The Unavoidable Truth of the Mighty Middle Kingdom
China's uniqueness in the world can be summed up in one broad statement: China doesn't need to care about anyone else.
Please, let me explain.
There are roughly 7 Billion people in the world right now. Twenty percent of those people live in China, which also happens to be the most resource rich country on the planet AND the most un-tapped country in terms of accessing those resources (not to mention its staggering adoption rate of environmental policy and renewable energy). China is also the oldest continuous society in history dating back some 5,000+ years. So why don't they have the largest economy, longest lifespan, or best standard of living in the world by a huge margin? To put this in perspective, let's compare China to the USA in terms of natural resources, labor, education, and economic power.
The United States of America is the most powerful economy in the world my a small but clear margin. However, the US has been tapping their natural resources for the better part of 200 years and has a population of 350,000,000 people. China, on the other hand, has five times that number of people and a country full of untapped resources. What we can conclude is that something is limiting the Chinese population from creating an economy that is roughly five times the US economy. What is that limitation? Many people have differing opinions, but I believe it is primary-level education.
Roughly 70 to 80 years ago, China underwent a serious cultural revolution that forever changed the landscape of the country and population. Teachers were stoned in the street and libraries were looted and burned, among many other atrocities. Following that revolution, a new and more stable government took control, but the damage had been done. The first group to suffer during times like this is the young. The ripple caused by that undeserved generation is still echoing across China today.
Three very distinct groups of people exist in modern China. The generation that was young either during or following the revolution has an extremely nationalistic outlook on politics and very little primary education whatsoever. This leads to a huge population partaking in practices that limit their potential such as substance abuse, adoption of traditional medicine, and perpetuation of customs inspired by the propaganda of the time.
The next distinct group is the generation that grew up during the rebuilding of China. This generation has known huge growth and almost inconceivable change over the last 40 years. They have witnessed cities like Shenzhen grow from a villages of 2,000 people to massive, international hubs of technology with whopping 12 to 35 Million person capacities in less than 20 years. This 'sandwiched' generation has also witnessed the industrialization of china, the explosion of manufacturing growth, and the decline of manufacturing as labor costs started to rise. They have even seen the incredible transformation of China from a completely closed society into a fully-online global society.
The last distinct group, and I believe the most important group for China's future, is the generation that has matured in the last ten to fifteen years. A complete generation of people who have only ever known China as a global power. An entire generation who will accept nothing less than the best the world has to offer and, most critically, the first significantly educated generation in China for almost a century. It's the small things that indicate this generation will become the future of the world as we know it. While the older generations fully embrace 'imperial Chinese customs' and pre-prosperous mindsets, the new generation has grown up knowing about the rest of the world and how China fits into the puzzle of humanity. To list a few stark contracts between the current generation and the previous generation I called out above: They use trash cans instead of throwing garbage on the ground, the rate of smoking is much lower, and most of the young generation will actively search out news and publications from outside China in order to expand their horizons.
Why have I gone into this detail about the three distinct generations of China? Let me make an analogy. China is a large canoe (or dragon boat, maybe) paddling up a river. A third of the people in the boat are actively slowing it down, a third are just splashing around without a care in the world, and a third of the people are staring straight ahead and paddling for their life in perfect sync. If it were any other country in the world, the canoe would stay still in the water, but this is the Middle Kingdom. The People's Republic of China. The oldest empire in the world. The country that gave us domestication of plants, domestication of livestock, the printing press, gunpowder, religion, philosophy, and art dating back 5,000 or even 10,000 years. China has made inconceivable progress in the last 75 years with two-thirds of its population either paddling backwards or paying no attention at all.
What happens when everyone in the boat is paddling forward?
That question leads me back to my thesis statement: China doesn't need to care about anyone else.
The most resource-rich country in the world. The most populous country in the world. The fastest developing country in the world. The most resilient country in the history of the world. China is on track to have the worlds largest economy in the next few years and at some point it could conceivably have an economy equal to the rest of the world's countries combined.
China doesn't need to care about anyone else to survive. This is not a malicious statement, just fact. The Middle Kingdom has everything it needs to be self-sustaining for the next few centuries. They have been more or less isolated for millennia and will continue to be isolated as long as they have the resources and population control to do so. The Mighty Middle Kingdom has survived for over 5,000 years as a world powder and they will continue to do so, regardless of the rest of the human race.
