Early in the term I informed my students that they would write an op-ed article for submission to a good regional or national newspaper. The discipline of slimming an argument to a parsimonious 750 words is a good job skill.

My Chinese student was happy to write an article but reluctant to send it anywhere. He claimed his written English skills were too weak and that he would be embarrassed to have a professional editor read his work. I made a counteroffer. He could write for a Chinese-language paper and give me the English version.

Although his discomfort had been clear from the start, I was surprised when he politely but flatly refused the assignment.

Later that afternoon Mr. Hu came to my office to explain his behavior. He said he was happy to express his views in private discussions but determined to avoid any public forum. For him, the story of the journalist-economist He Qinglian was a life lesson. Her 1998 book, "The Pitfalls of Modernization," was a sharp exposé of corruption linked to Chinese market liberalization. A national best-seller, the book was originally state-sanctioned reading for China's leaders as they struggled with the social pathologies that accompanied economic reforms. 

Her continued criticism met with a less favorable reception. She was silenced, and in July she fled to the United States to avoid possible arrest. Since Mr. Hu planned to return home, he was unwilling to write anything for public consumption that might be interpreted as critical of Chinese policy.

His job prospects were at risk in his view. He preferred to keep his head down, and I honored his decision. He wrote his paper in English for my eyes only. It was a very effective analysis of the likely costs to Chinese farmers of China's entry into the World Trade Organization. To me it was a well-crafted argument, rooted in logic and respect for data. For him, the lesson of He Qinglian is that analysis and political action are indistinguishable. This is not news in China, but often it becomes news in the United States.

Although my student clearly would prefer a more open and pluralistic China, he expressed no interest in working for change from within the system. Some would say this is the "hostage's dilemma" at work. Just as one person with a gun can keep a hundred unarmed and uncoordinated people at bay, my student's economic future is at stake if he challenges authority or stands out from the crowd in other ways.

Both sides of the current American debate on China policy work from this hostage premise. The engagers want to expand the private economy so that government coercive power will reach fewer people in ways that matter. The punishers would deny full access to international markets until we see clear progress on basic human rights.

Each is optimistic that U.S. policy can play a decisive role. The engagers want to reduce the cost and risk to individuals who dissent, while the punishers want to raise the costs to China's elites of continuing repressive conduct.

The hostage metaphor is certainly persuasive, yet I saw no hostage in despair when I talked to Mr. Hu. For him, ties of family, culture and nation are very strong. Freedoms that we in the West view as fundamental he may be willing, at least for a while, to trade for gains of a different sort.

When these motives are strong, pressure from outside may not produce the expected results as surely or as rapidly as we might hope. We may want every Chinese student to be a dissident in the making, but we should expect that most would have other, equally honorable, things on their minds.

And yet Mr. Hu takes back to China more than a set of skills. He has lived in an academic community in which critical thinking and open-minded discussion are part of the curriculum. His story does not suggest any new policies for reinventing China. Instead, I see a cautionary tale about the limits of policy and the virtue of patience. 

The writer, a professor of economics at the College of William and Mary, contributed this comment to The Washington Post.

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