Whether you are one of our older or younger MBA students, I suspect that when your parents found out we/you were going to China, they may have said the same thing my own mother asked me when I started pulling this trip together several years ago and that she still asks me each year because she loves her youngest boy and wants him to stay safe: “Oh my goodness. I hear it’s not very safe there. Why don’t you go to England or Italy?”

Five thoughts:

1. Yeah, right, Mom. Like lilly white Europe is any safer! I was once mugged in a train station in Milan. I was once peed on by a drugged out Frenchman in a park in Paris because he felt, in his apparent state of hallucenating, that my 25 feet away from him while walking along a flower path in the garden was not far enough from him (in the US we call that an assault and battery). I was once caught in the middle of an ugly soccer hooligan brawl (more like a riot) in a pub in London, where I was really, really scared and just wanted to crawl under a table to make sure I survived.

2. China is where business is happening right now. In my own bullish (and admittedly biased) view on China, it is the future of business for at least the next several decades. Let’s go see and experience it while we can. Crime occurs everywhere, including in California.

3. I have never felt unsafe in China. But, I am a pretty big guy and I ALWAYS try to be aware of my surroundings and try not to make stupid decisions that put me in danger. I agree with Dan Harris’ recent CLB post, “Mapping Crime in China and Democracy in Action” (a must read; check it out) where he writes:

“When clients ask me whether they need to worry about crime in China, I typically say it is hard to know because the statistics are so unreliable…. I then talk about ‘my sense’ of things, based on my own experiences (so far, so good) and that of the people I know (both Chinese and foreign) in China (mostly petty crimes like pickpocketing).”

That has been my experience as well. Dan goes on to note:

“[T]he Danwei blog just did a great post, entitled, ‘Thief Maps Let Netizens Fight Crime,’ on the growing phenomenon in China of citizens mapping out crime locations on the Internet using “thief maps.” These maps are set up so users can contribute their individual run-ins with thieves and those incidents get mapped.”

Be sure to check out this Danwei post. This is an absolutely fascinating development. Is this, as Dan writes, democracy in action in China because by letting this occur on the Internet the government is in effect admitting they can’t handle this facet of crime effectively and by letting citizens take this into their own hands they are allowing some meaningful freedom of association and assembly to occur? I think so, and agree with Dan on this point. If so, this is pretty powerful stuff and China may, indeed, be changing for the better, albeit slowly.

4. I also sense and smell a business opportunity or two in this “Netizens Fight Crime” development in China. Do you, and if so, what do you see and smell?

As an MBA student, I want you to come out of our program always looking for and being able to quickly recognize business opportunities, because you will find you will have to reinvent yourselves professionally every so many years as you change, as the economy changes, your firm changes and/or your industry changes.

5. While we are in China, here I again repeat what I have advised you before on several occasions – always be aware of your surroundings, keep your bags/luggage close to you and your eye on them, look out for each other, and NEVER get drunk during your off time and thereby make yourself a prime target for crime and thieves, etc. (see, e.g., my earlier related post, Burning A Hole In Your Stomach, Chinese Style). (Several of the questions in your Frequently Asked Questions document also address these and other points.) I.e., be and remain the smart Cal Poly MBA students with good judgment that you are.