6 ms·

China is not Russian style system where oligarchs close to leader step in and steal your stuff if you get rich. China resembles (British) monarchy of the old.

China is not Russian style system where oligarchs close to leader step in and steal your stuff if you get rich. China resembles (British) monarchy of the old. There are laws, but they are not same for the common man and to the noble (60 million members of the communist party). If you steer away from the politics, you can be entrepreneur and become rich. Corruption exists of course, but that's like taxation. You pay your taxes and bribes. Bribing can sometimes allow more freedoms than completely lawful society, because it allows more. China has basically the same bioethical laws as the west, but they are not enforced because party does not care. China became the first country to approve the commercial production of a gene therapy.

seanmcdirmid 10y ago
Rule by law, not rule of law. Once you understand the difference between these two concepts, you'll understand China a bit better.
- RickHull 10y ago
  Rule of (arbitrary and capricious) man vs. rule of law is a similar distinction
- dredmorbius 10y ago
  That's not a particularly clear distinction, care to expand / unpack?
  - nyolfen 10y ago
    hazarding a guess, i expect he's saying rule by a privileged group using law as a tool, versus the (ideal) western conception of the rule of law, as a framework that everyone must operate within, equally subject and evenly applied
    - dredmorbius 10y ago
      Thanks, that helps.
  - seanmcdirmid 10y ago
    "Rule by law" is the use of law to control the people. You use laws as convenient to punish your enemies, but aren't particularly interested in enforcing laws fairly. It becomes more of the default whenever there is no independent judiciary to interpret the law, or an independent media to make sure the government stays honest. "Rule of law" is the aspiration that we are used to in the west (fair application of the law, everyone is subject to the law, etc...). It isn't perfect, we often exist in between the two extremes, but our systems are set up to at least aspire to it, while the Chinese system self admittedly depends solely on the wisdom and benevolence of a singular ruling class (in this case, the top-down CPC).
    - Canada 10y ago
      With over a billion people in the country, the highest levels of leadership can't easily stop the kind of corruption that most businesses are victimized by: Extortion by local officials. It's like, they walk in to your factory, claim your fire extinguishers are not regulation, and demand that you buy a dozen of them from their friend and no one else, and it's going to cost you 50,000 RMB ($7k USD). And if you don't go and get them, right now, then they're taking the keys to your factory, kicking out all the employees (who you will still have to pay) and not letting anyone back in until you do. And it has to be cash. And no, you're not getting a receipt. Or it will be things like, you order something, it's not delivered even close to spec, and the corrupt police make you pay for it anyway or else. Contracts are utterly meaningless. And of course this only starts happening when you start making money. And they'll know you're making money because the locals around you are definitely ratting you out and quite possibly in on it. You need to have the right friends to avoid this, and those kind of friends cost money. Our systems aren't perfect, but it's rare we have to put up with shit like that. Still, I like it here. The cost of living is reasonable, the weather is good, it's a big city with lots of entertainment, and a lot of people are here doing stuff. Being right next to Hong Kong is also a big plus. Biggest downside is how bad the internet sucks.
      - malloryerik 10y ago
        Can I ask what you mean about the internet sucking? Is it censorship, quality of sites, or speed and reliability of service?
ajross 10y ago
At least some of that may be simple circumstance. When GDP growth is at 7%, it makes more sense for the oligarchs to invest in whatever is hot than it does to steal (everyone's getting rich, why take the risk and make the enemies?). The US remains mostly uncorrupt at 2.2%. Russia's GDP growth is at 1.3% per my quick google search, which is well underneath inflation. If you're sitting at the top with a mostly asset-dominated income, you have to be stealing if you want to grow. So only the thieves win.
- Retric 10y ago
  US has high levels of corruption at the top, it's just better hidden and less accessible to most people. The secret is changing how the rules operate instead of selective enforcement.
  - ajross 10y ago
    Corruption in this sense of the word is economic and quantifiable, we're not talking about policymaking and who bought off whichever party you hate. The US is near the bottom of the industrialized world in metrics like this.
    - Retric 10y ago
      This is independent of party and more obvious at the local level than national. Look into your local zoning some time. When the rules says X must be farm land, but changing that so X can become tract housing means local developer can make a few million... Well that's a lot of power to hand some tiny group with minimal oversight. Supplying pencils etc to the local high schools can be a lot simpler if you know the right people...
  - enraged_camel 10y ago
    >>US has high levels of corruption at the top, it's just better hidden and less accessible to most people. It is hidden... in broad daylight. For example, what is lobbying, if not legalized corruption?
mncharity 10y ago
> Corruption exists of course, but that's like taxation. A few years ago, at an economics talk out of Harvard, the speaker suggested there were advantages for innovation in China-style vs US-style corruption. One was that when legislative bribes are mostly paid by large incumbent companies, instead of being more broadly sourced, there's more systematic use of regulatory capture to reduce competition and replace innovation with rent seeking. Caveats: it was a side comment, and it wasn't clear to me the topic was fully within their research focus. Similar issues exist around patents. I recently heard a billion-ish hardware tech CEO describe a large defensive patent portfolio as "table stakes" for playing. Though I wonder if they meant "buy in".
r00fus 10y ago
> Bribing can sometimes allow more freedoms than completely lawful society, because it allows more. Bribing allows one to buy more freedom, generally at the cost of those who don't pay. It's essentially pay-to-play. One could argue that the Chinese system has more "devolved/decentralized" pay-to-play system as opposed to the US where the Federalization experiment (states allowed to experiment with different legal interpretation) has broken down.

seanmcdirmid 10y ago

Rule by law, not rule of law. Once you understand the difference between these two concepts, you'll understand China a bit better.

