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December 13, 2008

Comments

Fellow Traveller

You've examined the wrong age range. Middle aged men don't make revolution. Young men (18-24) do. They don't owe the existing system anything and could quite easily become the leaders of the new order.

I agree that the Chinese state doesn't look weak enough for a successful revolt. I anticipate mass demonstrations, protests and a re-organization of the political hierarchy in their wake.

jamie k

"Middle aged men don't make revolution"

No, but they do lead them :-) I was thinking more of this idea that recession is some kind of unparalleled catastrophe in recent Chinese history.

What I'd anticipate politically is more of a withdrawal from the parallel administrations the CPC runs right down to village level, with autonomy and local democracy very gradually increasing in size and scope, at times under pressure from localized outbreaks of discontent.

In Britain we got the Baron's charter in 1215; women were granted equal suffrage with men in 1928. I think we might be looking at that kind of timescale for China.

Fellow Traveller

I think the modern world moves at a faster rate than your historical analogy. The speed of communications across the whole globe makes rapid transformation much more likely. We've not seen the full effect of the Internet & mobile phones in every pocket yet.

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