Feature
The World of Market Authoritarianism
China’s winning model is leaving the U.S. and the West increasingly isolated. Our October issue’s cover story.
In September 1972 President Richard Nixon played the China card. It was a brilliant gambit; in one stroke he opened U.S. relations with Communist China and chilled Beijing’s relations with Moscow.
The succeeding four decades saw the Soviet system collapse and China emerge from the fanaticism of the Cultural Revolution (1966–76) to become the global power it is today. Along the way, China has mounted a formidable challenge to U.S. economic and military pre-eminence. But more serious is China’s challenge to the ideas that have informed Western progress for 300 years, and which now provide the foundation for Western dominance in global affairs.
Today the elegance of Nixon’s strategic vision has gone missing.
Gangs and Grand Scenarios
When Hillary Rodham Clinton appeared before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee as the administration’s nominee to be secretary of state, the confirmation hearing produced a transcript of more than 53,000 words. It covered a long list of pressing issues: the global financial crisis; terrorism; nuclear proliferation; the intractable Arab-Israeli conflict; climate change; plans for withdrawing troops from Iraq and rooting out al Qaeda in Afghanistan. In this extended congressional exchange, one major issue was barely mentioned. As a subject in itself, China accounted for a total of six sentences.
Clinton’s Senate hearing highlights another aspect of the China challenge. Beyond Olympic games and occasional headline grabbers like violent protest in Tibet, China is often ignored or skipped over by American politicians and opinion writers, unless you belong to one of Washington’s designated “China-gangs.”
Former Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger makes the point that the American China debate is globulated and divided into separate lobbies and single-issue groups. Each group is concerned with a specific part of the China question: Chinese military development, trade and labor issues, human rights, technology transfer, intellectual property rights violations, or business opportunities and the benefits of commercial engagement.
These groups proceed along largely separate lines. But taken together, they create a China debate dominated by competing sets of grand scenarios, such as “China is coming to get us,” “China is coming to buy us,” or “China is coming to join us.” In turn, these scenarios create camps of “panda-huggers,” who tend to preach the virtues of commercial engagement and the inevitability of Western-style democracy in Asia, and “panda-bashers,” who warn of a menacing China threat in various guises.
The reality, however, is that the China story defies these kinds of scenarios. The nature of the China challenge is such that no single group has the answer—or even a complete definition of the problem. The Chinese are our economic partners. But they are also our political rivals. Thirty years of successful market reforms indicate that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is not about to crumble. But neither is it melting into democracy. China has survived the global demise of Communism to become the world’s most powerful rising power. Yet it has neither confronted the U.S.-led system nor gradually conformed to its worldview in the two decades since Soviet collapse.
The China Threat…
America and the West face a very serious challenge from the East, but not in terms of the conventional definitions of the China threat. Over the past two decades, U.S. analysts have viewed China’s actions in the Taiwan Straits and South China Sea, the purchase of U.S. Treasury debt, and the hugely unfavorable trade balance with varying degrees of concern. We must ask, however, if these pose China’s most serious challenge to American security—or if the more serious challenge from China arises in a different dimension.
The Military Threat: Many in the national security community and beyond have been concerned about China’s dramatic military modernization, warning that China is catching up with America’s military lead in ways that may soon challenge American military supremacy in the Western Pacific and, possibly, elsewhere.
What’s more, the speed and degree of Chinese military modernization has increased in tandem with its emergence as a global economic player. Rapid economic growth has provided the hard currency to expand a range of military programs, and research and development, without leaving gaping holes in the broader national budget.
The overall budget for the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), for example, has doubled in recent years, from $27.9 billion in 2000 to $60.1 billion in 2008. The Pentagon, moreover, estimates that in terms of actual military expenditures, total military-related spending for 2008 was more likely between $105 billion and $150 billion.
It is clear, then, that Beijing takes the question of military modernization very seriously. Fast-paced development can be seen in the acquisition of submarine and space capabilities as well as cyberspace.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (90) | Leave a comment
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Paul Crowley| 10.2.09 @ 7:29AM
"The overall budget for the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), for example, has doubled in recent years, from $27.9 billion in 2000 to $60.1 billion in 2008.
Pentagon, moreover, estimates that in terms of actual military expenditures, total military-related spending for 2008 was more likely between $105 billion and $150 billion." [Stefan Halper]
The Department of Defense (A.K.A. "The Pentagon") is certainly the government agency with the people with the expertise to recognize this sort of creative accounting (the difference in what's listed as being spent in budget reports and what is actually spent by a country on military development).
Alan Brooks| 10.4.09 @ 4:18PM
You wouldn't want a one way ticket to China-- that is for sure.
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Paul Crowley| 10.2.09 @ 7:45AM
The official base budget for the U.S. Department of "Defense in 2009 was $515.4 billion. . . Behind this is another $70.0 billion in “emergency allowance” to support “activities related to the Global War on Terror into 2009.” [Stefan Halper]
So what does the adjusted direction of American resources to military development sum to, using the same standards to make the estimate of the Chinese budget numbers?
Then factor in the difference in the bloc of countries with China and those in the American-Anglo-French bloc.
Yeah, we got the British Commonwealth countries, the French Union countries, the Dutch and their satellites, the Portuguese remnants (now being absorbed by the Brits), the European Union, a good bit of eastern Europe, and Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan, and most of the SEATO countries, but, hey, the PRC still has North Korea!
I hope that this grim realization properly turns ones blood cold, and leaves one suitably trembling. . . Why some of the men sounding the alarms about the PRC, might just be compelled to wet their panties.
Paul Crowley| 10.2.09 @ 7:52AM
"It is clear, then, that Beijing takes the question of military modernization very seriously." [Stefan Halper]
I'm no supporter of Red China, but I'm not a lunatic either.
Given the propaganda from "The West" and the developments of the past eight years, especially American in the past seven, then it damn sure better.
Paul Crowley| 10.2.09 @ 7:57AM
There's also "The East:" The Russians potentially up to their old double-dealing ways, should be motive also.
And there's the Five Great Powers of the world, the U.S.A., Britain, France, Russian and China.
What a great deal; a real sweet "kinder, gentler, new world order," no? And to think all of this has developed in a mere 20 years' time this year!
Paul Crowley| 10.2.09 @ 8:17AM
U.S. reliance on communications and intelligence technology. [Stefan Halper]
I.e. The global Command and Control infrastructure (satellite, submarine cable, closed-circuit, broadcast. . . and high speed digital computers, at the heart) that allow the armed forces of the American-Anglo-French bloc countries the capability of unified military operations, rather than being limited to only an older-fashioned Division of Labor basis only.
The new regulation, on a global basis, being developed via the G-20, should aid in tying together industrial production and logistics capababilities of the bloc (blocs, from the looks of things with the Russians).
Galen| 10.2.09 @ 9:53AM
China has masked its intentions toward the West since the 16th century. If anyone says he understands China he should be sent home at once!
Ken (Old Texican)| 10.2.09 @ 9:59AM
Mr. Halper
Thank you for a splendid analysis all across the board regarding China.
A couple of thoughts:
1. Our own country is sliding toward authoritarianism, economically, and politically.
2. You may have used the word "compete" but I did not pick up on it. Across the board we are in competition with the Chinese, and free men are intrinsically much more productive than slave labor in China.
3.Old Chinese proverb: Think not what your opposition MIGHT do, but rather what they CAN do, and plan, (and compete), accordingly.
