photos — taken with a $99 Kodak digital camera — to the site Flickr.
Since then, through her Flickr photos, she has received a contract with the stock-photography company Getty Images that gives her a monthly income when publishers or advertisers license the images. The checks are sometimes enough to take the family out to dinner, sometimes almost enough for a mortgage payment. “At the moment, it’s just great to have extra money,” she said.
Mr. Eich and Ms. Pruitt illustrate the huge shake-up in photography during the last decade. Amateurs, happy to accept small checks for snapshots of children and sunsets, have increasing opportunities to make money on photos but are underpricing professional photographers and leaving them with limited career options. Professionals are also being hurt because magazines and newspapers are cutting pages or shutting altogether.
“There are very few professional photographers who, right now, are not hurting,” said Holly Stuart Hughes, editor of the magazine Photo District News.
That has left professional photographers with a bit of an identity crisis. Nine years ago, when Livia Corona was fresh out of art school, she got assignments from magazines like Travel and Leisure and Time. Then, she said, “three forces coincided.”
They were the advertising downturn, the popularity and accessibility of digital photography, and changes in the stock-photo market.
Magazines’ editorial pages tend to rise or fall depending on how many ad pages they have. In 2000, the magazines measured by Publishers Information Bureau, a trade group, had 286,932 ad pages. In 2009, there were 169,218 — a decline of 41 percent. That means less physical space in which to print photographs.
“Pages are at a premium, and there’s more competition to get anything into a magazine now, and the bar is just higher for excellent work,” said Bill Shapiro, the editor of Life.com, who ran the print revival of Life before Time Inc. shut it in 2007. And that is for the publications that survived — 428 magazines closed in 2009 alone, according to the publication database MediaFinder.com, including ones that regularly assigned original photography, like Gourmet, Portfolio and National Geographic Adventure.
And while magazines once sniffed at stock photographs, which are existing images, not original assignments, shrinking editorial budgets made them reconsider.
“When we began, stock photography or licensed images, preshot images being licensed, was perceived as the armpit of the photo industry,” said Jonathan Klein, the chief executive of Getty Images who helped found the agency in 1995. “No self-respecting art director or creative director would use a preshot image, because it wasn’t original, it hadn’t been commissioned by them, it wasn’t their creativity.”
At the same time, the Internet has made it easier for editors to find and license stock photos — they can do it in seconds with a search term and a few clicks, rather than spending seven weeks mailing film transparencies back and forth.
Concurrently, digital photography took off. “It used to be you really needed to know how to use a camera,” said Keith Marlowe, a photographer who has worked for Spin and Rolling Stone. “If you messed up a roll, you couldn’t redo the concert.” Now, though, any photographer can instantly see if a shot is good, or whether the light balances or other technical aspects need to be adjusted.
That meant a flood of pretty decent photographs, and that changed the stock-photography industry. In the last few years, stock agencies have created or acquired so-called microstock divisions. They charge $1 to $100, in most cases, for publishers or others to rerun a photo, often supplied by an amateur. And Getty made a deal with Flickr in 2008, permitting Getty’s photo editors to comb through customers’ images and strike license agreements with the amateur photographers.
“The quality of licensed imagery is virtually indistinguishable now from the quality of images they might commission,” Mr. Klein said. Yet “the price point that the client, or customer, is charged is a fraction of the price point which they would pay for a professional image.”
In 2005, Getty Images licensed 1.4 million preshot commercial photos. Last year, it licensed 22 million — and “all of the growth was through our user-generated business,” Mr. Klein said. That is because amateurs are largely happy to be paid anything for their photos. “People that don’t have to make a living from photography and do it as a hobby don’t feel the need to charge a reasonable rate,” Mr. Eich said.
With stock-photography payments declining and magazines pulling back on original assignments, some Web sites like Life.com and BurnMagazine.org have popped up as homes for original photography. Life commissions about two projects a month — it sent Mr. Marlowe to Haiti after the earthquake, for instance, and the entertainment photographer Jeff Vespa to cover the European news media tour by the “Avatar” cast.
There seems to be an audience for professional photography on these sites. The average number of photos each visitor viewed for “Michael Jackson: The Memorial” at Life.com was 41, for example, and for “Oscars 2010: The Best Dresses,” it was 38 images.
Still, the pay, compared with print, is “less, for sure,” Mr. Shapiro of Life.com said, since some professional photographers “are really more excited for the exposure than they are to drive a hard bargain.”
But it is hard to live on exposure alone. And some professionals worry that with ways to make a salary in photography disappearing, the impact will be severe.
“The important thing that a photojournalist does is they know how to tell the story — they know they’re not there to skew, interpret or bias,” said Katrin Eismann, chairwoman of the Masters in Digital Photography program at the School of Visual Arts in New York. “A photographer can go to a rally or demonstration, and they can make it look as though 10 people showed up, or 1,000 people showed up, and that’s a big difference. I’m not sure I’m going to trust an amateur to understand how important that visual communication is. Can an amateur take a picture as good as a professional? Sure,” Ms. Eismann said. “Can they do it on demand? Can they do it again? Can they do it over and over? Can they do it when a scene isn’t that interesting?”
But amateurs like Ms. Pruitt do not particularly care. “I never followed any traditional photography rules only because I didn’t know of any — I never went to photography school, never took any classes,” she said. “People don’t know the rules, so they just shoot what they like — and other people like it, too.”
