A Day in The Life . . . . . . Of China: Free to Fly Inside the Cage

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Forty years ago this Sunday, Mao Zedong stood on a balcony overlooking Tiananmen Square and said, "The Chinese people have stood up, and the future of our nation is infinitely brighter." Infinitely messier is closer to the mark today. The economy's course is uncertain. Provincial and municipal governments will surely pursue their own interests despite efforts to restrain them. The party, with its ideology bankrupt, offers only order and is begging for faith -- and not getting it. How long can a government like that retain control and stay in power? "A regime that . . . is forced to fire on the young, who protest in the name of liberty," said French President Francois Mitterrand after Tiananmen, "has no future."

Yes, but how long, exactly? The Chinese live in a cage. Some farsighted policies have expanded the cage beyond what anyone would have imagined a decade ago. But it is still a cage, and even if it continues to expand, how long will an increasingly modern nation be content to live behind bars?

"I don't know," said an 88-year-old man in a Beijing park. It was early morning, and along with a score of others, the old man was exercising his birds -- by illusion. The men walked about and swung their birdcages. The movement is said to convince the birds inside that they are free. "We trick them, you know," he said. "How long can they stay fooled? Who knows? Maybe they hope. Like us. We hope. I hope. But you know, in China it is dangerous to hope. Your heart is always being broken." I said I knew.