FW: China struggles with western concepts of success

[Karen Watters Cole]

2nd attempt:  Following up on some recent posts regarding China, here is a link about testing the limits of capitalistic excesses in modern China: To Be Rich, Chinese and in Trouble: 3 Tales "A few people in China have gotten rich beyond imagination, and the government needs to show that it controls rich people, too," said Liu Huan, a finance expert at the Central University of Finance and Economics in Beijing.  "Private entrepreneurs have higher status now than before, but they also have more demands on them."   The crackdown on industry titans shows how China's economy — however robust and Westernized it appears on the surface — still answers to an ossified political system.  The country has a growing number of multimillionaires and even a few billionaires, but their fortunes depend on the whims of a handful of Communist Party officials.   China recognizes that private enterprise, long the most dynamic part of the economy, has become its mainstay. As state-run companies continue to shrink and lay off workers, the private sector has surged ahead, increasing efficiency and production as well as the personal wealth of an entrepreneurial elite. Privately run businesses now account for just over half of the gross domestic product and employ 130 million people — the lion's share of industrial workers, but only about one-fifth the total work force.   At least on paper, China has built the legal infrastructure to enforce commercial laws much as the United States does. The difference is that real enforcement occurs only when party bosses in Beijing decide that the time has come, and when they identify capitalists who have fallen from favor.   http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/13/business/yourmoney/13CHIN.html?todaysheadlines   I have several interesting journalism files on China, so if anyone is interested, please email me.  For example, Some see the future in China as capitalist 05.04.02; Russia and China/Dangerous Liaison 08.21.02; China struggles to cut Reliance on Mideast Oil 09.03.02;The faces of China 10.13.02.    If you have a good China website, comparable to Japan Echo, (http://www.japanecho.com/), I would be interested.  Thank you.  Karen Watters Cole East of Portland, West of Mt. Hood Outgoing Mail scanned by NAV 2002