4. old American proverb: If you owe the bank ten thousand dollars, the bank can bankrupt you. If you owe the bank ten million dollars, you can destroy the bank.
So, the trick is to fire all our communists in congress, get our own house in order, and re-industrialize our country. We can still be the engine that runs the world.
Thank you
Bob Miller| 10.2.09 @ 10:08AM
The decline of the US vs. China is being accelerated by Obama and the Congress. Some of this reflects incompetence, but some reflects design. Democrats in Washington seem much more comfortable with any other country's hegemony than they are with ours, all the more so when the other country is socialist.
SHIPCHIEF| 10.2.09 @ 12:38PM
I found the article generally believable, with the exception of assumptions about our liberal capitalist economy.
Our economy is so choked with regulation and tax that it is no longer the economic model for developing nations. Our political class places such onerous burdens and changes the buisness landscape so fast that capitalizing anything is risky. Add the national debt and falling dollar, US leaders don't look like responsible stewards of our political-economic model.
Authoritarian capitalism looks more stable from an investment point of view because the US election cycle can cause a sea change in rules that a more stable 'One rule" goverment shouldn't experience.
John II| 10.2.09 @ 1:38PM
Several years ago, when Robert Nisbet (as I recall) pointed out that you can't have democracy without capitalism, he was hooted at by the logically challenged Left, who pointed to such authoritarian arrangements as capitalist Singapore in smug refutation.
Of course, the airhead socialists who mocked Nisbet had never learned the elementary logical distinction between a sufficient condition and a necessary condition. (And I also recall their response to being so informed: glazed eyes.)
Though it's true that you can't have a real democracy outside of a market economy, the opposite isn't the case. A quick kudos to Mr. Halper for showing how China's touted economic advance should not be interpreted as the prelude to socio-political enlightenment--a canard I've heard more times than I have fingers and toes to count.
We all need to remember, I think, that, historically, the preference of every culture's busybodies has always been for autocracy--and the tendency of those living under the heels of the busybodies has been to relinquish personal responsibility in exchange for an imagined security.
In other words, the liberal Democrats really ARE on the side of history in their efforts to squash the American experiment.
Alan Brooks| 10.2.09 @ 1:42PM
"We must ask, however, if these pose China’s most serious challenge to American security—or if the more serious challenge from China arises in a different dimension.
The Military Threat: "
Gosh, no foolin'? Golly gee whiz, we never would have guessed; all those thousands of WMDs the chinese possess-- and what with how undemocratic the Chinese are.
Heavens to Betsy.
SHIPCHIEF| 10.2.09 @ 5:31PM
Sun Tzu, in The Art of War, would rank a shooting war as nearly outright failure.
Much better to buy us with our own debt and investment money, and leave us grateful for the new more stable government.
And careful not to cause trouble so we can keep our jobs.....
Serge from Wellington| 10.2.09 @ 7:17PM
It's funny to see how almost everybody here - including the article's author - continues to evaluate the lack of democracy in Chinese society in purely Western terms.
But Chinese civilization isn't a Western one. Contemporary mandarins are successfully getting rid of the intentional ignorance of the Cultural Revolution and the ignorant Soviet Commissar style . The most important development there is the return of a bureaucrat versed in tradtional Chinese culture and values on which the only world's nation with 5 thousand years of uninterrupted history is based.
The Confucian duty to obey isn't forcibly imposed on 1.3 billion Chinese - it is an integral part of this basis. In accordance to Mr. Halper, the Chinese authorities were afraid of the ideas formulated by Obama in his "important" Cairo speech... but I don't think so, because the said ideas are as alien to their subjects as they are unacceptable to them.
Since their indigenous system worked for the Chinese for few thousand years, why would they be eager to replace it with the Western (or any, for that matter) one? I mean, if it ain't broke, don't fix it, right?
Alan Brooks| 10.4.09 @ 4:12PM
But you wouldn't live there if they paid you to.
Buzz of the Orient| 10.6.09 @ 12:54AM
Ah, but I am a Westerner who has been paid to live here, and I am much more comfortable than I would have been in the West. Your comment cannot have universal application.
John II| 10.2.09 @ 8:14PM
"Since their indigenous system worked for the Chinese for few thousand years, why would they be eager to replace it with the Western (or any, for that matter) one? I mean, if it ain't broke, don't fix it, right?"
Well, it remains to be seen whether the cultural influence of the West will take hold in any deep way, but the West has already taken over the Chinese imagination in every conceivable technical way, from televisions to tanks to nuclear submarines to international trade to blue jeans and Scotch.
Perhaps all that is because their "indigenous system" only worked for the privileged classes of China--not "for the Chinese." Communism is a Western import too, remember? And murder is a universal preoccupation of the species.
But I presume that when you say "1.3 billion Chinese," Chinese Christians and Chinese dissidents and Chinese occupants of the Chinese gulag and the Chinese riffraff that crowded Tiananmen Square in 1989 don't count. If not, I'm wondering if you can give an exact number to subtract from 1.3 billion, since you appear to know what's going on in the hearts of "the Chinese."
Serge from Wellington| 10.3.09 @ 7:56AM
But I presume that... don't count.
Yes, they do. They're also Chinese, as well as anyone there wearing blue jeans and a mobile telephone clipped on the belt.
The whole Muslim world uses these Western attributes, the whole Russia, Africa, South East Asia... so what? It doesn't change their mentality, doesn't amend their cultural roots.
More over: societies totally failed economically have much better chances to really adopt Western ideas as a foundation for building prosperity. China overcomes poverty amazingly quickly, it is a global power house; her traditional ideas are so ancient and deeply ingrained in people's minds that I cannot see why would they shopping around for some vogue alien theories.
Communism is a Western import too, remember?
Exactly. Their unfortunate experience with this Western import would prevent them from experimenting with the rest of the merchandise.
Serge from Wellington| 10.3.09 @ 8:08AM
And something else: Chinese do not deem Western thought and ideas haute. The most innovative and sophisticated philosophic notions of the West were developed by Chinese thinkers as long ago as in the 4th century AD. Why would they borrow from barbarians?
Pingback| 10.2.09 @ 8:22PM
The American Spectator : The World of Market Authoritarianism « Noya Khobor links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Pingback| 10.2.09 @ 9:09PM
The American Spectator : The World of Market Authoritarianism | kozmom news links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
SHIPCHIEF| 10.2.09 @ 10:57PM
China is entering fast flux.
The 'mandarins' as you put it are trying to keep the lid on a pot that was never totally covered even during the great cultural revolution.
China IS different. Controlled Capitalism will change China in many ways, including increases in civil liberties.
It won't happen in any way recognizable in a past model. Chinese citizens emerging into the 1st world don't embrace us. They seek their own identity and work with their own system.
Although they are building a large military, I don't hear that they are changing their birth policy to create a sustainable army for world conquest.
They have the formula for economic competition-to-victory that the US could have used to buy the world in the 1960's.
Maybe they have the will to give it a try?
Paul Crowley| 10.3.09 @ 12:25AM
"China has masked its intentions toward the West since the 16th century." [Galen 10.2.09 @ 9:53AM]
LOL!!!
Paul Crowley| 10.3.09 @ 12:44AM
" 'The Military Threat:' . . . Gosh, no foolin'? Golly gee whiz, we never would have guessed; all those thousands of WMDs the chinese possess-- and what with how undemocratic the Chinese are.
