Privatization, the fortune-cookie view

Yesterday, we had a roundtable discussion of editors of newspapers that may be privatized over the next few years. During that discussion, I pulled out an old chestnut that I've seen attributed to everyone from JFK to Linda Ellerbee. In fact, Al Gore used it when testifying before Congress a few weeks ago about the "inconvenient truth" of global warming. Gore said:

"As many know, the Chinese expression for 'crisis' consists of two characters side by side. The first symbol means 'danger.' The second symbol means 'opportunity.' I would like to discuss both the danger and the opportunity here today."

The Mandarin Chinese pictograph for "crisis" -- "wei ji" -- is:



I applied the above bromide to the privatization of media, which is indeed a crisis for currently government-owned newspapers and TV and radio stations: They're going to lose their subsidies and their financial security -- and have to find advertising and other revenue sources. That's the danger. The opportunity is: They'll be independent -- they won't have to pull any punches when they report the news -- and that will mean better journalism.

A few editors -- in particular, Ivan Tsygan, editor in chief of Reshetylivs'ky Visnyk -- were intrigued by rhetorical device/analogy.

I have to confess that I gave a rather shorthand version of the "danger + opportunity = crisis" canard. Victor Mair has labeled this a "widespread public misperception" fueled by New Agers. But Gary Feng says "the urban myth has some kernel of truth in it." Benjamin Zimmer has assembled an insightful essay with historical context about the controversy.

The bottom line is that media privatization is indeed both an opportunity and a danger (and a crisis) for Ukrainian editors -- even if the Chinese reference wilts under close inspection. (But if "wei ji" holds up, it does make a better story!)