Zhang

If there is a big buz word since the year 2007 , you have to dig a hole to find it out.

China is generate such an interest across disciplines. From academia to politicians, from Taiwan crisis to military spending, from Olympic to Human Rights, even the severe weather was published in the front page of some big-name newspapers. Here you will find something more fascinating. When you put “China” in a Google Search engine, it turned out more than one billion hit. ( “Results 1 – 10 of about 1,190,000,000 for china [definition]. (0.04 seconds) ” http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=china&btnG=Search, 2-8-08) While you put “Sex” in a Google Search engine, it turned out less than a billion. ( “Results 1 – 10 of about 943,000,000 for sex [definition]. (0.05 seconds”, http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=sex&btnG=Google+Search, 2-8-08)

What does this phenomena mean to the rest of the world? or simply mean for the Google robot? From this statistical analysis, we are focusing more on China than Sex. China is generating such a big buzz on its emerging power , especially its economic power. China’s GDP has time-and-time again shown the rest of the world its global impact which perhaps is leading this surge interest in China by the multidisciplinary. Wall Street is chasing the money in China, White House is debriefing the potential conflict with China, NGOs are doing more ground work in China, Human Rights Group are more critical of China, and higher educations are accepting more students from China . . . . It can go on and on and on. Now the issue is if the Chinese growth model is sustainable. Through the history, there is some balance between economic growth and the associated protection needed to be implemented, such as enforcement of law and protection of citizen’s rights. From grade school, we have learned that the triangular is the most stable, basic structure. For a stability of a nation, like China, it also need this magic triangle to protect from deterioration and destruction. Economic growth or economic policy is only one factor of this stable triangular. It also needs the enforcement of the law and the protection of citizen’s rights.

The Enforcement of law need means the nation needs to utilize the resources efficiently to enforce the law based upon the law without interference of outsiders. The Protection of citizen’s rights means the nation needs respect and protect the basic human rights, which has been in almost every nation’s constitutional law around the globe. The enforcement of the law and the protection of citizen’s rights are correlated, and with the economic growth it can keep the current stability. Otherwise, everything is going to change in a broad time frame. Look at the cyclic Stock Market, the global temperature, or even heart beat, everything is changing in a way which has to been a systematic way from the past. We can predict accurately, or at all, the future; however, we can at least learn some lessons from the past by analyzing the history. It is a double edged sword, it can cut both ways, but which way is the right way, we have to examine certain factors, such as . . . .

…To Be Continued…

Now what, China — the China?

Everything is going unconventionally. In Old Age people were burned by saying the earth is round. However, today Thomas Friedman is popular by publishing the World Is Flat. In the old days China is known as a Forbidden City, but now the China has become an world economic center.

If you haven’t heard of the latest news, you might continue reading this article. Now PetroChina, just go through Initial Public Offering in the Shanghai Stock Exchange, becomes the largest oil and gas company in the world with twice as much the capital as Exxon Mobile (the number two by then). Now let us run some Number One’s.

PetroChina is the largest Oil and Gas company by capital in the world.

China Life Insurance is the largest Insurance Company by capital in the world.

Industrial & Commercial Bank of China is the largest Bank by capital in the world.

China Mobile has the largest subscriber in the world.

Well, what’s it all about? Why the newly listed public-traded Chinese companies are so attractive? Is it babble behind all those Number One’s? There are many theories behind it, mostly from the economic perspectives, such as emerging market, state-planning policy, and infantry of the stock market. However, there is a new cultural facet as well. Being the number one or break the record is the dream and the pride of all Chinese people. Three-Gorge Dam …Damn to be the largest. The National
Beijing Theater gonna be the largest. The stock market gonna be the largest. . . . Well it is good when we run the figures while listening to the buzz — the largest. It is good because it show the attraction to the foreign investment; it is good because it will drive local and global economic growth; it is good because it will bring welfare to local and global citizens. People will keep pouring more money into the Stock Market nowadays with pride and enjoyment.

At the moment, it is a great scene and hopefully it will be happy ever after. The Chinese economy is still young, the intact market is still large, and the growth is still prominent. Now what? What will be the next thing after those glamorous achievement, which can be marked on the tomb stone of current leaders, as Thomas Jefferson put only three of his greatest achievements as his epitaph.

