7 ms·

Could be all of the above, but for at least a year I have been reading how the real estate bubble that's underpinning the Chinese growth economy is starting to

Could be all of the above, but for at least a year I have been reading how the real estate bubble that's underpinning the Chinese growth economy is starting to pop with the potential to bleed into the banking system, e.g. [0] If this happens, and is at bad as some analysts say it could be, then the model propping up the CCP effectively ends [1] and they'll have bigger things to worry about than re-unification or tariffs. 0. https://moderndiplomacy.eu/2022/07/17/a-real-estate-and-banking-crisis-in-china/ https://moderndiplomacy.eu/2022/07/17/a-real-estate-and-bank... 1. https://zeihan.com/the-cutting-room-files-part-6-the-future-of-the-china/ https://zeihan.com/the-cutting-room-files-part-6-the-future-...

jacquesm 4y ago
And that in turn might cause them to start a war... Because when the regime has nothing to lose all bets are off, even though it makes no sense whatsoever. They will have to distract from their culpability somehow.
- andy_ppp 4y ago
  The ever centralisation around one man is incredibly short sighted. The Chinese system used to be much more sophisticated, having both a very capitalistic view of the world and a very communistic view. They have completely lost half of that and even the communism will disappear if things start going wrong - all that will be left is maintaining the dictatorship at all costs.
  - jacquesm 4y ago
    There is a fair chance of that happening. But: The cult of the individual leader has always been a strong component in China historically. So it wouldn't be a new thing, more a regression to the norm.
    - anonymouskimmer 4y ago
      It's been a strong component the world over. Even in the US we've got exemplars such as George Washington, FDR, and the Adams and Bush dynasties. Democracies as political-individual-leader absent as Switzerland are the exception, not the rule. And the less so for other forms of government.
      - cafard 4y ago
        The Adams dynasty? The first two incumbent presidents to lose an election?
      - jacquesm 4y ago
        I see significant differences between those. Xi is a dictator in all but name now, that does not hold for the others listed in your comment.
        anonymouskimmer 4y ago
        Oh sure. The US governmental structure doesn't easily allow dictators. And it's much easier for an FDR-like fellow to rewrite the Chinese constitution to allow a dictator than to so rewrite the US one. FDR was probably as close as we got to a Xi like figure, who was able to bend the Supreme court to his will by realistically threatening to pack it.
  - chaostheory 4y ago
    Deng Xiaoping created the seeds of destruction for his reforms when he crushed the peaceful democracy protesters in Tiananmen. This has led to mess after mess with Jiang Zemin, leading eventually to the biggest disaster of them all: Xi In an alternate timeline, one can imagine what a democratic China would look like: - Silicon Valley would have been long overtaken by Shenzhen - Chinese media would have been a strong rival to South Korea’s - the Chinese domestic market would have been opened up to the world long ago - Taiwan would willing reunify with the mainland. There would be no looming war
    - anonymouskimmer 4y ago
      > - Taiwan would willing reunify with the mainland. There would be no looming war From what I've been told the younger Taiwanese tend to see themselves as Taiwanese, not Chinese. If mainland democratization happened early enough, maybe, but I don't see what a small country in Taiwan's position has to gain by merger with a larger one. > - Silicon Valley would have been long overtaken by Shenzhen To the extent the markets were fairly free before Xi's heavy handedness, why didn't this happen yet anyway? Silicon Valley is kind of unique even in the USA. I've read this is because of particularly startup-friendly California laws. Is there reason to believe these startup-friendly laws would have been duplicated in Shenzhen? Or some other reason to believe Shenzhen would have turned into a Silicon Valley rival otherwise? > - the Chinese domestic market would have been opened up to the world long ago Anti-import policies are adopted by democratic countries too.
      - chaostheory 4y ago
        > From what I've been told the younger Taiwanese tend to see themselves as Taiwanese, not Chinese. That was cemented once Xi started being reckless, leading to the end of the one China two systems policy. Prior to Xi, it wasn’t as black and white. > To the extent the markets were fairly free before Xi's heavy handedness, why didn't this happen yet anyway? You just answered your own question. Under authoritarianism, the government can abruptly shutdown the party at any moment for any arbitrary reason. There’s no rule of law that comes with a democracy. Also innovation needs freedom of speech. There is a cost to society and business when you’re constantly having to self censor yourself > Anti-import policies are adopted by democratic countries too. Sure, the EU has a lot of protectionist laws, but they don’t even come close to CCP’s draconian version
  - dirtyid 4y ago
