Orient Express

So back to China, shall we?

This is an excellent article on the challenge China is posing for US Hegemony. It manages concern, which is certainly warranted, without going in to hysterical alarmism, which is certainly not.

One of the mistakes the author makes, I'd argue, is overestimating the longevity of Communist Regime. I'm certainly no Friedmanite ("globalization will make us all hug!") but China's an example where being connected to the global economy is going to provide an important stimulus.

More specifically, Hong Kong might be another Tiananmen-in-waiting. The chief executive of Hong Kong is currently named by a council, most of whose members are either appointed by Beijing or are pro-business (which means, ironically enough, pro-Communist.) The major democratic parties of HK attempted to ensure direct election of the Chief Executive for the 2007. Beijing has thus far refused to allow this, but the demands aren't going away - HK's government is primarily in the executive, while the legislature is very weak. So two possibilities present themselves: Either the people of HK give up, or they go to the streets. Given that they've already won once by taking to the streets (in 2003 during Beijing's attempt to push a PATRIOT-act style security law through) I think it's unlikely that this is going to go away.

So what does Beijing do when crowds bigger than ever showed up at the Gate of Heavenly Peace are marching through Hong Kong? Beijing could afford to lose western trade temporarily during the early 1990s - much of China's growth then was endogenous. Today, China is far more dependent on foreign capital and foreign markets. So Beijing's usual methods of crowd control - a whiff of armor-piercing ammo - would not only be horrible, it would be absolutely devastating to the mainland economy. Even if they did it (boy I hope not) it certainly wouldn't solve the underlying problem.

So eventually, Beijing is likely to concede, and allow direct elections of the Chief Executive. Once they've done this, the Communists have a real problem on their hands. How does Beijing say that HK can have elections, but Shenzhen (right across the river) can't? Beijing is going to need to allow democracy - even without HK, there's already major disturbances in the mainland. Once that happens, you've got the possibility for a USSR-style political collapse. The USSR collapsed (among oh so many reasons) because Soviet Communism was totally incompatible with democracy - something Gorbachev didn't understand when he held elections. Similarly, I can't imagine the CCP surviving a democratic moment in China.

Two things to note:
First: China, having an economy in far better shape than the USSR's was in 1990-91, is liable to be able to weather the transition better. That said, the west needs China. Allowing a Russia-style collapse to occur was profoundly stupid with Russia, it would be suicidal for us to allow China to fail. I'm not saying Russia's collapse was the west's "fault", just that there were some pretty obvious mistakes made, and we need to learn from them.

Second: I have no idea how quickly this will happen, but I'd bet against seeing the CCP still in power by 2015.