This seems to be completely at odds with the ‘real’ world as we see it – articles all over are beating the Chinese (and to a lesser extent the Indian) bandwagon – urging investors from Silicon Valley, New York, London and elsewhere to buy into China. Is this reminiscent of the days when the Soviet Union and the United States were considered to be on a par wrt arms supremacy? And what happened – the Soviet Union as we knew it collapsed in 1991 just a few years after the fall of the Berlin wall. Points to ponder, folks! Can China Survive or will China Fail?
While I am no specialist in international collapses, I would say that there was an exposure to free market systems that preceded both these collapses – I see the same situation in China today – the native Chinese have tasted ‘capitalism’ – and with Hong Kong in their portfolio, the stresses and strains are bound to grow - I believe in the span of a decade they will want a full course ‘meal’ – and ‘democracy’ could very well become the ‘mantra of tomorrow’ in China - the important thing is not whether China as we know it today survives or not – but how will the United States deal with such a crisis – the triggering event could be bank failures and the real estate meltdown in China (akin to what happened in Japan in the not-so-distant past) – we have to remember that when 1 billion people begin to taste something, something has to give. The talented folks at the Economist, Wall Street, and the Fed should plan for such an event because one never knows – meanwhile, for the common investor I suggest that when investing in China, proceed with caution - as they say - 'history repeats itself' - a dose of world history re-visited might save some hard-earned dollars – Goodday!
posted by sekhar @ 12:04 AM
1 Comments:
Anand,
Thanks for your observations and your points are welltaken - I do, maintain, however, that while the former USSR and China are two completely separate scenarios the reality is that the capitalist approach only nurtures the idea of greed (which translates to a craving for a higher standard of living)and all that the investments from the west have done is, possibly, to quicken the pace of transformation and hasten the breakdown of the political system in the China of today. The success or failure of the west in China has no bearing in the minds of an individual Chinese person who is aspiring to shout 'I want more'.
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