6/3/12Quality of Life
Research Paper
When you think of a country as being a superpower, what comes to mind? Well what most people think is the United States and is right, however China also comes to mind but at best China can only become an economic superpower nothing more. To many people China 's strength, mainly in its economy, is strong and China 's economy now ranks as the second largest in the world. According to a video, Is China the next superpower?, on YouTube, “China 's per capita income is still a little more than 10 times lower than that of Japan and the United States,” mainly because China is forced to export because of the low standard of living and lack of arable resources, that is what the Chinese economy is, an export-oriented economic system. This, however, has made China an overwhelmingly dependent on consumers in the West. The United States navy dominates global sea trade routes making it extremely difficult for China to do otherwise.
Beijing, China 's capital, is forced to invest its resources to build up a modern navy to that of the standard of the United States. Aside from the economics and naval buildup, China faces enormous domestic issues. The east side of its territory is inhabited by secessionist-minded minority groups minorities, meaning groups of people that withdraw themselves from an organization, union or especially a political entity, creating more dilemmas for China. The control of the East side takes a huge toll on the Chinese economy as Beijing has to balance the prosperity in the East with disparity in the West.
According to http://carnegieendowment.org, “Aside from China 's internal fragmentation, China also faces a lot of external pressure from its neighbors.” Unlike the United States, China has to contend with strong regional rivals such as Japan from the East, Russia from the North and India from the South. They all put a lot of weight and stress on the Chinese military and economic resources
Bibliography: http://carnegieendowment.org/2009/12/29/china-s-not-superpower/1rgl – China 's not a superpower http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pG225dz89TY&list=UUwnKziETDbHJtx78nIkfYug&index=3&feature=plcp – Is China the next superpower?