What really need to do is to cement the babble and transform the babble into the solid material; in other words, it might not be babble only if the China does something about it. Perhaps it is a dream, perhaps it is crazy, and yet it makes sense if you know the PetroChina, ICBC, and etc., from unknown to the largest industrial leader in the world. All of it happened over night of the Initial Public Offering. Nothing else can’t it have done? There might be one, which has been neglected by almost all the people in the whole country, politics.

In order to consolidate the growth of this unthinkable achievement, which is a huge babble from everyone’s eyes, the China needs to bring more political legitimacy (no matter what flavor, western democracy or Chinese Rules with special characteristics, or blend) to its citizens; to enforce the election law to elect, not appoint, real representatives to their constituencies; and to give more power to the people, but rather the public servants. Only if the China provides more protections and benefits for the people, especially ordinary people, to secure the colossal progress of its economic power, which is also determined by economic principles (either Marx to Smith or Ricardo. . .) China is on the edge of the cliff. It is dangerous but curable. If the China can build a 3-Gorge Dam across the Yangzi River, it can also build a freeway to transform the cliff. It is called being safe after being in danger.

That is so what? And that is so, the China.

To be continued.

The rest of the world is learning English for a buzz, but Goldman took different approaches. It needs its chief to learn Chinese instead.

“Goldman Sachs Group could not promote its co-head of investment banking in Asia to the post of chief executive of its Beijing joint venture because his knowledge of the Chinese language was too weak, three bankers at the firm have said.” from International Herald Tribune (July 13, 2007).

It is a trend of learning Chinese as important as learning English due to the economy booming, tourists surging, and culture exchanging. Chinese or China is such a buzz word in almost anywhere — from the major newspapers to most influential TVs, from economic forums to law seminars, and from leading universities to shadow streets. GS takes advantages of the golden opportunities to launch Chinese business by appointing executives with Chinese expertise.

The lesson for today is to learn the Chinese before or during your tenure at money-generating firms, such as Investment Bank Goldman Sachs. Chinese learning is also an investment for your financial future, the same as learning English.

There is a fascinating article in Today’s New York Times with the title C.E.O. Libraries Reveal Keys to Success.

Actually great people always have something in common.

Venture Capitalist Michael Morit has his private library; NIKE founder Phil Knight got his library just back in his office. . . .

There are also other numerous leaders seeking help from libraries, books exactly. Books ignite ideas ignored by average people; words generate creativity out of touch; libraries provide world leaders with answers neglected by the world. The examples of such are countless: Winston Churchill “locked” him in his personal library to read before his return to power; Karl Marx “dived into” British library before he finished his Le Capital. Benjamin Franklin fled Boston to be an apprentice printer in Philadelphia, leading him to be one of the Founding Fathers of the US. Mao Zedong who took advantage of Beking University Library when he worked there before he took over China from Chiang Kai-shek. …

It can go on and on and on. Thus the take-aways is to make reading a low-hanging fruit to the extent in which you will be amazed now and be great in the future.

quotations

“XI. Tomorrow: The Familiar and the Necessary,” Arthur E. Sutherland, The Law at Harvard, (Cambridge, 1967).
p364. Our duty is to teach men to education themselves in a corpus of professional learning not yet in existence.

P 367 Somehow we must develop men who can train themselves in all the now unforeseen aspects of his governmental movement as it develops during the coming tow and more generations.

P 368 Man is a creature of habit and tends to like what he has.

p369 Our universe is changing. We had better accept it changes and all.

Daniel R. Coquillette, Justinian in Braintree: John Adams, Civilian Learning, and Legal Elitism, 1758-1775, Law in Colonial Massachusetts 1630-1800 (eds. Daniel R. Coquillette, Robert J. Brink & Catherine S. Menand) (Boston, 1984), 359-82.

“The best source of intellectual and social excitement was the occasional visits of the circuit judges to the local courthouse. “

“Life with Putnam was not all roses. Adams would later lament that ‘now I feel the Disadvantages of Putnams Insociability, and neglect of me. Had he given me now and then a few Hints concerning practice, I should be able to judge better at this Hour than I can now.'”

