The
rise of China surely ranks among the most important world developments of the
last 100 years. With America still trapped in its fifth year of economic
hardship, and the Chinese economy poised to surpass our own before the end of
this decade, China looms very large on the horizon. We are living in the early
years of what journalists once dubbed “The Pacific Century,” yet there are
worrisome signs it may instead become known as “The Chinese Century.”
But does the Chinese giant have feet of clay? In a
recently published book, Why Nations Fail, economists Daron Acemoglu
and James A. Robinson characterize China’s ruling elites as
“extractive”—parasitic and corrupt—and predict that Chinese economic growth will
soon falter and decline, while America’s “inclusive” governing institutions have
taken us from strength to strength. They argue that a country governed as a
one-party state, without the free media or checks and balances of our own
democratic system, cannot long prosper in the modern world. The glowing tributes
this book has received from a vast array of America’s most prominent public
intellectuals, including six Nobel laureates in economics, testifies to the
widespread popularity of this optimistic message.
Yet do the facts about China and America really
warrant this conclusion?
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