Big Dragon: China's Future: What It Means for Business, the Economy, and the Global Order

Diametrically opposing U.S. critics of China who recommend a strategy of isolation and containment, the authors want America to expand its trade and investment with the country as well as to offer technical support and intergovernmental exchanges to foster economic interdependence. For a start, they suggest that President Clinton should visit Beijing. This policy of ""dynamic engagement,"" they contend, will ultimately benefit both the U.S. and China, which they expect will become the world's largest economy and the biggest manufacturer in the decades ahead. Investment banker Burstein (Yen!) and De Keijzer, a consultant to U.S. firms doing business in China, argue that the People's Republic--much more open and modernized now than in the 1970s, when it was in the throes of Mao's Cultural Revolution--has made dramatic progress on many fronts by allowing greater freedom of expression, unshackling a centralized economy and holding contested elections for thousands of local posts. They emphatically dispute those who view China as expansionist and inherently adversarial toward America. Clear writing, along with the authors' admission of assumptions and biases, makes this polemic a noteworthy contribution to the China debate. (Mar.)