>> and let's remember china has some rather serious internal problems. and maintaining this growth rate, to sustain the bargain between the communist party and the chinese public stay out of politics and we will guarantee vigorous economic growth and a better standard of living year after year for the chinese people. that bargain is not going to be all that easy to keep in the future. we also need to understand that china faces international challenges as its international profile rises, some of the resentment directed against the west can begin be directed against china. and i think we're just beginning to see some of the early stages of that.

the united states might respond to this challenge with new policies and far more intelligent policies. all of that could make the notion of the inevitablity of the beijing authoritarian model moot. secondly, while i think dr. halper does a very good job analyzing the appeal of the chinese model in various parts of the world, to me the future characteristics of the international system will largely be determined by outcomes in a small number of nations. what happens in india especially. a country that is now democratic but does not have deep democratic roots and a strong civil society.

in indonesia, in russia, in some midsize power such as ukraine, vietnam, at some point probably a united korea, if those countries thoroughly, firmly embrace a democratic market capitalist model, then the international system norms will be democratic market and capitalism. what happens in those countries, brazil i would add to that, of course -- what happens in those countries is far, far more important than what happens in bolivia, botswana or in bosnia, and countries of that size. that's where the victory of this battle of ideas will be won or lost.

dr. halper has written a very important book. i've described it as certainly one of the most important books on china and the u.s./china relationship in the past decade. he has done a great service with that. it's already getting a good deal of attention. a number of book reviews. it deserves to get a lot more. and we're very happy here at the cato institute to provide the first book forum here in washington to start the discussion about u.s. policy toward china needs to be in the coming decades. thank you. [applause] >> thank you, ted. [applause] >> staff, we want to get the questions or would you like to take three minutes it off respond to the comments? >> sure, i can do that. >> either way is fine. >> first of all, thank you both very much for a good critique.

and i want to say, ted, following a conversation we had during the time i was writing this book about pivot powers in which you made the point that india, brazil, indonesia were critical powers, they were pivot powers in terms of whether these market authoritarian ideas gain traction. and momentum, and i revised the text to reflect this discussion that we had. second thing is and more of a lighter note, i nearly broke my contract with the publisher over the subtitle. [laughter] >> i strongly objected to the subtitle.

as you say it is entirely too categorical i was hoping how chinese's model will affect the indians. -- 21st century. anyway, i just wanted to say i agree with that very much. [laughter] >> if i might respond to bonnie for a moment, on the china model, of course, i do emphasize throughout that there is no china model per se. it is a china example. and people take bits and pieces of it. iran, for example, was fascinated with the way china manages the internet and they sent people over to have a look and took portions of that for their own hughs other countries have taken other things. but this is what i was referring to here. and, yes, of course, it's not a

perfect example. the social welfare services are a disaster. and they're being improved but that's not more than likely something another country would want to replicate. as far as the -- oh, yes. in terms of u.s. policy, i'm not suggesting that u.s. policy has been utterly misdirected and completely useless. i think we've had some success. we've offered some guidance. we have encouraged china to join the international system. and they have become members -- dealt with the imf, world bank and so on. but the point i would make here is that they didn't do this because we asked them to. it wasn't a function of u.s. persuasion.

it was because accepting relationships with these institutions was a practical and convenient and beneficial thing for china to do in terms of its specific development objectives. china was not embracing global norms and ethics and standard operating behavior. it was moving to secure its own advantage by linking into the international system. i think i'll leave it there and let others have questions. >> we'd like to move to questions. i'd ask first that you wait for the microscope to come and second if you state your name and your affiliation. why don't we bring one down here. >> paul sloan, a retired american.

for mr. glaser and possibly mr. happenper. -- halper. can you compare and contrast just before the revolution of the 1948 of the haves and haves-not. it seems the totalitarian government today a is similar to the other leader. and if you could discuss the endemic corruption in china and its effects? >> you want me to go first? >> sure. >> well, i don't have any data here with me. but there were certainly a wide gap between people who -- the haves and the haves-nots before the revolution in china. whether it is -- it is worse today, i don't know. but you really did have this period, of course, immediately after the revolution in 1949 where there was sort of a leveling out of incomes and that has gradually widened and particularly over the last decade and really since the

launching of the reform in '78, it has widened substantially. the second -- your second question was about corruption. i believe that corruption is epidemic in china. it is -- it is -- i would say it's not part a of the communist system. it is -- it is almost part of chinese culture. there are many chinese systems around the world that are just as crutch. -- corrupt. i think taiwan, for example, has really struggled with getting rid of their open corruption. they have made some progress. but as we saw with the last taiwan president, he obviously stole a lot of money from the people. so this is a problem many countries have. but in china it is -- it is the part of the way of doing business. there is no way that you can close a deal and very difficult even to get a child into school or get somebody a job without paying in some way for it.

