Many Americans took away from the Cold War the belief that democracies are better than autocracies at correcting course. But the Chinese state, under the leadership of Xi Jinping, has proved adept at fixing its problems—arguably more so than the “supposedly supple and adaptive American system,” argues Jonathan Czin in the latest issue of Foreign Affairs.
Xi has marshaled the resources of the state to address what he sees as “China’s most glaring weaknesses,” namely, “the side effects of four decades of economic reform,” writes Czin. An open economy and rapid growth brought China “wealth and power but also indecision, corruption, and dependence on other countries.” Xi’s solution—“reversing liberalization altogether”—might look like a dangerous rejection of “the tried-and-true playbook that brought China from poverty to power.” But, Czin concludes, “Beijing’s success in rebuffing Washington’s trade war suggests that Xi’s strategy is working.”
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