Power of Prayer

Notes from visiting my government students in China

Kuandian County is in Dandong in Liaoning Province, and sits on the border with North Korea, across the Yalu.

It is one of the semiautonomous majority-minority counties in China. The population is mostly Manchu, one of the barbarian tribes that pestered China for centuries. In 1644 the Manchus took over Beijing, established the Qing dynasty and began elimination of the Ming dynasty. Kuandian is one of those dongbei, northeast China areas from which the Manchus came.

Lack of trust and lack of communication    See, hear, speak no evil

This is the fifth post in the series on civil society in China now

I could never get Chinese government officials in my classes to ask questions in class. I could never get my Chinese undergrads to ask, either. They all knew – asking questions can be dangerous.

Housing Affordability ... and a bit more

A recent chart on housing affordability in major cities compared with incomes -

Failures of Civility and Social Capital in China Now   no generalized trust means no loyalty and no moral authority

This is the eighth post in the series on civil society in China now

In the west, the lack of an active civil society is politically worrisome. Civil society is the home of organized disagreement with government but also a home of innovative ideas and the force for change. Without it, democracy is politically adrift.

Rulers can never be certain of the quality of information they get. People lose the sense of community that comes with civility and social capital. There are information and emotional holes in society.

What does a society look like without civility? China is a good example.

International Difficulties  forget civil society, we’ll take civility

This is the ninth post on civil society in China now

One view is that without civil society fundamentals like generalized trust and freedom to express one’s opinion, China is doomed to … well, I don’t know what.  Decline? Fail? Disappear? Go into economic decline?

Moral Freedom and Nihilism    What, me worry?

 This is the seventh post on civil society in China now

 When you make the rules and then act as judge and jury, its hard to do the wrong thing. So, for CCP - If CCP does it, it must be the right thing to do. A couple of my government students, and another good friend, were judges. I was impressed, but I found out later that until recently being a judge did not necessarily have much to do with attending law school, and still less with balancing of rights. Justice is not blind, and sometimes it doesn’t even squint very much. Judges only nominally work for the government. They work for CCP.