American Nightmares: Wang Huning and Alexis de Tocqueville’s Dark Visions of...
There is a passage in Democracy in America that has appeared in many of my essays." In the United States,” Tocqueville reports, “there is nothing the human will despairs of attaining through the free...
View ArticleXi Jinping’s Plan to Save China Through Science
Does China have a plan to save its wobbly economy? Last week in Foreign Policy I argued that it does—but not the sort of plan most Western economists are comfortable with. Western analysts blame...
View ArticleMore on Xi Jinping’s Industrial Drive + London Meet Up
A few items of interest to my readers: First, at the end of last month I appeared on the German Marshall Fund's China Global podcast to discuss the CPC's current techno-industrial drive. You can listen...
View ArticlePatronage vs. Constituent Parties (Or Why Republican Party Leaders Matter...
The Republican and Democratic parties are not the same: power flows differently within them. The two big political news items of this week—the happenings of the Republican National Convention and the...
View ArticleUber is a Poor Replacement for Utopia
Two items of interest passed through my feeds this week. The first is the podcast Marc Andreesen and Ben Horowitz released to explain why they are endorsing Trump for president. The second is an...
View ArticleFive Fundamentals of Chinese Grand Strategy
Last month Civic Future invited me to join a panel at their annual policy forum. The topic: what the United Kingdom should do about China. As I am neither a British citizen nor an expert in British...
View ArticleThe Silicon Valley Canon: On the Paıdeía of the American Tech Elite
I often draw a distinction between the political elites of Washington DC and the industrial elites of Silicon Valley with a joke: in San Francisco reading books, and talking about what you have read,...
View ArticleWashington DC is Not a Popularity Contest
IN 2009 PAUL GRAHAM WROTE A THOUGHTFUL ESSAY titled “Cities and Ambition.” There he proposes that a great city is defined by the sort of ambitions it kindles—or perhaps more accurately, the sort of...
View ArticleDionysus Against the Daoists
IN WESTERN PHILOSOPHY AND AESTHETICS a contrast is sometimes made between the Dionysian and the Apollonian. Made famous by Nietzsche, this schema was first used to describe the thought and art of...
View ArticleRepublican Debates on China: A Political Compass
MANY HAVE TRIED to pin Trump to Heritage’s “Project 2025.” The Trump campaign has not only refused to endorse Project 2025—they have refused to endorse any detailed policy plan whatsoever. Trump...
View Article