__________________________________
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
Friday, April 23, 2010
Ryan Pyle Blog: Where are all the Girls?
Hello.
China, and most poor agrarian countries, have a problem with baby girls. It seems that on almost every level they are not desired. The impression is that they can’t work as hard in the fields and once they are of marrying age they’ll be gone and working for another family, so what use are they? Well, actually they are incredibly useful and China is slowly waking up to this fact.
According to the Economist, a few weeks back, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) showed what can happen in a country with too few baby girls. Within ten years, the CASS reported, there will be one in five young men who will be unable to find a bride. This is apparently unprecedented for a country that is not at war.
China, by 2020, will have some 30 or 40 million more men than women. This group of Chinese bachelors, known as “bare branches”, seemed to actually accelerate from 1990 to 2005, and in ways not directly related to the “One Child Policy” which was introduced in 1979. The real reasons behind this male preference are not entirely understood but poverty and ignorance do play their part, so do prenatal sex-determination technology and the general decline in fertility.
While under natural circumstances the average birth ratio is roughly 104 boys for every 100 girls born. In China, from 2000 to 2004, the number is a sky-high 124 boys for every 100 girls. And even today in 2010 the number stands at 123 boys for every 100 girls. While the numbers for China that are quoted here are “national level” statistics, provinces in China contain wild variations. For example, Tibet has what would be considered a natural birth rate of about 104 boys to every 100 girls, but some of the more rural and backwards provinces have birth statistics as high as 130 boys for every 100 girls.
So what does all this mean for China? Well, having lots of energetic young men around without much work and without a woman to keep them tame is one of the telling influences for many of the world’s social revolutions; so yes, political instability could be a potential outcome. Increased crime rates and the deterioration of traditional family values could also be possible side effects; as well as the proliferation of prostitution and brothels. Fulfilling the needs of these young “bare branches” will be an economic opportunity that surely won’t be missed by those who practice the world’s oldest profession.
The original story is posted below:
Please follow this LINK to the original online version.
________________________________
The worldwide war on baby girls
Mar 4th 2010
XINRAN XUE, a Chinese writer, describes visiting a peasant family in the Yimeng area of Shandong province. The wife was giving birth. “We had scarcely sat down in the kitchen”, she writes (see article), “when we heard a moan of pain from the bedroom next door…The cries from the inner room grew louder—and abruptly stopped. There was a low sob, and then a man’s gruff voice said accusingly: ‘Useless thing!’
“Suddenly, I thought I heard a slight movement in the slops pail behind me,” Miss Xinran remembers. “To my absolute horror, I saw a tiny foot poking out of the pail. The midwife must have dropped that tiny baby alive into the slops pail! I nearly threw myself at it, but the two policemen [who had accompanied me] held my shoulders in a firm grip. ‘Don’t move, you can’t save it, it’s too late.’
“‘But that’s...murder...and you’re the police!’ The little foot was still now. The policemen held on to me for a few more minutes. ‘Doing a baby girl is not a big thing around here,’ [an] older woman said comfortingly. ‘That’s a living child,’ I said in a shaking voice, pointing at the slops pail. ‘It’s not a child,’ she corrected me. ‘It’s a girl baby, and we can’t keep it. Around these parts, you can’t get by without a son. Girl babies don’t count.’”
In January 2010 the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) showed what can happen to a country when girl babies don’t count. Within ten years, the academy said, one in five young men would be unable to find a bride because of the dearth of young women—a figure unprecedented in a country at peace.
The number is based on the sexual discrepancy among people aged 19 and below. According to CASS, China in 2020 will have 30m-40m more men of this age than young women. For comparison, there are 23m boys below the age of 20 in Germany, France and Britain combined and around 40m American boys and young men. So within ten years, China faces the prospect of having the equivalent of the whole young male population of America, or almost twice that of Europe’s three largest countries, with little prospect of marriage, untethered to a home of their own and without the stake in society that marriage and children provide.
Gendercide—to borrow the title of a 1985 book by Mary Anne Warren—is often seen as an unintended consequence of China’s one-child policy, or as a product of poverty or ignorance. But that cannot be the whole story. The surplus of bachelors—called in China guanggun, or “bare branches”— seems to have accelerated between 1990 and 2005, in ways not obviously linked to the one-child policy, which was introduced in 1979. And, as is becoming clear, the war against baby girls is not confined to China.
Parts of India have sex ratios as skewed as anything in its northern neighbour. Other East Asian countries—South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan—have peculiarly high numbers of male births. So, since the collapse of the Soviet Union, have former communist countries in the Caucasus and the western Balkans. Even subsets of America’s population are following suit, though not the population as a whole.
The real cause, argues Nick Eberstadt, a demographer at the American Enterprise Institute, a think-tank in Washington, DC, is not any country’s particular policy but “the fateful collision between overweening son preference, the use of rapidly spreading prenatal sex-determination technology and declining fertility.” These are global trends. And the selective destruction of baby girls is global, too.
Boys are slightly more likely to die in infancy than girls. To compensate, more boys are born than girls so there will be equal numbers of young men and women at puberty. In all societies that record births, between 103 and 106 boys are normally born for every 100 girls. The ratio has been so stable over time that it appears to be the natural order of things.
