Politics
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Understanding China – or not
On Monday, Vice-Premier Wang Qishan said, in an interview with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner on The Charlie Rose Show: It is not easy to really know China because China is an ancient civilization and we are of the Oriental culture.… Continue reading
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OK, Shooting someone in the head is not a Taoist foreign policy…
My last post below was singularly ill-timed: the day after I pointed out a Taoist facet of Obama's foreign policy he goes and orders the attack on Osama. Oops. Clearly, the careful planning and calculation that went into the raid,… Continue reading
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Remembering the Great Leap Forward
Any assertion that China is a Confucian culture and society, or has maintained some sort of essential continuity with an older, traditional form of Confucianism, has to deal with the horrors of the mid-twentieth century, the Great Leap Forward and… Continue reading
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Zhuangzi consoles Democrats on Republican control of the US House of Representatives
Birth and death, living and dead, failure and success, poverty and wealth, honor and dishonor, slander and praise, hunger and thirst, hot and cold – such are the transformations of this world, the movements of its inevitable nature. They keep… Continue reading
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Thoughts on the Stewart/Colbert Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear
Yes, I attended the gigantic (200,000+ people) rally on the Washington Mall on Saturday. It was a blast. A lot of fun. Very well directed and performed, with a bit of political sincerity thrown in at the end. It would… Continue reading
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Liu Xiaobo and the weakness of political Confucianism in China
I am late to the party on the Liu Xiaobo Noble Peace Prize story. Let me first simply add my congratulations to a man who is certainly deserving of the recognition. And then let me point readers in the direction… Continue reading
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Xie Chaoping and the Impossibility of State Confucianism in China
Can Confucianism serve as a basis for state ideology in the PRC today? Can it be a source of principles that might guide and justify the use of state power? No, it cannot. Long story short: given the nature of… Continue reading
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More on Confucian Soft Power
My friend, Daniel Bell, has an op-ed in today's International Herald Tribute in which he returns to the question of Confucianism and soft power (I written about this topic here and here and here). Daniel and I disagree on this:… Continue reading
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The Fear of National Self-Knowledge
This morning a "Letter from Beijing" in the NYT reports: Even as China’s economy and society become increasingly diverse and sophisticated, its relationship to its own history remains stubbornly mired in cover-ups and silences. A look at how high school… Continue reading
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Killing Chinese People
Frank Dikotter has a new book out about the Great Leap Forward, Mao's Great Famine: The History of China's Most Devastating Catastrophe. I haven't read it yet (mine is on order) but early reviews are in. Here's Jonathan Mirsky: In… Continue reading
The Useless Tree 