Blog Post #2

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HistoryUpdated Dec 3, 2008 2:41 PM by Alex Rajewski…

This response was to the current economic crisis, China's response thereto, and how this is applicable to the US. For this post, I was able to draw on a great deal of knowledge about China's economic system and governmental structure. I was able to discuss how China's admission of capitalism has spread and what this means for the future of Chinese communism. In addition, I was able to relate this back to the US and our governmental and socio-economic structure. I feel that this sort of reflection is helpful. Even though I am not learning about the US per se, the best part of learning about another culture is gaining new insights into your own. Though I was able to relate back to the US, my predictions were sadly wrong, highlighting perhaps a flawed understanding on my part of the US. I am not well versed on ecnomics and thusly many of my conjectures were not as fully formed as I would have liked them to be. Despite these mistakes, I feel that the post is very well written and shows a critical and in-depth analysis of both the poltics and economies of the US and China.

Response to November 9th Post

I think that the interesting blend of communism and capitalism is working very well for China. Their flexibility regarding economic matters has allowed them to adapt to the changing global marketplace while also allowing them to gain both economic and political prominence. The Chinese blend has several advantages. Since the Chinese government is essentially a technocracy, the people holding political power are very highly skilled in their field. This combined with the command economy that China has means that the Chinese government can institute very intelligent, well thought-out, and sweeping changes much more rapidly than any laissez-faire capitalist economy ever could. The downside to this blend is that capitalism is insidious. As an example, in the 1980s China created 3 special economic zones to facilitate free trade and foreign investment. These are areas where the communist economy does not apply so strictly and capitalism is allowed in. Since then the number of special economic zones has swollen, approaching 100. This includes the capital cities of all provinces, certain coastal areas, and the Yangzi river valley. The fact is that once capitalism was allowed into China, China’s conversion to at least a semi-capitalist states was ensured. This can be taken as either a negative or positive side-effect; creeping capitalism erodes the communist power base and efficacy, but at the same time leads to an increase in the quality of life.

The policies of the Chinese government to prevent or fix a recession are very good and will no doubt have a positive effect on the Chinese economy. These policies however are not suitable for America. The policies described are those of a socialist country, which the US is not, at least not to the extent of many other countries. The last time such a policy was enacted was the New Deal period, which provided massive public works campaigns as well as the basis for the current welfare state. The sweeping socialist assistance programs used by the Chinese would never gain popular support in America because of our more individualistic, capitalist mindset. Separate from that, I believe that they could be helpful to the American people, in fact many of the programs are already in place albeit on a smaller and less integrated level.