That order has changed fundamentally in the past 25 years. In China the sex ratio for the generation born between 1985 and 1989 was 108, already just outside the natural range. For the generation born in 2000-04, it was 124 (ie, 124 boys were born in those years for every 100 girls). According to CASS the ratio today is 123 boys per 100 girls. These rates are biologically impossible without human intervention.
The national averages hide astonishing figures at the provincial level. According to an analysis of Chinese household data carried out in late 2005 and reported in the British Medical Journal*, only one region, Tibet, has a sex ratio within the bounds of nature. Fourteen provinces—mostly in the east and south—have sex ratios at birth of 120 and above, and three have unprecedented levels of more than 130. As CASS says, “the gender imbalance has been growing wider year after year.”
The BMJ study also casts light on one of the puzzles about China’s sexual imbalance. How far has it been exaggerated by the presumed practice of not reporting the birth of baby daughters in the hope of getting another shot at bearing a son? Not much, the authors think. If this explanation were correct, you would expect to find sex ratios falling precipitously as girls who had been hidden at birth start entering the official registers on attending school or the doctor. In fact, there is no such fall. The sex ratio of 15-year-olds in 2005 was not far from the sex ratio at birth in 1990. The implication is that sex-selective abortion, not under-registration of girls, accounts for the excess of boys.
Other countries have wildly skewed sex ratios without China’s draconian population controls (see chart 1). Taiwan’s sex ratio also rose from just above normal in 1980 to 110 in the early 1990s; it remains just below that level today. During the same period, South Korea’s sex ratio rose from just above normal to 117 in 1990—then the highest in the world—before falling back to more natural levels. Both these countries were already rich, growing quickly and becoming more highly educated even while the balance between the sexes was swinging sharply towards males.
South Korea is experiencing some surprising consequences. The surplus of bachelors in a rich country has sucked in brides from abroad. In 2008, 11% of marriages were “mixed”, mostly between a Korean man and a foreign woman. This is causing tensions in a hitherto homogenous society, which is often hostile to the children of mixed marriages. The trend is especially marked in rural areas, where the government thinks half the children of farm households will be mixed by 2020. The children are common enough to have produced a new word: “Kosians”, or Korean-Asians.
China is nominally a communist country, but elsewhere it was communism’s collapse that was associated with the growth of sexual disparities. After the Soviet Union imploded in 1991, there was an upsurge in the ratio of boys to girls in Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia. Their sex ratios rose from normal levels in 1991 to 115-120 by 2000. A rise also occurred in several Balkan states after the wars of Yugoslav succession. The ratio in Serbia and Macedonia is around 108. There are even signs of distorted sex ratios in America, among various groups of Asian-Americans. In 1975, calculates Mr Eberstadt, the sex ratio for Chinese-, Japanese- and Filipino-Americans was between 100 and 106. In 2002, it was 107 to 109.
But the country with the most remarkable record is that other supergiant, India. India does not produce figures for sex ratios at birth, so its numbers are not strictly comparable with the others. But there is no doubt that the number of boys has been rising relative to girls and that, as in China, there are large regional disparities. The north-western states of Punjab and Haryana have sex ratios as high as the provinces of China’s east and south. Nationally, the ratio for children up to six years of age rose from a biologically unexceptionable 104 in 1981 to a biologically impossible 108 in 2001. In 1991, there was a single district with a sex ratio over 125; by 2001, there were 46.
Conventional wisdom about such disparities is that they are the result of “backward thinking” in old-fashioned societies or—in China—of the one-child policy. By implication, reforming the policy or modernising the society (by, for example, enhancing the status of women) should bring the sex ratio back to normal. But this is not always true and, where it is, the road to normal sex ratios is winding and bumpy.
Not all traditional societies show a marked preference for sons over daughters. But in those that do—especially those in which the family line passes through the son and in which he is supposed to look after his parents in old age—a son is worth more than a daughter. A girl is deemed to have joined her husband’s family on marriage, and is lost to her parents. As a Hindu saying puts it, “Raising a daughter is like watering your neighbours’ garden.”
“Son preference” is discernible—overwhelming, even—in polling evidence. In 1999 the government of India asked women what sex they wanted their next child to be. One third of those without children said a son, two-thirds had no preference and only a residual said a daughter. Polls carried out in Pakistan and Yemen show similar results. Mothers in some developing countries say they want sons, not daughters, by margins of ten to one. In China midwives charge more for delivering a son than a daughter.
Chasing puppy-dogs’ tails
The unusual thing about son preference is that it rises sharply at second and later births (see chart 2). Among Indian women with two children (of either sex), 60% said they wanted a son next time, almost twice the preference for first-borns. This reflected the desire of those with two daughters for a son. The share rose to 75% for those with three children. The difference in parental attitudes between first-borns and subsequent children is large and significant.
Until the 1980s people in poor countries could do little about this preference: before birth, nature took its course. But in that decade, ultrasound scanning and other methods of detecting the sex of a child before birth began to make their appearance. These technologies changed everything. Doctors in India started advertising ultrasound scans with the slogan “Pay 5,000 rupees ($110) today and save 50,000 rupees tomorrow” (the saving was on the cost of a daughter’s dowry). Parents who wanted a son, but balked at killing baby daughters, chose abortion in their millions.