    >incredibly short sighted It's incredibly pragmatic, Chinese system was shit show in the 80s-10s going after easy gains while building up onerous contradictions. A lot of toes needed to be stepped on to do something as basic as military modernization, meanwhile Xi hasn't even aggregated enough political power to pass wide scale property tax. The issue isn't Xi centralizing power, but power was never sufficiently centralized, and in many ways, still isn't.
- noduerme 4y ago
  My grandfather was an old Russian whose views on dealing with USSR boiled down to détante, or in his immortal words, "once they have a pot to piss in, they won't fight..." The flipside to that is, China does now have a pot to piss in, and is far less likely to be kettled into a war over something as stupid as an overabundance of crappy housing.
  - papito 4y ago
    Does this mean "once the people have a normal life, they won't want a war?" I am seeing the opposite. All dictatorships seem to start getting land conquest ideas once they have the resources. There is a direct correlation between Russia's cash reserves and their belligerence, for example. China is becoming one man, just like Russia is Putin, and it's also becoming a less rational actor as the result. Allowing the housing bubble (which seems to have enriched those close to the party), punishing the tech sector for their own success, the completely baffling Zero Covid. At some point it's the dear leader's ego and quest for "legacy", not the economy.
- fmajid 4y ago
  Except if they think there is a significant likelihood they will lose, which would guarantee the downfall of the regime. The Argentinian junta thought the UK would be unable to respond to their invasion of the Falklands (and if they had waited a couple more years, they may well have been right), but I doubt China dismisses the US out of hand, specially after the sobering experience of Russia in Ukraine.
  - selimthegrim 4y ago
    >The Argentinian junta thought the UK would be unable to respond to their invasion of the Falklands (and if they had waited a couple more years, they may well have been right) Because of elections or ships and planes being retired?
    - Kon-Peki 4y ago
      Well, sure, it took quite a while for the British Navy to get there - they didn’t have ships or planes nearby. But the UK economy wasn’t doing well and Margaret Thatcher was very unpopular especially with the working class. I doubt many British people cared that much about the Falklands and wouldn’t have minded if they had let it go. But I think an awful lot of the British, and even Americans and Europeans, were completely shocked that Thatcher would not, under any circumstance, tolerate an invasion of British territory - even unwanted territory! Had the Argentinians waited a few more years, the British may have just given the islands to them.
      - trilbyglens 4y ago
        I believe there was literally a plan in the works to do just that.
    - fmajid 4y ago
      Aircraft carriers that were in the process of being sold off, like HMS Hermes and HMS Invincible.
- 93po 4y ago
  I really wish we wouldn't speculate about China starting a war. It's completely baseless and comes across as some sort of china-man-bad xenophobia.
  - jacquesm 4y ago
    That's entirely on you then. I'm free to notice a pattern between countries led by individuals that are failing economically and what is happening in China and to see a war as one of the possible outcomes. That's - unfortunately - a realistic option, it may not have very high odds but they definitely aren't zero. Internet fora are a place where such speculation will happen and for that to happen the odds are allowed to be a lot lower than those for China at war. And if such speculation turns out to be baseless than so much the better. If you're willing to put up a hard guarantee that this can't possibly happen I'd like to see some hard evidence as to why you believe this to be the case. I'm sure it would make lots of people sleep a lot better.
  - pas 4y ago
    Have you read about this "danger zone" argument? What do you think of it? https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/book-review-danger-zone https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/book-review-danger-zone
  - tasuki 4y ago
    The person you're replying to said this might cause China to start a war. He did not say it was a sure thing, he simply said this is how things often are. In no way was the comment china-man-bad xenophobia.
  - 8note 4y ago
    Baseless? China's policy is reunification. Why xenophobic? America man invaded Iraq on a whim, and Russia man invaded Ukraine after having a policy of reunification Countries are exerting might-is-right
93po 4y ago
It's impossible to take your second "source" seriously since it's a dude that literally went to school to learn war games and worked at a think tank affectionately known as "The Shadow CIA" that effectively profits by pushing a narrative of foreign countries being violent.
LorenPechtel 4y ago
Yeah, I have been watching the mess that's the Chinese real estate market for ages and it's insane. Rent should be something like the mortgage payment on a property--but it's like 10% of a mortgage payment. The government is determined to keep the growth rate up--despite the fact that an advanced economy can't maintain the sort of growth rate developing economy can. The people can see the market is dangerous but allowing the money to flee to safer locations would crash the market and that's unacceptable. Hence things like capital controls. It's not the hardcore efforts to get foreign currency that we saw in the old days, but it's still an issue.

