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REVIEW Controlling the beast Exit the Dragon?, edited by Stephen Green and Guy
S Lin
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Reviewed by Dmitry Shlapentokh
The title of this book - a collection of essays on the contemporary Chinese
economy from 10 scholars from around the world - is indicative of the content
of the volume.
It is stated in Privatization and State Control in China that China has
moved from the highly centralized and inefficient economy of Mao Zedong's era
to a market economy. Still, the dragon's exit from a centralized economy is
slow and inconsistent.
Furthermore, there is even talk, as some of the authors of the book imply, to
increase state control further. This is an indication
that the dragon of the Chinese economic and, implicitly, political system is
still backward and that much needs to be done to make China as efficient as
societies and economies of the West - the US first of all.
The overall idea of the book might have worked in the 1970s when China, only
starting its reforms, was a poor country that had just recuperated from Mao's
rule. The US was seen then as the workshop of the globe. This, however, is
hardly the case now, when China is quickly catching up with the US, whose
economic importance is in continuous erosion. In fact, the huge US deficit is
in many ways subsidized by China, which lends billions of dollars to the US
treasury.
How did this happen? One could argue that what is seen by the authors as a sign
of political/economic underdevelopment is actually the major reason for China's
success.
It is the strong hand of the central government that makes it possible to
discourage the outflow of capital, concentrate resources in the development of
key industries, punish corruption and other abuses and discipline workers.
In fact, the reason for China's economic development is the same as was the
case with Europe in the early period of capitalism, the era when the Western
economy experienced its most rapid period of economic expansion.
European states had been ruled by absolutist monarchies or, at least, by a
small segment of the population - the ruling elite. These states had employed
an array of frightful tortures and executions to discipline society. The life
of the people - movement, job changes, even marriages - had been meticulously
regulated. Black slavery had expanded to enormous proportions, and the
"workhouse" was absolutely indistinguishable from the penal/economic
institutions of the totalitarian states.
Economic life, including trade, was also strictly regulated. And the members of
the totalitarian state, the residents of those early capitalist societies, had
to attend church services subject to control and indoctrination. It was not
accidental that English philosopher Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) described these
states as Leviathan - the over-embracing, over-controlling, brutal Biblical
beast.
And this Hobbesian Leviathan has been considered as the matrix for the
totalitarian states of the modern era. It is this Hobbesian nature of church
and state that has ensured its speedy economic progress.
But should one blame the editors of this volume for ignoring this aspect of the
Chinese economic miracle? If they were to take the manuscript - centered around
the importance of a centralized and repressive government - to a present-day
major academic press specializing in books on the economy, they would be in for
a rude awakening. The publisher would most likely immediately tell them that
their ideas were outdated by at least several generations.
The editors could, of course, turn to some obscure leftist publishing house
whose director still praised socialism and believed that the centralized
economy should work for the benefit of the people, for whom the major goal of
the economy is not economic growth at all costs but a broad safety net.
But that publisher, glancing through the manuscript and finding that
repressive/controlling power over the workers is one of the prerequisites for
Chinese success, would reject the manuscript with indignation and angrily state
that the house did not publish "Stalinist" and "fascist" manuscripts advocating
repression of the worker.
Thus the authors and editors of the book should not be blamed nor judged
harshly. They plainly had no choice. Still they should also be aware that the
Chinese leaders whose totalitarian prejudices have been exposed will not read
it. And, to be frank, they surely can safely ignore it. They do well being a
strong Chinese dragon to the state when it could easily swallow the
market-preaching American eagle.
Exit the Dragon? Privatization and State Control in China, edited by
Stephen Green and Guy S Lin. Chatham House/Blackwell Publishing, 2005. ISBN
1405126434. Price US$34.95, 256 pages.
Dmitry Shlapentokh, PhD, is associate professor of history, College of
Liberal Arts and Sciences, Indiana University South Bend. He is author of
East Against West.The First Encounter - The life of Themistocles, 2005.
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