“Adams particularly recalled being asked if he had read Grotius and Pufendorf, whom Gridley described as ‘great writers.’ Adams had to make lame excuses. “I cannot say I have Sir. Mr. Putnam read them, when I was with him, and as his Book Lay on the Desk in the office for the most part when he had it not in his hand, I had generally followed him in a cursory manner, so that I had some very imperfect Idea of Content….’ ‘[b]ut,’ Adams hastily added, it was his “intention to read them both as soon as possible.”

p366.

As a result of his efforts Adams was routinely sworn in at the Suffolk bar on 6 November 1758. He had no formal legal education and only a two years’ apprenticeship in the countryside. But he could talk about Cicero. As Gridley put it to the Court, on moving Adams’ application, “I take it he is qualified to study the law by his scholarship….”

p369

(((From Adam’s Diary))) …’it is my Destiny to dig Treasures with my own fingers. No Body will lend me or sell me a Pick axe.’ And, to an astonishing degree, Adams really was self-taught.

“During the earlier period Adams was technically a student and apprentice, but Putnam was an indifferent teacher. During the later period Adams was technically a full-fledged practitioner, but, in fact, business was slow starting. Under the informal tutelage of Jeremiah Gridley, a great teacher, Adam filled the empty hours between clients with an extensive course of study.

{{{Adams’ reading list}}}”Adams’ Braintree reading under Gridley’s influence. In Adams’ words:’ I have read no no small Number of Volumes, upon the Law, the last 2 years [1758-1760]. Justinians Institutes I have read, thro, in Latin with Vinnius’s perpetual Notes, Van Muydens Tractatio institutionum Justiniani, I read thro, and translated, mostly into English, from the same Language. Woods Institute of the Civil Law, I read thro. These on the civil Law; on the Law of England I read Cowells Institute of the Laws of England, in Imitation of Justinian, Dr. and student, Finch’s Discourse of Law, Hales History, and some Reporters, Cases in Chancery, Andrews Etc. besides occasional searches for Business. Also a general Treatise of naval Trade and commerce, as founded on the Laws and Statutes.”

“But did Adams really absorb this learning? By his own account, “All this series of Reading, has left but faint Impressions, and [a] very imperfect system of Law in my Head.”

“… indeed I never read any Part of the best authors, Pufendorf and Grotius.”

p372

“… this institute is a curious monument of Priestly ambition, avarice and sublety. it is a system of sacerdotal Guile.”

p373

“Adams’ Daiary itself contained crabbed passages that were evidence of painful agony over Wood’s New Institutes of the Imperial or Civil Law and Van Muyden’s Tractatio.

“…’At this time October 1758 the Study of the Law was a dreary Ramble, in comparison of what it is at this day [1802]. The Name of Blackstone had not been heard, whose Commentaries together with Sullivans Lectures and Reeves’s History of the Law have smoothed the path of the Student, while the long Career of Lord Mansfield, his many investigations and Decisions … have greatly facilitated the Acquisition of it.”

p380

” … Adams missed the next Sodalitas meeting at Joseph Dudley’s on 31 January 1765, but the following meeting, on 21 February 1765, was his trun to be host. he entertained the Club “at Blodgets”:…

…

This was an important meeting in the development of Adams’ political thought and jurisprudence. The topic of conversation was the feudal system and Adams had brought up Rosseau’s hostility to feudal institutions.

“Gridley: … it should also be a Part of our plan, to improve ourselves in Writing, by reading carefully the best English Writers, and by using ourselves to writing — for it should be a part of our Plan to publish Pieces, now and then. Let us form our style upon the Ancients, and the best English Authors.

“Adam concluded:’I hope and expect to see, at the Bar, in Consequence of this Sodality, a Purity, an Elegance, and a Spirit, surpassing any Thing that ever appeared in America. Fitch said that he would not say he had Abilities, but he would say he had ambition enough to hope for the same thing.”