and that give-and-take is very much part of this system and part of the culture. i think it's a real challenge for them to eliminate in the future. >> stef, do you want to add anything? >> only this is a very good point. a very good question. i agree with bonnie, corruption is endemic in chinese cultures. there were massive demonstrations against corruption, against the misuse of party power and selling of land that didn't belong to the party. in 2005 there were 58,000 protests across the country. in 2006 there were 64,000. 2007, there were 78,000. and they stopped issuing that statistic in 2008. [laughter] >> point being, these are not major convalive violence and the

police were called. yeah, it's a mainly hirsch and it's not unlike what happened under the other leader. >> my name is steven and i'm with the pbcg. two questions, the first is -- i think all the speakers assume that there is one group of men in beijing with a singular outlook. my question is -- the first question is, is the diversity among chinese rulers at least as wide as any other significant world power? and the second is, even if you grant that the yuan is undervalued, would we really want them to let it float? would this be -- probably even worse for america than the continuation of the current alleged undervalue? >> if i could take the second part of that question first. i think there's a tendency in

the united states to seek scapegoats for a lot of our own economic problems. we saw it in the 1980s. it was japanese unfair trade practices. we see it now with china. if only we could get them to revalue the currency and lower a few nontariff-barriers, many of our problems would be resolved. -- solved. i'm not going to argue that the value of the current chinese value si is fair and accurate. one thing that's outside my area of expertise. i think it is undervalued. how much, that's very hard to tell. but if we think that would be a panacea, that would just cause our economic growth rate to rocket upward, i think we're deluding ourselves. in any authoritarian system there's always a diversity of views within the leadership elite. but it's very hard to measure. for obvious reasons.

you know, again, i suspect within the communist party hierarchy in beijing there's probably a wide range of views. there certainly was in the late 1980s during the period leading up to the tiananmen square episode. it's very hard to tell. but it is a mistake to assume that the leadership elite, even within a highly authoritarian system is a monolithe. we do have to be a lot more sophisticated than that in our analysis. stef? >> i would just make the point that you see the differences in the chinese leadership when you see the different positions that the bank of china and the department of commerce have on the question of allowing the yuan to rise. bank of china seems to be in favor, commerce department, which has connections with business people seems to be opposed.

so, yes, there's a real spectrum and that's an example of this argument on the yuan may i just refer to one previous question? the question was raised about this new generation in china. people born after 1980. i think in my recent trips to china, talking to that new generation, these young people are very career-oriented. they're very interested in employment. they're talking about what -- where they're going to buy a condominium or an apartment. i do not have the sense of the ideological or plet drive in this generation. yes, we see people who are wall jumpers on the internet. and there's a lot of resistance

of the idea of pushing google out and so on. this is a generation that seems to me to be quite material. career-oriented. and in some ways strangely except on issues of the united states or japan where there's a big nationalist question, they tend to be less political than one would have expected. >> if i may comment on the parallel that an earlier questioner made about today's china with china old china, you can draw parallels of ineequality and corruption, but one huge difference is, of course, that from 1911 to 1949, china was engaged in almost

permanent military conflict both internal and external. whereas under the communist party rule, once the korean war ended in 1953, you've had over 50 years of peace with the exception of two relatively brief border squirmishes with india in 1952 and india and vietnam in 1969. it's an enviable record compared to the u.s. record during that period. >> i take your point. more questions. we will go over to the first row. >> i'm a little surprised that nobody has mentioned what i've read. >> what's your name. >> i'm sorry. i'morn lawrence. -- i'm sorry. i'm george lawrence and i'm only representing myself.

