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| Pendragon |
 Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 3:06 pm Post subject: China's rise in historical perspective |
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It's old news that China is rapidly developping in just about every aspect (economically, socially, militarily; perhaps politically too), and it seems that a lot of 'westerners' were taken by surprise when they first realized the extent of this change. In a way this is strange. Many times in its history China was a world power, and as recent as 1700-1750 it was probably the most powerful country in the world before it was eclipsed by Europe. Its population was certainly a lot higher, and I'm not sure if Europe really had a technology advantage by then to make up for its smaller population (in terms of military tech: Europe had reasonably effective gunboats, but China had ships with incendiary rockets to counter it). Maybe China is just returning to its former position on the world stage, after two centuries of weakness?
Should we really be surprised about China's recent rise to economic and military power? Or should we actually be more surprised that China was not in a dominant position in the world for two centuries? |
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| i_feel_tiredsleepy |
| Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2008 3:16 pm Post subject: |
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Forum Masters Degree
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| Historically I believe it was the isolationist nature of asian nations during that period that resulted in Europe comming to supremacy. The ambitious and exploitative nature of western culture gave them the drive to take advantage of the discovery of the new world. |
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| kojax |
| Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2008 4:40 am Post subject: |
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I'm going with the printing press. China's symbolic language would not have adapted easily to being printed with a printing press. Europe's alphabetical system, on the other hand, was perfectly suited.
China's amazing arrogance makes it difficult for them to move swiftly in the area of technology. Even to this day, they're unable to design their own cell phone chips. It was a huge scandal about a year or two ago when one of their lead scientists claimed to be near accomplishing it, only to have it blow up when it was discovered that he'd copied his design.
Japan, on the other hand, has typically managed to pick up every technology they saw within a few years, and even improve it to where they become the leaders in its use. |
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| icewendigo |
| Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2008 6:26 am Post subject: |
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| I dont think China's past glory has much incidence on its position, otherwise we might as well expect Grece to be a superpower or Italy to be a great empire. |
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| sunshinewarrior |
| Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2008 9:38 am Post subject: |
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Again, I'm with Pendragon on this one.
A few other points in passing.
1. China invented printing with movable type. So that argument may not wash.
2. Historical greatness does not lead to any inevitability of current glory (greece, Italy et al), but if there were sound reasons for China to be a dominant power (and I'll never get sick of recommending Guns, Germs and Steel on this matter) then as Pendragon suggests, we might see the past two-and-a-bit centuries as a glitch in China's history. |
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| kojax |
| Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2008 8:59 pm Post subject: |
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| sunshinewarrio wrote: |
1. China invented printing with movable type. So that argument may not wash.
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Well, movable type is pretty much a useless technology without an alphabetic language, as I think another poster has already pointed out.
| Quote: |
2. Historical greatness does not lead to any inevitability of current glory (greece, Italy et al), but if there were sound reasons for China to be a dominant power (and I'll never get sick of recommending Guns, Germs and Steel on this matter) then as Pendragon suggests, we might see the past two-and-a-bit centuries as a glitch in China's history. |
Yeah, only continuous/ uninterrupted glory makes accomplishment more probably in the present. Momentum can carry you from one accomplishment to the next, but not after you've lost it. |
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| onthink |
| Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2008 9:03 pm Post subject: |
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| 425 Chaotic Requisition |
| Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2008 4:37 am Post subject: |
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The Doctor
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China is large, very large. Therefore there will always be a lot of trouble controlling the masses and keeping their country in shape. I'm sure there is a lot of corruptness in China.
Centuries ago when the world was changing, they kept a low profile, probably because they didn't know what was going off much. Don't either forget that their main religion is Buddhism, and if you know the outlines of that, then you can understand why China's historical development is different to ours.
