Is China really rising?
Posted: Sun Jul 05, 2015 4:27 am
Recently the Chinese economy has been hammered by a severe stock market downturn (http://www.economist.com/news/business- ... ble-market) which threatens to expose more glaring inconsistencies in its economy. And perhaps more troubling, the government is rushing through a series of new national security laws which are designed to tighten the grip of the state (and party) over the country (http://www.cnn.com/2015/07/02/opinions/ ... -bequelin/).
Now to me the latter is much more revealing than the former. Why would the government, supposedly prosperous, and secure need sweeping new powers in order to maintain its power and influence in the country? When a state has to resort to such measures of coercion that usually means it is scared and/or fearful of losing its grip on power. And regarding the former, there is still a lot of questions inside the Chinese economy as the government no doubt fiddles with the numbers to reach its own desirable ends.
So, are we looking at simply growing pains for China or are looking at a serious stumbling block they might not be able to overcome?
For further reading:
http://www.stripes.com/news/pacific/tai ... e-1.356373\
http://news.yahoo.com/japan-joins-us-au ... 11716.html
ON a side note, what nations/powers/coalitions do you see rising in the future? Will the US continue to be the dominant superpower? Will the EU get its act together and become a superpower? Will we see a resurgent Russia make a power play? What about a Russian-Chinese alliance?
Now to me the latter is much more revealing than the former. Why would the government, supposedly prosperous, and secure need sweeping new powers in order to maintain its power and influence in the country? When a state has to resort to such measures of coercion that usually means it is scared and/or fearful of losing its grip on power. And regarding the former, there is still a lot of questions inside the Chinese economy as the government no doubt fiddles with the numbers to reach its own desirable ends.
So, are we looking at simply growing pains for China or are looking at a serious stumbling block they might not be able to overcome?
For further reading:
http://www.stripes.com/news/pacific/tai ... e-1.356373\
http://news.yahoo.com/japan-joins-us-au ... 11716.html
ON a side note, what nations/powers/coalitions do you see rising in the future? Will the US continue to be the dominant superpower? Will the EU get its act together and become a superpower? Will we see a resurgent Russia make a power play? What about a Russian-Chinese alliance?