that china has a morbid prognosis for its demographics. that the population is aging very rapidly and there's not enough worker to take care of these people. the productivity is not rising at a huge rate. >> bonnie, will you start us on that. >> stef referred all the challenges that china faces. that is absolutely one of them. the demographic situation is a great challenge especially where you have a country that has enforced a one-child policy which now they're beginning to loosen up to some extent. they may allow people in the cities to have two children. people in the countryside have been able to have two children all along.

and they've revised the law so that if you have a husband and a wife who are both only children, that they can have two children. but the demographics are challenging, of course, there are other countries that face difficult demographic challenges as well. japan comes to mind. there are certainly some countries in europe, i think, actually taiwan is probably even worse off right now than china is. your point is certainly well-taken. and if we add it to the list of the challenges china faces we would want to look at the very serious environmental degradation that has taken place in the country and the challenges that that has posed obviously the corruption which was raised earlier. so their challenges are really quite daunting and i agree with you. >> stef, do you want to add anything? >> it's an interesting point. the most striking statistic on that between the ages of 19 and

24 in rural china there are 20% more men. and that means that you have in some cases sort of groups of men who are unmarried, unattached really to families, so there are -- there are consistencies and employment patterns. the chinese are trying to export some of these people to other countries for jobs. and there are also programs or arrangements in which women are being imported to live in those areas so that they could begin to create new families. there's a lot of peculiars but the one male one child families. >> in the far back.

>> my name is megan shank. i'm wondering in your estimate nation what kind of impact has u.s. education had on the liberalization of chinese who are in power now in terms of the ccp leadership? and what impact might this education have on returnees who are going back today. thank you. >> well, you know, they say that there are -- the folks in the chinese foreign ministry are so pro-american or so inclined to be pro-american that they're walled off from the rest of the political process. we may not think of them that way but that's the way their colleagues often do. many of these folks are educated in the united states. i have large numbers of chinese in my classes in cambridge and england. they are very able. they come from all walks of life. military foreign office and so on.

the theory is the more of these people that we educate, the better they can accommodate to global norms and institutions. what kind of scope they have on the ground in beijing to do that is really unclear. as i say, the foreign ministry is sometimes ostracized. they say the u.s. doesn't need an embassy here. they've got the foreign minister? [laughter] >> bonnie, do you want to chime in on this? >> i think that educating people from china has had a significant impact in terms of probability helping china develop faster as those people have chosen not to stay here but increasingly to go back to china and contribute to the development of their country. and i think that there's really stronger forces at work here. among those people in the area of their open history. and their own education that they even received when they were children.

and i'm referring here to the century of humiliation that china suffered from the mid-19th to the mid-20th century. and this is indelibly etched in the minds of the churn. and there's a commitment to making their country a great power once again. and perhaps that outweighs the influence of the values that they may have been to some extent inculcated with in the few years that they spent studying here. >> i would say that is a prime example of soft power by the the exposure of the brightest segment of the chinese population to american values, to western values. and i think that is extremely useful. it's a subtle process. but it's a very important one.

i might feel even better if so many of the chinese students were not educated at some of our more extreme left universities where, you know, they may discover that the attitudes there are further to the left than what they find -- >> they may turn them into real communists. [laughter] >> wait for the -- >> my name is todd pierce. i'm representing myself. how much credibility does the united states have left in the world to make these types of arguments when after the, you know, previous administration we repudiated all these so-called western values. i've heard mentioned a couple of times, geneva conventions, and i don't think i listed those. in 2003 we had people how we'd gain oil by conquering iraq. and china was acquiring oil from the oil way and then, in fact, even after we conquered iraq

they get the contract for oil for iraq anyway. how do we looks like the world's superpower of hypocrisy? >> that's a very good question. that's part of the phenomenon of the self-inflicted wounds that i talked about. unfortunately, it's not just the previous administration. this is a problem that's gone back a long time. there are people in the persian gulf area who remember the u.s. coup against the democratically elected government in iran in 1953. this is a problem of image and substance that goes back a good many decades. well, the best way to deal with that is to correct the problem. to start now. to modify the behavior. and create a much better impression in the world of u.s. behavior. there's been this big gap between professed american values and actual u.s. behavior.