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An apple a day... Oh never mind. |
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| ishmaelblues |
| Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2008 7:35 am Post subject: |
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| i agree with you all, if it werent for other nations leeching the chinese for the last 200 years and if their leaders had taken a better intitive like the Japanese or Americans, China would have reached its current level of world influence some time ago. i mean the reason they were leeched in the first place was because of China's greatness |
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| sunshinewarrior |
| Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2008 7:55 am Post subject: |
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| kojax wrote: |
| sunshinewarrio wrote: |
1. China invented printing with movable type. So that argument may not wash.
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Well, movable type is pretty much a useless technology without an alphabetic language, as I think another poster has already pointed out. |
Poor argument - they quite happily use moveable type these days. They even have highly functional computer keyboards.
| kojax wrote: |
| Quote: |
2. Historical greatness does not lead to any inevitability of current glory (greece, Italy et al), but if there were sound reasons for China to be a dominant power (and I'll never get sick of recommending Guns, Germs and Steel on this matter) then as Pendragon suggests, we might see the past two-and-a-bit centuries as a glitch in China's history. |
Yeah, only continuous/ uninterrupted glory makes accomplishment more probably in the present. Momentum can carry you from one accomplishment to the next, but not after you've lost it. |
Why?
Actually, that's not relevant as a response to my point: I said that if there were factors that in general made China a great power (population levels, depth of infrastructure, agricultural resources, geographic security etc) then they would apply for long periods of time, and any change from that state would be the anomaly.
| willmer wrote: |
| Don't either forget that their main religion is Buddhism, and if you know the outlines of that, then you can understand why China's historical development is different to ours. |
Buddhism is an import that sits alongside earlier established Chinese belief
systems like Confucianism. And it doesn't explain why Mao's Red Army was so successful 60 years ago. |
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| kojax |
| Posted: Sat Mar 29, 2008 12:37 am Post subject: |
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| sunshinewarrio wrote: |
| kojax wrote: |
| sunshinewarrio wrote: |
1. China invented printing with movable type. So that argument may not wash.
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Well, movable type is pretty much a useless technology without an alphabetic language, as I think another poster has already pointed out. |
Poor argument - they quite happily use moveable type these days. They even have highly functional computer keyboards.
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Well, in the early stages of the technology, you'd need 3,000 custom carved imprinting molds, more than that if you planned to re-use words on the same page.
With a 26 letter alphabet, you can get away with a lot fewer custom carved molds.
| ishmaelblues wrote: |
| i agree with you all, if it werent for other nations leeching the chinese for the last 200 years and if their leaders had taken a better intitive like the Japanese or Americans, China would have reached its current level of world influence some time ago. i mean the reason they were leeched in the first place was because of China's greatness |
Well, the fact they were weak enough to be leached from is a failing in and of itself. Nobody else *could* have taken advantage of them if they'd been on their game. |
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| 425 Chaotic Requisition |
| Posted: Sat Mar 29, 2008 4:37 am Post subject: |
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The Doctor
Joined: 18 Jun 2007
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| sunshinewarrio wrote: |
| willmer wrote: |
| Don't either forget that their main religion is Buddhism, and if you know the outlines of that, then you can understand why China's historical development is different to ours. |
Buddhism is an import that sits alongside earlier established Chinese belief
systems like Confucianism. And it doesn't explain why Mao's Red Army was so successful 60 years ago. |
I said it explains why their development was different to ours, not that it explains why their battles are succesful. How did you deduce that from my earlier statement I was applying it to all of their history?
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| Pendragon |
| Posted: Sat Mar 29, 2008 7:42 am Post subject: |
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| 425 Chaotic Requisition wrote: |
| China is large, very large. Therefore there will always be a lot of trouble controlling the masses and keeping their country in shape. I'm sure there is a lot of corruptness in China. |
You could just as well say "China is large, very large, therefore there will always be sources of economic growth in China". With over a billion people who can almost freely travel (internal migration is almost free in China, but there are some practical limits to it) and exchange ideas within a country that has quite a lot of resources, it would almost be improbable if there wouldn't be a dozen good economic initiatives somewhere in China every year.
| 425 Chaotic Requisition wrote: |
| Centuries ago when the world was changing, they kept a low profile, probably because they didn't know what was going off much. Don't either forget that their main religion is Buddhism, and if you know the outlines of that, then you can understand why China's historical development is different to ours. |
You have to ask yourself what Buddhism really means in China. Max Weber (famous sociologer) argued that a people's belief system influences their willingness to take initiative and develop their economy and society, and in his analysis Buddhism is near the bottom of the list in terms of competitiveness. But those ideas are a century old and I doubt whether they really explain much.