Heavens to Betsy." [Alan Brooks| 10.2.09 @ 1:42PM]
Hi Alan:
No doubt, the Chinese probably do posssess thousands of weapons that could fall under the extremely broad heading of "WMD."
Pared down to medium and long-range nukes, then the number drops to under 500, relative to our couple-and-a-half thousand.
And we (the American-Anglo-French bloc) have the global missile battery, and China does not.
After the beginning of an initital exchange of nukes begins, then it can only last as long the capacity of the smallest magazine.
The "our" is only the U.S.A. I'm not counting the arsenals of the other Great Power Countries, the British, French or Russians.
Other than the British Commonwealth countries, India and Pakistan, where in the former there's at least evidence, then I don't count the bit-size satellites either, especially the Israelis, North Korea, or Iran.
Whether the Israelis, North Korea, or Iran even have nukes, then who knows? It's not clear at all (except to those people who Know such things, without knowing anything whatsoever to back their supposed knowing up with. Knowing without knowledge. It's an intrinsic attribute of countless millions of people who now make up Modern Mankind at this point in time).
Alan Brooks| 10.4.09 @ 4:15PM
oh, in that case then they're doing better than we thought they were.
Paul Crowley| 10.3.09 @ 1:25AM
“But Chinese civilization isn't a Western one. . .” [Serge from Wellington| 10.2.09 @ 7:17PM]
The rot about Chinese culture in Halper’s political essay is bad enough, but grows to the peaks of the absurd in some of these comments.
“John II,” who seems to fancy himself as what Alan Brookes dubbed an “intelleckshuel” back in April, quotes “Serge from Wellington,” and first expresses qualified agreement (“Well, it remains to be seen whether the cultural influence of the West will take hold in any deep way”), but then contradicts himself with his sound observation that “Communism is a Western import too, remember?”
Marxism certainly is, since Marx' Communist Manifesto was written in English, issued in Britain, and is a synthesis of elements of modern German philosophy, British economics, British & French communist movements of about 1825-40, and a heavy dose of historical determinism.
Galen’s comment ("China has masked its intentions toward the West since the 16th century.") [Galen 10.2.09 @ 9:53AM], might at first seem tough to beat, but the most Idiotic of the Lot Award still has to go to Serge from Wellington: “Since their indigenous system worked for the Chinese for few thousand years, why would they be eager to replace it with the Western (or any, for that matter) one? I mean, if it ain't broke, don't fix it, right?"
Yep. If the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was good enough for Confucius (circa 551-479 B.C.), then it should be good enough for the 21st Century Chinese too!
Serge from Wellington| 10.3.09 @ 8:41AM
Paul, instead of naming you for a well deserved Bouffons' Prize I'ii try to explane what you failed to grasp.
China as a state exists since 1989 BC, or almost 4 millenia, of which 2.5 thousand years on the ideological basis of Confucianism. Her fling with some sort of Communism, quite different from Marx's invention, was a mere... fling. And the Confucian principles remained valid even for the members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
Well, do you still insist to receive your tinfoil crown?
John II| 10.3.09 @ 1:08PM
Er . . . I think I'd prefer henceforth to stay out of this, but I can't help pointing out that there's no contradiction between my opening remark to Wellington and my passing remark regarding Communism as import. As an example of a sure-enough immanent contradiction on the order of, say, the skeptic who declares his skepticism with certainty, we have Paul's know-it-all condemnation of know-it-alls.
And no, I don't consider myself an intellectual. I don't much like intellectuals of my acquaintance--they tend to be smug know-it-alls with little apparent in the world around them. My only claim for now would be that I seem to be able to think and write more clearly than Paul.
In any event, if I'm at all to blame for Paul's cataract, which starts about here and cascades on and on below, I apologize to everyone, including Paul.
RW Exterminator| 10.4.09 @ 1:31PM
No matter what you say, Crowley, You're still one fry short of a Happy Meal.
Paul Crowley| 10.3.09 @ 1:58AM
“its colossal thirty-year transformation” [Stefan Halper ].
Just to keep this in perspective.
There’s no small touch of the anachronous (making something sound older than it is) in this statement also.
One can date the reforms to 1979, if he wishes, or even a few years earlier.
No question that the reforms, circa 1976-92, laid the foundation for what followed.
However, the term “colossal” applied to the People’s Republic of China, properly only belongs to the last 15 years.
Chinese exports did not begin to soar until 1994.
It was not only due to Chinese reforms.
As recently as 1992: Walmart was still blaring its Buy American campaign, Charles Krauthammer, was still sounding the alarm about the Japanese economic conquest of America, and some others, such as Friedman, were predicting a coming war with Japan and speculating on whether Japan wouldn’t swallow the PRC economically, reducing China to a colonial-like supplier of raw materials, and source of cheap manpower for Japanese industries (to be developed in China).
Chinese exports did not begin to soar until 1994.
The colossal transformation” has been the past 15 years.
It was not only due to Chinese reforms.
China, and this current situation, has “Made in the West” (as “West” has now become: the American-Anglo-French bloc, with help from Russia), written all over it.
Paul Crowley| 10.3.09 @ 2:04AM
To be clear (since my phrasing wasn't):
Friedman's book was predicting, and purporting to demonstrate the inevitability of, a second American-Japanesae War.
Style-wise, Friedman's analysis was a variation of what Halper is doing here with China.
Paul Crowley| 10.3.09 @ 2:31AM
“So, the trick is to fire all our communists in congress, get our own house in order, and re-industrialize our country. We can still be the engine that runs the world.” [Ken (Old Texican)| 10.2.09 @ 9:59AM]
The American government doesn’t need the advice of a comment poster on American Spectator, especially one who does so via nothing more substantial than a quasi-cartoon character (e.g. “Old Texican”).
Even if it did, then this is redundant advice.
There is already a re-industrializing taking place in the U.S.A. The “free men” who are at the top of it, include some Americans, but also British, Dutch, French, Russian, Saudi, Japanese, Indian, and Brazilian, among a few others.
Sorry if the ad hominem is a bit rough. However, as an old New Mexican, who has known, and worked with, plenty of old Texans all of my life, and is now a resident of Texas, I recognize a Cartoon (caricature if one prefers) when I see it.
RW Exterminator| 10.4.09 @ 1:28PM
"The American government doesn’t need the advice of a comment poster on American Spectator, especially one who does so via nothing more substantial than a quasi-cartoon character (e.g. “Old Texican”)."
Hey Crowley--
Did you just eat an encyclopedia for breakfast and you're burping it up all day? Old Tex has one thing you ain't got and that's INTEGRITY. You old geezer. All the intelligence in the world don't matter a hill of beans if you don't have the spine to back it up.
Paul Crowley| 10.3.09 @ 3:21AM
“China National Offshore Oil Corporation, which attempted to purchase the U.S. oil firm UNOCAL in 2005 before it was blocked by Congress. Critics have argued that Chinese ownership of important U.S. economic assets would present a serious national security threat.” [Stefan Halper]
Beyond Halper’s verbal verbosity in describing the design focus of Chinese military development, which can be much more clearly and concisely described as National Self Defense (what used to be an American principle, prior to about seven years ago), then such as the above points to a VERY Key Element of the current situation.
The People’s Republic of China is the only one of the Five Great Powers that is not allowed to own Real Property in the U.S.A.
