China's Rapid Growth

By Ginny Finch

Fifty years ago families in western Chinacould only afford one set of shared clothing. But by the middle of this century, the size of China’s fast-growing economy will double that of the U.S. Why is China doing well when advanced countries are doing poorly? What about human and religious rights issues in China?

According to Dumbarton’s Bert Keidel, China’s spiraling economic growth is due to these four factors: Corporate-style leadership, public goods provision, “demand management,” and monetary incentives.

”What they’re about is adapting world technology to their own uses,” said Keidel, a development economist at the Atlantic Council of the United States and adjunct graduate professor at Georgetown University. “That’s how they can grow so fast.”

To people considering human-rights work in China Keidel offered this sobering challenge: “You make a choice when you go there… Are you the good cop or the bad cop? Do you raise hell…or do you work hard to…change the nature of the society over the longer run?”