China's wealthy bypass the banks

[James A. Donald]

    --
James A. Donald.
> > China stagnated because no thought other than official 
> > thought occurred.

On 12 Nov 2004 at 15:40, ken wrote:
> And when was this stagnation?

Started soon after the Qing dynasty

> And what were the reasons China did not "stagnate" for the 
> previous thousand years?

When the Song dynasty attempted to appoint important people, 
they did not necessarily become important people, and when it 
attempted to dismiss important people, they did not stay 
dismissed - The Song dynasty was unable or unwilling to give 
full effect to Confucianism.  The local potentates 
conspicuously failed to behave in a properly confucian manner 
towards the emperor.

The Song emperor could not reliably make local authorities obey 
him, which mean that his confucian mandarins could not reliably 
stop anyone other than themselves from thinking - much as today
the communists are unable to stop anyone other than themselves
from banking - in part because they are reluctant to apply the
rather drastic measures that they have frequently threatened to
apply.

China prospered under Song Confucianism for pretty much the
same reasons as it is today prospering under "communism". 

    --digsig
         James A. Donald
     6YeGpsZR+nOTh/cGwvITnSR3TdzclVpR0+pr3YYQdkG
     Yv20dIxJj7Vr+GPh5ImGfq9c3N7OLh5qda5/qc+9
     49HxvL6pJJ1duyj3afDTLVoAjtWFWKz322go1DD9I