Ed Finn, China: From Offshore to The Shore?
How did they do it?Seemingly from nowhere the Chinese have built a fantastic landscape of skyscrapers and a roaring economy. But since the emergence of China has been predicted for some time now — it was perhaps more than ten years ago that The Economist ran a lead story on the likelihood that China would match and then surpass the US economy — the questions that pertain to the Triad are about how the Chinese have used technology and innovation to achieve such rapid growth. Surely much is due to the rise of an entrepreneurial class and a government that is prepared to tolerate private concentrations of wealth. Viewed narrowly, China looks like a smashing success and indeed this seems to be the way in which the Chinese government wishes to be portrayed to the world and to investors. But it's a view that's hard to square with the vision one sees in Manufactured Landscapes, a film about Canadian photographer Edward Burtynsky's documentation of the ecological devastation brought on by rapid development shown recently as part of UNCG's Sustainability Film Series.
If you're an investor, you're interested in the "real" China because you want to know where your money is going and what are your risks. Going to China and seeing MacDonalds and hotels up to Western standards might be comforting but it is also consistent with the vision of China that its government wishes outsiders to see. It makes a visitor think less about the host of problems that the country is deferring, ignoring, or unable to solve.
In fact, America has had a very long history with China. We have a large portion of the Chinese diaspora living in the US. A lot of Silicon Valley is made up of Chinese and Chinese-American entrepreneurs. Chinese culture, much like Jewish culture to which it has been compared, is transnational, surviving generations. My great uncle was among the last to take the Imperial Examination in 1905. He came to the US afterward to study at George Washington, served in Sun Yat Sen's government, and eventually moved to the US, and died in Sacramento. This summer my niece will return to China to study in Suzhou.
There are many kinds of investments we make for the future. Global capitalism can be exploitive and brutal as many Triad textile and furniture workers can attest, pulling out when better opportunities abroad beckon. But resurrecting the Triad is not a short term proposition. And clearly it's not just about dollars and a return on investment but the kind of community we wish to live in and work for.