i noted at one point the united states had used military force in a significant pattern on ten separate occasions in the two decades since the end of the cold war. that's so wildly in excess of the conduct of any other country in the international system. and it creates a foul image of the united states worldwide. that's the kind of conduct that we have to correct right away? >> i would just add that there clearly has been an increase in sort of what we call the favoribility rating of the united states around the world since the obama administration. if you do some comparisons, for example, the pew polls that are done every year, you look at the -- how many people view u.s. policies favorable or unfavorable, you'll find that in 2009, 17 out of 20 countries that were polled, the percentage of the people that viewed the u.s. favorably had increased, some of them from some rather low levels and in some cases the

increase is not really substantial. but i would certainly agree with ted and with the basis of your question. that it is u.s. policy that has been a problem. and it does go back really before the george w. bush administration. and that -- i think this president has recognized that the credibility of the united states has been wounded and damaged and is trying to make some changes in that area shutting down the guantanamo bay prison, i think, is one example. >> stef, do you want to add anything? >> i would only add this, having lived in england since 2001 teaching at cambridge, we found after george bush invaded iraq, that we had to wear a helmet if we went to a dinner party. [laughter] >> it's pretty clear we would come away at the end of the evening with dents in it.

since obama has been elected there is this sense that america is effectively reintroducing itself to europe at least. it's obviously not going all that smoothly. but it is a very different attitude. and you can now go to dinner without a helmet. [laughter] >> first row over. >> doug mcpherson representing myself. would it help to consider a mercantilist consideration for china. you can tie it back to england to the 18th and 19th centuries? and perhaps get guidance as to what they'll be doing next? >> this is a very good point. i try to address this in my book "the beijing consensus" by

pointing out that we don't have clean hands on this. major powers in need of resources have not got clean hands particularly as it relates to africa and the near east. the mercantile model does work very well. we pursued these countries for the resources. and we left them in a condition that was worse than when we arrived. the difference, however, is that in the 1960s when these problems were promulgated, these areas of the third world were thought to be populated by barbarians. and it was very different world view. today we look at these areas as developing societies. and we have names for these countries and we know their leaders. we have a greater obligation to view our responsibility of

drawing them into a productive part of the international system and benefiting from the goods available in the west and for the information process and so on. and the charge is that that is what china is not doing. that china is simply not accepting that responsibility or that obligation. >> the one thing i would add the mercantilist model has the superficial of appeal but it generally doesn't work well for anybody including the mainly power that's trying to apply. that certainly doesn't work for colonies or de facto economic colonies. another areas where i think we have to be very careful is not to assume that we have the answer through our foreign aid programs.

stef i think correctly noted the backlash, the resentment at the world bank and the imf. and that backlash is absolutely warranted. the record of those two institutions -- the record is absolutely dreadful. but the record of america's bilateral foreign aid programs is not significantly better. and, in fact, what we've tended to do with our foreign aid programs -- whether intentionally or not is very often to entrenched corrupt, represstive political elites in power in the recipient countries. and create disincentives for needed economic reforms. this track record is something that has not improved america's image in the world and it has certainly not improved the overall economic state of most

recipient countries. >> bonnie, would you like to add anything? >> i would just add one point. and that is that there's also a positive story to tell about china's overseas development aid. the assistance that it's provided particularly to some countries in africa where it's really contributed to investing in infrastructure, roads and railways and built hospitals, things of that nature. where i would be extremely critical would be in the lack of transparency that the chinese have in not publishing any figures about how much aid they give. there's been less investment in things like stadiums in recent years. i think that the chinese are actually listening to the developing countries and are trying to do a better job. but i think they need to

coordinate more with the west and particularly oecd countries who have tried to engage china to coordinate assistance. and i think as stef says in his books, there's some things we might learn from china and some things that the chinese might learn from the west. >> we have time for one more question. >> michael powell, i was wondering if you guys could discuss the role of popular culture as it regards to the soft power? >> who would like to start? >> i would just say the u.s. has an enormous advantage in that. there's almost no question in that. that has been sometimes not always beneficial. one of the strongest elements of american influence in the world. and that's something that the chinese will have a great deal

of trouble providing potent competition at least for a very long time. >> avatar was number one in beijing this past weekend. [laughter] >> bruce springsteen was disinvited in july. so there you have two sides of it. our popular culture is complex. some of it is acceptable for the chinese. others they found threatening. but if you look at the blossoming of the visual arts in china, painters and musicians and others, a lot of it is an attempt to emulate broadly speaking western artistic style. and certainly they're very enamored taiwanist and hong kong music. yeah, it's a very powerful dimension. joe nye has a lot to say about this.

