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> China has a long history of civil unrest > The return to authoritarianism can be seen as battening down the hatches Obligatory not a "China expert" but I th
by sho 8y ago
> China has a long history of civil unrest
> The return to authoritarianism can be seen as battening down the hatches
Obligatory not a "China expert" but I think you're very much correct. A lot of people don't seem to understand how different, and explosive, the political situation is in China. There is very little social trust, certainly little trust in government, and things could fly apart quickly and violently. The CCP is in a very difficult situation, trapped between fragmented and competing power bases, from a gigantic and angry rural underclass to godlike and kleptocratic SOEs to the tier-1 (and even 2) cities who by this point are practically mini-states with a law unto themselves. It is no surprise they have pulled every trick in the book to try to keep the music playing.
I totally agree that there needs to be a proper national health and social security system; this will be on the same magnitude as the "New Deal" the US had after the great depression. This could only be accomplished by a massive tax, and even more importantly power, overhaul. Xi Jinping is totally unreadable to me and I have no idea whether he is consolidating power just because that's what "strongmen" do or because he understands he needs it to execute on the desperately needed reforms. I doubt anyone not literally in the Politburo could say for sure. I hope it's the latter.
I keep saying this every year but the stakes just keep getting higher - things in China will come to a head sooner rather than later. And when they do, I want to be very far away, because it is a whole lot of shit, and a very big fan...
- cm2187 8y agoBut also isn’t China half way through its industrial revolution, with still a massive rural population almost living in the previous century? Are there other examples of countries that stalled in that process and the political consequences of a two tier population?
- simonh 8y agoThe rural labour pool is running pretty low at this point, it’s mostly just kids growing up and going to work in the cities rather than actual untapped capacity. Of course given China’s scale that’s still millions of workers looking for jobs every year. I’d say at this point China is very much an industrialised country with a young but burgeoning domestic economy. Wages for manufacturing workers have been rising steadily as a result though and low value manufacturing that relies on the lowest wages is moving on to places like Vietnam. It’s still pretty rough out in the countryside, my wife is Chinese and I’ve been out in the countryside, but it is getting better.
- _jgdh 8y agoI can't speak to the rest of your comment, but tax overhaul is certainly a high priority for the Party right now. https://www.economist.com/china/2018/12/01/why-only-2-of-chinese-pay-any-income-tax https://www.economist.com/china/2018/12/01/why-only-2-of-chi...
- jhanschoo 8y agoRegarding Xi's motivations with respect to his "strongman" actions, this document about Xi before he became the Gen Sec might shed some light: https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/09BEIJING3128_a.html https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/09BEIJING3128_a.html
- sho 8y agoThank you for that, hadn't seen it. Very interesting, if somewhat dated, but perhaps cause for cautious optimism.