China as Global Hegemon - A Good Reading...

Well, the China issue certainly seems to be a hot-button topic.  A brief
injecture on what could be a relevant reading that echoes some of Warren's
points below (and also a reading that is accessible enough to use in classes
of various stripes).

Please see "Our Real China Problem", by Mark Hertsgaard in The Atlantic
Monthly (Nov. '97).  It is available via their website, and very readable.

Jon D. Carlson

On Thu, 1 Mar 2001 wwagar@binghamton.edu wrote:

> 
>       I would have to agree with this post on China's short-term
> prospects and those of the world-system as a whole.  China seems clearly
> embarked on a project similar to Khrushchev's USSR 40 years ago, except
> that it is buying more than 50% into the Western capitalist way of doing
> business.  The result is expanding production and rising standards of
> living.  But the Western model assumes Western preconditions:  virtually
> unlimited supplies of cheap clean energy, raw materials, industrialized
> agriculture, and competitive advantage, together with relatively low
> fertility rates and relatively high levels of mass education, especially
> in areas such as science, engineering, and management.  Much of
> eastern and southern China has done well with what it has, but I don't
> think it can keep driving down the same road indefinitely.  Environmental
> constraints are likely to kick in.  Already China is a food-importing
> country.  The greater the volume of its manufacturing output and diversion
> of labor from farm to factory, the more acute its food problem will
> become.  Meanwhile, its population continues to surge, not at the same
> rate as India or many African and other countries, but also nothing like
> the demographic situation of, say, Germany.  And unlimited supplies of
> cheap clean energy are rapidly becoming a thing of the past.  Nor are the
> United States, Europe, and Japan taking a nap to allow China to "catch
> up."  Forecast (and beware of forecasts!):  over the next 50 years, China
> will not catch up and may even fall further behind, China will not imperil
> the hegemons of the world-system militarily, and the whole world-system
> will be paralyzed and perhaps will implode as the consequence of its
> multiple internal contradictions.
> 
>       Cheers,
> 
>       Warren   
>