>> the biggest competitors to u.s. pop culture which is far and away the most admired in the world but in asia the biggest competitors are japan, japanese animae comic books very, very popular. taiwanese pop music. so, you know, china just doesn't lag far behind the united states. it has far less soft power than lots of other countries in asia do because the asian audiences, i think, in addition to looking at u.s. pop culture are attracted really to asian, other forms of asian pop culture. south korea, for example, films and soap operas and things of that nature are very, very popular. >> please join and give a round of applause to our participants. [applause] >> and we have lunch upstairs if you want to proceed for a sandwich. thank you.

>> stel fan halper is a distinguished fellow at the microscope center here in washington. he served in the white house and state department during the nixon, ford and reagan administrations. to find out more visit cato.org. >> host: well, there's a new worldwide community gathering to read a book. and it's called "one book and one twitter" and the organizer is jeff howe. mr. howe, explain to what one book one twitter is? >> guest: well, you know, in a sense it's a global book club but the inspiration was really not book club. which twitter has a few of and they're really wonderful. but the big reads we've seep over the last at the point years. the first one being nancy pearl's "what if everyone in seattle read the same book" where in 1998 where all of seattle read "the sweet here after.

i was reading one book one chicago, the first -- the inaugural case where they read "to kill a mockingbird" and the source of connections that drew. and i was reading -- i was a fellow at harvard and i was taking a course at harvard and the idea that these programs, you know, while they get people to read and that's wonderful, what necessity do is they build social capital. they build connections between people. they give people with nothing in common something in common. >> host: so what book was chosen to be read? >> guest: well, there was a long and involved nominating and then voting process. ultimately the book chosen was "american gods" by neil gaiman? >> host: why did you choose that one? >> guest: i didn't. that was the crowd. why did the crowd choose it, that's a good question. there were a lot of classics up there. essentially we -- i launched believe on wired.com. i'm a contributing editor at

"wired." the books that were nominated and then collected the most votes in that first phase we had a lot of science fiction. we had some -- fahrenheit 101 was close but even when we added, you know, the board picked the six popular ones and then added four titles to sort of introduce some diversity into a list of finalists, people still -- you know, a broad group of people really decided that they wanted neil's book. and i think anything anyone read in high school or college people didn't want to read this for this project. they wanted to read something new. >> host: what's the process? have people started reading "american gods" and started tweeting about it? >> guest: good heavens yes.

it's been -- we have a lot of traffic. it's been at least as successful as i could have wished and probably more. i keep saying this is one big experiment. we have never -- no one to my knowledge has really tried to conduct a global book club before. and it's so international that there's no dip in activity overnight. because that's when all the people and everywhere are reading the book and tweeting about it. what we've done is there's one hash tag, where general comments about the book are being made. and then we split the subsequent discussions up into chapters so that people aren't giving away some of the plot points. . >> host: can some of the booktv viewers join today.

>> guest: log on twitter and look for 1b1t and they should follow our official count and that's the @ symbol and from that account is where we dispense all the information people want to know. >> host: jeff howe, how long will this be going on? >> guest: for another eight weeks. >> host: all right. thanks for joining us on booktv. >> guest: sure, thank you. >> this was prague the capital of czechoslovakia in 1950s and today it's a very colorful city but back then it was very much bleak and not very colorful. as a child you cannot control really what country you're born or what political system you're born into or situation. so i was born just after the communist takeover of czechoslovakia.

and i'll try to move the picture. jumped the family house. this is the family house. it's just interesting because this picture is taken just before 89. maybe even like in september of 1989. and this is what prague -- i grew up looked like. it was very sort of falling apart, gray. and i think that's what i was trying to create in the pictures. so you just see it was very police vehicle. if you come to prague this is the main street full of cafes and tourist shops and this is completely different. and when i was a little child i was told that i liked to draw. this is how i start with a little baby who likes to draw. people say so you're very talented since you were a little child. not necessarily. there was no television and computers and sometimes when the parents wanted the child to be quiet they would just give him pencil and let him sit there and draw.

