The Useless Tree

Politics

  • No Ayn is an Island

    Jonathan Chait has a review of a couple of new biographies of Ayn Rand (h/t Sullivan).  This passage struck me: ….Rand held up her own meteoric rise from penniless immigrant to wealthy author as a case study of the individualist… Continue reading

  • Canadian Confucians

    This will come as no surprise to my Canadian friend Daniel A. Bell, but, according to Adam Gopnik's recent New Yorker profile of Michael Ignatieff (the full article can only be seen through subscription), folks north of the border have… Continue reading

  • Time to end the Tehran/Tiananmen comparisons

    With the escalation in violence, Iran appears to have moved into its Tiananmen moment, the time when the regime brings much more deadly force to bear against popular mobilization.  But events in Iran have moved away from the China comparison.… Continue reading

  • Teheran and Tiananmen, IV

    There is a sad truth about the 1989 Beijing Massacre.  It is a truth that those of us who live in liberal democracies would rather avoid.  But it is a truth nonetheless: in Beijing in 1989 repression worked. Repression worked… Continue reading

  • Teheran and Tiananmen, III

    Events in Iran have reached a new stage. The defiant Saturday demonstrations and protests, which came after Supreme Leader Khamenei called for a return to normalcy, are a direct challenge not only to Ahmadinejad but to the very basis of… Continue reading

  • Tehran and Tiananmen

    Watching the extraordinary political events unfold in Iran, I am reminded of the massive protests that swept across China twenty years ago.  Here are a couple of comparative ideas: 1) Protests of this sort start out spontaneously, in response to… Continue reading

  • Mencius in Lhasa

    There are people in the PRC, brave people, who are willing to stand up to power and present facts that run contrary to both popular perceptions (which, after all, are shaped by official media control) and political interests: A group… Continue reading

  • Zhao Ziyang: Humane Leader

    A new book on Zhao Ziyang, derived from a series of tape recorded interviews, is a good reminder of what might have been in China.  He was the man at the top of the Party hierarchy who stood against violence… Continue reading

  • Nanjing, Spring 1989

    Twenty years ago the PRC was experiencing the largest demonstrations of public dissent in its history.  I was then living and teaching in Nanjing and I watched as that city and my students were swept up in the tide of… Continue reading

  • Jackie Chan does the Orientalist thing

    Let's just go straight to the report in the Telegraph in the UK: Jackie Chan has triggered controversy by claiming Chinese people are so chaotic they need to be firmly controlled by the government. The actor told a forum on… Continue reading