On the eve of June 30, Hong Kong was officially passed back to China. This event will mark what Willem van Kemenade sees as the start of an increasingly problematic -- and even dangerous -- reintegration of the old Chinese empire into a new world superpower. Since the early 1980s, investment money has been pouring into China from Hong Kong and trade has escalated at a rocket's pace. A few years later, the same pattern began between China and Taiwan. The combination of Hong Kong/Taiwan management, financial and export know-how with China's inexhaustible pool of cheap labor and land has enabled China in one decade to leap from an impoverished revolutionary state to a major international trading power. This economic boom, in conjunction with the violation of intellectual property rights, systematic tax fraud, and the corruption of the police force, has helped shape the "socialist market economy," China's third way -- and a new mix of old-fashioned Soviet Communism and East Asian capitalism. The formal addition of Hong Kong will add to this mixture the democratic structures set in place by the British. And, as China moves to reclaim Taiwan (the process has already begun), it will be incorporating a rival Chinese sub-nation with a fully election-based political system and a powerful independence movement. Can such a reunified China resist the "spiritual pollution" of democratic values, human rights, and political freedom? Will it become the first depoliticized "corporatist superpower"? What are the prospects that reunification will be peaceful? Van Kemenade's portrait of the true internal power structures of the three Chinas provides our clearest look yet at the fastest-rising new empire in the world today.

Prepared by the East Asian Institute, NUS, which promotes research on East Asian developments particularly the political, economic and social development of contemporary China (including Hong Kong and Taiwan), this series of research reports is intended for policy makers and readers who want to keep abreast of the latest developments in China. Yann-Huei Song describes and analyses the evolution of the South China Sea Workshops.

This book asks questions like: What is the nature and trend of trade and investment within the CEA and within Greater Hong Kong? What are the barriers to the economic integration of the CEA? What policies should be pursued to enhance economic integration?

The key question at the heart of this book is to what extent political activists in mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong have made progress in their quest to liberalise and democratise their respective polities. Taking a long historical perspective, the book compares and contrasts the political development trajectory in the three regions from the early 1970s—from the election-driven liberalisation in Taiwan from 1969, the Democracy Wall Movement in mainland China in 1978, and the top-down political reforms of Governor Patten in Hong Kong after 1992—until the present day. More specifically, it sets out the different strategies and tactics political activists have taken, assesses the lessons activists have learned from both successes and failures and considers how these experiences have informed their struggles for democracy. Importantly, the book demonstrates that at the same time, throughout the period and earlier, the Chinese Communist Party has been making use of "sharp power" —penetrating the political and information environments in Western democracies to manipulate debate and suppress dissenters living both inside and outside China—in order to strengthen its domestic position. The book discusses the nature of this sharp power, explores the rise of the security state within mainland China and examines the effectiveness of the approach, arguing that in Taiwan and Hong Kong the approach has been counterproductive, with civil society, campaigns for greater democracy and the flourishing of religion in part stimulated by the Chinese Communist Party's sharp power practices.

Herein the writer discusses the present rise of China from looking at a specific critical statement made by Sun Tzu in his ancient treatise “The Art of War.” The writer builds on this one particular quote in such a way as to obtain a “synthesis” for why Mainland China needs so desperately to bring back Taiwan “back into the fold.” Mainland China has for decades claimed that Taiwan is a “renegade province” and nothing more. Mainland China hopes and works desperately on a round-the-clock daily basis in order to try to convince the rest of the world that this in fact is the case. Because of the mainland’s unceasing rhetoric, often the rest of the world isn’t aware of the true state of affairs (as on the contrary all Chinese in the world are) that in fact Taiwan, because of its democratic and open society, it therefore is an absolute threat to the state security of mainland China. In fact, many of Taiwan’s open policies date back to the Japanese control of Taiwan from the years of 1895 until the end of WWII. This fact is something that mainland China refuses to officially accept and will without hesitation vehemently deny. However everyone who knows even some history and has travelled to Taiwan and spent time there can easily figure out. The writer has seen it for himself. Systemics and reductionism are discussed as part of the analytical framework of this synthesis using Sun Tzu’s theory as per several noted writers on the theories of International Relations. Mention will be made of how this present mainland policy has in fact seriously eroded the once very sound infrastructure that was once the fundamental social fabric and framework for Hong Kong, leaving many Hong Kong people in serious doubt for their future. Ultimately, all of this gets put on the “front door” of the U.S.A., whose position in the world, is by this very policy further under an even greater threat. Can China “out-flank” the USA in places such as the Pacific and continents such as Africa? The outcome remains to be seen. But this book will try to consider many of the possible scenarios. Notwithstanding, what also gets mentioned is the concept of Entropy in trying to analyze international political activity. Certain concepts such as the “entropy of mixing” are use to speculate that historical events cannot easily be “stopped” once political momentum and policies are put into place. The power of the “coalition” in game theory.