i don't think it happened exactly when i was a baby like that. but i needed to start a book somewhere so this is the reason. [laughter] >> i was surrounded by a loving family. i'm just showing it as a contrast what happened in private life and public life. because the family -- my both parents are artists and they encourage us to draw and do things. and, of course, nothing about the politics outside or the situation would come to our mind because we were living in this sort of family harmony at least i remember. and then strange thing happened because my father was a young filmmaker who was drafted into the army. everybody was. and because he was a filmmaker he was sent to china because the chinese government asked the czech government -- we were in all big fraternity as a communist country to send some filmmakers how to make documentary films. so my father as 27-year-old, 28-year-old man was sent to china.

i'm deal with it in my book. now we know where china is and what's happening there but at that time even it was friendly country to us. it was so far away to many, many weeks to get on the plane through russia. and we only knew the chinese people eat with the chopsticks and my father disappeared and as i thought as a child he was gone for many, many years. as an adult i discovered that he was gone only for 19 months but as a child i thought he was gone forever. and this is a picture because he was sort of adventurist when he probably borrowed some costume in tibet to look like tibetan and he met the dalai lama who was 19 years old. in that way i lost a great friend and supporter. and somebody who was making fun so that's a picture with my sister. and i drew and drew maps. this is not my map. this is a map of my daughter. she drew. because the maps i drew survived and i wanted to discovered the

world and i think my father with his trip to tibet was important because he indirectly told me when he came back it's much bigger than what i told at school. this is the picture when i went to school. this is how ridiculous we looked in the middle of last century for the first time. and this is when the problem started because all of a sudden we were exposed to the political fact that at school we were told different things than at home and today i'm wondering how it was that the parents would tell us not to talk about certain things. and when we would start to make sense out of things because it was in the first grade, second grade, third grade when we were exposed to all the propaganda to become young pioneers and said very excitedly this is what everybody should do and the parents really couldn't tell us how it was. so i'm dealing with it too. and this is the pictures all the influences when i'm being a confused little pioneer walking

in the street and this is all the mix of propaganda with not only stalin, lenin and khrushchev but these very different books we went at that time. and about the pilot who's crawling to moscow with no legs. it's interesting because if i speak to people from east germany and russia today, everybody has the same repairs to all the things you write about. and all these things he sort of exposed all of us in the same way. this again is from duvall dealing with the same things in the way, way. they are not exactly in the same order in time zone but what was important was the hungarian up. rising, berlin wall, then cuban missile crisis which came much later. president kennedy and his assassination in dallas and the vietnam war. this was interesting because i

didn't know that it was one thing which was common for me and my wife who's american that we found out that we both were hiding the tables in the fear of the nuclear war. because it was the solution at that time the students would be hiding under the table like it would solve anything. i think i didn't like prague -- what was happening outside very much. it wasn't very friendly place. it was a dark place. that was not that much fun going on. so at that time i painted everything in our house. i was afraid that my father would leave on some big trip again but i painted these light switches. and then i found these old chairs so i made sort of a series of chairs for people who i wanted to be my friends so this was somebody who was famous circus artist. this was a famous soccer player

so he even has these socks and this was a famous tricepis player and it was red but at that time nobody knew that i would become an artist in my life. and let's face as a old person i say the chairs are made for sitting and not for painting on them and this chair wasn't quite dry when my friend came to visit. and to my alcoholic i would see my painting leaving through the door. and at that time it wasn't appreciated a lot at all. i drew a lot at school. this was at later time. i have big gaps in physics and math just because i was doodling it. and i'm telling kids don't doodle anymore. i think they would doodle on facebook probably. [laughter] >> and i did all these different pictures at that time of people sort of flying somewhere and getting over the borders. but i didn't understand the concept that it would be

something wrong with the government who's tell me you cannot go from this place to this place because it was just part of our lives and nobody was questioning that. so i was deal -- i wanted to be a painter. these are paintings. i wanted to be a rock and wall musician. we're getting into '68. and this is alexander dubchek. this was the best part of my life because i was young and i could hitchhike. we would hear about the beatles all these things came together at the same time. and we thought the world sort of will open it up and it will be reasonable. and i remember going in 1968 -- hitchhiking from belgium and asia and i sawed to a british soldier said the russians cannot do it what would the whole world say about it.

