Genesis
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A lot of people have been saying China will have an Arab spring of our own, but even as they are saying this do they not realize the causes of the spring and the difference in China?
Arab Spring countries are fundamentally broken, China is just not perfect. While it may look similar there is a key difference. China will get better, and keeps on improving, while the Arab spring countries won't.
Especially now that Arab spring has more or less destroyed those countries rather than helped, but I could have told them that before it happened. The situation is so similar to China a century ago.
The leading military strong man Yuan shikai declared himself emperor, his friends and subordinates either turned or remained neutral while Sun Yan Sen sent him into an early grave, but as soon as he's dead, the second in command quickly halted the rebels, regained more than half of China and became acting PM, with puppet presidents. General Sisi, fits this, while the Libya warlords fits the warlord era of China which also happened at the same time. The Syrian crisis also happened in China.
So, yea I saw it coming, one of the three principles of Chinese democracy by Sun yat sen was people power. The Arab countries got none, a revolution didn't give them any, if anything it took it away. This is too long an explanation, but needless to say it also happened in China.
Ironically, without a revolution, China has been giving the people power year after year, far quicker than any other nation before it. This is also too long an explanation, but just think, a sports team isn't a democracy, but if a few players is so good, they can dictate the terms.
Now back to difference. Why did Arab spring happen? Failure of the government for one. Regardless of what you may think of China's government, here are the facts.
China is the world's second, and soon to be first in GDP, PPP standards, by 2016, while nominal it will be around 2023-25. China will break the middle income point by no later than 2022, most likely sooner, and China is one of the best in infrastructure even today.
Massive reforms in social services, social freedom, as well as other programs are also in the works and some already achieved, for example, Hukou (think of it as a more important birth certificate) today is very different from what it was even a few years ago, no more re education through labor, so drug addicts can just go to jail, more social welfare as well as access to cheaper, reliable daily needs like food, water, electricity and such.
China will become a lower end developed country as a whole by 2030, a mid developed country in the coastal provinces the size of the US in population, by the same time, and a developed country like UK and US in the special administrative regions like Beijing, Shanghai and such, which holds about half the population of US and more than twice UK, by the same time.
None of these were happening in those countries, or at the speed of China. But that's more or less true for all developing countries.
Then there is freedom, namely economic freedom, freedom of movement, freedom of religion, freedom of speech, of assembly, of democracy and such.
Economic freedom is the least important in terms of worry, because it's happening before our eyes. You will see it and you can already see it.
Freedom of movement, China doesn't restrict your movement, but China doesn't have enough money for social services for everyone, so if you want to take advantage of said services, you need to stay in your region, but there's obviously groups that would help migrants, and some policies that would also help. But this is a developing country problem, not a authoritarian problem.
Freedom of religion, Chinese are not really religious, there may be about 30-40 million really religious people, maybe. But that's a far cry from the 1.3 billion in China. So while it may seem like a problem for Xinjiang and Tibet, nobody in China really cares, and hence Chinese don't really take this seriously.
Freedom of speech and assembly, well, China has it, sort of. Religious countries are sometimes too strict on what can and can't be shown, but China doesn't really care, in fact a **** industry is developing. Political speech, yea that needs work, but with the Social media, it's a lot harder to control and because of it thousands of officials and social injustices have been fixed.
Assembly, you could, just not rallies, for one thing China is a nation of 1.3 billion, Beijing alone has 20 million plus, it's a problem even if it's a parade for Disney land. People gather for all kinds of different crap all the time, in fact it's a stupid trend that I hate for people to come together for stuff.
Democracy? It will be with Chinese characteristics, what it will look like I have an idea, but it's too big a topic so let's leave it.
A Chinese fourth tier city. Compare it with other developing world and see the difference.
Pretty much you can do anything you like as long as it doesn't harm others. Getting a car is harder in Beijing, but too many cars harm others. China has 1.3 billion people, too many babies harm others, so somethings are unique to China and soon India. Chinese freedom is head and shoulders above most developing countries, even though we got a 4 out of 100 from one of those Western surveys.
One simple question, China allows people to move, but limited social services due to Hukou, most developing countries has close to no services period, but has no Hukou, how is that more free?
There's obviously more, like outlook, education level, culture, and more but let's leave it at that.
So before anyone start predicting the fall of China and a Chinese revolution, ask yourself, what do you really know of China.
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LOL. Genny writing another useless piece again? You get to get out more often.