Chinese investment is limited to purchases of American electronic capital, as listed sufficiently well by Halper.
This does not apply to any of the other Great Powers, or their satellites, British, French, or, now, Russian.
Britain, France, Russia, and their satellites, including the so-called BRIC countries, do not have the same restrictions placed against them as China does.
This is why the Cartoon, in his cartoonish manner, could type:
"old American proverb: If you owe the bank ten thousand dollars, the bank can bankrupt you. If you owe the bank ten million dollars, you can destroy the bank.”
One of the columnists at Weekly Standard, left out the cornball 'old proverb' stuff and simply stated it as:
“If you owe the bank a million dollars, then the bank owns you. If you owe the bank a billion dollars, then you own the bank.”
In my own words, so as to be clearer than either the Cartoon or the columnist:
We (the American-Anglo-French bloc) have the Real Property; China does not.
This, and the joint military superiority, is what gives the American-Anglo-French bloc its economic clout over China, and why the charges of China owning America due its large reserves of electronic currency, are false. It places China into a far more exposed position at present, than it does any of the countries of this bloc of countries.
So the charge of “Market Authoritarianism,” and just precisely who is actually engaged in such a thing, is obviously itself debatable.
In case it hasn’t sunk in, then “West,” as used by men like Halper, includes Saudi Arabia, Japan, South Korea and a number of other Asian and African countries.
The alarm about alleged economic aggression by China is not new. The late Admiral Tom Moorer laid a good many foundations before he died (most of rubbish).
No alarm over British, French, and now Russian, “economic aggression,” as they and their satellites buy up the remnants of one-time American-owned companies of one-time American domestic industries.
(Except for the hullaballo about Russia, a few years back, in the Caucusus, during the color Revolutions, at the very time that its corporations were entering the U.S.A.).
Since petroleum is an especial favorite to focus on, and the example given by Halper, then I’ll point out that the Brits (Canadians), as is true of so many American minerals reserves across the U.S.A., own no small portion of the oil reserves in Texas.
Saudi Refining, doesn’t face the same opposition as the CNOOC.
The Saudis have had ownership of American refining, distribution and marketing systems, since at least 1989. The Saudis, with the British and the Dutch, are now modernizing the one-time Texaco plant (original the Port Arthur Works of the Texas Company) in Port Arthur, TX, into the largest oil refinery in the U.S.A. Motiva Enterprises, L.L.C., a “Delaware Corporation.”
Serge from Wellington| 10.3.09 @ 6:41PM
Too many words and characters, Paul! And one persistent delusion: you continue to include Russia among the Great Powers where she doesn't belong. Russia has one commodity (oil/gas) based economy, and the revenues from suppying it to the West do not trickle down to the populace even in the manner they do in the Arab Gulf states. Democracy in Western sense of the word exists there even less than in China - the mob (synonym: KGB) runs that country. What is great about it, except a pile of rusted nukes?
Confucius | 10.4.09 @ 2:18PM
Confucius say: Me confused what Mr. Crowley try to say.
Pingback| 10.3.09 @ 6:39AM
Twitter Trackbacks for The American Spectator : The World of Market Authoritarianism links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
SHIPCHIEF| 10.3.09 @ 11:50AM
Foreign ownership of American domestic oil and refinerys might be a reason that T Boone Pickens is hawking Natural gas?
Ken (Old Texican)| 10.3.09 @ 11:53AM
WoW, thanks, Paul. A very nice compliment!
I am genuinely flattered and honored. I have always thought political cartoons rammed a simple message home better than reams of words.
...And caricatures along With cartoons are even more powerful. Again, thank you. No pain inflicted.
I am a fifth generation Texan. My folks were here during the Texas Republic era, hence my appellation "Texican" is derived from that long term cultural background.
Nevertheless, I'm glad you caught the joke.
I have not seen your name, or at least comments under that name, here before. So, what is with the data-dump here? If comments here are so meaningless, did you simply drop in with some copy/pastes from another "important" venue?
You can find one of my best recent articles at
http://judgeroy.wordpress.com
Yosemeti Sam| 10.3.09 @ 12:02PM
" ... Former Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger makes the point that the American China debate is globulated and divided into separate lobbies and single-issue groups. Each group is concerned with a specific part of the China question: Chinese military development, trade and labor issues, human rights, technology transfer, intellectual property rights violations, or business opportunities and the benefits of commercial engagement...."
Oh - the humanity.
The tribulations of Communism - in elegantly
according their controlled populace according
to their disparate needs; save true freedom
from slavish oppressions - are you attuned
Mrs. Barack Hussein Obama?
john lockwood| 10.4.09 @ 8:00AM
Let's not forget that Taiwan shows how the people of China can indeed fit together their ancient culture with democracy. If Taiwan can do it, the mainland could do it---if they were permitted to.
JD| 10.4.09 @ 8:48AM
China has been Confucious for 2000 years and didn't succeed. It is only their embrace of capitalism that has worked. It is simply folly to say that this means the death of capitalism. And by the way the majority of Chinese still are agrarian by way of ox carts and hand labor. The Chinese "threat" is overblown. Truth is they are the next growth industry and we can benefit from their success.
Pingback| 10.4.09 @ 10:45AM
Maher & Garofalo – Leaders of the DEM Party, Say You are all RACISTS! hahaha « Voting links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Paul Crowley| 10.4.09 @ 4:36PM
"And one persistent delusion: include Russia among the Great Powers where she doesn't belong." [Serge from Wellington| 10.3.09 @ 6:41PM]
Hi Serge:
There’s no delusion.
There are five Great Powers.
The U.S.A., Britain, France, Russia and China.
They were established in 1945.
Unlike 1945, four of the five really are Great Powers, including Russia.
In 1945, four of the five had to be rebuilt, or built, up into Great Power stature (Britain, Russia, France and China).
These are the countries with permanent seats and veto on the U.N. Security Council.
This hasn't changed, even though lesserling states are being broken in on a rotating basis.
Russia is more of a power today than it was in 1945.
Britain, since its reforms, is stronger now than it was in 1945.
France at the time was essentially an honorary Great Power, since it still had only a provisional government, and a great mess to deal with. It's vastly much stronger now then it was then also.
China, due to its economic and military weakness after eight years of war, and the period circa 1830-37, that preceded it, and impending civil war in the north, was also effectively an honorary Great Power.
China is in many ways the most interesting of the five.
In its de jure status, it remained merely an honorary Great Power through to the 1970s. Militarily it was the only the Great Power without nuclear weapons. In General, China has only begun to really LOOK like a Great Power since about 1994.
What constitutes "China" has been consistent (albeit conistently vague) since the American and British change in 1943, when Formosa, and some other territories, were ceased to be recognized as soveriegn territories of Japan by the U.S.A., Britain, the Free French Government, and the Republic of China, and were de jure ceded to China.
The de jure government of the whole of China was that of the Republic of China, with its capitol in Tapei, from 1943 until it was displaced by the government of the People’s Republic of China P.R.C.), with its capitol in Beijing, in the U.N. Effectively an informal American recognition.
The formal recognition by the U.S.A. followed with formal recognition of the P.R.C. as the de jure government of China on 1 January 1979.
The combination of consistency and inconsistency, on the part of the U.N., and the U.S.A., has resulted in a confusing situation and requires some clarity in semantics, with the word Chinese.