jacquesm 4y ago

And that in turn might cause them to start a war... Because when the regime has nothing to lose all bets are off, even though it makes no sense whatsoever. They will have to distract from their culpability somehow.

andy_ppp 4y ago
The ever centralisation around one man is incredibly short sighted. The Chinese system used to be much more sophisticated, having both a very capitalistic view of the world and a very communistic view. They have completely lost half of that and even the communism will disappear if things start going wrong - all that will be left is maintaining the dictatorship at all costs.
- jacquesm 4y ago
  There is a fair chance of that happening. But: The cult of the individual leader has always been a strong component in China historically. So it wouldn't be a new thing, more a regression to the norm.
  - anonymouskimmer 4y ago
    It's been a strong component the world over. Even in the US we've got exemplars such as George Washington, FDR, and the Adams and Bush dynasties. Democracies as political-individual-leader absent as Switzerland are the exception, not the rule. And the less so for other forms of government.
    - cafard 4y ago
      The Adams dynasty? The first two incumbent presidents to lose an election?
    - jacquesm 4y ago
      I see significant differences between those. Xi is a dictator in all but name now, that does not hold for the others listed in your comment.
      - anonymouskimmer 4y ago
        Oh sure. The US governmental structure doesn't easily allow dictators. And it's much easier for an FDR-like fellow to rewrite the Chinese constitution to allow a dictator than to so rewrite the US one. FDR was probably as close as we got to a Xi like figure, who was able to bend the Supreme court to his will by realistically threatening to pack it.
- chaostheory 4y ago
  Deng Xiaoping created the seeds of destruction for his reforms when he crushed the peaceful democracy protesters in Tiananmen. This has led to mess after mess with Jiang Zemin, leading eventually to the biggest disaster of them all: Xi In an alternate timeline, one can imagine what a democratic China would look like: - Silicon Valley would have been long overtaken by Shenzhen - Chinese media would have been a strong rival to South Korea’s - the Chinese domestic market would have been opened up to the world long ago - Taiwan would willing reunify with the mainland. There would be no looming war
  - anonymouskimmer 4y ago
    > - Taiwan would willing reunify with the mainland. There would be no looming war From what I've been told the younger Taiwanese tend to see themselves as Taiwanese, not Chinese. If mainland democratization happened early enough, maybe, but I don't see what a small country in Taiwan's position has to gain by merger with a larger one. > - Silicon Valley would have been long overtaken by Shenzhen To the extent the markets were fairly free before Xi's heavy handedness, why didn't this happen yet anyway? Silicon Valley is kind of unique even in the USA. I've read this is because of particularly startup-friendly California laws. Is there reason to believe these startup-friendly laws would have been duplicated in Shenzhen? Or some other reason to believe Shenzhen would have turned into a Silicon Valley rival otherwise? > - the Chinese domestic market would have been opened up to the world long ago Anti-import policies are adopted by democratic countries too.
    - chaostheory 4y ago
      > From what I've been told the younger Taiwanese tend to see themselves as Taiwanese, not Chinese. That was cemented once Xi started being reckless, leading to the end of the one China two systems policy. Prior to Xi, it wasn’t as black and white. > To the extent the markets were fairly free before Xi's heavy handedness, why didn't this happen yet anyway? You just answered your own question. Under authoritarianism, the government can abruptly shutdown the party at any moment for any arbitrary reason. There’s no rule of law that comes with a democracy. Also innovation needs freedom of speech. There is a cost to society and business when you’re constantly having to self censor yourself > Anti-import policies are adopted by democratic countries too. Sure, the EU has a lot of protectionist laws, but they don’t even come close to CCP’s draconian version
- dirtyid 4y ago
  >incredibly short sighted It's incredibly pragmatic, Chinese system was shit show in the 80s-10s going after easy gains while building up onerous contradictions. A lot of toes needed to be stepped on to do something as basic as military modernization, meanwhile Xi hasn't even aggregated enough political power to pass wide scale property tax. The issue isn't Xi centralizing power, but power was never sufficiently centralized, and in many ways, still isn't.
noduerme 4y ago
My grandfather was an old Russian whose views on dealing with USSR boiled down to détante, or in his immortal words, "once they have a pot to piss in, they won't fight..." The flipside to that is, China does now have a pot to piss in, and is far less likely to be kettled into a war over something as stupid as an overabundance of crappy housing.
