Reply to Message

depends on the leadership

CobraA1 1st Jul 2010

I'd say it depends largely on the leadership. We're so used to rapid turnaround of leadership here in the USA it's difficult to see how leadership works in other countries. Leaders in many foreign nations are often in power for a long time and if you get a bad leader, you're likely stuck with that leader until either a successful revolt or a death of the leader. It's not like the USA where you can simply wait for the next elections and change your vote.

Leaders in other countries are also a lot more powerful - here in the USA, if the people don't want a leader to have power, they can easily block that power. Think about how long it took for Obama to get health care through, and how the seats in congress have been changing. I don't think the Chinese leadership have seen a credible block to their power in a long time.

The Chinese have been stuck with same the old problems that plagued other nations in the past, and which the concept of democracy was much designed to minimize: Corrupt leadership having too much power, and the people of the nation having too little power.

Now, that's not to say a system like what the Chinese have can't occasionally work. But it needs the right leadership, and it's prone to corruption well above and beyond what we have in the USA. It only takes a couple of corrupt leaders in China to really make the lives of the people miserable.

Let's not forget one of the pillars of Communism - what makes it communism in the first place - is the lack of private ownership. A totally communist country would have "public" (government) ownership of all of the businesses inside of it. The fact that Google is even allowed in China tells me this isn't Communism at work - it's communism collapsing.

"One also has to wonder if the effort, drama, and legal wranglings are worth Google?s trouble in China."

Let's turn this question on its head: Why did Chinese leadership invest so much effort, drama, and legal wranglings into fighting Google? I'm not about to let China off the hook here, sorry. The truth is that China DID in fact go to great lengths to fight Google. They're not innocent bystanders. Let's not pretend they are. Let's not forget that they DO have a great firewall, and they use it all the time.