In the 20th century, privatization and market capitalism have reconstructed Eastern Europe and lifted 800 million people – in China, Brazil, and India – out of poverty. In Economics Does Not Lie, noted French journalist Guy Sorman reveals that behind this unprecedented growth is not only the collapse of state socialism but also a scientific revolution in economics – one that is as of yet dimly understood by the public but increasingly embraced by policymakers around the globe.
Before the totalitarian reign of Mao Zedong and his immediate successors, never in human history had an entire nation been under such intense surveillance. The Chinese not only had to speak alike; they had to think alike. Traveling to China regularly since 1967, and spending all of 2005 and 2006 there, Guy Sorman saw it all, and in this jaw-dropping book, he documents the horrifying stories of China through the 21st century. He shows how the Party's primary concern is not improving the lives of the downtrodden; it seeks power more than it seeks social development. It expends extraordinary energy in suppressing Chinese freedoms-the media operate under suffocating censorship, and political opposition can result in expulsion or prison-even as it tries to seduce the West, which has conferred greater legitimacy on it than do the Chinese themselves.