Cameron Speaks to China: WSJ editorial

• REVIEW & OUTLOOK ASIA
• NOVEMBER 11, 2010

Cameron Speaks to China

A worthy first effort by the British Prime Minister.

Lamenting Barack Obama's reluctance to talk about political freedom during his visit to China last year, artist Ai Weiwei noted that "Many Chinese, especially the young, hope for a more open and just society—this needs the support of foreign leaders." Mr. Ai, who was placed under house arrest last week, finally got his wish thanks to a visit from David Cameron.

In a speech Wednesday at Beijing University, the U.K. Prime Minister did not stint in his praise for the economic progress China has made in the past three decades. But neither did he stint in his critique—largely by way of contrast to the U.K.—of China's political system.

In Britain, he noted, the Prime Minister is personally answerable to Parliament. The opposition party has "a constitutional duty to hold the new Government publicly to account." An independent judiciary may overturn the decisions of government. The free press gives voters the opportunity "to hear directly from people who hold different views from the government." And while he acknowledged that ordinary Chinese live, travel and work more freely than before, he also made clear that more was needed. "I hope that in time [the rise in economic freedom] will lead to a greater political opening because I am convinced that the best guarantor of prosperity and stability is for economic and political progress to go in step together."

All this was right and necessary to say, particularly to an audience that included Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao. Mr. Cameron might even have gone a step further: In 2008, on the eve of the Beijing Olympics, George W. Bush insisted that "America stands in firm opposition to China's detention of political dissidents, human rights advocates and religious activists." At a minimum, we trust the Prime Minister raised the cases of Nobel Laureate Liu Xiaobo, Gao Zhisheng, Hu Jia, Mr. Ai and other dissidents directly with his hosts in private.

Still, private diplomacy has its limits. As dissidents the world over will attest, nothing is so encouraging to them, and so embarrassing to their oppressors, than to have Western leaders speak openly and forcefully on behalf of political freedoms and human rights. Mr. Cameron took a good step in that direction on Wednesday.