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Western news about China depends on intrepid Chinese ‘news assistants’

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Re: Western news about China depends on intrepid Chinese ‘news assistants’

#51

Post by pjc50 »

kiba wrote: post #5

From my perspective, it looked like China will overtake the world and maybe prove that democracy is optional for economic prosperity, a blow to Western values and ideal. But how true is that? I hear a lot about corruption and crackdown, and wonder how much does that impact their economy. How critical is good information about the world? Do Western Media do a good job of it, or at least a better one than those in less…

> democracy is optional for economic prosperity

You might want to look at the history of US external economic relations, especially the United Fruit Company (which created the "banana republics").

Re: Western news about China depends on intrepid Chinese ‘news assistants’

#52

Post by richardknop »

echaozh wrote: post #25
Cyph0n wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They might take over the world (I think it's unlikely), but in my opinion, the main reason isn't their political system: it's human capital (1/7 of the world population) and homogeneity (very cohesive culture due to China's history). Western countries lack the former, India and others lack the latter.

The Muslims have both, they're sure taking over the world.

Muslims are actually very diverse group. Not only Sunni / Shia rift which is major one but also differences between African/Middle Eastern/Asian Muslims. I think Indians and Chinese are much more culturally homogenous and more likely to take over world.

Re: Western news about China depends on intrepid Chinese ‘news assistants’

#53

Post by owebmaster »

stevenwoo wrote: post #43
owebmaster wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The secret is to continue raising the standard of living of the people as fast as it's been raising in the past 2 decades.

I thought the problem with that is that it is literally impossible to continue the trajectory.

It might be a better time to say this when the strategy start to fail but this seems like american wishful thinking as China keeps growing strongly.

Re: Western news about China depends on intrepid Chinese ‘news assistants’

#54

Post by owebmaster »

PakG1 wrote: post #41
owebmaster wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> sent many of the young, brave democratic protestors in Hong Kong to prison, silenced many of its Xi critics, etc. The crackdown on black people and BLM is very similar, but a lot more violent.

I'd say that has more to do with societal norms and biases, not political strategy.

From a commoner standpoint, for sure.

Re: Western news about China depends on intrepid Chinese ‘news assistants’

#55

Post by taejo »

PakG1 wrote: post #39
khc wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mandarin is _NOT_ the Han dialect of Chinese. Each region has its own dialect and while they are not taught in school (mostly due to central government's policy), regional dialects are often spoken at home. Source: I grew up in Hong Kong and have relatives in mainland China

Sorry, to be clear, I said that Mandarin is basically the Han dialect. It is true that a lot of people interchange the names Hanyu, Guoyu, and Putonghua, though they are not exactly the same thing. Just asked my co-worker about this to be sure, he said a lot of people consider Hanyu to be Putonghua even though it's not. It's like me telling a Chinese person that Canadian English is basically American English, even th…

It's closer to saying "English is the European dialect of Indo-European". Cantonese, Shanghainese, Taiwanese are all languages spoken primarily by Han people, they are all Han dialects. Of course Mandarin has a priviledged position among them, but that priviledged position has not much to do with the Han people, since it shares that with all the others.

EDIT: it may well be the case that people use "Hanyu" (literally, Han language) as a synonym for "Guoyu" (lit. national language, the Taiwanese version of Modern Standard Mandarin [MSM]) or "Putonghua" (lit. common speech, the PRC version of MSM). "Han language" is a poor English translation for "Hanyu" if that's what you mean.

Re: Western news about China depends on intrepid Chinese ‘news assistants’

#56

Post by kercker »

coumygen wrote: post #17
Cyph0n wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They might take over the world (I think it's unlikely), but in my opinion, the main reason isn't their political system: it's human capital (1/7 of the world population) and homogeneity (very cohesive culture due to China's history). Western countries lack the former, India and others lack the latter.

Human capital doesn't automatically indicate economic prowess; you have to remember there's around 700M in China that still lives in rural areas with under $1 a day, and they can't get the jobs in urban cities because those jobs are going away due to moving to cheaper SE asia countries, robots, and lack of skillsets.

From Word Bank: "According to China’s current poverty standard (per capita rural net income of RMB 2,300 per year in 2010 constant prices), there were 55 million poor in rural areas in 2015."

Your statement "there's around 700M in China that still lives in rural areas with under $1 a day" is simply wrong.

[1] http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/china/overview

Re: Western news about China depends on intrepid Chinese ‘news assistants’

#57

Post by CoolGuySteve »

kibwen wrote: post #33
est wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Cantonese, a language with 60 million speakers in China Most of cantonese speakers can speak mandarin as well.

That doesn't refute my point; most French Canadians can also speak English, and yet French Canadian retains its own distinct subculture, so distinct that Quebec has repeatedly voted to secede from Canada. Language is merely one very obvious indicator of cultural heterogeneity, and the point remains that China is not nearly as culturally unified as the typical Westerner understands (which should not be so hard to beli…

> Quebec has repeatedly voted to secede from Canada.

I believe your point may be refuted by the fact that you state outright lies like this whopper here.

Re: Western news about China depends on intrepid Chinese ‘news assistants’

#58

Post by odiroot »

kiba wrote: post #5

From my perspective, it looked like China will overtake the world and maybe prove that democracy is optional for economic prosperity, a blow to Western values and ideal. But how true is that? I hear a lot about corruption and crackdown, and wonder how much does that impact their economy. How critical is good information about the world? Do Western Media do a good job of it, or at least a better one than those in less…

> democracy is optional for economic prosperity

This is quite obvious. We've had economically prosperous countries for ages now. Even in feudal times.

Doesn't mean the average citizen is going to prosper.

Re: Western news about China depends on intrepid Chinese ‘news assistants’

#59

Post by odiroot »

Cyph0n wrote: post #9
kiba wrote: post #5

From my perspective, it looked like China will overtake the world and maybe prove that democracy is optional for economic prosperity, a blow to Western values and ideal. But how true is that? I hear a lot about corruption and crackdown, and wonder how much does that impact their economy. How critical is good information about the world? Do Western Media do a good job of it, or at least a better one than those in less…

They might take over the world (I think it's unlikely), but in my opinion, the main reason isn't their political system: it's human capital (1/7 of the world population) and homogeneity (very cohesive culture due to China's history). Western countries lack the former, India and others lack the latter.

You shouldn't overstate the homogeneity.

We're probably more homogeneous here in European Union. Granted, China is a log bigger.

The biggest industrial centers (like Guangdong or even Shanghai) don't even use Mandarin on a daily basis.

Yes, alas, the thing that makes this whole thing going is the central government.

Re: Western news about China depends on intrepid Chinese ‘news assistants’

#60

Post by odiroot »

friendwithwifi wrote: post #2

China under Xi Jinping has effectively turned into a dicatatorship, and so with a dictatorship, censorship and blackouts naturally comes along with it. That's the reason why Beijing has recently cracked down on VPN, sent many of the young, brave democratic protestors in Hong Kong to prison, silenced many of its Xi critics, etc. Will China suffer from the censorship and blackouts? As discussed heavily on HN, probably.…

> That's the reason why Beijing has recently cracked down on VPN.

This is completely unrelated to Xi's reign. The point is to keep the population "harmonious" before the Communist Party congress that starts next week.

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