The following is from Chapter 1, “The changing of the guard” from “When China Rules the World, The End of the Western World and the Birth of a New Global Order” by Martin Jacques, published in 2009:
“Prior to 1960, the West and Japan enjoyed a huge economic advantage over the rest of the world, which still remained largely agrarian in character, but since then a gamut of developing countries have closed the gap with the West, especially those in East Asia. As a consequence, it is becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish between the developed world and the more advanced parts of the developing world: South Korea and Taiwan, for example, are now to be counted as developed.
”But as countries reach Western levels of development, do they become more like the West, or less like the West, or perhaps a combination of the two? Clearly the pressures for convergence indicate the former but the forces of divergence and indigenization suggest the contrary. Previously the overarching difference between the developed and the developing world was the huge disparity in their levels of economic development.
“It is only with the arrival of these countries at the lower reaches of Western levels of development that the question of convergence or divergence becomes pertinent. There has been an assumption by the Western mainstream that there is only one way of being modern, which involves the adoption of Western-style institutions, values, customs and beliefs, such as the rule of law, the free market and democratic norms. This, one might add, is an attitude typically held by peoples and cultures who regard themselves as more developed and more ‘civilized’ than others: that progress for those who are lower down on the developmental scale involves them becoming more like those who are higher up…
“The mainstream Western attitude has held that, in its fundamentals, the world will be relatively little changed by China’s rise. This is based on three key assumptions: that China’s challenge will be primarily economic in nature; that China will in due course become a typical Western nation; and that the international system will remain broadly as it now is, with China acquiescing in the status quo and becoming a compliant member of the international community. East of these assumptions is misconceived. The rise of China will change the world in the most profound ways…
And later: “China should not primarily be seen as a nation-state but rather as a civilization-state.”
For more information, see New York Times’ book review.
The Chinese government, unlike ours, was quite functional as the economic crisis hit. The government did the type of stimulus spending that Obama and the Congress were incapable of doing (and seem incapable of doing even moreso after the election). They never got off the path of economic growth unlike the U.S. — even though we are the far wealthier country.