RickHull 10y ago
Rule of (arbitrary and capricious) man vs. rule of law is a similar distinction
dredmorbius 10y ago
That's not a particularly clear distinction, care to expand / unpack?
- nyolfen 10y ago
  hazarding a guess, i expect he's saying rule by a privileged group using law as a tool, versus the (ideal) western conception of the rule of law, as a framework that everyone must operate within, equally subject and evenly applied
  - dredmorbius 10y ago
    Thanks, that helps.
- seanmcdirmid 10y ago
  "Rule by law" is the use of law to control the people. You use laws as convenient to punish your enemies, but aren't particularly interested in enforcing laws fairly. It becomes more of the default whenever there is no independent judiciary to interpret the law, or an independent media to make sure the government stays honest. "Rule of law" is the aspiration that we are used to in the west (fair application of the law, everyone is subject to the law, etc...). It isn't perfect, we often exist in between the two extremes, but our systems are set up to at least aspire to it, while the Chinese system self admittedly depends solely on the wisdom and benevolence of a singular ruling class (in this case, the top-down CPC).
  - Canada 10y ago
    With over a billion people in the country, the highest levels of leadership can't easily stop the kind of corruption that most businesses are victimized by: Extortion by local officials. It's like, they walk in to your factory, claim your fire extinguishers are not regulation, and demand that you buy a dozen of them from their friend and no one else, and it's going to cost you 50,000 RMB ($7k USD). And if you don't go and get them, right now, then they're taking the keys to your factory, kicking out all the employees (who you will still have to pay) and not letting anyone back in until you do. And it has to be cash. And no, you're not getting a receipt. Or it will be things like, you order something, it's not delivered even close to spec, and the corrupt police make you pay for it anyway or else. Contracts are utterly meaningless. And of course this only starts happening when you start making money. And they'll know you're making money because the locals around you are definitely ratting you out and quite possibly in on it. You need to have the right friends to avoid this, and those kind of friends cost money. Our systems aren't perfect, but it's rare we have to put up with shit like that. Still, I like it here. The cost of living is reasonable, the weather is good, it's a big city with lots of entertainment, and a lot of people are here doing stuff. Being right next to Hong Kong is also a big plus. Biggest downside is how bad the internet sucks.
    - malloryerik 10y ago
      Can I ask what you mean about the internet sucking? Is it censorship, quality of sites, or speed and reliability of service?

ajross 10y ago

At least some of that may be simple circumstance. When GDP growth is at 7%, it makes more sense for the oligarchs to invest in whatever is hot than it does to steal (everyone's getting rich, why take the risk and make the enemies?). The US remains mostly uncorrupt at 2.2%. Russia's GDP growth is at 1.3% per my quick google search, which is well underneath inflation. If you're sitting at the top with a mostly asset-dominated income, you have to be stealing if you want to grow. So only the thieves win.

Retric 10y ago
US has high levels of corruption at the top, it's just better hidden and less accessible to most people. The secret is changing how the rules operate instead of selective enforcement.
- ajross 10y ago
  Corruption in this sense of the word is economic and quantifiable, we're not talking about policymaking and who bought off whichever party you hate. The US is near the bottom of the industrialized world in metrics like this.
  - Retric 10y ago
    This is independent of party and more obvious at the local level than national. Look into your local zoning some time. When the rules says X must be farm land, but changing that so X can become tract housing means local developer can make a few million... Well that's a lot of power to hand some tiny group with minimal oversight. Supplying pencils etc to the local high schools can be a lot simpler if you know the right people...
- enraged_camel 10y ago
  >>US has high levels of corruption at the top, it's just better hidden and less accessible to most people. It is hidden... in broad daylight. For example, what is lobbying, if not legalized corruption?

mncharity 10y ago

> Corruption exists of course, but that's like taxation. A few years ago, at an economics talk out of Harvard, the speaker suggested there were advantages for innovation in China-style vs US-style corruption. One was that when legislative bribes are mostly paid by large incumbent companies, instead of being more broadly sourced, there's more systematic use of regulatory capture to reduce competition and replace innovation with rent seeking. Caveats: it was a side comment, and it wasn't clear to me the topic was fully within their research focus. Similar issues exist around patents. I recently heard a billion-ish hardware tech CEO describe a large defensive patent portfolio as "table stakes" for playing. Though I wonder if they meant "buy in".

r00fus 10y ago

> Bribing can sometimes allow more freedoms than completely lawful society, because it allows more. Bribing allows one to buy more freedom, generally at the cost of those who don't pay. It's essentially pay-to-play. One could argue that the Chinese system has more "devolved/decentralized" pay-to-play system as opposed to the US where the Federalization experiment (states allowed to experiment with different legal interpretation) has broken down.