China is changing the world.
The New York Times recently ran a story that quoted the current leader of China’s strategic vision for the future.
He calls them the four comprehensives: “Comprehensively build a moderately prosperous society, comprehensively deepen reform, comprehensively govern the country according to the law, comprehensively apply strictness in governing the party.”
Like most government propaganda — and I don’t say or mean that negatively — they are vague and lacking in definitive substance. But they do communicate something exceedingly important.
Etched in these four lines is a message of seriousness and objectiveness that would make the most technocratic among us drool with envy.
The China in which Chinese President Xi Jinping believes has reclaimed the world stage through economic power and done so in a way that challenges the entire framework of Western political thought.
What he believes in is prosperity, the rule of law and a ruling party in China that thinks more of China than they do of themselves. In many ways it is both incredibly modern in terms of pragmatism and yet archaic in its collectivity.
It has long been the West’s belief that prosperity and a government without corruption come only through democracy. China wholeheartedly disagrees. As the comprehensives exhibit, there is no mention of personal liberty or freedom, only its end result.
And it is not all words, you can scarcely go a month without another story of another politically powerful individual being arrested for corruption in China. Xi Jinping is sending a message of reform not just to the country but his own party, and he is not afraid to use the enviable power at his disposable to achieve it.
What I believe is happening is an evolution of autocracy. Historically, oppressive governments have been created for one of two purposes: either to simply sustain the ego and the ambition of the leader, or to achieve an ideological objective. In both instances, revolution or collapse inevitably follows. It must — at least it always has.
But now we see a new kind of political body, and this political body is quite different. It believes in capitalism, in efficiency, in law and even the insignificance of its leader. It just doesn’t believe in democracy, pluralism or liberty.
And yet that doesn’t seem to be a problem for the ?Chinese government at all.
It has effectively excised the by-products of democracy only to discard democracy as a cancer and a problem. To me, this is incredibly thought-provoking and a little scary.
China is well on its way to being a super power in many ways and it shows no signs of slowing up. In fact, if it continues to reform, it may arrive at its pedestal among the ?nations sooner than we think.
And where will that leave us? We have a world dominated, at least in power and wealth, by freedom-loving democracies. If that changes, what will change in our world? Will the world be a better place or a worse place?
I don’t know if the marriage between prosperity and democracy is finished, but I do know that it’s not the only happy couple on the block anymore.
cgerst@indiana.edu
