Lets face it, China has been navigating some pretty hostile waters since its decision to host the 2008 Summer Olympic Games. Politically, socially, economically, and environmentally, the ferment in the Middle Kingdom certainly seems to be coming to a head. It could just be that a recent series of unfortunate events has brought the international spotlight to China’s doorstep, skewing popular perception with its limy hues. Yet, this dismissal would belie the very real and very serious issues that have been, are, and will be taking place in China for decades to come.

Does anybody remember the political and social firestorm caused by recent demonstrations in Tibet? Headlines and captions using expressions like “cultural genocide” shouldn’t be taken lightly. Allegedly, troops deployed by the Chinese government to quell an uprising in Lhasa resulted highly controversial (and ambiguous) constabulary measures. This was back in October, and for the past 7 months the news has been peppered with reiterations and developments of the stormy situation reaching a crescendo in late March and subsiding since. In fact, the Times recently ran an ironic bit entitled: “China Earthquake Pushes Tibet to Sidelines”. Fair enough. Mother nature’s seeming vendetta against East and Southeast Asia is reason enough to marginalize any prior concern in the area–for a period of time anyway.

This brings me to my next point: China’s impressive response to the devastating Sichuan Earthquake. In addition to the quake’s magnitude (7.9 on the Richter) and ever growing casualty estimates, China’s response to the atrocity has been spectacular to say the least. Over 100,000 troops have been deployed in the past 2 weeks to facilitate the rescue, regroup, and rebuilding processes. Efforts have brought relief to some 250,000 injured and 5 million homeless victims. My intention is not to imply in any way that the natural disaster has been a windfall to the Chinese people, but a certain amount of international pressure has been lifted from the Chinese government as it has been forced to focus solely on its immediate circumstances, thereby allowing it to demonstrate its ability to act responsibly and efficiently. Furthermore, in light of recent and related situations abroad and afar, China’s response has been doubly well-received. The 2005 Hurricane Katrina catastrophe brought humiliation to the American government as it demonstrated its inability to respond effectively and responsibly to a foreseeable natural catastrophe. The cyclone that hit Myanmar just weeks before China’s earthquake has been and continues to be a humanitarian crisis as the xenophobic military junta prevents any much-needed foreign aid from reaching those who desperately need it. Interestingly, China’s ability to deal with its situation with relative independence is precisely the criticism that former Burma is now facing. The difference, of course, is openness, China immediately accepted offers to receive aid, but quickly proved that it didn’t need it. Myanmar, on the other hand, refused help from the get-go and has been suffering the consequences. Moreover, these very isolated but thematically related issues, coupled with the late Tibet splash have culminated in a very rapid reordering of our preconceptions about China. Set in motion when China decided to host the 2008 Summer Olympics, the media has been relentlessly scrutinizing China–measuring and assessing its behavior in hopes of defining the elusive beanstalk.

So why has China been so successful in its relief efforts? Response upstaging notwithstanding, it is irrefutable that China has done a very good job facing its current calamity. I think it is, in part, for the same reasons that venerated economist Joseph Stiglitz ‘64 gives for why China has been so successful in alleviating national poverty. In a lecture given by Stiglitz this Spring, he asserted that China has successfully moved more than 500-600 million people out of poverty in the last 30 years. He accounts for such breakneck progress in three ways. First, China has a an extremely high savings rate (something like 42%). Meaning that it has decreased dependency on foreign aid (ergo, it could weather its crisis alone). Second, population control–the 1979 one child only mandate–has resulted in more resources per capita. Third, universal education policies have diminished the gap in knowledge heretofore present–especially in rural areas and most blatant with women. A robust and burgeoning infrastructure is implicit in these three factors. Skilled and unskilled labor married to new innovative technology has created an incomparable labor force. A new national highway system has united the country, increasing the mobility of resources. Superior airports (Forbes lists Hong Kong International is the #1 airport in the world) further indicate China’s advancing economy and capacity to deal with myriad regrettable circumstances or situations. In sum, China’s status as a flagship for poverty alleviation is precisely why they occupy the same rank in disaster response.

All the while, though, I can’t help but wonder how China plans to support its own weight in the long run. With its sudden change of face–from oppressive overlord to savvy savior–it is important to bear in mind that China’s whirlwind growth has a lot of implicit, deleterious consequences. The growth of its middle class (a welcomed consequence of poverty alleviation) is projected to reach 700 million by the year 2020. Thats a lot of happy people living lives of a much more acceptable quality. Yet what beyond that high savings rate, fewer children being born, and universal education opportunities does such progress imply? Energy consumption and concomitant emissions. Americans are quite good at this. In 2006 we emitted nearly 7,100 million metric tons of CO2. It should, therefore, be quite frightening to think that China’s middle class alone in 12 years will be more than twice what the current total population of the United States is. Furthermore, China has already outstripped the U.S. in its consumption habits. In fact, in 2006 it burned more coal (2.5 billion tons) than the U.S., Russia, and India combined. Other estimates show a similar upstaging–pitting China’s unmatched consumption against the U.S., Japan, and the E.U. Yikes! Even more perturbing is China’s waxing reliance on coal, by far the dirtiest fossil fuel used and unfortunately its most abundant energy resource. As many as 700 coal power plants could be built in the next few decades to meet energy needs. The environmental consequences are unthinkable.

China, though proven able to deal with the most dire of crises, has rendered itself unable to deal with one at hand: Global Warming.