India vs. China

This fall I'll be writing a piece for the Rice Standard that will analyze the similarities and differences between China and India. That article will be considerably longer than this blog post, but I thought I'd post a "sneak peak" of what that article will look like.

In a 10 month period I've been through countries that represent over 42% of the world population (China, India, United States, and South Korea). The largest of these, China and India, both contain over a billion people, and the two Asian supergiants are both emerging as major players in the world economy. The differences and similarities between the two are fascinating, and after visiting both countries and seeing the major similarities and differences, I wanted to post an examination of where the two nations currently stand, and where I feel like they'll be in the future. Certainly this is a very important issue to us as Americans, because the way the two countries interact with us defines how our economy runs.

First, I might mention some similarities. First of all, it's unbelievable to see the amount of construction going on in both countries. Especially as you go out from the cities, construction cranes dot the horizon. The difference seems to lie not so much in the amount of construction, but in what is being constructed. China specializes in the production of cheap goods. Indeed, whole cities are often devoted to the production of a single product. India produces products as well, but as we're all aware, it's probably more likely to here the thick Indian accent on the other end of the phone when calling for customer support for your electronics than it is to see "Made in India" on the back of that same device. Conversely, few of us have heard a Chinese voice answering tech support, whereas "Made in China" is ubiquitous on all our products.

China and India are both trying to eat up market sure in all sorts of ways. They have both had varying degrees of success, but with very different methods. Both countries have very different but very ancient pasts, and both have had difficulty in coming to terms with the West. However, they both have come to their present success in very different ways.

Indian civilization dates back to the Indus River valley civilizations, but its history has long been a history of various civilizations encroaching on the subcontinent and establishing foreign rule over the land. This history of foreign occupation dates back to the time of Alexander the Great and moves forward through various other occupations all the way up to the time of the British. In 1948, India became a sovereign state, but it took almost a half a century for it to establish the strength to assert itself as a world power. China, on the other hand, has long been a sovereign nation, and the second half of the 20th century was more or less spent trying to figure out how a communist government could still assert itself with the West.

Today, the Indian economy is free market, capitalist, and in many ways, out of control. The market has complete control over the Indian economy, and it looks like utter chaos. Aside from a small minority of Indian businessmen who have been able to raise substantial capital, most Indians are limited to the little capital they can afford, forcing them to go into a business that infringes on an already saturated market. After all, how many cloth stores can one possibly have on one street? The Chinese economy, by contrast, is one of forced order. The Chinese have become exceedingly efficient (though not perfect) at identifying market forces and capitalizing on success and stamping out failure.

The mindset between the two nations is markedly different. The Indians value the individual (much as we Americans do), such that if someone wants to try something, they have the right to try and do it, no matter how it negatively affects that market as a whole (or at least, how it's perceived to negatively affect the surrounding market). The Chinese value society as a whole, seemingly at the expense of the individual, such that they pick and choose where to place their capitalization.

The question that follows is, "Which one is better?" It's not an easy question, and at this point I'm going to make a shameless plug and leave you hanging--I'll delve much deeper into this question in the fall and further analyze the nations of China and India.