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The Sleeping Giant Awakens

The consequences of China's growth.

Mar 22, 2004, Vol. 9, No. 27 • By IRWIN M. STELZER
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THAT CHINA'S NATIONAL PEOPLE'S CONGRESS convened last week is not news, though it provided the occasion for prime minister Wen Jiabao's first address to the rubber-stamping body, a 90-minute affair which, quite predictably, was well received. That China released two dissidents, Wang Youcai and Phuntsog Nyidron, may be news, if it portends a greater sensitivity to pressure from international human rights advocates and even a slight loosening of the regime's grip on the political system. That Wen announced China will address the economic imbalances that threaten to turn its phenomenal growth into an equally phenomenal bust is news. China has accounted for a larger share of world growth in the past seven years than has the United States, making the health of its economy important to far more than its own 1.3 billion people.

China's trade policy, and especially its burgeoning trade surplus with the United States, is now front and center in the debate over the propriety of George W. Bush's (somewhat) free trade policies. A combination of resurgent Democratic protectionism and a sluggish jobs market has Americans worried, and White House campaign-planners are trying to figure out how to counter that new recruit to the protectionist cause, John F. Kerry, without completely abandoning the president's commitment to free trade.

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