The NYT reports that some Chinese intellectuals and officials have kind words for India:
“India is a far more diverse country… a place with the second largest Muslim population in the world, and lots of ethnic minorities, and yet it organizes regular elections without conflict. China is 90 percent Han, so if India can conduct elections, so can China.” [Pang Yongzhing, a professor of international relations at Nankai University in Tianjin]
India, a paragon of manufacturing efficiency?
“To produce goods worth $10,000, for example, we need seven times more resources than Japan, nearly six times more than the United States and, perhaps most embarrassing, nearly three times more than India.” [Pan Yue, China’s environment minister]
Respect for intellectual property? He’s probably never visited a pirate desi Blockbuster store.
“In India there is a lot more room to move around… their capital markets are good, their banking sector is better than in China, and there is entrepreneurialism everywhere in India, along with well-protected intellectual property rights. All of these are things that China lacks.” [Zhang Jun, director of the China Center for Economic Studies at Fudan University in Shanghai]
Some desis have a disturbing attachment to authoritarian government, or perhaps (not so disturbing at all) just plain effectiveness:
There is constant talk these days of turning Mumbai, the southern commercial metropolis formerly known as Bombay, into a new Shanghai, China’s most glitteringly modern city… Such contrasts have left some Indians to remark, sometimes despairingly, about a “democracy price” that slows development… “I’m often approached by friends returning impressed from China, saying how our airports in Bombay and Delhi can’t compare,” said G. P. Deshpande, a longtime China scholar at Jawaharal Nehru University in Delhi. “When I tell them that these things come in a package, that you don’t just get the new airports, and I describe the package, though, they say no thank you.”
Finally, perhaps India too will get its Mideast invasions:
“As far as exporting democracy, it is only a matter of time before India gets the self-confidence to begin doing this.” [Subramanian Swamy, president of India’s Janata Party and former minister of law, commerce and justice]
“Respect for intellectual property? He’s probably never visited a pirate desi Blockbuster store.”
India is far far better than China in terms of intellectual property. There is no doubt about it. Even companies with subsidiaries in China do not send their complete source code if they can help it. It is not surprising to have a company down the street developing the exact same product that you are working based on the exact same code base. go figure!
Traditionally communist socities like the one in China have a hard time understanding the concepts of private ownership. Its hard to respect intellectual private property when until recently no one even had private property.
Just because China is this shiny glittering “new world power” doesn’t mean it gets everything right. India’s banking and legislative structure is way ahead of China’s. Also, the fact about resources is absolutely true. Being made to work at gunpoint will definitely get you to a certain stage in life, but only so far. Oh, that, and forcibly removing a woman’s ovaries after her first (usually male child). China’s sex ratio is much worse than India’s – the source for this is the Economist. Let’s stop kissing China’s ass on Sepia Mutiny, shall we. It’s a Sepia Mutiny, not a Soya Bean Mutiny….
TTG, I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings: you are irony-impaired. Take two and call me in the morning.
Al Mujahid: China is ‘traditionally’ communist? I thought communism was the opposite of tradition; I thought it was all about the revolution and not being a reactionary and breaking the old to make the new or some crap like that. Sorry, couldn’t resist…. you make a good point about the no private property!
Anyhow, this is the joke I always make about Marx (it’s not very funny, but I like it):
I never understood ‘from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs.’ I mean, if you apply this philosophy to me and my ex you get this – I had the ability to work (hard) and he had the need to, uh, not work (at all). So naturally, Marxism did not work out for this member of the proletariat. Stupid Marxism 🙂
There is constant talk these days of turning Mumbai, the southern commercial metropolis formerly known as Bombay, into a new Shanghai, China’s most glitteringly modern cityâ€Å
It’s just media talking to politicos talking back to media. I live in the city and except the papers no one is least interested in Shanghai, or even bothers to find out which country that is. sarcasm