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A review by mkesten
Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth, and Faith in the New China: Chasing Fortune, Truth, and Faith in the New China by Evan Osnos
4.0
This afternoon on the Internet I saw the launch of China’s second super aircraft carrier, a massive, beautiful beast. It put me in mind of the lessons of Great Leap Liu, a character in Evan Osnos’ book who built China’s massive high speed railways in record time before being fingered as one of China’s most corrupt public officials.
I look at the picture of that aircraft carrier and wonder what the size of the graft is that lurks beneath the hull of that mega-monster ship.
Because China today as when Evan Osnos wrote this book some years ago is still mired in the privilege of the elites and huge corruption even as its storied growth slows to mere epic levels.
Osnos’ book tries but in my opinion does not quite convey the entrepreneurial zest of 21st century China, nor the massive political capital the authoritarian regime has created in a mere two generations.
Rather he focuses on it’s soft underbelly and insecurities.
When I think of my own country Canada I see three centuries of scraping the countryside of its treasures and negligible influence on the world stage.
What few people will acknowledge today is that Mao’s slaughter of millions in China due to incompetent gov’t set the stage for a massive comeback using virtually slave labour to rob the West of its wealth under its own nose.
Nixon played the “China card” to push the Soviet Union into irrelevance not realizing that unleashing the Asian tiger would also be America’s undoing.
Osnos seems to think that the Chinese state needs a better rudder than the Communist Leadership can offer now or ever, and he may have a point.
When I think of a state with so many cities of 20 million or more souls, enormous environmental challenges, the aging workforce, the imperative for growth, I can barely comprehend the pressures on this government.
I look at the picture of that aircraft carrier and wonder what the size of the graft is that lurks beneath the hull of that mega-monster ship.
Because China today as when Evan Osnos wrote this book some years ago is still mired in the privilege of the elites and huge corruption even as its storied growth slows to mere epic levels.
Osnos’ book tries but in my opinion does not quite convey the entrepreneurial zest of 21st century China, nor the massive political capital the authoritarian regime has created in a mere two generations.
Rather he focuses on it’s soft underbelly and insecurities.
When I think of my own country Canada I see three centuries of scraping the countryside of its treasures and negligible influence on the world stage.
What few people will acknowledge today is that Mao’s slaughter of millions in China due to incompetent gov’t set the stage for a massive comeback using virtually slave labour to rob the West of its wealth under its own nose.
Nixon played the “China card” to push the Soviet Union into irrelevance not realizing that unleashing the Asian tiger would also be America’s undoing.
Osnos seems to think that the Chinese state needs a better rudder than the Communist Leadership can offer now or ever, and he may have a point.
When I think of a state with so many cities of 20 million or more souls, enormous environmental challenges, the aging workforce, the imperative for growth, I can barely comprehend the pressures on this government.