China, Freedom, And The Internet
China is moving ever closer to expansive western style freedom (and not democracy!) unlike Russia, who put the cart before the horse and tried to democratize itself without unburdening from it's communistic mindset. Russia fell for the cruel joke that democracy will bring freedom and all good things. They tried to split up the pie before baking it.
Not China. While condemning it for its abuses of individual rights, one should note that perhaps somewhere, upstairs, at Communist Central in Beijing, the Central Commitee guys are reading the Austrian Economists. Could it be that seeping into their collective think is the truth that freedom is superior to democracy, and that when building a society from scratch (Mao had destroyed whatever correspondence China had with liberty prior to 1949, and it was thus forgotten by the people) capitalism MUST and can alone be the economic system of a free society. Strictly speaking, it is not even an economic system; it is the absence of one.
Everyone is a capitalist anyhow. The only question is who is going to control the capital.
Social freedom naturally follows economic freedom. Liberty begets liberty and those who are free to trade will not tarry in their demand for freedom to trade in the marketplace of ideas. This is happening in China, without promotion by government, but as a essential progression of natural law. If a man is free in one sphere of life, he cannot help but want it in all. He sees it as a natural right.
Today, the internet is helping those who want to promote individual liberty. Nicholas Kristof in his editorial today says that "the collision between the internet and Chinese authorities is one of the grand matches of history". And there is probably no better example than a brave Chinese citizen, a self appointed, but no less a journalist named Li Xinde who without any government restraint (because he publishes a website from a laptop and keeps moving around the country) is pointing out the weakness' of Chinese authority, and the power of one man's freedom.
And there is nothing they can do about it.
Joe Postove
Li Xinde's Website
Not China. While condemning it for its abuses of individual rights, one should note that perhaps somewhere, upstairs, at Communist Central in Beijing, the Central Commitee guys are reading the Austrian Economists. Could it be that seeping into their collective think is the truth that freedom is superior to democracy, and that when building a society from scratch (Mao had destroyed whatever correspondence China had with liberty prior to 1949, and it was thus forgotten by the people) capitalism MUST and can alone be the economic system of a free society. Strictly speaking, it is not even an economic system; it is the absence of one.
Everyone is a capitalist anyhow. The only question is who is going to control the capital.
Social freedom naturally follows economic freedom. Liberty begets liberty and those who are free to trade will not tarry in their demand for freedom to trade in the marketplace of ideas. This is happening in China, without promotion by government, but as a essential progression of natural law. If a man is free in one sphere of life, he cannot help but want it in all. He sees it as a natural right.
Today, the internet is helping those who want to promote individual liberty. Nicholas Kristof in his editorial today says that "the collision between the internet and Chinese authorities is one of the grand matches of history". And there is probably no better example than a brave Chinese citizen, a self appointed, but no less a journalist named Li Xinde who without any government restraint (because he publishes a website from a laptop and keeps moving around the country) is pointing out the weakness' of Chinese authority, and the power of one man's freedom.
And there is nothing they can do about it.
Joe Postove
Li Xinde's Website
posted by Mr. Liberty at 3:59 AM
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