For instance, some Chinese are allowed to own real property in the U.S.A. Those from the Republic of China (Taiwan).
Formosa (Taiwan) continues to be recognized as sovereign territory of China by the U.S.A., as it has been since 1943.
Since 1 January 1979, the de jure government of China has been recognized by the U.S.A., as being that of the P.R.C. That was a major change.
Taiwan’s status as a territory of China was publicly reiterated by President G.W. Bush.
Obviously it makes for a confusing situation.
It’s an obvious factor why the Formosa Strait remains one of the many potential flash points in Asia.
It’s why its status now is different in kind from the Formosa Strait Crises of 1954-64, or the patrols through to 1979, which Halper mentions, but doesn’t say why.
The situation becomes all the more confused since Japan has claimed the Formosa Strait as part of its defense region, just a few years ago.
There’s also the problem of what precisely is mainland China?”
“China” was not clearly demarcated back in 1945, hence the many border and maritime disputes with Russia, Britain and France (subsequently inherited by India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, ex East Pakistan, Burma, now Myanmar, and Vietnam). The Sino-Russian dispute was just settled. The Sino-Pakistan disputes were settled about five decades ago, and led to another Indian-Pakistan dispute. The Indian-Pakistan and Sino-Indian disputes are ongoing. Border disputes and the question of greater China is the reason for the situation of the government of the Republic of China siding with the government of the People’s Republic of China, neither of which recognized the existence of the other, against Britain and the U.S.A., back during the Sino-Indian border war in 1962.
Some things have not changed at all since 1943 and some things have changed a great deal since 1 January 1979. More so than merely us Americans being able to purchase goods manufactured in the P.R.C., which we were forbidden to do prior to that time. The British Crown Colony of Hong Kong and Portuguese Macao were major export ports for Red China during the Cold War. Prior to 1979, P.R.C.
manufactures purchased in Hong Kong by Americans were seized by customs (or the military) as contraband.
We may not have understood why the Brits were selling goods manufactured in Red China, but at least it was understandable why we were patrolling the Formosa Strait. That changed since 1979. It's all the more obscure since the Japanese Maritime and Air Self Defensea Forces (i.e the Japanese navy and air force) have taken over the lion's share of the work and returned to patrolling what was the Empire's (f. 1867) old maritime dominion (circa 1894-1945).
At any rate, there are five Great Powers: The U.S.A., Britain, France, Russia and China.
They were formally established in San Francisco, California, in April 1945.
P.S. Regardless of the Confucian theme, popularized in the past seven years, and the many Confucian institutes popping up on the P.R.C., your comment, “Since their indigenous system worked for the Chinese for few thousand years, why would they be eager to replace it with the Western (or any, for that matter) one? I mean, if it ain't broke, don't fix it, right?" still gets the Most Idiotic of the Lot Award of the above comments on "Chinese culture."
RW Exterminator| 10.4.09 @ 4:53PM
Oh look, more encyclopedic cuts & pastes. Wowee we're so impressed. (not!)
Serge from Wellington| 10.5.09 @ 6:33AM
Yes, Russia was a real Great Power back in 1945, with military (though not economic) ability to match other Great Powers.
Now she is a honorary member of the club - more of a Great Bully than a Great Power. Her military is in tatters, her population impoverished, her economy is a raw material appendage of Western Europe, and her veto in the UN Security Council is used mainly for the advantage of rogue countries like Iran, North Korea and Venezuaela.
The Half-Muslim Republic of France continue to be the realm of Cheese Eating Surrender Monkeys, as it was in 1940 and up to 1945. Another honorary member, eh?
Britain has properly dropped the adjective "Great" from her name... so why to consider it a fully great power?
This leaves us with two really Great Powers: the U.S.A. and China. (However, a lot of people refer to the U.S.A. as a sole Great Power.)
As to the organization established in April 1945 under the stromg influence of some KGB agents (like Alger Hiss, Secretary General of the San Francisco Conference ) , it's time to disband the talk shop for dictators and crook international bureaucrats. Or, until it happens, at least not to refer to it as the source of final truth.
And thank you for the Award. I plan to print it out and frame - together with your epoch-making statement that two millenia old Confucian doctrine 'became popular in the past seven years'.
Is there an accolade adequate to this stunning discovery? I don't think so...
Paul Crowley| 10.4.09 @ 4:45PM
“WoW, thanks, Paul. A very nice compliment!
I am genuinely flattered and honored. I have always thought political cartoons rammed a simple message home better than reams of words.” [Ken (Old Texican)| 10.3.09 @ 11:53AM]
Hi Ken:
For nothing; you’re welcome.
But, obviously it wasn’t mean as a compliment and my statement had absolutely nothing to do with the context of political cartoons, since it’s your nick and the words in your comments here on American Spectator that it was based on.
Unless there are two people posting as “Old Texican,” and I've confused you with another?
If so, then I may owe you an apology.
If not, then I don’t.
RW Exterminator| 10.4.09 @ 4:55PM
Mr. Crowley is such a nice man. He knows how to insult, and then how to insult again. Class, real class. Mr. Crowley was born free in this forum, and will stay free.
Paul Crowley| 10.4.09 @ 5:14PM
Actually, what's most striking about Halper's polemic, presented in the form of analysis, is not so much how he defines present Chinese culture, or redefines capitalism, historically, but it is how he redefines American (USian now?) culture.
Friedman employed the same style in his book, that Halper, does in this essay: Polemic, presented as analysis. He also did the same thing with Japan, casting Japan as having a unique, and foreign, form of Japanese capitalism (which it wasn't). His rationalionizations of why it wasn't really monopoly capitalism were painful to read in places.
However, Freidman did not redefine American culture, or go so far as to link democracy with capitalism, as though it's a natural union, which, historically, it is not, and only came up with a novel rationalization of American history.
There's nothing in Halper's redefining of American culture that a Marxist intellectual wouldn't be perfectly satisfied with, particularly where the concept of sovereignty is concerned.
Paul| 10.4.09 @ 8:59PM
Will the planet could be a safer place is all nations will have the same basic cultural political economic model? Yes, a source of conflict througth out history is the 'diversity ' of models
We learned from history than Western mature democracies do not go to war with democracies .
Than Non Democratic models , lack scruples restrains in issues of human rights because their model lack political, economical check and balance, they owe not deference to public opinion and lack any accountability for their actions . They prevent free speech and free expression and in an Animal Farm kind of way, their societies members are collective thinkers , rarely daring to rock the boat and challenge orthodoxy . China Imperial System created many injustices, abuses and exploitations. They system went broke and it has reemerged under new skin and some reforms but the beast still intact and Chinese people suffer state persecution, sale of organs, concentrations camps, arresst and death without the protection of a Western judicial system. However lamentably it is truth that cultural ethnic pride makes overlook for many the great flaws of their systems, not only in China but in many nations around the planet. While Western cultures posses great instropection and self criticism( in my point of view to the extreme of self loathing) such self criticism is lacking in most cultures . Spreading Weestern culture socio, political, values and being proud of our culture and stop the self loathing served the interest of worldwide peace and human rights otherwise competing systems will capture the world
Paul Crowley| 10.5.09 @ 3:42AM
“Of Mice and Men?”
“Oh look, more encyclopedic cuts & pastes. Wowee we're so impressed. (not!)" [RW Exterminator|
10.4.09 @ 4:53PM]
Hi R W E:
Sorry for the delay in responding, I had some chores to do that took precedence.
