The recent crackdown by Chinese authorities on their largely foreign-listed education and tech companies has caused much chaos among Western investors.
As I hinted last year, the CCP leadership’s vision for China’s future appears to be a sophisticated version of high-tech big-data authoritarianism that advances the interest of the party-state. While “authoritarianism” and “big data” are the inherent political and demographic characteristics of China, “high tech” is, to a great extent, an imported good. Given that foreign investment and know-how in technology are still relatively scarce, it is indeed puzzling to see the PRC killing the goose that lays the golden eggs at such an early stage of its “technology struggle,” to the point where it appeared to be helping its adversaries in achieving their goals.
Unless “we must have missed something”—as the “conventional wisdom” goes when it comes to the “mysterious ancient nation that reads Sun Tzu and plays Go”—
Unsurprisingly, the “usual suspects” in the U.S. quickly came to the PRC’s rescue, arguing that “investors have misconstrued China” and it “could ultimately be a good thing.”
So is China playing Go? I don’t know. What I do know is that an enormous bet is being placed: if successful, it could make George Orwell blush for his lack of imagination, but if it goes south, one can only hope that things would end up peacefully.