The progression of an independent rule of law in China through changes in judicial practice will be enhanced through international instruments in the broader multilnational community. As China assumes broader responsibilities as a stakeholder in the international system, an independent rule of law will be fostered.

In its shortened form the argument lacked clarity and it seems unclear that this “critical mass” exists in China. It is also unclear how this argument fits with the ideas included in the extended portions of the post that suggest the internet can reinforce the power of authoritarian regimes. Though it is clear the internet is not a silver bullet in the struggle for freedom, it is also not a key factor in the government’s ability to “adapt and accommodate” indefinitely.

Professor Zhu argues discussions of Chinese politics focus almost exclusively on political leaders and ignores trends within Chinese society; she argues regular Chinese are “more and more the masters of their own destiny.” She notes that most discussions of information flows in China emphasize government control and censorship. She, however, characterizes information sources in China in the following manner:

“What emerges in China is a commercialized and vastly expanding information society. We’ve heard about censorship and crackdowns; but as you know much better than I do, people who want to DO find means to bypass the Great Firewall. Vigorous public discussion and networking on the Internet and via social media have become central features of contemporary Chinese society. So, for the fans ofThe X-Files, I don’t know about the “truth,” but the information is out there, even in China. And people do process information on their own terms, incorporating a variety of resources…”

Zhu provides several examples of instances where rapid online mobilization generated shifts in or constraints on policy – the Google row, the Green Dam incident and the reinstatement of Avatar. The example of the online response to the Google incident is particularly interesting. Initially the sympathies of both citizens and netizens seemed to lie with Beijing. She gives the example of a conversation with a colleague from a university in China:

“She told me that the majority of her students consider it opportunistic for Google to threaten to leave China just when a new round of Internet crackdowns is raising eyebrows among Chinese netizens. Her students think that Google is exploiting anti-crackdown sentiment and that its threat is mainly a gesture to please the U.S. government.”

In the discussion of shifting public sentiment over the Google incident the piece seems to contradict its initial assertions. Zhu cites the “continuing lack of easy access to unfiltered information” for the initial lack of response to Google’s action by Chinese citizens. She goes further to say the following:

So it’s not surprising that the politically targeted computer hacking, downplayed in mainstream Chinese news reporting on Google, escaped widespread notice. To most people in China, the Google story is only about differences over the state’s censorship policy.

The fact that most Chinese use “the internet and social media primarily for entertainment, social networking and other mundane purposes” makes it highly unlikely that those individuals working to “assure that a constant stream of unauthorized information flows through the networks of public discourse” impact the online experience of ordinary citizens. Especially when Zhu says that “[Chinese] normally do not have any great reason to doubt the news reports of their own media or to go looking… for something more about the Google story than the mainstream media tell them”.

The final chapter to the Google story is yet to be written and it remains unclear what impact the internet discourse will have on the outcome. Zhu provides examples of nationalists rallying against the rhetoric of President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton and equating freedom of information with imperialism. At the same time others see the struggle as a battle between liberty and tyranny. From her piece alone it is unclear which side carries the discourse – though she suggests opinion is turning in Google’s favor – or even the scale of the online debate. Despite this ambiguity, Zhu asserts that:

“In the case of Google, based on what I’ve gathered, the tide of public opinion expressed on the Internet and in social media appears to be turning now in Google’s favor. It at least looks as if a critical mass of public interest and opinion is building that will influence the ongoing negotiations between Google and the Chinese state.”

Additionally economic elites – crucial to Zhu’s notion of “critical masses” – apparently also sympathize with Google. The coalescence of popular and business sentiments will thus make it hard for Beijing to deal with Google severely.

