ONE of the few facts suggesting we still have unique traditions is that we observe the Spring Festival in the Chinese Lunar Calendar.

The beginning of a new year affords us a chance to make New Year's resolutions, and that generally presupposes a review of the previous year.

In Japan in recent decades, there has arisen the innovative practice of declaring the Word of the Year at the year's end, to sum up personal feeling about the year.

As these Japanese words are actually Chinese characters, this practice has been catching on in China in recent years.

It can be a challenge to select one character to symbolize an entire year, but for we Chinese, the choice seems fairly obvious for 2010.

According to an Internet survey in December, nearly 40 percent replied that zhang (surging prices) best expresses their feelings about 2010.

We were seeing surges in prices and costs of almost every kind, except that of labor (wages or salary).

This was not the first time that zhang has been singled out for that distinction.

In 2007, a survey also decided on zhang. Although soaring home prices have been a decade-long phenomenon, in that year zhang referred mainly to the soaring price of gasoline.

In 2010 price surge affected virtually every kind of commodity and service, from ginger, eggs, and water, to haircuts.

Another character that came close behind is chai (tearing down), as the year yielded another long list of brutal land grabs and forced relocations. Buildings are commonly condemned for demolition by marking them chai, to be torn down.

There were reports of desperate demolition victims committing suicides, some by self-immolation. Some were beaten to death or buried alive.

The moral: resistance is futile.

So indicative is chai of the Chinese reality today that some wits have twisted China into Chaina, sounding in Chinese like "keep pulling down."

Chai has really become a national obsession, with no letup in sight.

In late January, the central government issued new rules aimed at ending forced urban demolitions without due process and fair compensation.

According to the decree, no violence or coercion can be used to force homeowners to leave, in cities.

Would these provisions, hailed as revolutionary by some, be enough to put off greedy officials and developers?

Last month many provincial and municipal governments published their forecasts of GDP growth for 2011.

Nearly all provinces in the middle and western provinces are envisioning double-digit GDP growth.

If you know how local governments tend to extract growth from land acquisition and sales, you would have good reason to fear that chai might continue to fuel public outrage, and officials might continue to make a compelling case for demolition being necessary for urban expansion and "progress."

Although few people derive much personal contentment from local GDP, it is still the measure of official worth today.

Costs of growth

Local government officials have grown so addicted to growth that many of them have in effect lost their capacity to be incentivized by any other targets.

Given that addiction, it should not surprise us that government at all levels seems ineffective in cooling the red-hot property market.

The heat that was first registered in coastal cities has now radiated to the deserts in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region and Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.

The enshrinement of the market has led to decade-long growth, and as the racket has died down a bit, we can spare some time for reflections.

Some came to wonder if the miraculous growth in wealth is more distributive than creative.

Equipped with this insight, some people have developed a healthy cynicism about "public interests" so often cited by officials.

Some say that the largest annual migration on this planet occurs during China's Spring Festival period. Each migrant has his or her own tale of woe about the ordeal of the homeward journey.

But few could compare to the tragic report of a migrant couple from Chongqing who, deterred by travel costs, had not seen their son for 12 years, and when the son visited them in Shanghai, the mother mistook another lad for her son at the bus station. The tale suggests the costs of China's miraculous growth have been understated.

A lustrous GDP figure loses its allure if it fails to measure the depth of misery felt by the parents who had not seen their son for 12 years.

More holistic measures are needed.

Confucian doctrines, for instance, supply the basic principles for personal conduct, which is then extended to household management and government administration.

Governing principles

Children were once required to memorize these principles when they were first educated.

A prime minister of the Song Dynasty (960-1279) reportedly brought about national harmony with the benefit of only half of Confucius's Analects.

Whenever the minister, Zhao Pu, was in doubt over handling government affairs, he would be seen afterwards consulting a book in private, and then the solution would present itself.

It turned out to be only half of the Analects.

Exaggerating?

I would hope that if officials today were required to read just the first page of Mencius - and truly took it to heart - it would be enough to inject them with a proper dose of respect for the people.

The classic begins (In James Legge's translation) thus:

Mencius went to see King Hui of Liang.

The king said, "Venerable sir, since you have not counted it far to come here, a distance of a thousand li, may I presume that you are provided with counsels to profit my kingdom?"

Mencius replied, "Why must your Majesty use that word 'profit?' What I am provided with, are counsels to benevolence and righteousness, and these are my only topics."

He went on: "If your Majesty say, 'What is to be done to profit my kingdom?' the great officers will say, 'What is to be done to profit our families?' and the inferior officers and the common people will say, 'What is to be done to profit our persons?'"

"Superiors and inferiors will try to snatch this profit the one from the other, and the kingdom will be endangered."