In my last post the spotlight was on China's economic growth. And some interesting information about that topic, which I got from my blogger friends, give me the opportunity to write again a few words about that Asian vast country.
As known, since 2002 China's export started to surge and, as a consequence, every adult chinese people, who live in South and close to the coast of the country, have been enjoying strong improvement in their wages: in those developed regions of China hundreds of millions have joined the new middle class. During the last decade, manufacturing employment in five coastal regions ((Guangdong, Zhejiang, Fujian, Jiangsu and Sahndong) rose by a cumulative total of 4.9 million jobs.
At the same time, in the countryside condition are not so good. And in this unequal perspective, most Chinese people located in the Eastern urban area show the tolerance toward the regime, which holds elections for candidates of one party alone. Actually, Popular Republic of China may be classed as "pseudo-democracy" in polical terms. Politician would have to begin to deal with China's economic development which shows quite clearly a difference in average income and standard of life between coastal cities and counrtyside. Everyone can see that the rise of wealthy coastal cities, such as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, integrated with the world global economy, is in contrast to an interior that remains quite for behind. And there aren't attemps to begin to deal with that, which is important.
At the same time, in the countryside condition are not so good. And in this unequal perspective, most Chinese people located in the Eastern urban area show the tolerance toward the regime, which holds elections for candidates of one party alone. Actually, Popular Republic of China may be classed as "pseudo-democracy" in polical terms. Politician would have to begin to deal with China's economic development which shows quite clearly a difference in average income and standard of life between coastal cities and counrtyside. Everyone can see that the rise of wealthy coastal cities, such as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, integrated with the world global economy, is in contrast to an interior that remains quite for behind. And there aren't attemps to begin to deal with that, which is important.
Compared with western democracies, China shows a particular ability to increase inequality and it seems that Chinese policy-makers don't care.
All of this has a distorting effect on the Chinese population who can see a conflict with the formal policy objective of their country. In this perspective, the main risk is that the Chinese dream, which since 1990s have been wealth and strenght in the frame of a "harmonious society", ends up handing more power to a repackaged authoritarianism.
(photos used with cc permission from Stefano, http://cavnero.blogspot.it/ )
Beautiful and interesting post. Thank you for the mention, but you know, you can always use the photos without any permission; it's my pleasure.
ReplyDeleteI think for the Chinese government, having power is more important than having more wealthy people in the country. It is very similar to African countries. Power is everything for the leaders while the masses are dying of hunger.
ReplyDeleteCompletely agree with this point, Johann: in countries with a low living standard politicians don't care. On the other hand, in South Europe countries, such as Spain, Greece and Italy, policy-makers predict disaster, quite routinely, in order to justify the distruction of social security and other popular programs.
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