From, bcn dot boulder dot co dot us slash  health slash healthwatch slash canada dot html

In contrast, the single payer system that Canada has used for the last 25 years has drastically simplified their administration costs. For instance, it takes more people to administer Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts that it does to administer the entire health care system of Canada. Before Canada implemented their national health program, their health costs were the same portion of their economy as in the U.S. After they implemented their program, their costs stabilized at 9% while U.S. costs have increased to 14%. They spend one tenth of what U.S. health care providers spend on overhead.

Amartya Sen’s model

Pg 3

“Growth of GNP or of individual incomes can, of course, be very important as means to expanding the freedoms enjoyed by the members of the society. But freedoms depend also on other determinants, such as social and economic arrangements (for example, facilities for education and health care) as well as political and civil rights (for example, the liberty to participate in public discussion and scrutiny).

Pg 4

“Freedom is central to the process of development for two distinct reasons.

1. The evaluative reason: assessment of progress has to be done primarily in terms of whether the freedoms that people have are enhanced;
2. the effectiveness reason: achievement of development is thoroughly dependent on the free agency of people.

Pg 10

“Five distinct types of freedom, seen in an “instrumental” perspective, are particularly investigated in the empirical studies that follow. These include (1) political freedoms, (2) economic facilities, (3) social opportunities, (4) transparency guarantees and (5) protective security.

Pg 10

A CONCLUDING REMARK

“Freedoms are not only the primary ends of development, they are also among its principal means.”

Pg 11

“political freedoms help to promote economic security. Social opportunities facilitate economic participation. Economic facilities can help to generate personal abundance as well as public resources for social facilities.

Pg 14

“The ends and means of development require examination and scrutiny for a fuller understanding of the development process; it is simply not adequate to take as our basic objective just the maximization of income or wealth, ….

Pg 15

“It is sometimes claimed that the denial of these rights helps to stimulate economic growth and is “good” for rapid economic development. … Indeed, the empirical evidence very strongly suggests that economic growth is more a matter of a friendlier economic climate than of a harsher political system.”

Pg 19

“this is not to deny that deprivation of individual capabilities can have close links with the lowness of income, which connects in both directions: (1) low income can be a major reason for illiteracy and ill health as well as hunger and undernourishment, and (2) conversely, better education and health help in the earning of higher incomes.

Pg 25

“The relation of the market mechanism to freedom and thus to economic development raises questions of at least two quite distinct types, which nee to be clearly distinguished. First, a denial of opportunities of transaction, through arbitrary controls, can be a source of unfreedom in itself.

…

second… markets typically work to expand income and wealth and economic opportunities that people have.

Pg 27

“The shift in the focus of attention of pro-market economics from freedom to utility has been achieved at some cost: the neglect of the central value of freedom itself.

Pg 31

“Individual freedom is quintessentially a social product, and there is a two-way relation between (1) social arrangements to expand individual freedoms and (2) the use of individual freedoms not only to improve the respective lives but also to make the social arrangements more appropriate and effective.

Pg 31-32

“The real conflict is between

1) the basic value that the people must be allowed to decide freely what traditions they wish or not wish to follow; and

2) the insistence that established traditions be followed (no matter what), or, alternatively, people must obey the decisions by religious or secular authorities who enforce traditions – real or imagined.

Pg 33

“The motivation underlying the approach of “development as freedom” is not so much to order all states – or all alternative scenarios – into one “complete ordering,” but to draw attention to important aspects of the process of development, each of which deserves attention.”

Pg 38

“Political freedoms, broadly conceived (including what are called civil rights), refer to the opportunities that people have to determine who should govern and on what principles, and also include the possibility to scrutinize and criticize authorities, to have freedom of political expression and an uncensored press, to enjoy the freedom to choose between different political parties, and so on.

…

Economic facilities refer to the opportunities that individuals respectively enjoy to utilize economic resources for the purpose of consumption, or production, or exchange.

…

Social opportunities refer to the arrangements that society makes for education, health care and so on, which influence the individual’s substantive freedom to live better.

…

Transparency guarantees deal with the need for openness that people can expect: the freedom to deal with one another under guarantees of disclosure and lucidity.

…

Protective security is needed to provide a social safety net for preventing the affected population from being reduced to abject misery, and in some cases even starvation and death.”