What can the U.S. do to help facilitate the continued economic connectivity and progress of China?
The U.S.’s best strategy is to stay open. China’s current economic model is reaching the end of its capacity to deliver without substantial change. I argue in my book that democracy is good for the economy; accountability and whistle-blowing keep managements up to the mark and help efficient resource allocation. China’s astonishingly low productivity, wastefulness, and environmental degradation are self-destructive; it needs institutional change and the panoply of democratic institutions. By staying open, the U.S. brings forward the day that China has to change and especially by exposing it to best western practice. But that means we have to practice what we preach. When will the Chinese middle class push for greater political freedom to match growing economic freedom? The $64,000 question. The extent of the ideological bankruptcy of the Chinese Communist Party is not widely understood in the U.S. It claims single party rule because it is the trustee of the 1949 Communist revolution go
