China Rises -- The TV Show/"Getting Rich"

I watched one of the episodes of the highly publicized new four part TV series, "China Rises."  I watched the episode entitled, "Getting Rich" and I thought it was nicely done. 

The following things from the "Getting Rich" episode stood out for me:

1.  Many of the Chinese citizens interviewed spoke of the nearly limitless opportunities China now offers its people.  Only a few hours after watching this program, I was interviewed by a U.S. paper doing a story on China and I was asked what I thought was the American people's biggest misconception about China.  I said the idea that the Chinese people are in a constant state of repression. I said the reality is that the people with whom I deal (and admittedly these are for the most part the urban elite) are hugely proud of their country and wildly optimistic about its future.   

2.  Though one cannot fairly describe China as a country built on laws, it is becoming more so each day and the people are more and more turning to China's courts for legal redress.  These courts do not always rule fairly, but they apparently rule fairly enough for the people to generally believe in them.  I have definitely found this to be the case in the business world, where threatening to sue a company that has not paid its bills usually convinces them to pay. 

3.  Private enterprise is thriving and it is China's private companies (not its state owned entities) that drive what the show kept calling the "greatest transformation in history."

4.  The Chinese elite concur with the government's go slow reform policy of "crossing the river by feeling for stones."  In the show, an obviously wealthy banker talks about how this policy, first coined by Deng Xiaoping in referring to China's step by step liberalization, makes sense for China.  Those with whom I talk in China concur with this.  I think the urban elite of China concur with this not because they feel compelled to do so by the government, but because this policy has, at least so far, served them so well. 

The series is a co-production of the Discovery Times Channel, The New York Times,  the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, France 5, and S4C.  For more on this series, click here.  You can see the series trailers on the DaveinChinaBlog.