it was a big shock of 1968 when the russians came in. and, of course, i was in london at the time. but in my book i took the liberty to sort of not to explain it because it would become way too difficult. and i think today if i was in prague when the russian tank and planes came that probably i would have left right there and wouldn't spend another 15 years or something trying to figure out where i should be living. >> this was a portion of a booktv program. you can view the entire program and many other booktv programs online. go to booktv.org. type the name of the author or book into the search area in the upper left-hand corner of the page. select the watch link. now you can view the entire program. you might also explore the recently on booktv box or the featured video box to find recent and featured programs.

>> what's a khaarijee? >> it literally means the man who comes from outside. and that's what the translator in the book would call me. he had difficult pronouncing my name malcolm so he would call me khaarijee. >> and where were you? >> in kabul, afghanistan. >> why? >> i went there shortly after september 11 in november of 2001. i was working at the "kansas city star" which was part of a large newspaper chain. and the editors of the chain needed people to go overseas. and i volunteered. i hadn't worked overseas and just saw it as an opportunity? >> what were you writing about before you went over there? >> i was doing featured stories. it could be anything from dog of the week to local news in kansas city. so afghanistan was certainly quite a jump from what i'd been doing. >> how did that decision change your life? >> well, you know, i hadn't even

known where afghanistan was to be candid with you about it. it gave me a perspective that just leaped me across the globe outside of my day-to-day, 9:00 to 5:00 existence to seeing a culture just radically different from my own in a country that experienced 30 years of warfare. and had just been devastated. a kind of devastation i had only even in photographs of world war ii when there are pictures of europe after, you know, the allies victory. >> did you embed? >> i did in 2003. i did. i embed with the 82nd airborne. >> where were you and what did you cover? >> well, i arrived in kabul towards the end of november, 2001. and i connected with a gentleman whose name was hallid and he would always correct me because i felt i wasn't pronounceing it correctly. and i started calling him bro and he called me khaarijee. >> how did you connect with him? >> it was by chance.

i was interviewing his uncle who was part of a demining team trying to clear afghanistan from all the mines from the previous wars that it had been in. and i mentioned -- he spoke english and i mentioned to him that i was looking for a translator. this is my second day there. and i was pretty much on my own. i just had to fend for myself. and he told me that his nephew could speak english and thought he would be available. and that's how it started. that's how we met. bro was always reluctant of me as an outsider and as we got together as i described we just fumbled there. he had never translated and i never translated before. we fumbled through the country and trying not to get ourselves killed in the process. >> what kind of stories were you writing in 2001 some? >> i was where the country was after the taliban left northern afghanistan. what the country was like. how people are attempting to rebuild. the efforts to create a new government which is now the

karzai government. >> how many times did you return? >> since 2001 i've been there seven times. pretty much every year after that. >> why? >> you know, i was just sucked in. it just captured my manual nation. i formed real strong bonds with bro and his family. and i had a hard time just leaving. you know, i didn't feel my time there was done. it had such an impact and coming back to the united states, i felt somewhat discom bob lated. i had this experience. it was radically different than what i had known and i felt a need to go back there to learn more about the country and also for my own sense of balance. i felt like i needed to stay there. i just feel somewhat lost having done it and then just coming back to a place that was so different. >> was your reporting done all in the "kansas city star"? >> initially it was done primarily for "kansas city star" and knight-ridder newspapers. and then i started freelancing

and began working for some smaller magazines such as the virginia quarterly review and missouri review. submitting essays. some of which revise up here in the book about my personal experiences in afghanistan, my thoughts about people there in the country. thoughts that normally -- i don't go into a daily story. >> give an example. >> well, for example, there's one story in the book about some war orphan children that bro and i took under our wing. and so i talked about the process of getting to know them. taking them for lunch every day. and enrolling them in school and then the problems i faced when i left. and i had started this process with them and how to continue that. because a i -- because i created an expectation that i attempted to fulfill. >> who was funding all these trips? >> some of them were funded out of my pocket.

