Left & Right, Faith & Markets. Innovation in China.

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ANALYSIS, Melbourne — I’ve written quite a lot about China in the last few days. it came from an Italian question, and all went from there… (I’ll post a link to that later…)

I’m not totally down on China, just from our research, believe there are lower-risk opportunities at this time. The business case for China is being over-stated by applying Western metrics to a Communist state.

This Chinese fellow Zhao Xiao, Chinese government economist, was director of macro-economics research at SASAC. He wrote the essay “Market Economies with Churches, and Market Economies without Churches”:

“Then where does the greatest difference between the US and China ultimately lie? My personal opinion churches. Only in this area is the difference between China and the US not a question of numbers, but rather an essential difference between presence and absence. In the US, the spires of churches are more numerous than China’s banks and rice shops. On a street near Harvard Square, I once stood and looked about me, only to find that in three different directions there were three churches. In truth, from the east coast of the US to the west coast, from towns to cities, in any place you look, you will find that this country’s most numerous structure is none other than the church. Churches, and only churches, are Americans’ center; they are the very core that binds Americans together.
Churches and the market economy”.

Read the whole article in a blog here:

http://www.chinalyst.net/node/17605
I’d would like to point out I am quoting a quote and haven’t verified the ultimate source of this, but the point is it is a well-written article and topic.

I couldn’t agree more.

The common element is faith. Faith and trust in markets, and in many cases in Jesus.

Faith and love are innovation

“For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith.”

Mark 11:23, KJV

And that is much of what faith is. Faith is important. One person does not know better than God. Such debates among humans over smaller points of ever less-generous and more idiosyncratic ideology are fools errands.

Suspend disbelief for a second as an atheist (if you are). And note this simple test: which is more appetising? Faith that the World is in god’s hands? Or faith it is solely in the hands of humans who make human errors? Be honest. Just a test.

China and Church

The question I have for you is:

Are the Chinese government ‘floating a test balloon’ on the idea of China as a Christian nation?

Intriguing thought.

This observation has been in my head for some time.

There seems to be quite a lot of papal activity over Chinese Catholics. Many Chinese have been converting to Christianity of different types. Communists don’t allow change without a reason.

Korea, a regional neighbour is predominately Christian.

Why faith and innovation?

When one innovates one needs a reason for achievement.

Else everything is bogged down in a cultural relativism, an argument over who is right, which is the right outcome. And where the strongest or most cunning win.

Cultural relativism is a power-play

We all (mostly) agree some things are good (food/friends) and some bad(murder/rape).

If all is cultural equivalent why is that so?

Cultural equivalency test: all things being right and nothing wrong, let me shoot you.

As you are a relativist, it should be fine with you, and nothing is wrong, because to your mind all actions are equal.

Except you are dead, so your opinion is now largely irrelevant.

– Old former friend of mine, who once studied philosophy. (paraphrasing)

Cultural relativism (all cultures equal) is a dangerous cover for covert power, as opposed to overt power.

There is no such thing as no values, or value-neutral. There is only an environment where some people can covertly assert their values. That is a cultural relativist world, where being non-judgmental is normally followed by a judgment.

Channel 10 in Australia and TV networks are not being non-judgmental in showing wall-to-wall porn, they are judging that this titillation will spike their rankings.

And further they believe in the cause of the Paris Hilton brigade skankifying the world, one pair of sunglasses, lipgloss, bumsters and hack-straw-haircut at a time.

Why China and Innovation?

Fact is most of the top countries in economic rankings are predominately Christian.

Something this post goes onto say. Read it. It is very interesting on balance, deppite some issues: http://www.chinalyst.net/node/17605

Irrespective of any truth that I personally find in the Bible, one cannot deny a secular state (separation of Church and State) combined with a largely Christian population and an intellectual small ‘L’ liberal university tradition that embraces Shakespeare, Smith, Rousseau, Plato, Aristotle, Locke, Hume and others is a mostly optimal combination.

World without faith?

Without faith - faith in family, friends, food, fun, the sun, the seasons, the world; what is that reason?

China as a Christian nation? That would be interesting.

Watch this, could be something more later.

Take care,

Christopher

Connect to Christopher Hire.

Speaker. Author. Editor-In-Chief. Executive Director of Innovation, 2thinknow.

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