"BIG DRAGON: China's Future: What It Means for Business, the Economy, and the Global Order"

by Daniel & Arne de Keijzer Burstein ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 1, 1998

A relentlessly upbeat forecast of China's future and the potential implications for the US. Private investment banker Burstein (Road Warriors, 1995, etc.) and de Keijzer, a business consultant involved in US-China business dealings, assess ''the impact that China will have on the global balance of wealth and power in the twenty-first century"" and are impressed. Their goal is to move discussion of the threats and opportunities China's growing economy will pose for American business in a more historically and culturally sensitive direction. Their motivation for this effort is straightforwardly reactive: A ""new anti-China vogue"" has infected American thinking and clouded judgments with groundless ideological biases. The excitement and optimism in the wake of Nixon's historic 1972 trip has been replaced by foreboding following the Tiananmen Square massacre, and hard-line perceptions of China have subsequently prevailed regarding issues as varied as human rights, Taiwan, and campaign finance. Burstein and de Keijzer argue that the government reaction to demonstrators in Tiananmen Square was not surprising given previous Chinese norms and that this incident shouldn't obscure the wide range of social and economic reforms that have taken place. We must stop trying to place China within preconceived Western notions and accept that it has a unique politico-economic system, what the authors term ""the Confucian social market."" By avoiding misconstrual of Chinese intentions--the authors predict, for example, that China will continue a long-term historical pattern of both flexing its muscles within Asia and refraining from projecting its force throughout the world in an effort to become a global power--we will be able to recognize and take advantage of the opportunities its development will produce and sustain a peaceful, mutually beneficial relationship with China. Despite a tendency by the authors to become cheerleaders for China, this is a reasoned survey of truly significant issues.

Pub Date: March 1, 1998

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: 384

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1998

Categories: NONFICTION