Taking this example – and shorter examples about Avatar and Green Dam – Zhu moves on to her theory about the relationship between the internet and political change. The argument is riddled with jargon, but can be distilled to this: the internet can reinforce authoritarian governments by creating outlets for dissatisfaction, a mechanism for governments to discern the preferences of critical social groupings, and disaggregating demands into smaller groups based around malleable identities not tied to “primordial” characteristics. So while popular sentiment, if aligned with key economic players, can bring Avatar back to theatres and possibly keep Google in China this progress is double-edged. These new groupings can be readily mobilized, but Zhu argues that Chinese society more broadly has become “divided along socio-economic lines into smaller interest groups” and local issues “constitute the bulk of China’s recent [protest] activities such as the taxi driver strikes and localized and short-term protests about job losses and property confiscations.

Rather than linking this localization to policy successes in Beijing, Zhu argues it is in fact caused by the rise of “lifestyle politics”. Lifestyle politics simply refers to identities built around value preferences that are flexible owing to the availability of choices on the internet. Zhu argues that both Western governments and Beijing are incapable of servicing these new constituencies and that this spawns “public cynicism about government and traditional political action directed toward government action”. Instead people take it upon themselves to manage their lives.

I have three immediate hesitations about lifestyle politics and its explanatory value. First, the construct is vague and it is not clear why primordial, socio-economic or any other sort of identity cannot coexist with this new type. Second, there are numerous potential socio-economic issues that transcend the local level. Environmental degradation, youth unemployment, and even the property seizures that Zhu cites as a local concern are common across regions and provide the potential for broader political action. Finally, if government – local or central – is seen as impeding the realization of individual preferences, regardless of their relativism, there will be conflict between citizens and the government. Comparing the frustrations of average Chinese to the disgust some Americans felt about statements by the owner of Whole Foods against healthcare, as Zhu attempts to do, does not seem to make sense. The politics of grocery store choice among a small sub-segment of American consumers is hardly comparable to a Chinese family trying to receive recompense from a land seizure or American families trying to hang on to a mortgage. These issues cut across regional preferences and can mobilize people from competing ideological camps.

Zhu attempts to address this by explaining how lifestyle politics affect political participation. She argues that it also involves the “expression of individual rights and a consciousness abut the social responsibilities associated with a given lifestyle” and is about “associating with a group or class of people in order to claim rights and recognition against the insecurities of contemporary globalized society.” This sounds fairly unsurprising, “mediatized society” or not, and further suggests that lifestyle politics is like any other politics.

Zhu points out that there exists a great deal of public support for the Chinese regime and its form of government (how does this mesh with the cynicism built up earlier by these new identities?). Zhu argues that despite China’s autocratic form, there exists a “quasi-public sphere that compels the state to actively cultivate and incorporate public opinion into amore overtly deliberative policy making process.” This allows the government to react to public demands and undertake the accommodation necessary to avoid revolution.

This suggests that the primary challenge to authoritarian governments is a lack of information. While access to information is important and lower-level cadres have incentives to distort it, poor and unpopular policies persist for political reasons. When times are good the Chinese can afford to be more accommodating, but the regime’s flexibility will be severely challenged when crisis hits. If stability is the primary concern and resources become scarce, policy will overtly target constituencies crucial to the maintenance of communist party power. The majority of Chinese society is not yet one of those constituencies. It is easy to predict adaptability and persistence when things are good, and some argue that they are just going to get better, but no country’s development has been without crisis. And while some analysts believe in the ability of the Chinese government to ward off such calamities, history is not on their side.

How would such a city work? Imagine that a government in a poor country set aside a piece of uninhabited land. It invites a developed country to enter into a new type of partnership, in which the developed country sets up and enforces rules specified in a charter. Citizens from the poorer country, and the rest of the world, would be free to live and work in the city that emerges…

And the new zone created need not be ruled directly from the developed partner country – residents of the charter city can administer the rules specified by their partner as long as the developed country retains the final say…

Romer argues that because the cities will be uninhabited at first,

…as these cities seek out residents, the leaders and citizens in existing countries will face the most effective pressure for good governance – competition.

