Google China & Self Censorship

theanonymousgeographer · Black Bloc

They have an awful human rights record therefore they don't deserve to be the world's most powerful nation. Thats a fact.

Whether they will be or not is debatable.

nick_b · Street Demonstrator

increasingly markets outside europe and north america are becoming really significant. other countries are going to trade with china whether we want them to or not, cos china can provide much cheaper goods, and as a result there's v little we can do to any more than slgihtly slow down china's growth.

the point about the nukes is that even having adozen of them would be enough to guarantee that no-one else will invade you. note for example how we're not invading north korea who a) may have nukes themsleves now and b) have the backing of china who certainly do. therefore the western powers cannot control china by force.

some people also fail to understand that you can be the most powerful country in the world without looking after all of your own country. if you'd been there, you'd know that the east of china, and particularly beijing, are absolutely booming, like no other citiies i've ever seen. china is not in the least bit communist now - it barely even pretends anymore, except in the name. they certainly don't use it to promise to supply everyones needs. they stopped seriously attempting that long ago. the most major example of communism-leftovers i saw there was how easily they bulldoze people's homes when they want to build a new highway or a new skyscraper or whatever, cos the state rather conveniently holds the land. being totalitarian is clearly very useful at times. as someone i think pointed out, the western governments are held back by actually being vaguely accountable to their electorates.

we can throw insults around if you want to. i think the people who believe europe will stay important for as long as we both shall live are naive and egocentric. get over it. we barely matter now, especially when we're so disunited and mistrustful of each other. and america has almost had its time at the top now. its not going to stop being number 1 for a few decades yet, but it'll happen in our generation's lifetime.

covuni2ney · Meeting Facilitator

SimonM · Black Bloc

Militarily, China may have the biggest army in the world but it's a bit of a lame duck on the world stage. They have no aircraft carriers, few tanker aircraft and barely any significant bluewater navy to speak of. These days it's not how big your army is but whether you can get it to where it needs to be - the term is force projection. America or Britain can have military involvement anywhere in the world because we have the bases (both static and seaborne) and the tanker aircraft to allow our planes to reach anywhere. We have the transport capacity to land an entire army at a remote location within a week or two. This doubles, triples, quadruples the effectiveness of our military forces.

China still has a long way to go before its military might can be a significant factor on the world stage. Economically is different.

Silvia · Black Bloc

A study published 2 years ago by Goldman Sachs (an investment bank) predicted that in half a century China will be the biggest economy in the world with a GDP of US$ 44 trillion. The USA will come second and India third, followed by Japan, Brazil and Russia with US$ 7 trillion, US$ 6 trillion and US$ 5.9 trilion respectively.

During the past 3 years, average economic growth p.a. has been as follows (I've sort of rounded them up):
USA - 4%
Europe - 1.8%
Latin America - 4%
Japan - 2%
China - 9.5%

There's no doubt that if this scenario persists for a couple more years, China could, indeed, become the biggest global economy by 2050. As for the USA and the EU turning their back on China and boycotting them, it seems like a silly thing to do. There are many other markets that won't act hostile towards China - Latin America for one - and as someone said, it really would be counter-productive.

Also, as mentioned before, militarily there are still some improvements the Chinese need to make but economically they seem to be prospering amazingly.

From personal experience - and I do know many Chinese - I can say that they have a culture of incredible self-discipline and determination which, I feel, could be a crucial advantage to China in comparison to other nations.