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Comment by qd6pwu4 | Hacker News Reader

Your question is insightful. I think a major reason that China once fell so low is the Qing dynasty secluded itself from the outside world, and didn't catch up with the industrial revolution. So in 18xx-19xx, China was still an agricultural civilization and western countries have stepped into modern industrial form. And we know as to production efficiency, (non-modern) agriculture vs industry is like fist vs bombs. Besides, before 1911, China was still imperial, most people were not liberated and educated, so they can not effectively participate in industrial production (In some sense, being uneducated, they were not useful people). Now with 1.4 billion educated people, it's no wonder China is coming back to its normal place. And I believe today is not the end of China's rise, the Chinese people can do better as long as they continue working hard, especially on science and technology.

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1.4 billion educated people? China has made great progress in the area of education, but there is still a large percentage, especially from older generations and in rural areas, who never had any real educational opportunities (as you know, they were too busy fighting for survival).

Also, given that the current leadership is taking a very different path that that of Deng, why are you so optimistic that China's rise will continue? From my perspective, they seem to be alienating themselves once again, and straying from path to prosperity originally set by Deng.

1.4 may not be accurate, but nearly every child is educated. 9-year compulsory education is the lowest standard across the country. The number fighting for survival is very small compared to the whole population (the recent number is 20 million). Now the government's poverty line is <400$ annual income, and the gov has the goal to eliminate this absolute poverty in 2020. The current path is different from the last 30 years, but Deng's reform has never changed. In some area, censorship is more strict (this has to do with complicated political reasons), but in more areas such as science, technology, trade, and finance, China is becoming more and more open to the world. Things may seem that Chinese are alienating themselves, but that is not true. More and more people go abroad every year. And although there is the wall, actually people know what happens outside China.

People tend to significantly overvalue the executive branches power combined with the worst cases you hear in the news when evaluating the freedom of the average person in a country. The economic freedom indexes can be quite surprising compared to popular perception.

But still I read something like 1 in 4 people are party members whether directly or indirectly. That’s a whole lot of people directly involved in the snitch line.

there are 90 million party members among 1.4 billion people. I don't know how to count indirect party members. But I don't think that is near 1/4, that's too exagerating

I remember that stat from Evan Osnos book on China (a New Yorker journalist). It was between direct members, soldiers, student groups, workers groups, various retired people, and affiliate associations.

I’m sure that number is a bit inflated but the reach of the party at the local and individual level is quite significant.

This, and western countries exploited that weakness and turned China in a protectorate with actual warfare, etc.

> industrialized countries

Japan isn't western.

You're right. But Japan is an example of an Asian country that forced itself to assimilate the technology and habits of the West. They ended up invading China before WW2, last of a long list of countries.

Japan attacked China with the blessing of Teddy Roosevelt, a secret 1905 treaty allowed Japan to expand into Asia without push back from the US.

Pearl harbor happened because we reneged on this "secret treaty" by backing China 30 years later in the 2nd Sino-Japanese War... we reneged because congress had no clue the treaty existed.

Side note: Is Teddy Roosevelt the reason we got dragged into WW2? Yes.

> Side note: Is Teddy Roosevelt the reason we got dragged into WW2? Yes.

This is the same fallacy as the UK "being dragged into WW1 and WW2". You just needed an excuse for joining. You joined because you couldn't accept Japan or Germany becoming hegemons of their regions. An united Europe or East Asia can challenge American supremacy.

China fell low thanks to external sabotage (opium) and espionage (stolen tea,spices,manufacturing processes) by 5+ of the future economic powers working together in the take down of the superpower. This attack and disruption of established Chinese/Indian trade routes allowed new Western industrial manufacturers to step in and supply the market.

The US/UK has had anti-Chinese policies since the early 1800s leading to the modern day (people we celebrate were some of the biggest opium dealers in the world). Teddy Roosevelt (inheritor of a drug dealing fortune) even used the Japanese to sabotage China again when he was president in 1900s when he authorized Japanese expansion into Asia with a secret treaty.

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