The Best of Reason: Cutting Off Trade Will Make the U.S. Poorer and China More Totalitarian

Politicians in both major parties see the People's Republic as an economic and military threat. But the real threat is an isolated China.

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The Best of Reason: Cutting Off Trade Will Make the U.S. Poorer and China More Totalitarian

This week's featured article is "Cutting Off Trade Will Make the U.S. Poorer and China More Totalitarian" by Johan Norberg.

This audio was generated using AI trained on the voice of Katherine Mangu-Ward.

Music credits: "Deep in Thought" by CTRL S and "Sunsettling" by Man With Roses

Comments

[VULGAR MADMAN]

How the fuck is china going to get more totalitarian?

[Don’t get eliminated]

Fever dreams? Eventually someone will come along who listened and let us know.

[Fire up the Woodchippers! (Trump Ascendant!! )]

That was my initial thought as well. Reason is pathetic.

[Uncle Jay]

China cannot get more totalitarian.
Norberg doesn't know what he's talking about again.
Communist regimes are totalitarian by nature, and no matter what another country does, these communist countries will always remain overwhelming oppressive.

[David1234]

A response to Norberg's article has been published by James Roth at StoptheCCP.org: "Cutting Off Knowledge of China and Trade Makes Arguments Poorer."

"This title also states that less trade would make China more totalitarian. But this contradicts our experience: the decades have shown China becoming more totalitarian as trade increases and China becomes richer. More money and tools became available for control and repression. It’s praxeological, my dear Watson.

"Norberg knows this but does not process the fact. 'Where many of us hoped economic liberalization would produce political liberalization, an authoritarian backlash instead started clamping down on both free markets and free speech,' he writes. Yes, exactly.

"The author solves this contradiction by elevating..." https://stoptheccp.org/cutting-off-knowledge-of-china-and-trade-governance-makes-arguments-poorer/

[DesigNate]

This should be patently obvious to even casual observers. Communists, like those in power in China, cannot abide a growing middle class. (Those plebes start getting ideas like they should own their own labor and the means of production. And if there’s one thing commies don’t like, it’s people thinking for themselves.) That will always lead to the state getting more totalitarian/authoritarian.

[Don’t get eliminated]

"If we use the wealth and technology we've created with free markets to support a totalitarian regime against their own people, they'll be convinced to give up their power and become a free market" is maybe one of the dumbest foreign policy decisions ever.

[Brett Bellmore]

I can remember when opening up trade with China was supposed to make them less totalitarian.

Everybody who claimed that would happen should be eternally barred from serious discussions of foreign policy.

[Uncle Jay]

"I can remember when opening up trade with China was supposed to make them less totalitarian."

Yeah, I remember that too.
So, how did it work out?
Did China suddenly become the beacon of freedom the liberals said it would?

[damikesc]

The theory makes sense...but in practice, it simply is not so.

[Brett Bellmore]

The theory might make sense for a society that was already somewhat free. (Though even there it doesn't have a great track record, just so-so.) There's no reason to think a totalitarian state will become more liberal on account of becoming wealthier, because the only people who have any say in the matter are the despots.