New book on China raises a storm, by Richard Bernstein

“The questions have always been: How much should the United States publicly criticize China for its numerous, egregious human rights violations and how much does the human rights goal have to be accommodated to China’s power and importance?”

Wrong. The question has always been: How much should the United States publicly criticize China for its numerous, egregious human rights violations and how much should we expect that the human rights goal will naturally be achieved by strong and rapid economic growth and the resulting emergence of a large, educated, sophisticated middle class who will create a civil society on their own?

“… some China scholars criticize Mann for concentrating so much on political reform that he has failed to appreciate the enormous beneficial changes that have occurred in China over the past decade, where a middle class of perhaps 200 million to 300 million people has come into existence enjoying a degree of personal autonomy that would have been unthinkable 15 or so years ago.”

Correct. As someone who was living in China in 1990 (my junior year abroad in college) and who lives here today, I can say that the differences between then and now are breathtaking, and nearly all for the better (aside from the catastrophic destruction of the natural environment).