- papito 4y ago
  Does this mean "once the people have a normal life, they won't want a war?" I am seeing the opposite. All dictatorships seem to start getting land conquest ideas once they have the resources. There is a direct correlation between Russia's cash reserves and their belligerence, for example. China is becoming one man, just like Russia is Putin, and it's also becoming a less rational actor as the result. Allowing the housing bubble (which seems to have enriched those close to the party), punishing the tech sector for their own success, the completely baffling Zero Covid. At some point it's the dear leader's ego and quest for "legacy", not the economy.
fmajid 4y ago
Except if they think there is a significant likelihood they will lose, which would guarantee the downfall of the regime. The Argentinian junta thought the UK would be unable to respond to their invasion of the Falklands (and if they had waited a couple more years, they may well have been right), but I doubt China dismisses the US out of hand, specially after the sobering experience of Russia in Ukraine.
- selimthegrim 4y ago
  >The Argentinian junta thought the UK would be unable to respond to their invasion of the Falklands (and if they had waited a couple more years, they may well have been right) Because of elections or ships and planes being retired?
  - Kon-Peki 4y ago
    Well, sure, it took quite a while for the British Navy to get there - they didn’t have ships or planes nearby. But the UK economy wasn’t doing well and Margaret Thatcher was very unpopular especially with the working class. I doubt many British people cared that much about the Falklands and wouldn’t have minded if they had let it go. But I think an awful lot of the British, and even Americans and Europeans, were completely shocked that Thatcher would not, under any circumstance, tolerate an invasion of British territory - even unwanted territory! Had the Argentinians waited a few more years, the British may have just given the islands to them.
    - trilbyglens 4y ago
      I believe there was literally a plan in the works to do just that.
  - fmajid 4y ago
    Aircraft carriers that were in the process of being sold off, like HMS Hermes and HMS Invincible.
93po 4y ago
I really wish we wouldn't speculate about China starting a war. It's completely baseless and comes across as some sort of china-man-bad xenophobia.
- jacquesm 4y ago
  That's entirely on you then. I'm free to notice a pattern between countries led by individuals that are failing economically and what is happening in China and to see a war as one of the possible outcomes. That's - unfortunately - a realistic option, it may not have very high odds but they definitely aren't zero. Internet fora are a place where such speculation will happen and for that to happen the odds are allowed to be a lot lower than those for China at war. And if such speculation turns out to be baseless than so much the better. If you're willing to put up a hard guarantee that this can't possibly happen I'd like to see some hard evidence as to why you believe this to be the case. I'm sure it would make lots of people sleep a lot better.
- pas 4y ago
  Have you read about this "danger zone" argument? What do you think of it? https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/book-review-danger-zone https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/book-review-danger-zone
- tasuki 4y ago
  The person you're replying to said this might cause China to start a war. He did not say it was a sure thing, he simply said this is how things often are. In no way was the comment china-man-bad xenophobia.
- 8note 4y ago
  Baseless? China's policy is reunification. Why xenophobic? America man invaded Iraq on a whim, and Russia man invaded Ukraine after having a policy of reunification Countries are exerting might-is-right

93po 4y ago

It's impossible to take your second "source" seriously since it's a dude that literally went to school to learn war games and worked at a think tank affectionately known as "The Shadow CIA" that effectively profits by pushing a narrative of foreign countries being violent.

LorenPechtel 4y ago

Yeah, I have been watching the mess that's the Chinese real estate market for ages and it's insane. Rent should be something like the mortgage payment on a property--but it's like 10% of a mortgage payment. The government is determined to keep the growth rate up--despite the fact that an advanced economy can't maintain the sort of growth rate developing economy can. The people can see the market is dangerous but allowing the money to flee to safer locations would crash the market and that's unacceptable. Hence things like capital controls. It's not the hardcore efforts to get foreign currency that we saw in the old days, but it's still an issue.