The use of sex-selective abortion was banned in India in 1994 and in China in 1995. It is illegal in most countries (though Sweden legalised the practice in 2009). But since it is almost impossible to prove that an abortion has been carried out for reasons of sex selection, the practice remains widespread. An ultrasound scan costs about $12, which is within the scope of many—perhaps most—Chinese and Indian families. In one hospital in Punjab, in northern India, the only girls born after a round of ultrasound scans had been mistakenly identified as boys, or else had a male twin.
The spread of fetal-imaging technology has not only skewed the sex ratio but also explains what would otherwise be something of a puzzle: sexual disparities tend to rise with income and education, which you would not expect if “backward thinking” was all that mattered. In India, some of the most prosperous states—Maharashtra, Punjab, Gujarat—have the worst sex ratios. In China, the higher a province’s literacy rate, the more skewed its sex ratio. The ratio also rises with income per head.
In Punjab Monica Das Gupta of the World Bank discovered that second and third daughters of well-educated mothers were more than twice as likely to die before their fifth birthday as their brothers, regardless of their birth order. The discrepancy was far lower in poorer households. Ms Das Gupta argues that women do not necessarily use improvements in education and income to help daughters. Richer, well-educated families share their poorer neighbours’ preference for sons and, because they tend to have smaller families, come under greater pressure to produce a son and heir if their first child is an unlooked-for daughter**.
So modernisation and rising incomes make it easier and more desirable to select the sex of your children. And on top of that smaller families combine with greater wealth to reinforce the imperative to produce a son. When families are large, at least one male child will doubtless come along to maintain the family line. But if you have only one or two children, the birth of a daughter may be at a son’s expense. So, with rising incomes and falling fertility, more and more people live in the smaller, richer families that are under the most pressure to produce a son.
In China the one-child policy increases that pressure further. Unexpectedly, though, it is the relaxation of the policy, rather than the policy pure and simple, which explains the unnatural upsurge in the number of boys.
In most Chinese cities couples are usually allowed to have only one child—the policy in its pure form. But in the countryside, where 55% of China’s population lives, there are three variants of the one-child policy. In the coastal provinces some 40% of couples are permitted a second child if their first is a girl. In central and southern provinces everyone is permitted a second child either if the first is a girl or if the parents suffer “hardship”, a criterion determined by local officials. In the far west and Inner Mongolia, the provinces do not really operate a one-child policy at all. Minorities are permitted second—sometimes even third—children, whatever the sex of the first-born (see map).
The provinces in this last group are the only ones with close to normal sex ratios. They are sparsely populated and inhabited by ethnic groups that do not much like abortion and whose family systems do not disparage the value of daughters so much. The provinces with by far the highest ratios of boys to girls are in the second group, the ones with the most exceptions to the one-child policy. As the BMJ study shows, these exceptions matter because of the preference for sons in second or third births.
For an example, take Guangdong, China’s most populous province. Its overall sex ratio is 120, which is very high. But if you take first births alone, the ratio is “only” 108. That is outside the bounds of normality but not by much. If you take just second children, however, which are permitted in the province, the ratio leaps to 146 boys for every 100 girls. And for the relatively few births where parents are permitted a third child, the sex ratio is 167. Even this startling ratio is not the outer limit. In Anhui province, among third children, there are 227 boys for every 100 girls, while in Beijing municipality (which also permits exceptions in rural areas), the sex ratio reaches a hard-to-credit 275. There are almost three baby boys for each baby girl.
Ms Das Gupta found something similar in India. First-born daughters were treated the same as their brothers; younger sisters were more likely to die in infancy. The rule seems to be that parents will joyfully embrace a daughter as their first child. But they will go to extraordinary lengths to ensure subsequent children are sons.
The hazards of bare branches
Throughout human history, young men have been responsible for the vast preponderance of crime and violence—especially single men in countries where status and social acceptance depend on being married and having children, as it does in China and India. A rising population of frustrated single men spells trouble.
The crime rate has almost doubled in China during the past 20 years of rising sex ratios, with stories abounding of bride abduction, the trafficking of women, rape and prostitution. A study into whether these things were connected† concluded that they were, and that higher sex ratios accounted for about one-seventh of the rise in crime. In India, too, there is a correlation between provincial crime rates and sex ratios. In “Bare Branches”††, Valerie Hudson and Andrea den Boer gave warning that the social problems of biased sex ratios would lead to more authoritarian policing. Governments, they say, “must decrease the threat to society posed by these young men. Increased authoritarianism in an effort to crack down on crime, gangs, smuggling and so forth can be one result.”
Violence is not the only consequence. In parts of India, the cost of dowries is said to have fallen (see article). Where people pay a bride price (ie, the groom’s family gives money to the bride’s), that price has risen. During the 1990s, China saw the appearance of tens of thousands of “extra-birth guerrilla troops”—couples from one-child areas who live in a legal limbo, shifting restlessly from city to city in order to shield their two or three children from the authorities’ baleful eye. And, according to the World Health Organisation, female suicide rates in China are among the highest in the world (as are South Korea’s). Suicide is the commonest form of death among Chinese rural women aged 15-34; young mothers kill themselves by drinking agricultural fertilisers, which are easy to come by. The journalist Xinran Xue thinks they cannot live with the knowledge that they have aborted or killed their baby daughters.
