WPR's The New Rules: Don't Count Out Free Markets Just Yet

The recent global financial crisis has birthed a slew of books proclaiming the superiority of state capitalism -- or, alternatively, authoritarian capitalism -- over free markets. China, we are led to believe, will not merely own this century, but will also likely win the bulk of the world over to its "unique" and "unprecedented" model of development. Stunningly, even though no serious thinker still believes in the efficacy of command economies, we are now encouraged to quake before state-directed economies, as if a bunch of power-fixated politicos sitting around a table will somehow manage to outsmart, out-predict, and outperform the "wisdom of crowds" and the market's "invisible hand" -- all while easily maintaining their dictatorship over just-emerging middle classes.

Read the rest here at World Politics Review.

As for the book I review in the piece:

Find it here

Comments

[Gilbert Garza]

Like the US model, the China model is basically a very opportunistic market capitalism working with and against whatever it has to accept from a socio-political governmental overlay, in competition with economic world powers, and making its way in a tense and chaotic political world order. This model is already winning the bulk of the world over. China’s version is arguably unique and unprecedented in its overlay and in other incidental (and significant) ways (as was the US model when first introduced) but still they are both based in what has become (and some have said has always been) a fundamentally firm and natural standard.

[Petrer]

Economic freedom is very potent, even in small doses. I see the chinese simply allowing certain economic freedoms, while still holding to their authoritarianism. The only reason I see that China doesn't want to be like Hong Kong (yet) is that economic freedom invariably leads to democratic and civil (protesting, yelling, etc.) freedom.

The amazing aspect to China is how slowly they have liberalized, and how much further they have to go, and the potency of the progress for their slow and incremental actions!