Link Banana

As nominally communist countries who believe firmly in capitalism as a way to economic development, China and Vietnam obviously have a lot in common. From this week’s Economist’s Special Report, an explanation of some of the ways they differ:

A foreign diplomat in Hanoi who used to serve in Beijing says that “everything here is more moderate than in China.” Vietnam is a bit less harsh with dissidents than China, and its capitalism too is less red in tooth and claw. Its health and education services have adapted more successfully to the transition to a market economy. Its press is strictly controlled, as in China, but the growing numbers of internet surfers have free access to most foreign news websites: there is no Vietnamese equivalent of the Great Firewall of China.

Whereas China is led from the top down and one man is clearly the paramount leader—Hu Jintao, who is both the head of the Communist Party and the state president—Vietnam has a consensual leadership. Its triumvirate of president, party boss and prime minister must reach accommodations with an increasingly independent national assembly and a host of other forces, and avoid upsetting the many surviving heroes of Vietnam’s independence wars.

Only 18% of the people live in a country whose press is rated “free” by Freedom House. You may be heartened a bit by the fact that that’s actually 36% or the countries, but it still seems a terribly sad state of affairs. A map (PDF) is available as well.

Also of note, The Economist’s Asia.view column examines how censorship has changed in recent years.

I think this is a great idea and I’m rather ashamed that the movement toward it has been so slow. Here’s hoping they approve it.

Faculty members are scheduled to vote on a measure that would permit Harvard to distribute their scholarship online, instead of signing exclusive agreements with scholarly journals that often have tiny readerships and high subscription costs.

Although the outcome of Tuesday’s vote would apply only to Harvard’s arts and sciences faculty, the impact, given the university’s prestige, could be significant for the open-access movement, which seeks to make scientific and scholarly research available to as many people as possible at no cost.

I have to admit that half of my affinity for this Europe.view column is that I just love that word. It’s like so many fights held in so many places all over the world. But the column’s also got a few very valuable points about relations between the Kremlin on the West that are worth hearing.

One solution is to use points made by Russian leaders themselves. Guess who said this: “Russia is a country of legal nihilism at the level…that no European country can boast of…Corruption in the official structures has a huge scale”. That sounds as though it came from some opposition politician such as Garry Kasparov—the sort of marginal (or marginalised) figure that Russians often say gains far too much western attention. But the speaker was Dmitri Medvedev, successor-designate to Vladimir Putin.

Another is for outsiders to show a bit more self-criticism. It is worth noting early on in the discussion some outrageous flaws in American (or British, or German, or French) foreign policy, as well as recent scandals involving corruption and abuse of power.

The most powerful western asset during the last cold war was not bigger nukes or higher living standards, but self-criticism. However bad western governments may be, they risk trouble eventually—from the media, the courts or the voters. That is not something that one can say with much confidence about Russia now.

The 14th Dalai Lama won the Nobel Prize in 1989. And though that’s hardly news, the speech which I just found (while working on this) is definately worth reading today:

I accept the prize with profound gratitude on behalf of the oppressed everywhere and for all those who struggle for freedom and work for world peace. I accept it as a tribute to the man who founded the modern tradition of non-violent action for change Mahatma Gandhi whose life taught and inspired me. And, of course, I accept it on behalf of the six million Tibetan people, my brave countrymen and women inside Tibet, who have suffered and continue to suffer so much. They confront a calculated and systematic strategy aimed at the destruction of their national and cultural identities. The prize reaffirms our conviction that with truth, courage and determination as our weapons, Tibet will be liberated.

No matter what part of the world we come from, we are all basically the same human beings. We all seek happiness and try to avoid suffering. We have the same basic human needs and is concerns. All of us human beings want freedom and the right to determine our own destiny as individuals and as peoples. That is human nature. The great changes that are taking place everywhere in the world, from Eastern Europe to Africa are a clear indication of this.