Some of the consequences of the skewed sex ratio have been unexpected. It has probably increased China’s savings rate. This is because parents with a single son save to increase his chances of attracting a wife in China’s ultra-competitive marriage market. Shang-Jin Wei of Columbia University and Xiaobo Zhang of the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington, DC, compared savings rates for households with sons versus those with daughters. “We find not only that households with sons save more than households with daughters in all regions,” says Mr Wei, “but that households with sons tend to raise their savings rate if they also happen to live in a region with a more skewed sex ratio.” They calculate that about half the increase in China’s savings in the past 25 years can be attributed to the rise in the sex ratio. If true, this would suggest that economic-policy changes to boost consumption will be less effective than the government hopes.
Over the next generation, many of the problems associated with sex selection will get worse. The social consequences will become more evident because the boys born in large numbers over the past decade will reach maturity then. Meanwhile, the practice of sex selection itself may spread because fertility rates are continuing to fall and ultrasound scanners reach throughout the developing world.
Yet the story of the destruction of baby girls does not end in deepest gloom. At least one country—South Korea—has reversed its cultural preference for sons and cut the distorted sex ratio (see chart 3). There are reasons for thinking China and India might follow suit.
South Korea was the first country to report exceptionally high sex ratios and has been the first to cut them. Between 1985 and 2003, the share of South Korean women who told national health surveyors that they felt “they must have a son” fell by almost two-thirds, from 48% to 17%. After a lag of a decade, the sex ratio began to fall in the mid-1990s and is now 110 to 100. Ms Das Gupta argues that though it takes a long time for social norms favouring sons to alter, and though the transition can be delayed by the introduction of ultrasound scans, eventually change will come. Modernisation not only makes it easier for parents to control the sex of their children, it also changes people’s values and undermines those norms which set a higher store on sons. At some point, one trend becomes more important than the other.
It is just possible that China and India may be reaching that point now. The census of 2000 and the CASS study both showed the sex ratio stable at around 120. At the very least, it seems to have stopped rising. Locally, Ms Das Gupta argues†††, the provinces which had the highest sex ratios (and have two-thirds of China’s population) have seen a deceleration in their ratios since 2000, and provinces with a quarter of the population have seen their ratios fall. In India, one study found that the cultural preference for sons has been falling, too, and that the sex ratio, as in much of China, is rising more slowly. In villages in Haryana, grandmothers sit veiled and silent while men are present. But their daughters sit and chat uncovered because, they say, they have seen unveiled women at work or on television so much that at last it seems normal to them.
Ms Das Gupta points out that, though the two giants are much poorer than South Korea, their governments are doing more than it ever did to persuade people to treat girls equally (through anti-discrimination laws and media campaigns). The unintended consequences of sex selection have been vast. They may get worse. But, at long last, she reckons, “there seems to be an incipient turnaround in the phenomenon of ‘missing girls’ in Asia.”
________________________________
--
Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
_______________________________________
China, and most poor agrarian countries, have a problem with baby girls. It seems that on almost every level they are not desired. The impression is that they can’t work as hard in the fields and once they are of marrying age they’ll be gone and working for another family, so what use are they? Well, actually they are incredibly useful and China is slowly waking up to this fact.
According to the Economist, a few weeks back, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) showed what can happen in a country with too few baby girls. Within ten years, the CASS reported, there will be one in five young men who will be unable to find a bride. This is apparently unprecedented for a country that is not at war.
China, by 2020, will have some 30 or 40 million more men than women. This group of Chinese bachelors, known as “bare branches”, seemed to actually accelerate from 1990 to 2005, and in ways not directly related to the “One Child Policy” which was introduced in 1979. The real reasons behind this male preference are not entirely understood but poverty and ignorance do play their part, so do prenatal sex-determination technology and the general decline in fertility.
While under natural circumstances the average birth ratio is roughly 104 boys for every 100 girls born. In China, from 2000 to 2004, the number is a sky-high 124 boys for every 100 girls. And even today in 2010 the number stands at 123 boys for every 100 girls. While the numbers for China that are quoted here are “national level” statistics, provinces in China contain wild variations. For example, Tibet has what would be considered a natural birth rate of about 104 boys to every 100 girls, but some of the more rural and backwards provinces have birth statistics as high as 130 boys for every 100 girls.
So what does all this mean for China? Well, having lots of energetic young men around without much work and without a woman to keep them tame is one of the telling influences for many of the world’s social revolutions; so yes, political instability could be a potential outcome. Increased crime rates and the deterioration of traditional family values could also be possible side effects; as well as the proliferation of prostitution and brothels. Fulfilling the needs of these young “bare branches” will be an economic opportunity that surely won’t be missed by those who practice the world’s oldest profession.
The original story is posted below:
Please follow this LINK to the original online version.
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The worldwide war on baby girls
Mar 4th 2010
XINRAN XUE, a Chinese writer, describes visiting a peasant family in the Yimeng area of Shandong province. The wife was giving birth. “We had scarcely sat down in the kitchen”, she writes (see article), “when we heard a moan of pain from the bedroom next door…The cries from the inner room grew louder—and abruptly stopped. There was a low sob, and then a man’s gruff voice said accusingly: ‘Useless thing!’
“Suddenly, I thought I heard a slight movement in the slops pail behind me,” Miss Xinran remembers. “To my absolute horror, I saw a tiny foot poking out of the pail. The midwife must have dropped that tiny baby alive into the slops pail! I nearly threw myself at it, but the two policemen [who had accompanied me] held my shoulders in a firm grip. ‘Don’t move, you can’t save it, it’s too late.’