I think that Romer is on to something here. He is taking a stab at a great injustice when it comes to development: sovereignty is fiction, but poverty is real. Why should people who live in poor countries suffer because they have bad governments? The poor in poor countries are those who are least likely to be able to emigrate to wealthy ones, so charter cities plausibly provide an alternative.

Nevertheless, the important question is not whether they would work in theory, but whether they would work in reality and this is a tough question. One problem is the commitment one that Romer discusses: once the city exists, the host government can renege on the promise to accept the terms of the bargain. Thus, there would need to be a credible enforcement mechanism and I wonder if a treaty – as Romer suggests – is enough. Let’s suppose it is. The more important question is whether host countries would want charter cities. Here I think Romer is on shakier ground. He cites two quasi-examples of where this has worked, Hong Kong and Mauritius. I am not sure these are great examples as Hong Kong was a formal British colony and the Government of Mauritius saw special export zones as an important part of their own economic development program, as Romer makes clear.

Poverty is pervasive in many developing countries because politicians are not committed to economic development, but personal enrichment and maintaining political power. If economic development is consistent with these objectives, such as in China, then they could work. However, charter cities are not necessary in China because the government is committed to economic development.

In my opinion, the question is whether governments in most developing countries would have the political incentive to allow charter cities. I think in many cases the answer is no. To have a booming economic enclave due to good governance within a country would demonstrate clearly the failings of the existing government and thus might plausibly create demands for reform. Why politicians who are content with their country’s current political situation would want to take such a risk is not clear. North Korea is an extreme – yet clear – example of where something like this could happen. I thus conclude that the countries that need these the most – those with the lousiest governments – are those who would want it least. Similarly, while weak governments in failed states, such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo or Somalia, might welcome charter cities, because the governments in these countries can’t provide security, I can’t imagine who would want to take the risk of setting up a charter city in such a territory.

Romer’s idea is the latest version of trying to spur development by getting around politics. In many ways it’s an updated – and more extreme- version of the Washington Consensus and Romer has made the same mistake that proponents of the Washington Consensus made. The Washington Consensus did not fail because it’s bad economics, but because it’s bad politics. I think charter cities fit the same category.

Militarily, no other countries comes close to the US in its ability to project power:

America’s decline has been vastly overstated. To become a global superpower requires economic, political, and military might, and on the last two counts, the United States remains leagues ahead of any Asian rival. Despite boosting defense budgets by 20 percent annually, Asian powers like India, China, or Indonesia will not rival the US military for decades, if ever – only the Pentagon could launch a war in a place like Afghanistan, so far from its homeland. When a tsunami struck South and Southeast Asia five years ago, the region’s nations, including Indonesia, Thailand, and India, had to rely on the US Navy to coordinate relief efforts…

The US is the only country that others see as a powerful, neutral power-broker:

America also has other advantages that will be nearly impossible to remove. With Asian nations still squabbling amongst themselves, many look to the United States as a neutral power broker, a role America plays around the world. German writer and scholar Joseph Joffe calls the United States today the “default power”: No one in the world trusts anyone else to play the global hegemon, so it still falls to Washington…

Rumors of economic decline are vastly overstated:

Even in the economic realm, the United States remains strong…the United States accounted for 32 percent of global output in 1913, 26 percent in 1960, and 26 percent in 2007, remarkably consistent figures. The United States remains atop nearly every ranking of economies according to openness and innovation. While Asia’s centrally planned economies can build infrastructure without worrying about public opposition…they are less successful at nurturing world-beating companies, which thrive on risk-taking and hands-off government. Compared to Intel, Google, or Apple, China’s major companies still are state-linked behemoths that do little innovation of their own. The leading corporations in most other Asian nations (with the exception of Japan and South Korea) also are either giant state-linked firms or trading companies that invest little in innovation. And censorship or tight government controls alienate the most innovative firms – Google is now threatening to pull out of China entirely…

While people may admire the economic growth in Asia, the moral authority of the US is vastly stronger.

