The Coming China Wars: Where They Will Be Fought and How They Can Be Won, Revised and Expanded Edition

What China Must (But Probably Won’t) Do

If I tell you how things are, I’ve told you why things cannot change.

—Professor Edward C. Banfield

This sobering observation from one of Harvard’s great conservative professors would suggest that there is little or nothing that the Chinese government is going to do to bring about constructive change. I do not, however, entirely share Professor Banfield’s “council of despair” on the prospects for internal reform within China. In fact, there are small signs of progress.

For starters, China’s latest Five-Year Plan, which was unveiled with great fanfare by President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao, marks a significant evolution, if not altogether dramatic shift, from its “Adam Smith on steroids” growth-at-any-cost ...