No. No cut and paste (except from comments, and headings, being addressed, or quoted, which is obviously necessary).
Why the whining? Do my plain statements regarding comments in this string seem “un-nice” to you? The actual term is blunt. I’m not trying to be nasty or merely sensatioal. There’s more than enough of that these days. Alan Brooks, confused it when he told me back in April, the last time I looked in and posted at The American Spectator,” to “stop being so nice.”
What’s the matter? Did I upset you with my comment made to an individual posting under another name in another political essay here:
“You and the other human vermin of American Spectator, and websites like it, left and right, that have to survive by posting comments like these to distract and whip up the vitriol are pathetic.”
Sorry to have to tell you, but it’s true.
Equally true is that most of you are probably EXTREMELY dispensible. This is especially obvious judging by the low-quality of so many of the comments made. What moderately intelligent 17-year old (with the right moral disposition, of which more are being produced, Every Day) couldn’t write such claptrap? If I see it, then whoever signs your pay checks no doubt does as well.
Look. It’s not our fault that you guys lack the skills to live productive lives, or, more accurately, that you live in a society now so reformed, that THIS is the only application of gainful employment that SOME men can make of what skills they do have.
Again, the term for my comment is blunt. It really is pathetic, where individual human beings are reduced to such a state for their survival. It’s not only worthy of being despised, by those human beings who have skills that allow them to do something productive, in the normal sense of the term, it’s worse: Reduction to such a despicable state as that of the professional comment posters (dubbed “trolls” I guess?) is worthy of simultaneously being pitied.
RW Exterminator| 10.5.09 @ 4:23PM
Equally true is that most of you are probably EXTREMELY dispensible."
Wow. Your day will come too, bud.
ghd | 10.5.09 @ 3:52AM
GHD MK4 Kiss is absolutely great, it leaves your hair so silky smooth and soft and trust me. I was a little worried about GHD MK4 Black hair straightener bc the price was lower than I expected.
Paul Crowley| 10.5.09 @ 4:27AM
"Spreading Weestern culture socio, political, values . . ." [Paul| 10.4.09 @ 8:59PM]
Hi Paul:
First, I hope that no one counfuses you with me.
With that said, then I don’t agree with your statements about history.
As to so-called "Western Culture" and its so-called socio, political, values,” then this is still a work in
progress.
"The West," as in the Occident (the old French term), one-time Western Europe and the Western Hemisphere, geographically, as its been being reformed, since about 1825, is a hybrid of European culture, new ideologies from Europe, and elements of Asian, African and Pacific cultures, with select elements of what truly was European culture, have been being steadily eradicated. It began in portions of Western Europe first.
In short, much of the culture has been orientalized, just as the Orient, during this same period, has been selectively occidentalized.
Even the pretense of Confucianism, something long dead in China, and the indochinese peninsula (from Myanmar to Vietnam) is purely a modern (post-1830) Anglo-French-Russian tactic in origin. Ultimately, it's roots are modern English (post-16th century).
As to the U.S.A., then the reformation of American culture has been in high gear in the for the past 40 years, and especially the past 20 years.
What's the difference between Houston, Texas and Tokyo, Japan?
About 9,500 miles. Post-WWII Tokyo has clearly been more of a model for urban development than Houston, or any other American metropolitan area, in the U.S.A., or in western European countries (and now Eastern European countries) post-1979, and Tokyo's infrastructure is more modern and more advanced.
Tokyo's population appears more Racially homogenous, so one might think the same of its culture, and the Japanese traditionally have been more uniform, but since the reforms in Japan, circa 1990 to present, it is only very superficially so.
There are sub-populations of Americans, here in the U.S.A., of all of the new reformed “Races,” and regardless of skin color, or physical features, culturally more resemble South Pacific islands primitives of the 19th through middle 20th centuries, far more, than they bear ANY resemblance to their own fathers and grandfathers.
Democracy has been being openly re-defined since World War II (1939-45).
Republicanism has been being redefined openly since 1949, when Britain recognized the republican form of government for the first time in its history.
Both are pretty much dead in the U.S.A. at this point in time. The final nails in the coffins are via redefinition.
Americans looking at British Commonwealth countries, like India or Kenya, may be tempted to think that ‘gee, their just us,’ but in reality, Americans have been reformed to be Just Like Them.
East and West: The twain are meeting and mixing, world wide (i.e. globally).
In Asia, and Eastern Europe, the place of interest at the moment is the Caucasus and Central Asia, which has an “older fashioned” look about it: A situation largely set up by Russia, 1991 to present.
This cultural hybridization of the world is a long way from making it more uniform, culturally speaking. The populations are being broken up on a class basis (culture, religion, and race, reformed, and even redefined, continue to be useful in this "process."
Paul Crowley| 10.5.09 @ 4:30AM
Halper’s Reinvention of American Culture.
As I said [in Paul Crowley| 10.4.09 @ 5:14PM], what's most striking about Halper's polemic, presented in the form of analysis, is not so much how he defines present Chinese culture, or redefines capitalism, historically, but it is how he redefines American (USian now?) culture.
This political essay, and this recasting of America, could not have been circulated publicly, as in beyond some fringe elements, left and right, even 20 years ago. Not even 15 years ago. Now much what was fringe is in the main.
Paul Crowley| 10.5.09 @ 4:46AM
Again, there’s nothing here, as is true of most at the "The American Spectator," these days, that a Marxist intellectual wouldn't be perfectly satisfied with:
From Halper's redefining of American culture, particularly where the concept of sovereignty is concerned, or in the comments by Serge From Wellington,” “John II,” "Paul," and a few others on culture, or such as the Cartoonish aspects of “Old Texican” (over at least the past six months). . .
Without what is now dubbed "Classical Liberalism," which Halper's "Market Authoritarianism" describes quite well, in practice (de facto), and cultural changes in Western Europe in the 19th century, then Marxism would have gone nowhere.
Without is resurgence, then the reformed Marxian movements, that began to go public again, about 1995, wouldn't either.
RW Exterminator| 10.5.09 @ 4:25PM
So who's side are you on anyhow? It's a little confusing to us DISPENSIBLES.
opake| 10.6.09 @ 1:50AM
you may also be interested in
The World of Market Authoritarianism 1
The World of Market Authoritarianism 2
Pingback| 10.6.09 @ 1:56PM
Steynian 387 « Free Canuckistan! links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Paul Crowley| 10.7.09 @ 8:38PM
"So who's side are you on anyhow? It's a little confusing to us DISPENSIBLES" [RW Exterminator| 10.5.09 @ 4:25PM]
Hi R W E:
I got a chuckle out of your question (due to the phrasing).
First.
Of course, you understand that I didn’t mean to imply that you guys can be replaced by a mere 17-year old. Not before the amoral 17-year old (and these are being cranked out in much greater numbers all of the time) is put through a series of humanties training, mis-dubbed “education,” in a liberal arts college of some university somewhere.
It’s not something that I’m familiar with the details of though. How does it work? Are the best of the Ph.D. hires put to work writing political essays, and the balance of them put to work as clerks, Data Miners, and scholastic-researchers, while the All-But-A-Dissertation Graduate hires are put to work as so-called “Trolls?” (with suitable adjustments and rotations made according to demonstrated abilities and attitude afterwards, of course).