Most important, the United States is a champion of an idea that has global appeal, and Asia is not. During the opposition protests in Iran, demonstrators look to the United States, not China or Indonesia or even India, to make a statement. In a reversal of the Iranian regime’s rhetoric, some protestors even chant “Death to China” because of Beijing’s support for the repressive government in Tehran. As long as protestors in places like Iran, or Burma or Ukraine, call out for the American president, and not China’s leader or India’s prime minister, the United States will remain the preeminent power…

I have rarely met anyone, in any country, who wanted to move to China, or India, or even Japan, rather than the United States…Perhaps one day China or Indonesia or India will draw these migrants, who would come seeking the same dreams and openness as they do today in the United States. But it won’t be soon – and it might not even be this century.

Solid argument.

A speech by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Thursday showed a lack of respect for China, which cannot accept conditions on matters of “national security” or “social stability,” said Beijing Association of Online Media Chairman Min Dahong…

“How China’s Internet develops and how it is managed are Chinese people’s own affairs,” Min said in an interview with state-run Xinhuanet.com.

“On the Internet question, China doesn’t need any lessons from the United States on what to do or how,” he said…

“Hillary’s speech on January 21 insinuating that China lacks freedom of information and speech is in fact disrespectful and doesn’t stand up,” Min said.

Good for Secretary Clinton.

Freedom House…in its latest annual assessment that liberty and human rights had retreated globally for the fourth consecutive year. It said this marked the longest period of decline in freedom since the organisation began its reports nearly 40 years ago.

The author (I have no idea who because The Economist does not carry bylines), goes on to discuss the various causes of the latest democratic recession:

…the worrying thing is that the cause of liberal democracy is not merely suffering political reverses, it is also in intellectual retreat…

there are some obvious reasons why Western governments’ zeal to promote democracy, and the willingness of other countries to listen, have ebbed. In many quarters (including Western ones), the assault on Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, and its bloody aftermath, seemed to confirm people’s suspicion that promoting democracy as an American foreign-policy aim was ill-conceived or plain cynical.

In Afghanistan, the other country where an American-led coalition has been waging war in democracy’s name, the corruption and deviousness of the local political elite, and the flaws of last year’s election, have been an embarrassment. In the Middle East, America’s enthusiasm for promoting democracy took a dip after the Palestinian elections of 2006, which brought Hamas to office…

But perhaps the biggest reason why democracy’s magnetic power has waned is the rise of China – and the belief of its would-be imitators that they too can create a dynamic economy without easing their grip on political power.

The article then makes one of the most concise, clear, and convincing arguments the importance of supporting democracy I have read in a long time. It methodically addresses all of the criticisms leveled against democracy and shows why they are wrong.

So how does the case in defence of democracy stand up these days?…Democracy may not yield perfect policies, but it ought to guard against all manner of ills, ranging from outright tyranny (towards which a “mild” authoritarian can always slide) to larceny at the public expense.

… all but two of the 30 least corrupt countries in the world are democracies… Autocracies tend to occupy much higher rankings on the corruption scale…

What about the argument that economic development, at least in its early stages, is best pursued under a benign despot?…For every economically successful East Asian (former) autocracy like Taiwan or South Korea, there is an Egypt or a Cameroon (or indeed a North Korea or a Myanmar) which is both harsh and sluggish…

Believers in democracy as an engine of progress often make the point that a climate of freedom is most needed in a knowledge-based economy..It is surely no accident that every economy in the top 25 of the Global Innovation Index is a democracy, except semi-democratic Singapore and Hong Kong.

