For 9 out of the last 10 centuries, China had the world's biggest GDP. China is one of the world's oldest cultures. We underestimate them as a people and a nation at our own peril. The 19th and 20th centuries weren't a Golden Era for the Chinese, but that doesn't mean that they have always been less-advanced than the West.
And don’t tell me it’s just because of Communism, they were a backward country even before the communists took over in 1949.
Much of the world was backwards at the end of WWII. China's development was stunted due to communism. The country is only now starting to recover.
“For 9 out of the last 10 centuries, China had the world’s biggest GDP. China is one of the world’s oldest cultures. We underestimate them as a people and a nation at our own peril. The 19th and 20th centuries weren’t a Golden Era for the Chinese, but that doesn’t mean that they have always been less-advanced than the West.”
No, just for most of the last 4 centuries. Sure they’re old, that’s the only reason they were ahead in the first place, they got off to a long head start, and yet still ended up way behind pack, what does that tell you?
“Much of the world was backwards at the end of WWII. China’s development was stunted due to communism. The country is only now starting to recover.”
I’m comparing them to the west. China’s development as stunted by Confucianism long before it was stunted by Communism.