Your suggestion that there was no simple explanation for how China's leaders pulled off their "economic miracle" ignores the careful planning that went into it and the models they used.

Japan's rise to a post war economic powerhouse was a primary motive as were the economic reforms initiated during the Meiji period. Having been invaded once, and conquered, China was not about to see itself the victim of a technologically superior power. Furthermore the coastal cities of China were ready and willing to take on the challenge of competition with Japan. Singapore's economic miracle Swee as Economic Advisor to the China State Council was crucial in laying the blueprint for their development both economically and politically. Home ownership in Singapore was seen as a key strategy to political stability and copied. The Chinese people had to feel as if they had a stake in their society's development. Singapore and Hong Kong's emphasis on education was adopted fully despite the Tiananmen Square massacre. The knowledge and the technologies of the Western powers were sucked out by waves of Chinese students and from encouraging joint ventures with Chinese companies. Singapore's cabinet headed by Lee Kwan Yew toured China once a year to report back in the Central committee on its progress. Delegations from major cities in China visited Singapore on a regular basis to look for new ideas.

Though we as Westerners are somewhat bemused that our "notions" of individual freedom have not been adopted with increasing economic liberalization, the idea of the rights of the individual as opposed to needs of the society as a whole is alien to the Confucian and Buddhist way of thinking. Lee Kwan Yew ran Singapore as a benevolent dictatorship. Japan is in name a democracy only. The Chinese central government is essentially weak. Power rests with the Governors so the central government is naturally extremely edgy about any sign of dissent.

Napoleon was right when he said, "China is a sleeping giant. Let her sleep, for when she wakes she will move the world." China is now awake but the problem it faces with 375 people per square mile is "How can it feed itself in the future?" Here in the US we only have 92 per square mile. The other challenge both Japan and China face is how, in Confucian societies which respect conformity and social cohesion, do you encourage the innovative thinking which is at the root of technological innovation? We shall find out.