Two questions:
- Does Buddhism really depress economic and social initiative?
- Did Buddhism really make a strong mark on Chinese society?
I can't answer either question with certainty, but my educated guess would be "not really" to both of them. During China's early 'golden age' (Tang dynasty, especially Ming dynasty) Buddhism was quite important, but during the Qing dynasty it had waned a bit. So a decline of the importance of Buddhism seems to have coincided with a decline in China's economic power. But that's just a very rough estimate.
| ishmaelblues wrote: |
| i agree with you all, if it werent for other nations leeching the chinese for the last 200 years and if their leaders had taken a better intitive like the Japanese or Americans, China would have reached its current level of world influence some time ago. i mean the reason they were leeched in the first place was because of China's greatness |
True, China's greatness in the sense of its wealth. I've heard claims that China was the wealthiest country in the world around 1750. I don't know if that's per capita wealth (probably not), but the Chinese imperial treasury was probably the most attractive one in the world. For some reason this wealth didn't translate into military power over the last couple centuries, and because it did attract imperialists it actually weakened China.
| sunshinewarrio wrote: |
2. Historical greatness does not lead to any inevitability of current glory (greece, Italy et al), but if there were sound reasons for China to be a dominant power (and I'll never get sick of recommending Guns, Germs and Steel on this matter) then as Pendragon suggests, we might see the past two-and-a-bit centuries as a glitch in China's history. |
Yea great book 
About Greece and Italy: those countries are now many times richer than they ever were in their golden age, they were relatively wealthy for some time but lost their position because other areas grew faster. China didn't just stagnate when others grew, it actually lost much of its wealth after 1750-1800. So I think we haven't seen its full potential yet. |
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| kojax |
| Posted: Sat Mar 29, 2008 2:59 pm Post subject: |
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| ishmaelblues wrote: |
| i agree with you all, if it werent for other nations leeching the chinese for the last 200 years and if their leaders had taken a better intitive like the Japanese or Americans, China would have reached its current level of world influence some time ago. i mean the reason they were leeched in the first place was because of China's greatness |
True, China's greatness in the sense of its wealth. I've heard claims that China was the wealthiest country in the world around 1750. I don't know if that's per capita wealth (probably not), but the Chinese imperial treasury was probably the most attractive one in the world. For some reason this wealth didn't translate into military power over the last couple centuries, and because it did attract imperialists it actually weakened China.
[/quote]
Maybe they had the sense to part with some of that wealth in order to get rid of the imperialists.
I think one of China's big problems has been that it always grows to the maximum size that can possibly be ruled, and then cannot expand further. (Which means it can only stagnate). Japan, on the other hand, is this little pipsqueak country that always just can't wait to expand.
Still, the smaller size makes it easier to adapt new technologies. China has to move slow because it's a big elephant of a country.
| Quote: |
| sunshinewarrio wrote: |
2. Historical greatness does not lead to any inevitability of current glory (greece, Italy et al), but if there were sound reasons for China to be a dominant power (and I'll never get sick of recommending Guns, Germs and Steel on this matter) then as Pendragon suggests, we might see the past two-and-a-bit centuries as a glitch in China's history. |
Yea great book
About Greece and Italy: those countries are now many times richer than they ever were in their golden age, they were relatively wealthy for some time but lost their position because other areas grew faster. China didn't just stagnate when others grew, it actually lost much of its wealth after 1750-1800. So I think we haven't seen its full potential yet. |
Or it's going to keep on sinking. |
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