>> this book "the khaarijee: a chronicle of friendship of war and kabul." does it cover all seven trips? >> it does, yes. >> walk us through. >> the initial chapters are just, you know, my immersion into the country in 2001. and my reaction to that. and then i return in 2002, which was the beginning of the karzai government. there was a process involved where he was assuming the leadership of the country. then in future years i did an embed and then followed up when the country started to kind of devolve into the violence we're seeing now. and then most recently, and this isn't in the book, i cover the election in august. >> where did you stay when you were there? >> initially we stayed in a house that was rented by the newspaper chain.

and then after that i began staying in a hotel. >> what was it like? >> well, it used to be a place where you could exchange money. and then the hotel owner recognized that with all the journalists he could make it more money. and in the winter there was glass. there was no central heating and nothing glass between you and a sleeping bed. you had all sorts of people from lost souls who were just drawn to war to whatever their reasons to journalists to people who work in an aid organizations. >> when did you get a book contract? >> that said after -- i'll have to remember that. that was in september of '08. it was serendipity. i'd written a lot of these chapters as individual essays. suggested to me to put them into a book. and then i began sending them out through an agent. >> a lot of books in afghanistan -- on afghanistan and people's experience over there in the last couple of years, what makes yours

different? >> well, i think it's a very personal book. i don't get into a lot of talking into the leadership of the country, which -- and i'm not saying that's bad thing. but my book -- i approached afghanistan from a very grassroots perspective. i come from a social work background. i used to work with homeless people in san francisco. and so i talk to people in the street. i went to their villages i just referred to. i really tried to so-called mainstream afghans and really get a sense from them what -- how they feel what is happening to their country. no matter what the politicians or whomever may be saying. >> what does bro do in his daily life when you're not there to -- >> now he's working for a bangladesh ngo or aid organization. he said he's very satisfied. and that's great. but we stay in touch through email and then when i go back obviously i see him. >> and so he has email connections? does he have to go to an internet cafe? does he have his own computer? >> he usually goes to an internet cafe?

>> where does he live? >> in south kabul in a large house with his family, his wife. he has three children. >> a large house? >> uh-huh. >> is he a wealthy man? >> i wouldn't say he's a wealthy man because the whole family lives in the house they're all chipping in to support the house. and the income there is radically different from ours. his father earns $200 a month and he feels that's a good salary. so obviously their cost of living is different from ours. i'm not saying they're having an easy time. but the comparison is radically different from ours. >> how did you get around when you were there? >> you drove. >> what kind of car? >> well, it varied. but usually it was sort of a toyota van is the best way i can describe it. it was pretty beatened up and battered. the driving in afghanistan is sort of like bumper pool. it's not at all like the united states. i mean, there's a lot of honking, a lot of cars -- i always thought we were about to have an accident, you know, at anticipate moment because everybody just converges and just sort of shifts around to

try to get through. >> how often were you personally afraid? >> you, oftentimes i was afraid after the fact. there's a time when we were out after curfew early on and we were frantic to get back to kabul so we could get past the checkpoints, et cetera. at the time i really didn't have time to be afraid. but when we finally got through all the mess that we had to get through, i thought back to it. and i thought, we had some close calls just now. >> who's on the front of believe? what's the picture? >> that's actually just a picture of an afghan man on a motorcycle on his way to bagram air base. around the road that leads to bagram air base whether he's going to bagram, i don't know. a colleague of mine took the picture. >> how large is the military presence there in kabul or all around afghanistan? do you see it constantly? >> you do.

i mean, you see -- you see a lot of is vehicles. you'll see some soldiers on the street but you see a constant stream of military vehicles. you're always aware that there's a military presence. and even with the afghans, you see a constant stream of security personnel of the afghan forces. you're constantly aware even if there's not any fighting going on that this is a country and a city kabul under siege. >> where are you living now and what are you doing? >> i'm living just outside of chicago. and i'm a freelance journalist. >> you've left the "kansas city star"? >> i have. >> and you've left kansas city. >> i've left kansas city? >> do you miss it. >> not so far. i just recently moved. this is a new adventure to me. >> do you plan to be in afghanistan anytime soon? >> i do. i hope to go back this summer? >> and do what? >> continuing follow up and see how the american surge is being perceived by the afghan people.