James Mann has written a new book: The China Fantasy: How Our Leaders Explain Away Chinese Repression . I saw Mann interviewed on television yesterday. Current U.S. policy postulates economic progress will weaken China's authoritarian, Communist government. There's no sign of that happening. Are we kidding ourselves? Mann thinks so. James Mann is associated with John Hopkins University. He was previously the Los Angeles Times Beijing bureau chief.
Here's a summary from another blog post:
James Mann challenges the assumptions that have guided American policy toward China for more than three decades. Americans believe wrongly that with increasing prosperity and with the arrival of McDonald's and Starbucks, China will move inevitably toward political liberalization and democracy. U.S. leaders suggest, with waning conviction, that trade and investment will eventually bring an end to China's one-party system. But Mann argues that this is merely a new version of the old fallacy that the Chinese are becoming like us. In fact, Mann suggests, the newly enriched elites in cities like Beijing and Shanghai could turn out to be not the vanguard for democracy, but the driving force in favor of perpetuating an authoritarian regime.
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Victor Davis Hanson doesn't have much respect for Newsweek magazine and in particular its current cover story on President Bush and Iran. He explains why here. It strikes me that skepticism (if not cynicism) is becoming an appropriate posture to adopt towards our mainstream media.