Re:Huawei Could Divide the World
by seanmcdirmid on Friday December 21, 2018 @04:55PM
(#18737031)
You have to understand the liberalization that led up to June 4th 1989 was pretty unprecedented. That it resulted in a horrible knee jerk is really sad.
China was liberalizing at an unprecedented rate in the 80s, to the point that the government didn't immediately react when a bunch of students gathered in Tiananmen square to protest. That could not have happened in 2008 and definitely not 2012.
Hu Jintao was not a reformer, not even close. Power was divested for sure, but the general direction of his reign was a show of opening before the olympics and then quick repression. Xi consolidated power, but did not "reverse course" on liberalization, it was already going in that direction.
China was liberalizing at an unprecedented rate in the 80s, to the point that the government didn't immediately react when a bunch of students gathered in Tiananmen square to protest. That could not have happened in 2008 and definitely not 2012.
Hu Jintao was not a reformer, not even close. Power was divested for sure, but the general direction of his reign was a show of opening before the olympics and then quick repression. Xi consolidated power, but did not "reverse course" on liberalization, it was already going in that direction.