In truth, all of us reformed Human Resources peons in our new reformed U.S.A. are dispensables, now!
I do suspect that you guys are probably more so than many others. And one can only wonder at your reactions when the day comes, after doing your ‘bits’ in aiding the reformation? You won’t even have the luxury of ignorance to feel offended, confused, or a sense of injustice at it. A lot like some of the purgees of the Soviet purges of the 1930s (although, no doubt that some will, anyway, it’s the fallen-side of human nature. . . I don't doubt that plenty of those who got a bullet to the back of the head were astonished at being set to get what they got).
That day will come. The period for confusion and distraction won’t last indefinitely. At least Orwell, THE Original Winston Smith of the post-Cold War Winston Smiths, could die knowing that he would be immortalized for a time, well beyond anything that his own skill really merited. There’s an example of something that is certainly due to no Market Forces: If it was based upon merit only, then the majority of us alive today would never have even heard of George Orwell. But the literary age is mostly over.
Poetry and novels don’t have the same usefulness, as they did about 1870-1949.
But I digress. . .
As to your question, "who's side are you on anyhow?"
You’re going to have to tell me what “sides” that you are referring to (i.e. what options you view as open, before I can answer your question (better, what is the “side” that the The American Spectator on? How does it define its task? Who funds this “public service?”).
As to “It's a little confusing”
Not knowing you, then I don’t doubt that you may very well be confused by me, but, in truth, for some of the participants that I’ve dubbed human vermin, then this would be like the proverbial Kettle Calling The Pot Black.
One thing is sure, especially looking at the last string of statements made above by Serge [Serge from Wellington| 10.5.09 @ 6:33AM], the attempt to confuse, not just simply misdirect, is his TASK. I believe that the primary term is “cognitive dissonance,” no? Being a technical and not a humanities typie, and not being into things like tearing wings off of flies as a kid, then I only learned the term about six years ago.
Comparing and contrasting “The American Spectator” with the other self-dubbed conservative periodicals, such as “The Weekly Standard” and "National Review Online,” social revolutionary all, then it looks like American Spectator’s task of the past eight years has been to largely lead astray a particular element, and then (wham!) shock and further divide and reform the so-called Social conservatives. Those who stay, can be coarsened up, and rendered amoral, by it.
No question that the poor innocents led down the proverbial Prim Rose Path by any of the various libertarian movements over the course of about the last 38 years, and especially about the 28, are in for some real shocks. Culturally, economically, and socially, the rationalizations are getting to be rather thin gruel. They always were, but at least originally, it was a new, and queer synthesis, so curious. But now its just the same, repeated, over and over. There’s nothing conservative about libertarianism. There’s nothing liberal about libertarianism. Libertine, not liberal. In sum, it’s purely infantile. The self-delusion of being both revolutionary and conservative, at the same time, for the right-wing element of it. I have to say though, left and right, the concoction is damn effective at rendering people divided, effectively in-stupidated, and ineffectual.
As I said, there’s nothing in Halper’s essay, especially his remarks about sovereignty, and little to nothing that I’ve seen on American Spectator this year that any Marxist Intellectual would not be pleased with. The same is probably true of at least some of the higher level Cato Institute Free Marketeers, is my guess.
Beyond my brief observations on the Strange Bedfellow relationship between Marxism and Finance Capitalism, 1848-present, then the primary works of Both Adam Smith and Marx are included in the "Great Books of Western Civilization" series, after all (a fascinating choice of works, in the collection, all by itself).
National sovereignty in the new Usian (i.e reformed American) culture being formed, seems now to only apply to the tribal governments of the Indian reservations (The First Nations), I guess?
I’m not a Marxist, pre, or post reformed, so my observation is obviously not a compliment, even if its taken as one.
I’m not any other kind of communist or socialist, revived, or otherwise, either. I am old enough to remember the last of the American Wobblys, but at my age, then to be a non-marxist communist or socialist, I would have be a revived one (i.e. “neo”).
I’m too young to have continuity with the originals.
Those guys were in mid-to-late middle age and old age when I was a boy. Their days of organizing and manning any strike lines, or whatever else, were decades in the past. We’re talking about being in the barber shop, when the one-armed and one-legged WWI vets were still common enough, and all old men, and something like: “You see Joe over there? He used to be a Wobbly.” Which is about the closest to anarchists that any native Americans ever came to being.
The post-Cold War neo-anarchists, on the left, that emerged publicly about 1994, did so at a time when the last real anarchists of such as Spain or Argentina, were in their 70s-80s. The last real American wobblys by then were in their 90s. They, and the neo-anarchists of the WTO and G-whatever meetings of the past ten years, are purely synthetic: new, man-made, creations, with only nominal resemblance to their predecessors; revived after the majority of the originals had died off, and while the last remanants of them were were dying. It’s technology and cultural reforms that allow something to be revived (“neo”) now, before the real thing has completely disappeared.
The bizzare libertarian anarcho-capitalist stuff, that emerged publicly this decade, is simply infantile. I feel sorry for anyone taken in by THAT.
The 21st century Confucianism, that’s come up here, and has only begun to be publicized in the past seven years or so, whatever it turns out to be, will be the same as all of the other synthetic cultures, religions, and movements, that are kicking into high gear now: Something with only nominal resemblance to its predecessor.
I’m obviously not a cheerleader for the 19th century form of raw, naked Finance Capitalism that is now being championed as “Classical Liberalism.” I would not only be stupid to be so, but God should curse me if I was.
What can I say? I’m no Rip Van Winkle. I’m just an unreformed American. I’ve lived with my “ears and eyes open,” as a man told me about 25 years ago. Now, I think he was right.
My advice to you is to come up with something better than “. . . (not),” and to develop skills that will stand you ready for a "Plan B" in the immediate future.
Paul Crowley| 10.7.09 @ 8:56PM
“And thank you for the Award. I plan to print it out and frame - together with your epoch-making statement that two millenia old Confucian doctrine 'became popular in the past seven years'.” [Serge from Wellington| 10.5.09 @ 6:33AM]
Hi Serge:
Sorry, I didn’t see your reply until now.
No. I never said that “two millenia old Confucian doctrine 'became popular in the past seven years'.”
I said:
“P.S. Regardless of the Confucian theme, popularized in the past seven years, and the many Confucian institutes popping up on the P.R.C., your comment, ‘Since their indigenous system worked for the Chinese for few thousand years, why would they be eager to replace it with the Western (or any, for that matter) one? I mean, if it ain't broke, don't fix it, right?’ still gets the Most Idiotic of the Lot Award of the above comments on ‘Chinese culture.’" [Paul Crowley| 10.4.09 @ 4:36PM]
"Popularized" is not the same as your rephrasing, "became popular."
Popularization (as in the public press, or media, if you prefer) of the theme of a “Confucian Bloc” only began in political commentary, publicly, in any significant way, in about the past seven years. The theme is purely a post-Cold War one, circa 1989 to present.
Confucian institutes have been popping up in the People’s Republic of China (P.R.C.) in increasing numbers during this decade.
China has clearly been being popularized in American Education, since the transition was made in American universities and colleges, from freshman requisites of survey history coures in Western Civilization (as I took when in college) to World History, about 1987-91, so by now we should have a solid cadre of young specialists.