“‘But that’s...murder...and you’re the police!’ The little foot was still now. The policemen held on to me for a few more minutes. ‘Doing a baby girl is not a big thing around here,’ [an] older woman said comfortingly. ‘That’s a living child,’ I said in a shaking voice, pointing at the slops pail. ‘It’s not a child,’ she corrected me. ‘It’s a girl baby, and we can’t keep it. Around these parts, you can’t get by without a son. Girl babies don’t count.’”
In January 2010 the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) showed what can happen to a country when girl babies don’t count. Within ten years, the academy said, one in five young men would be unable to find a bride because of the dearth of young women—a figure unprecedented in a country at peace.
The number is based on the sexual discrepancy among people aged 19 and below. According to CASS, China in 2020 will have 30m-40m more men of this age than young women. For comparison, there are 23m boys below the age of 20 in Germany, France and Britain combined and around 40m American boys and young men. So within ten years, China faces the prospect of having the equivalent of the whole young male population of America, or almost twice that of Europe’s three largest countries, with little prospect of marriage, untethered to a home of their own and without the stake in society that marriage and children provide.
Gendercide—to borrow the title of a 1985 book by Mary Anne Warren—is often seen as an unintended consequence of China’s one-child policy, or as a product of poverty or ignorance. But that cannot be the whole story. The surplus of bachelors—called in China guanggun, or “bare branches”— seems to have accelerated between 1990 and 2005, in ways not obviously linked to the one-child policy, which was introduced in 1979. And, as is becoming clear, the war against baby girls is not confined to China.
Parts of India have sex ratios as skewed as anything in its northern neighbour. Other East Asian countries—South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan—have peculiarly high numbers of male births. So, since the collapse of the Soviet Union, have former communist countries in the Caucasus and the western Balkans. Even subsets of America’s population are following suit, though not the population as a whole.
The real cause, argues Nick Eberstadt, a demographer at the American Enterprise Institute, a think-tank in Washington, DC, is not any country’s particular policy but “the fateful collision between overweening son preference, the use of rapidly spreading prenatal sex-determination technology and declining fertility.” These are global trends. And the selective destruction of baby girls is global, too.
Boys are slightly more likely to die in infancy than girls. To compensate, more boys are born than girls so there will be equal numbers of young men and women at puberty. In all societies that record births, between 103 and 106 boys are normally born for every 100 girls. The ratio has been so stable over time that it appears to be the natural order of things.
That order has changed fundamentally in the past 25 years. In China the sex ratio for the generation born between 1985 and 1989 was 108, already just outside the natural range. For the generation born in 2000-04, it was 124 (ie, 124 boys were born in those years for every 100 girls). According to CASS the ratio today is 123 boys per 100 girls. These rates are biologically impossible without human intervention.
The national averages hide astonishing figures at the provincial level. According to an analysis of Chinese household data carried out in late 2005 and reported in the British Medical Journal*, only one region, Tibet, has a sex ratio within the bounds of nature. Fourteen provinces—mostly in the east and south—have sex ratios at birth of 120 and above, and three have unprecedented levels of more than 130. As CASS says, “the gender imbalance has been growing wider year after year.”
The BMJ study also casts light on one of the puzzles about China’s sexual imbalance. How far has it been exaggerated by the presumed practice of not reporting the birth of baby daughters in the hope of getting another shot at bearing a son? Not much, the authors think. If this explanation were correct, you would expect to find sex ratios falling precipitously as girls who had been hidden at birth start entering the official registers on attending school or the doctor. In fact, there is no such fall. The sex ratio of 15-year-olds in 2005 was not far from the sex ratio at birth in 1990. The implication is that sex-selective abortion, not under-registration of girls, accounts for the excess of boys.
Other countries have wildly skewed sex ratios without China’s draconian population controls (see chart 1). Taiwan’s sex ratio also rose from just above normal in 1980 to 110 in the early 1990s; it remains just below that level today. During the same period, South Korea’s sex ratio rose from just above normal to 117 in 1990—then the highest in the world—before falling back to more natural levels. Both these countries were already rich, growing quickly and becoming more highly educated even while the balance between the sexes was swinging sharply towards males.
South Korea is experiencing some surprising consequences. The surplus of bachelors in a rich country has sucked in brides from abroad. In 2008, 11% of marriages were “mixed”, mostly between a Korean man and a foreign woman. This is causing tensions in a hitherto homogenous society, which is often hostile to the children of mixed marriages. The trend is especially marked in rural areas, where the government thinks half the children of farm households will be mixed by 2020. The children are common enough to have produced a new word: “Kosians”, or Korean-Asians.
China is nominally a communist country, but elsewhere it was communism’s collapse that was associated with the growth of sexual disparities. After the Soviet Union imploded in 1991, there was an upsurge in the ratio of boys to girls in Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia. Their sex ratios rose from normal levels in 1991 to 115-120 by 2000. A rise also occurred in several Balkan states after the wars of Yugoslav succession. The ratio in Serbia and Macedonia is around 108. There are even signs of distorted sex ratios in America, among various groups of Asian-Americans. In 1975, calculates Mr Eberstadt, the sex ratio for Chinese-, Japanese- and Filipino-Americans was between 100 and 106. In 2002, it was 107 to 109.
