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Comment by powstudio | Hacker News Reader

China is one black swan event away from an economic collapse and possible Arab spring. The authoritarian Chinese government is starting to have some sense of fear now. Between the 300%+ gdp/debt ratio, second real estate bubble bursting in shanghai/tier1 cities, huge spike in shadow lending, stalled stock market, complete frozen capital control, Trump's 100 day ultimatum to China regarding trade deficit, demographics crisis, NK situation, south asia island situation, protectionisms against China in europe/US/Japan, Foreign Direct Investments leaving China, etc.

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The preconditions of revolution exist in the UK, and most western countries. The number of active pre-conditions is quite stunning, from elite isolation to concentrated wealth to inadequate socialisation and education, to concentrated land holdings to loss of authority to repression of new technologies especially in relation to energy, to the atrophy of the public sector and spread of corruption, to media dishonesty, to mass unemployment of young men and on and on and on. [...] Preconditions are not the same as precipitants. We are waiting for our Tunisian fruit seller. The public will endure great repression, especially when most media outlets and schools are actively aiding the repressive meme of 'you are helpless, this is the order of things.' When we have a scandal so powerful that it cannot be ignored by the average Briton or American, we will have a revolution that overturns the corrupt political systems in both countries, and perhaps puts many banks out of business. Vaclav Havel calls this 'The Power of the Powerless.' One spark, one massive fire. - Robert David Steele, ex-Marine, ex-CIA, Open Source Intelligence Expert in The Guardian, 2014-06-19 ... from my fortune DB @ https://github.com/globalcitizen/taoup

Robert David Steele has interesting things to say about OSINT, but one must take him with an entire cow lick of salt. After getting interested in his ideas and watching several interviews with him, I was very disappointed. His personal narrative is exaggerated; he advocates conspiracy theories that are popular but ridiculous; he shows a certain arrogance. He looks & quacks like an aggressive self promoter without much substance to offer.

This man has claimed to be the father of OSINT one day, and said that Pizzagate was spot-on the next. No one with a clue about how to conduct an investigation should have swallowed that.

That is all to say, I believe we are in very troubled times, but I don't believe we are on the verge of revolution.

About the same as my views, but still a fair and handy antidote quote to "China is on the brink of revolution!" as per OP!

I first read about the coming collapse of China in 2001 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Coming_Collapse_of_China - revised edition published in 2012).

I'm sure it will happen one day, and then all the broken clocks will be right.

China undoubtedly faces many challenges, as you fairly point out.

However, there's a long history in China that determines the thinking of both the government and its people. That view is that a strong centre leads to a peaceful and prosperous China, while a weak centre leads to confusion and chaos. An Arab Spring-like event isn't as likely, there just isn't the same desire to be liberated.

No one would challenge the centre unless they were prepared to go all the way. And there's a very powerful state security apparatus ready to come down hard if they do.

>...one black swan event away...

I read the book a long time ago, so I might be remembering it incorrectly, but aren't all nations just "one black swan event away" from something?

The idea is that you can't predict it and only makes sense when looking back.

Economic collapse? Are you insane? China very likely has a property crash in its near future but even the very most developed parts of China are not near to Korea, Japan or Taiwan. There's a lot of room for China to grow and there's no reason to believe growth is under 5%. Maybe heavily state directed capitalism can't reach South Korean levels of prosperity but if all of China reaches Shanghai prosperity that will be success.

And the Arab Spring was in very large part a result of rising bread prices as well as being a massive failure in every way outside Tunisia.

http://voxeu.org/article/measuring-and-mis-measuring-chinese...

Unofficial indicators of Chinese GDP often suggest that Beijing’s growth figures are exaggerated. This column uses nighttime light as a proxy to estimate Chinese GDP growth. Since 2012, the authors’ estimate is never appreciably lower, and is in many years higher, than the GDP growth rate reported in the official statistics. While not ruling out the risk of future turmoil, the analysis presents few immediate indications that Chinese growth is being systematically overestimated.

Look at the graph of Chinese Urban population and Chinese GDP. These graphs are in lock-step. Now look at the graphs of fully developed countries and extrapolate. The rural population is the economic fuel. So long as its there there will not be an economic downturn. There may be slow downs and specific cases of mismanagement, but never a true negative growth rate recession. IMO anyone predicting any change in the Chinese status quo before the mid 2030's is full of it.

I seriously doubt China will go into economic collapse like Venezuela, but I think in the next 5-10 years once growth is down below 3-4%, the economy will start to suffer and people will become uneasy because the economy is affecting how much they can buy. Probably the biggest domestic economic issue you pointed out is the debt to GDP ratio, which is very high, but may not be an issue depending on how China deals with the impending developing to developed country situation. I think that the two largest issues that will face China in the next decade or two are 1) that manufacturing and electronics jobs like at Foxconn will move to countries where labor doesn't cost as much, unless China is really smart and opens up powerful trade deals with certain countries (which it wants to spearhead with the downfall of TPP); and 2) South China Sea will likely become a major point of contention between its neighbors and could lead to a major cooling of relations with bigger economies like USA and Japan. NK possibly could be an issue but only if it becomes war, which all parties including NK want to avoid.

what you said above is nothing new, it has been claimed, argued, suggested, predicted in the last 35 years. There are even morons like Gordon Chang making a living by saying such stupid things.

you should probably contact Gordon Chang to see how you can get yourself on a similar payroll by making such claims.

> China is one black swan event away from an economic collapse and possible Arab spring.

This sounds like the Marxists' "eminent collapse of capitalism" or "this will be the year of Linux on the desktop" or Mao Ze-Dong's "America is a giant with clay feet".

Someday you'll be proven right. But only after being proven wrong for a million times.

This year is the year of the Linux desktop though...

> Trump's 100 day ultimatum to China regarding trade deficit

What is this ultimatum and why would China actually care or do anything about it?

Watch USDCNY and CNH/CNY spreads.

I'd love to hear more about this.

> and possible Arab spring

I'm sure that the powers-that-be in China aren't overly scared of a failed popular uprising.

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