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This was an interesting, if not somewhat exhausting, read. The premise of this article can be succinctly summarized by one of its references to a 19th century t
by CSSer 3y ago
This was an interesting, if not somewhat exhausting, read. The premise of this article can be succinctly summarized by one of its references to a 19th century text:
“Since the introduction of the examination system … scholars have forsaken their studies, peasants their ploughs, artisans their crafts, and merchants their trades; all have turned their attention to but one thing – government office. This is because the official has all the combined advantages of the four without requiring their necessary toil …”
It refers to a very difficult exam that existed for a time in Chinese society that the author feels is analogous to systems re-emerging in Xi’s modern China. I hope someone will correct me if I’m wrong. To be honest, I normally dislike comments like this that just paraphrase the article, but I read most of it and he repeats himself a lot. He could really use an editor to help him be more succinct.
- boomboomsubban 3y agoThe article is ostensibly an advertisement for his book, and the idea of reading the book seems tedious after reading this article. I understand not wanting to spend the time detailing your research showing that China's technological growth lagged after introduction of the Keju in a teaser article. Repeating "I found this data, it supports my conclusion, and China's doing the same thing today" isn't a good alternative. Maybe the book has a better editor.
- CSSer 3y agoYeah, I think similarly the most difficult aspect for me was its lack of focused instrumentation for its points. He mentions Gao Kao briefly but never revisits it again. Towards the end of the article, he mentions the U.S. systems. Most of the article just harps on Keju to the point that I felt it would’ve been better served if it were just a historical summary rather than a piece with an unclear agenda. I’m not crying propaganda either. I just mean I’m not sure there’s enough here to even know what he’s really trying to say. Perhaps he’s afraid of openly criticising these systems too?
- boomboomsubban 3y agoHe's pushing his book. It's "buy now for the full picture!" Only his way of displaying a partial picture makes me hesitant to labor through the full picture.
- visarga 3y ago> somewhat exhausting read I rely a lot on TTS screen readers, especially for longer articles. Listening and reading at the same time somehow makes my focus much sharper. Or I can just relax my eyes and listen.
- simonebrunozzi 3y agoA good use of current GPT-like tools could be to: 1. transform a long and repetitive test into a shorter one, and/or 2. analyze an article or a webpage and give us a "score" that represents how well or not well it has been edited. We shouldn' rely on someone like you to read the entire article and tell others that it's repetitive, and therefore boring to read in its entirety.
- konschubert 3y agoWhat is the proposed mechanism? The exam being difficult in an itself surely isn’t the thing that’s creating the draw?
- boomboomsubban 3y agoHuh? If you're asking why people took the Keju, passing it got you a prestigious job in the Chinese bureaucracy.
- icegreentea2 3y agoWithin the excerpt, I don't think its fair to say that the author is claiming that modern descendants of keju (Gao Kao and the modern civil service exam) are responsible for the authoritarian tendencies of the modern Chinese state. Rather, the author argues that the keju baked in centuries of authoritarian tendencies into Chinese... inertia? culture? I want to say society, but one of the author's arguments is that keju effectively neutered the growth of Chinese society, by channeling nearly all the excess energy of the Chinese population into the state. I would add to your premise summary "keju helped (allowed? permitted? enabled?) the Chinese state to dominate Chinese society".
- CSSer 3y agoIt’s funny because I see what you’re saying but I was caught on the same points you question here. I don’t really know. I suppose my takeaway is that there was interesting standardized test in Chinese history and leave it at that.
- seanmcdirmid 3y agoThankfully the Chinese state would occasionally fall, creating turnover in entrenched practices. The Ming dynasty would be very different from the Qing. Unfortunately, both dynasties lasted a very long time.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- ssnistfajen 3y agoGao Kao in its present form hasn't really changed much since 1978. Xi was still an university student in that year. So I don't see the point of blaming Gao Kao for making the country slip back into incompetent autocracy when the glaring problem is the lack of checks and balances to prevent an incompetent person from obtaining unchallengable absolute power. Checks and balances can exist in non-democratic systems too, it's about the design not the principle.