But the country with the most remarkable record is that other supergiant, India. India does not produce figures for sex ratios at birth, so its numbers are not strictly comparable with the others. But there is no doubt that the number of boys has been rising relative to girls and that, as in China, there are large regional disparities. The north-western states of Punjab and Haryana have sex ratios as high as the provinces of China’s east and south. Nationally, the ratio for children up to six years of age rose from a biologically unexceptionable 104 in 1981 to a biologically impossible 108 in 2001. In 1991, there was a single district with a sex ratio over 125; by 2001, there were 46.
Conventional wisdom about such disparities is that they are the result of “backward thinking” in old-fashioned societies or—in China—of the one-child policy. By implication, reforming the policy or modernising the society (by, for example, enhancing the status of women) should bring the sex ratio back to normal. But this is not always true and, where it is, the road to normal sex ratios is winding and bumpy.
Not all traditional societies show a marked preference for sons over daughters. But in those that do—especially those in which the family line passes through the son and in which he is supposed to look after his parents in old age—a son is worth more than a daughter. A girl is deemed to have joined her husband’s family on marriage, and is lost to her parents. As a Hindu saying puts it, “Raising a daughter is like watering your neighbours’ garden.”
“Son preference” is discernible—overwhelming, even—in polling evidence. In 1999 the government of India asked women what sex they wanted their next child to be. One third of those without children said a son, two-thirds had no preference and only a residual said a daughter. Polls carried out in Pakistan and Yemen show similar results. Mothers in some developing countries say they want sons, not daughters, by margins of ten to one. In China midwives charge more for delivering a son than a daughter.
Chasing puppy-dogs’ tails
The unusual thing about son preference is that it rises sharply at second and later births (see chart 2). Among Indian women with two children (of either sex), 60% said they wanted a son next time, almost twice the preference for first-borns. This reflected the desire of those with two daughters for a son. The share rose to 75% for those with three children. The difference in parental attitudes between first-borns and subsequent children is large and significant.
Until the 1980s people in poor countries could do little about this preference: before birth, nature took its course. But in that decade, ultrasound scanning and other methods of detecting the sex of a child before birth began to make their appearance. These technologies changed everything. Doctors in India started advertising ultrasound scans with the slogan “Pay 5,000 rupees ($110) today and save 50,000 rupees tomorrow” (the saving was on the cost of a daughter’s dowry). Parents who wanted a son, but balked at killing baby daughters, chose abortion in their millions.
The use of sex-selective abortion was banned in India in 1994 and in China in 1995. It is illegal in most countries (though Sweden legalised the practice in 2009). But since it is almost impossible to prove that an abortion has been carried out for reasons of sex selection, the practice remains widespread. An ultrasound scan costs about $12, which is within the scope of many—perhaps most—Chinese and Indian families. In one hospital in Punjab, in northern India, the only girls born after a round of ultrasound scans had been mistakenly identified as boys, or else had a male twin.
The spread of fetal-imaging technology has not only skewed the sex ratio but also explains what would otherwise be something of a puzzle: sexual disparities tend to rise with income and education, which you would not expect if “backward thinking” was all that mattered. In India, some of the most prosperous states—Maharashtra, Punjab, Gujarat—have the worst sex ratios. In China, the higher a province’s literacy rate, the more skewed its sex ratio. The ratio also rises with income per head.
In Punjab Monica Das Gupta of the World Bank discovered that second and third daughters of well-educated mothers were more than twice as likely to die before their fifth birthday as their brothers, regardless of their birth order. The discrepancy was far lower in poorer households. Ms Das Gupta argues that women do not necessarily use improvements in education and income to help daughters. Richer, well-educated families share their poorer neighbours’ preference for sons and, because they tend to have smaller families, come under greater pressure to produce a son and heir if their first child is an unlooked-for daughter**.
So modernisation and rising incomes make it easier and more desirable to select the sex of your children. And on top of that smaller families combine with greater wealth to reinforce the imperative to produce a son. When families are large, at least one male child will doubtless come along to maintain the family line. But if you have only one or two children, the birth of a daughter may be at a son’s expense. So, with rising incomes and falling fertility, more and more people live in the smaller, richer families that are under the most pressure to produce a son.
In China the one-child policy increases that pressure further. Unexpectedly, though, it is the relaxation of the policy, rather than the policy pure and simple, which explains the unnatural upsurge in the number of boys.
In most Chinese cities couples are usually allowed to have only one child—the policy in its pure form. But in the countryside, where 55% of China’s population lives, there are three variants of the one-child policy. In the coastal provinces some 40% of couples are permitted a second child if their first is a girl. In central and southern provinces everyone is permitted a second child either if the first is a girl or if the parents suffer “hardship”, a criterion determined by local officials. In the far west and Inner Mongolia, the provinces do not really operate a one-child policy at all. Minorities are permitted second—sometimes even third—children, whatever the sex of the first-born (see map).
The provinces in this last group are the only ones with close to normal sex ratios. They are sparsely populated and inhabited by ethnic groups that do not much like abortion and whose family systems do not disparage the value of daughters so much. The provinces with by far the highest ratios of boys to girls are in the second group, the ones with the most exceptions to the one-child policy. As the BMJ study shows, these exceptions matter because of the preference for sons in second or third births.
