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Originally Posted by ericj
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Since you're obviously not trying to make constructive dialogue, I won't bother either.
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Originally Posted by Nankai /img/forum/go_quote.gif
China goverment did a brilliant job for Chinese citizens during the last three decades.
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Given the conditions that China was in 30 years ago, I agree. The way how Deng used a pragmatic and gradualistic approach and how he put economic advance as his main priority was exactly what China needed. But it hasn't been brilliant for everybody, but then again it never is in times of drastic change (not an excuse, but an explanation).
However, China now isn't China 30 years ago and different times calls for different actions. And right now, China's biggest problem isn't economic stagnation.
I've actually talked to some political higher-ups in China, very smart and caring people, but these are also people for whom change is equivalent to bad. So many problems in China, especially those most heavily criticised by other countries, can be attributed to this fear of change. This fear, or almost paranoia, is understandable if you look at what they have lived through, but that doesn't make it right. However, if they don't even trust their own Harvard-educated children because they have "Western thought", I'm not sure how quickly China is going make the changes necessary before even more police stations and courts get burned down in the countryside. If anything, the Olympics has been (hopefully) a good eye-opener for some politicians here that not everybody in the world loves the way China is being run at the moment.
From the discussions I've had with people, what is needed most right now is more accountability on part of officials. This is hard to achieve without democracy but a free(r) press would be a good start in the right direction. Even in the absence of democracy, China's thousands of years of tradition of political leaders also being moral leaders is something that would help this cause if combined with greater press freedom. Admittedly, the press is getting freer by the day but it's not quick enough. I'm pretty confident that China will eventually get it right, mostly because I believe in the Chinese people and its many deeply embedded virtues. I just hope that the government will remember some of these virtues sooner rather than later. Again, more transparency through greater press freedom would be a big first step.