China, which comes 27th in this table, is often cited as a vast exception to this rule…The determination of China’s authorities to impose their own terms on the information revolution was highlighted this week when Google, the search engine, said it might pull out of China after a cyber-attack that targeted human-rights activists…

Admirers of China’s iron hand may conclude that it can manage well without the likes of Google…But in the medium term, the mentality that insists on hobbling search engines will surely act as a break on creative endeavour…

What about the argument that autocracy creates a modicum of stability without which growth is impossible?…On the State Fragility Index…democracies tend to do much better than autocracies…

At the very least, a culture of compromise – coupled with greater accountability and limits on state power – means that democracies are better able to avoid catastrophic mistakes, or criminal cruelty. Bloody nightmares that cost tens of millions of lives, like China’s Great Leap Forward or the Soviet Union’s forced collectivisation programme, were made possible by the concentration of power in a small group of people who faced no restraint.

Liberal democratic governments can make all manner of blunders, but they are less likely to commit mass murder autocracies may be faster and bolder. They are also more accident-prone.

For all its frustrations, open and accountable government tends in the long run to produce better policies…Above all, elections make the transfer of power legitimate and smooth. Tyrannies may look stable under one strongman; but they can slide into instability, even bloody chaos, if a transition goes awry. Free elections also mean that policy mistakes, even bad ones, are more quickly corrected…

I often describe democracy assistance as a harm reduction strategy. This is a crucially important point that the development first crowd does not seem to understand.

First, Google announced it will only stay in China if the government lifts its censorship of the internet for Google’s users. Nicholas Kristof cheers Google’s decision:

By announcing that it no longer plans to censor search results in China, even if that means it must withdraw from the country, Google is showing spine – a kind that few other companies or governments have shown toward Beijing…

Google announced its decision after a sophisticated Chinese attempt to penetrate the Gmail addresses of dissidents….

China is redrawing the balance between openness and economic efficiency. The architect of China’s astonishingly successful economic reforms, Deng Xiaoping, clenched his teeth and accepted photocopiers, fax machines, cellphones, computers and lawyers because they were part of modernization.

Yet in the last few years, President Hu Jintao has cracked down on Internet freedoms and independent lawyers and journalists. President Hu is intellectually brilliant but seems to have no vision for China 20 years from now…

Eventually, I think, a combination of technology, education and information will end the present stasis in China. In a conflict between the Communist Party and Google, the party will win in the short run. But in the long run, I’d put my money on Google.

Second, following Haiti’s earthquake, no one looked to China to provide much in the way of aid and reconstruction, and the Chinese response has been rather paltry: 50 rescue workers and a commitment of $2 million for aid and reconstruction.  By contrast, the US has already offered at least $100 million and 5,000 troops. Now I realize that geography and history play a role here: the US is much closer to Haiti and we have much deeper ties to the nation. Nevertheless, articles and books about the rise of China and the decline of the US abound today. It seems to me that if China wants to establish itself as a major power, it is going to have to do a lot better than a 1:50 ratio of aid and a 1:100 ratio in personnel with the US when it comes to global humanitarian crises.

Moral authority matters. It’s clear the US has this and China does not. Two questions tend to dominate the news on Haiti: how bad is it and what is the US doing about it. The US may do a lot of bad and stupid things in the world. Nevertheless, in times of global crisis, people turn to the US to lead the rescue. Obama’s reaction has been swift and forceful. China may have economic power, but it is woefully short of global leadership.

Copenhagen was a disaster. That much is agreed. But the truth about what actually happened is in danger of being lost amid the spin and inevitable mutual recriminations. The truth is this: China wrecked the talks, intentionally humiliated Barack Obama, and insisted on an awful “deal” so western leaders would walk away carrying the blame. How do I know this? Because I was in the room and saw it happen.

And why was the Chinese government so intent on wrecking the negotiations?  According to Lynas:

China’s growth, and growing global political and economic dominance, is based largely on cheap coal…Its coal-based economy doubles every decade, and its power increases commensurately. Its leadership will not alter this magic formula unless they absolutely have to.

So I get partial credit, but in a way that bolsters my argument. True, China did play a major role in these negotiations, contrary to what I wrote in the post. But the role it played was to make global cooperation more difficult because the Chinese government understands that combating climate change is bad domestic politics. This is not good news.