For an example, take Guangdong, China’s most populous province. Its overall sex ratio is 120, which is very high. But if you take first births alone, the ratio is “only” 108. That is outside the bounds of normality but not by much. If you take just second children, however, which are permitted in the province, the ratio leaps to 146 boys for every 100 girls. And for the relatively few births where parents are permitted a third child, the sex ratio is 167. Even this startling ratio is not the outer limit. In Anhui province, among third children, there are 227 boys for every 100 girls, while in Beijing municipality (which also permits exceptions in rural areas), the sex ratio reaches a hard-to-credit 275. There are almost three baby boys for each baby girl.
Ms Das Gupta found something similar in India. First-born daughters were treated the same as their brothers; younger sisters were more likely to die in infancy. The rule seems to be that parents will joyfully embrace a daughter as their first child. But they will go to extraordinary lengths to ensure subsequent children are sons.
The hazards of bare branches
Throughout human history, young men have been responsible for the vast preponderance of crime and violence—especially single men in countries where status and social acceptance depend on being married and having children, as it does in China and India. A rising population of frustrated single men spells trouble.
The crime rate has almost doubled in China during the past 20 years of rising sex ratios, with stories abounding of bride abduction, the trafficking of women, rape and prostitution. A study into whether these things were connected† concluded that they were, and that higher sex ratios accounted for about one-seventh of the rise in crime. In India, too, there is a correlation between provincial crime rates and sex ratios. In “Bare Branches”††, Valerie Hudson and Andrea den Boer gave warning that the social problems of biased sex ratios would lead to more authoritarian policing. Governments, they say, “must decrease the threat to society posed by these young men. Increased authoritarianism in an effort to crack down on crime, gangs, smuggling and so forth can be one result.”
Violence is not the only consequence. In parts of India, the cost of dowries is said to have fallen (see article). Where people pay a bride price (ie, the groom’s family gives money to the bride’s), that price has risen. During the 1990s, China saw the appearance of tens of thousands of “extra-birth guerrilla troops”—couples from one-child areas who live in a legal limbo, shifting restlessly from city to city in order to shield their two or three children from the authorities’ baleful eye. And, according to the World Health Organisation, female suicide rates in China are among the highest in the world (as are South Korea’s). Suicide is the commonest form of death among Chinese rural women aged 15-34; young mothers kill themselves by drinking agricultural fertilisers, which are easy to come by. The journalist Xinran Xue thinks they cannot live with the knowledge that they have aborted or killed their baby daughters.
Some of the consequences of the skewed sex ratio have been unexpected. It has probably increased China’s savings rate. This is because parents with a single son save to increase his chances of attracting a wife in China’s ultra-competitive marriage market. Shang-Jin Wei of Columbia University and Xiaobo Zhang of the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington, DC, compared savings rates for households with sons versus those with daughters. “We find not only that households with sons save more than households with daughters in all regions,” says Mr Wei, “but that households with sons tend to raise their savings rate if they also happen to live in a region with a more skewed sex ratio.” They calculate that about half the increase in China’s savings in the past 25 years can be attributed to the rise in the sex ratio. If true, this would suggest that economic-policy changes to boost consumption will be less effective than the government hopes.
Over the next generation, many of the problems associated with sex selection will get worse. The social consequences will become more evident because the boys born in large numbers over the past decade will reach maturity then. Meanwhile, the practice of sex selection itself may spread because fertility rates are continuing to fall and ultrasound scanners reach throughout the developing world.
Yet the story of the destruction of baby girls does not end in deepest gloom. At least one country—South Korea—has reversed its cultural preference for sons and cut the distorted sex ratio (see chart 3). There are reasons for thinking China and India might follow suit.
South Korea was the first country to report exceptionally high sex ratios and has been the first to cut them. Between 1985 and 2003, the share of South Korean women who told national health surveyors that they felt “they must have a son” fell by almost two-thirds, from 48% to 17%. After a lag of a decade, the sex ratio began to fall in the mid-1990s and is now 110 to 100. Ms Das Gupta argues that though it takes a long time for social norms favouring sons to alter, and though the transition can be delayed by the introduction of ultrasound scans, eventually change will come. Modernisation not only makes it easier for parents to control the sex of their children, it also changes people’s values and undermines those norms which set a higher store on sons. At some point, one trend becomes more important than the other.
It is just possible that China and India may be reaching that point now. The census of 2000 and the CASS study both showed the sex ratio stable at around 120. At the very least, it seems to have stopped rising. Locally, Ms Das Gupta argues†††, the provinces which had the highest sex ratios (and have two-thirds of China’s population) have seen a deceleration in their ratios since 2000, and provinces with a quarter of the population have seen their ratios fall. In India, one study found that the cultural preference for sons has been falling, too, and that the sex ratio, as in much of China, is rising more slowly. In villages in Haryana, grandmothers sit veiled and silent while men are present. But their daughters sit and chat uncovered because, they say, they have seen unveiled women at work or on television so much that at last it seems normal to them.
Ms Das Gupta points out that, though the two giants are much poorer than South Korea, their governments are doing more than it ever did to persuade people to treat girls equally (through anti-discrimination laws and media campaigns). The unintended consequences of sex selection have been vast. They may get worse. But, at long last, she reckons, “there seems to be an incipient turnaround in the phenomenon of ‘missing girls’ in Asia.”
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Ryan Pyle
Photographer
ryan@ryanpyle.com
Website: www.ryanpyle.com
Archive: http://archive.ryanpyle.com
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