David’s Blog

After reading a newspaper article titled “The penny drops in China”, and reading about how hundreds of billionaires have suddenly been relegated to the grey zone, where people who lose their high-level protection from the Chinese Government suddenly lose all their rights, even to the right to trial. 5 years ago all I heard was good things about China. I heard from bewildered people who toured China speak of the sheer magnificence of the cities, the massive numbers of buildings being built at once in Shanghai, how the people have suddenly turned into a prosperous, great nation. They won so much, and did so much, by building the largest hydroelectric dam in the world, by winning the largest number of gold medals in the Olympics, by hosting the Olympics in a fashion grander than anyone else in the world has seen (with a few ‘imposter problems’) and building some of the world’s tallest buildings. China seemed to be the invulnerable sleeping dragon, who has awoken from its sleep since the last dynasty passed. Showing off its might and strength to all those who did not know of it. The people awed.

Little did they know, China with all its might and resources, was still vulnerable for some reason. Suddenly, the recession came, and news spread of millions of people losing their jobs. Hundreds of thousands of companies collapsed and their executives charged with fraud. It shows how much little has been done to solve the fundamental problems that plagued the foundations of capitalism on which the Chinese state economy so heavily relies on. After a brief few decades of flirting with capitalism, China will now realize that with great power comes great responsibility. If you want capitalism to make you rich, you must also trust it will make you poor. In an effort to stem popular unrest caused by the economic collapse, the Government continued to arrest and detain high level execs to please the public, angered by the loss of jobs caused by their mistakes, and to prevent the media from broadcasting any news that may cause the public or foreign investors to act against the favour of the Government. However, the Chinese society, and the world too is starting to realise this a little more at a time. The recession has started to reveal some very disturbing realities about this world.

When Deng Xiaoping visited the US in 1979, it was generally a sign to all the China is finally throwing its doors open to the world. Deng promised and implemented economic reforms and relaxation, and from then on China started to tend towards a free market. What in essence was view by the world as a shift to capitalism was actually just a lack of enforcement by the Chinese Government. The Chinese Government, in good times and in bad, was always a Communist government, and history has never told of a successfull communist government. Few have managed a certain degree of success, but at the cost of serious repercussions during periods of economic collapse. Capitalism won’t work without a democracy, because the fundamental idea of capitalism and free trade is that the people, and not the government who decides how valuable your goods are.

But people went along with it and said China was different, in that it was made of a society accustomed to doing business. But if a person cannot easily set up a company in a country and honestly report their income to the government and be taxed in a fair manner, businesses would not survive in the form that they thrived in in other more successful countries like South Korea, Taiwan, Japan and Hong Kong: all of which have adopted representative governments.

Will a recession finally force the government to transform into one that is more conducive to capitalism?

After reading a link a friend sent me today, I was left utterly speechless at the absurdity of the situation. A school closing without notice is just plain unethical in my opinion. What’s worse, is that I don’t see Singapore doing much to help these students left high and dry after finding the gates shut after the holidays. But still, just leaving the school closed all of a sudden and not doing anything about it sounds like a conman’s tactic to me. After a bit of googling, it turns out that this isn’t news. There has been a flurry over schools closing over the past year starting with the University of New South Wales. But that’s a big anomaly, since UNSW is not just some university. Its one which a lot of people hold high acclaim to. That’s going to hurt their reputation I must say.

The funny thing is, why do people actually bother with private schools anyway? Is it because public schools don’t provide good education? I’m not sure about Singapore but back in Malaysia I think the public schools I have attended taught me more that I could ever have learned if I was sent to a private school.

The reason I think so is that back in a public school, all the students around us are unselected and from all walks of society. Since exposure is one of the most important things a person needs in life. It develops social skills and helps one learn to deal with all sorts of people and all sorts of situations. If it wasn’t because of the fights I had in school, or the awkward misunderstandings and occasionally racist comments, I would probably never have known how to get along with other non-chinese around me.

Also, in a public school, you have to make do with what you have. Interestingly enough, most say that people go to a public school to teach because they don’t really have many other career choices in life. It is probably true to a certain extent, and true as far as personal experience counts. But that doesn’t have to mean that they aren’t the most dedicated people you would ever meet, or aren’t the most educated. I’ve had science teachers who were so passionate about chemistry, you could ask them about hydrocarbon nomenclature and they will spend hours on end telling you about how oil is refined and cracked to produce more useful stuff, and just generally shower you with all the knowledge that they gathered while in university. And a LOT of my teachers held big bachelor’s degrees.

The likely reasons people favour private schools are:

1) Kiasu. This is the Singaporean word for fear of loss (as in, defeat). It is the best word I’ve seen that describes the need to save face in Chinese culture. Being able to send my children to a private school means that money is no object for me. For Chinese people, this is certainly something to be proud of. No one wants to be a poor loser.

2) If I’m paying more, I probably get better stuff. This is a tactic employed by lots of niche product companies. Like Apple Inc. In truth, the return on investment ratio drops very sharply as a price increases to accomodate quality. Apple’s computers ARE actually technically superior to generic PCs but you pay out of your nose for it. But I’m not sure if it ever increased my productivity just by being better.

3) They give more attention to students. I wonder how true this is and how effective it is if compared to a public school. Like I said before, my teachers were pretty awesome when you asked them questions. My physics teacher would tell me why a transformer can change voltages from high to low by showing me some diagrams of magnetic flux, copper windings and deriving some equations when I asked, even though I didn’t quite understand them at the time, I kinda got the basic idea of how it worked. When I studied in a private school just before university, it was pretty much the same. You HAD to approach the teachers if you had questions. They aren’t going to nurse you and baby feed you with knowledge.

On the contrary, private schools are akin to gated communities, something which I think is poison to society. Gated communities hide away a lot of reality from those living inside their gates, and usually for all the wrong reasons, like protect them from strangers. Children should be encouraged to mix with as many kinds of people as possible, and parents should not be afraid to let their kids fail early and often in relationships and social contact, since that which doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Of course, there’s always the chance of kids dying from accidents in the city, the chances are pretty much the same at home.

Then again, there’s always the case where public schools, especially universities which don’t have the space to take in all of the students and just select the best and brightest. Likewise, the solution isn’t for a government to pull in private schools controlled by businessmen and only interested in making money. Its just a sign that more investment in public education is long overdue.