Any 21st century Confucianism will be purely a neo-Confucianism, something entirely man-made, dependent upon specialist scholars, sifted through political leaders, reformed, and synthetic, with no cultural continuity, whatsoever, to its past. It will bear only nominal resemblance to the pre-1905 Chinese culture; even less to to pre-1830 Chinese Culture.
It was breaking from 1830-1905.
It was broken in 1905.
It’s been the realm of scholars only, for 104 years.
No question that it will be used to train the peons in an ethics that teache them to work hard, and be honest. Much as the new ethics, that began to be popularized here in the U.S.A., first via the larger corporations, and their long-term contractors, and the reformed religions, beginning about ten years ago, in "The West," have been being used to reform the very THINGS that the cultural reforms of the preceeding decades helped to form so many people into.
Whatever else is added, or most importantly, left out, then one can be quite sure that one element of Confucianism that will not be part of whatever the neo-Confucian synthesis of the 21st century that is developed, will be the Confucian prohibitions on usury.
The new Islamic Finance, a concoction that emerged in 2005, should aid in the development of the new synthesis.
Either way, 21st century Confucianism will be purely a neo-Confucianism, with only veyr nominal resemblance to the pre-1830 Chinese culture.
Paul Crowley| 10.7.09 @ 9:04PM
“Britain has properly dropped the adjective ‘Great’ from her name” [Serge from Wellington| 10.5.09 @ 6:33AM]
Hi Serge:
Wrong again.
No it hasn’t.
The name of the kingdom isn’t even debateable.
Queen Elizabeth’s title did change at her coronation in 1953 to “Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland” (rather than the post-1800 “and of Ireland”), due to the change in status of the Irish Free State in 1949.
You make so many statements that are just flat WRONG.
You must be considered one of the better so-called trolls of the “The American Spectator?”
The use of the term Britain and Great Britain in reference to the kingdom, have been understated in popular communications, about 1960-69, and all but dropped, 1969-2001, replaced by “United Kingdom” or simply “The U.K.” (popular among Brit baby-boomers).
Use of Britain and Great Britain have become increasingly common again, since 2001.
One major change after the terms Britain and Great Britain are fully revived will be that few to none will use the term England, meaning Britain, any more, as was common, pre-1969, and especially common to the World War II populations, who are now mostly dead, or in their late 80s and older.
That's my guess.
What is not a guess, is that Britain is one of the five Great Powers: The U.S.A., Britain, France, Russia and China.
They were established in San Francisco, California, in 1945.
These are the countries with permanent seats and veto on the U.N. Security Council.
In Britain’s case, its status as a Great Power has not changed, in any of the Great Powers reformations since 1815. It’s the only country of the present-day five Great Powers that has held the status continually since 1815.
Russia is number two. It dropped out only briefly (less than 17 years), during the period between the two world wars, during which time the Empire Japan and the Kingdom of Italy had their brief moments of Great Power status.
Paul Crowley| 10.7.09 @ 9:28PM
France is number three. It regained its status a few years after the 1815 formulation, dropped out only briefly, 1940-45, regained it in 1945, and has held it ever since.
The U.S.A. and China are new: purely 1945 to present.
China's de jure governments has changed, once, between 1949 and now (most significantly in 1979). The de facto governance of China remains divided between continentental Asia and Formosa (the latter a government not recognized by the U.S.A., and almost no other government, other than the Vatican).
This formulation of Great Powers, 64 years and counting, can change, but it hasn't yet.
Paul Crowley| 10.7.09 @ 10:28PM
CORRECTION.
China's de jure governments has changed, once, between 1945 and now (most significantly in 1979).
Keeping it to the period that China has formally been a Great Power, regardless of which government administration was the de jure government.
Paul Crowley| 10.10.09 @ 2:20AM
No wonder no comment in response, my post ( Paul Crowley| 10.8.09 @ 2:38PM), was removed. I'll repost it with addition of something I inadvertently left out of the first.
Paul Crowley| 10.10.09 @ 2:25AM
Back to page 1 of Halper's essay. . .
“In September 1972 President Richard Nixon played the China card. It was a brilliant gambit; in one stroke he opened U.S. relations with Communist China and chilled Beijing’s relations with Moscow.” [Stefan Halper].
To keep this in persepective.
[Using: Republic of China (R.O.C.), People’s Republic of China (P.R.C.) and United Nations organization (U.N.)].
In 1969 there were border clashes between the Russian Red Army and the Red Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA), over the Russo-Chinese borders in northern Manchuria and outer Mongolia.
In 1970 The government of the R.O.C. was replaced by the government of the P.R.C. as representative of of the de jure government of China in the U.N. General Assembly.
In 1971 The P.R.C. formally took its place on the U.N. Security Council.
The U.N. Security Council was made up at that time of the representatives of the five Great Powers, U.S.A., Britain, France, Russia, and China, as it had been since it was established in San Francisco, California, in 1945.
Since 1971, it has been comprised of the government representatives of the U.S.A., Britain, France, the U.S.S.R. (Russian Federation after 1991), and the P.R.C., and now, in our post-Cold War era, some minor (i.e. “emerging”) countries that serve on a temporary, rotating basis.
In 1972:
President Nixon visited Red China in February.
The last American combat ground troops were withdrawn from the Republic of Vietnam, a few weeks afterwhich the reformed (c. 1969-72) North Vietnamese armed forces launched the Easter Offensive into the Republic of Vietnam at the end of March.
President Nixon visited Russia and met with Premier Leonid Brezhnev, and signed the Stratetic Arms Limitation Talks (A.K.A. SALT1) agreement in May (The first American President to meet with a Soviet Premier, or Party Chairman).
Japan established diplomatic relations with the P.R.C. for the first time since the P.R.C. came into existence in 1949, at the end of September.
For Japan, that was a re-establishment of relations with China, after breaking relations with the government of the R.O.C. in 1970.
In 1978 Japan signed a Peace and Friendship Treaty with the P.R.C. (i.e. with China).
In 1979 The U.S.A. established diplomatic relations with the P.R.C. for the first time since the P.R.C. came into existence in 1949.
That was on 1 January 1979.
Jim O'Brien| 10.24.09 @ 2:58PM
I wonder how the Chinese manage health care for their population of over 1 billion people. How readily available is quality medical care? Are doctors and hospitals under centralized control by bureaucrats in Beijing? How successfully are various diseases diagnosed and treated to prevent premature deaths? Do farmers in Who-Ha province get the same level of care as the political elites? Imagine calling 1-800-MaoCare to get a green light for treatment.
Jim O'Brien| 10.24.09 @ 3:09PM
The author quotes Obama's June 2009 speech, as follows: "…I have an unyielding belief that all people yearn and have a say in how you are governed; confidence in the rule of law and the equal administration of justice; government that is transparent and doesn’t steal from the people; the freedom to live as you choose…There is no straight line to realize this promise. But…governments that protect these rights are ultimately more stable, successful, and secure. Suppressing ideas never succeeds in making them go away…"
1) Ask Chrysler secured deb holders about BO's belief in the rule of law;
2) Ask Fox news about BO's attempt so suppress ideas;
3) Ask all the people who are about to lose their existing medical insurance about freedom of choice;
4) Ask taxpayers about our government stealing from the people to pay for entitlements;
5)Ask those whose property has been taken by imminent domain about the government stealing their property so it can be developed to generate more real estate taxes;
6) Ask the Shadow Government of "Czars" about transparency;
ETC.
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Meet Asian Women, on Meet Asian Women, links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
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