China: Is Rapid Growth Sustainable? (review)

154Book Reviews establishment of the long-awaited Papua People's Assembly, a cultural body to express the aspirations and wishes of all Papuans. While dividing the province into three has been controversial, it must also be admitted that it is a logistical nightmare to administer the far-flung territory. For administrative efficiency and representation, smaller units are definitely needed. The Dutch had seven and even the three proposed by the Indonesian government might need further modifications. As such, unlike East Timor, where Jakarta was in denial about .the existence of a "problem", since the fall of Soeharto the political leadership in Indonesia has been trying to find ways and means to solve the Papuan problem. While various concessions, including the granting of wide-ranging special autonomy, have been acceded to, many issues remain unresolved. As long as Papuans are prepared to remain as part of Indonesia, it is likely that Jakarta would be prepared to accommodate, as far as possible, including the possibility of troop withdrawals and key political positions being given to locals. However, any attempt at secession is likely to meet stiff resistance from Jakarta's political and military leadership. Here, King's diagnosis of the way forward is rather unrealistic as Papua is not East Timor, and as long as the political will exists in Jakarta to ensure there are "no more East Timors", Indonesia is unlikely to give up Papua without a fight regardless of pressure from outside. Bilveer Singh Department ofPolitical Science National University of Singapore China: Is Rapid Growth Sustainable? Edited by Ross Garnaut and Ligang Song. Canberra: Asia Pacific Press, 2004. Softcover: 249pp. By 2004 China had become the sixth largest economy and the fourth largest trading nation in the world. Its trade volume is about to reach a trillion U.S. dollars. To achieve this status China has undergone concerted reform since the late 1970s. This has led to considerable interest among professionals and policy-makers across the globe. While some view China's rise and integration in the global economic system in terms of offering potential opportunities for trade, others view the phenomenon as a collapsing system that jeopardizes the security and stability of the region. The book under review broadly fits into the first category. Book Reviews155 This excellent collection of papers, written by 19 scholars from Australia and China, examines in detail the complex economic dynamics at play in the recent period. While there is no introduction to this work, the chapters weave around the theme of whether the current economic growth is sustainable. Most ofthe contributors to the volume suggest that China is poised to retain its economic development in future with a few caveats based on objective economic as well as subjective factors. They suggest that China, in order to sustain its economic growth rates, needs to further reform its market economy, overcome burgeoning income inequalities, eliminate or reduce urban poverty, accelerate financial reforms, ensure transparency and effective enforcement of the rule of law, and take steps for "public monitoring of government operations" (p. 134). In the long term, economic growth in China may falter owing to factors beyond its control. The limits to sustainable growth may include a general ageing of the population, and loss ofthe relevance ofthe same "miraculous" factors such as inexpensive labour, raw materials, tax incentives, and assured energy supply to other "rising" economies such as India and the like. The rapid growth of the "new economy" — information technologies — in India, for instance, is one such recent development. Some of these were highlighted in the Goldman Sachs report of 2003 based on capital accumulation and productivity trends in Brazil, Russia, India, and China till 2050 and in the United States National Intelligence Council's report on "Mapping the Global Future" released in 2004. The volume is evenly and appropriately distributed, if repetitive, to reflect current concerns about the Chinese economy: nearly three chapters are devoted to growth related issues, three discuss privatization and markets. There are two chapters about trade prospects from membership of the World Trade Organization (WTO), and one each on industry, agriculture, currency reform, regional policy, and poverty. Predominantly, these studies are based on the last two decades of reform...