The Narrow Road to the Deep North / First Person - Richard Flanagan
Whither Asia? - Pankaj Mishra and Nisid Hajari
PM: We are amidst not just an economic shift but a massive psychological shift; it's the west that made the modern world (through colonisation or deprivation of sovereignty) and created a system which is now coming to the end of a phase of relatively uninterrupted success; Asia now confident while the west is not
PM: First half of 20th C traumatic for China: internal struggle between Mao Tse Tung and Chiang Kai Shek and brutal Japanese occupation; so national sovereignty is #1 priority; belief that must develop or be destroyed; all led by historical experience of humiliation and loss
PM: China can appear an island of stability amidst ocean of chaos (not troubled by politics, technocratic, one-party)
NH: But if no dissent, risk of groupthink, e.g. worst recent mistakes such as territorial overclaim in South China Sea where China totally taken aback to have the ruling go against them
NH: Also means that the government's one source of legitimacy is its ability to deliver national outcomes
PM: Across the world we are seeing the fragmentation of individual nations' shared national dreams (e.g. the American dream); contrast China where there is an ideological consensus across rulers and ruled about China's promised/imminent greatness; should not underestimate the power of this coherency
PM: Xi Jinping trying to renew this by going after corruption - renewing legitimacy of the party state as the protector of the people's interests
NH: The environment also undermines legitimacy (e.g. air pollution) and China has responded strongly to this, including at cost to economic growth
NH: China hasn't yet been tested as a fully fledged world power (e.g. their roles in Korea and Afghanistan - via Pakistan influence - are critical but we haven't really seen how they'll act yet)
PM: China has no ideology to promote - it looks at the world instrumentally, as something that can help China become and stay powerful - it's not imperial in its approach
NH: Wonder whether that's a smart long-term strategy - by not intervening in the internal matters of the Asian countries it supports by investing in, and propping up repressive approaches, it may be becoming unpopular with the predominantly young populations of those countries
PM: The China/India comparison is lazy; they are chalk and cheese apart from population size; India's projections of catching up to China are a fantasy and not rooted in any domestic achievement; indicators of social stability and achievement in India are fragile and risk spiralling down; can't be an international power until it gets its own house in order
NH: The key decision China made early on was to invest heavily in primary health care and education, and that drove its economic growth; India is spending a fraction of what it needs to on that so will never grow its workforce to the level needed for such economic strength
PM: Moreover India missed the advantages of a semi free market economy where the state can intervene to make industries internationally competitive
PM: Also China (brutally) broke down existing class/power structures (e.g. land reforms, executing landlords) while India still has an oppressive caste society, not egalitarian, stifles innovation and ideas (which is one reason the US got ahead)
NH: Singapore has found a place between the elephants
PM: No one talks about Indonesia despite size/importance (NH: they are inward looking, don't asset themselves)
PM: Indonesia, India, and many western countries are all experiencing a crisis of legitimacy, which has been met by the rise of harder edged nationalist leaders playing on ethnic, religious, culturally chauvinist views and attacking the former 'elites'
PM: China decisively pursued modernisation but not westernisation; India has always been heavily influenced by British gradualist, Fabian notions, as well as the British bureaucratic and institutional apparatus (e.g. education system emphasises rote learning; universities turn out graduates with qualifications that are useless) and has sought to emulate westernised ways of doing things
- A book succeeds where people find many different things in it
- John Friedrich - the con artist whose autobiography RF ghostwrote at the beginning of his writing career - had a coherent worldview: the world is evil so you might as well act accordingly and accumulate treasures along the way
- This view has now become ascendant (Trumpian) - there is now a fundamental attack on the idea of truth, and if there is no truth then all that matters is opinion, and if so then the opinions of the most powerful will prevail
- Mark Zuckerberg has said we no longer have separate identities at work, home etc; this is the great totalitarian dream, to destroy the private sphere - today our private lives are increasingly assailed
- Novels have become a new unnamed resistance; reading is subversively in opposition to the assault on truth and private lives
Whither Asia? - Pankaj Mishra and Nisid Hajari
PM: We are amidst not just an economic shift but a massive psychological shift; it's the west that made the modern world (through colonisation or deprivation of sovereignty) and created a system which is now coming to the end of a phase of relatively uninterrupted success; Asia now confident while the west is not
PM: First half of 20th C traumatic for China: internal struggle between Mao Tse Tung and Chiang Kai Shek and brutal Japanese occupation; so national sovereignty is #1 priority; belief that must develop or be destroyed; all led by historical experience of humiliation and loss
PM: China can appear an island of stability amidst ocean of chaos (not troubled by politics, technocratic, one-party)
NH: But if no dissent, risk of groupthink, e.g. worst recent mistakes such as territorial overclaim in South China Sea where China totally taken aback to have the ruling go against them
NH: Also means that the government's one source of legitimacy is its ability to deliver national outcomes
PM: Across the world we are seeing the fragmentation of individual nations' shared national dreams (e.g. the American dream); contrast China where there is an ideological consensus across rulers and ruled about China's promised/imminent greatness; should not underestimate the power of this coherency
PM: Xi Jinping trying to renew this by going after corruption - renewing legitimacy of the party state as the protector of the people's interests
NH: The environment also undermines legitimacy (e.g. air pollution) and China has responded strongly to this, including at cost to economic growth
NH: China hasn't yet been tested as a fully fledged world power (e.g. their roles in Korea and Afghanistan - via Pakistan influence - are critical but we haven't really seen how they'll act yet)
PM: China has no ideology to promote - it looks at the world instrumentally, as something that can help China become and stay powerful - it's not imperial in its approach
NH: Wonder whether that's a smart long-term strategy - by not intervening in the internal matters of the Asian countries it supports by investing in, and propping up repressive approaches, it may be becoming unpopular with the predominantly young populations of those countries
PM: The China/India comparison is lazy; they are chalk and cheese apart from population size; India's projections of catching up to China are a fantasy and not rooted in any domestic achievement; indicators of social stability and achievement in India are fragile and risk spiralling down; can't be an international power until it gets its own house in order
NH: The key decision China made early on was to invest heavily in primary health care and education, and that drove its economic growth; India is spending a fraction of what it needs to on that so will never grow its workforce to the level needed for such economic strength
PM: Moreover India missed the advantages of a semi free market economy where the state can intervene to make industries internationally competitive
PM: Also China (brutally) broke down existing class/power structures (e.g. land reforms, executing landlords) while India still has an oppressive caste society, not egalitarian, stifles innovation and ideas (which is one reason the US got ahead)
NH: Singapore has found a place between the elephants
PM: No one talks about Indonesia despite size/importance (NH: they are inward looking, don't asset themselves)
PM: Indonesia, India, and many western countries are all experiencing a crisis of legitimacy, which has been met by the rise of harder edged nationalist leaders playing on ethnic, religious, culturally chauvinist views and attacking the former 'elites'
PM: China decisively pursued modernisation but not westernisation; India has always been heavily influenced by British gradualist, Fabian notions, as well as the British bureaucratic and institutional apparatus (e.g. education system emphasises rote learning; universities turn out graduates with qualifications that are useless) and has sought to emulate westernised ways of doing things
