I’m no Expert….

But here’s my opinion. Just as Americans vilified the Russians during the Cold War, it seems to me we’ve done the same with the Chinese. Fearing the country’s economic power, military might and Communist leadership we’ve assumed or been led to believe the Chinese people must be living lives of desperation.

Without excusing the regime’s terror tactics in Tibet for the past 60 years, or forgetting the inhuman working and living conditions of factory workers and poor farmers in the countryside, I have to say the people of Beijing don’t appear to be oppressed. In fact, the people we’ve met working in hotels and restaurants, playing with their children in public parks, and visiting their nation’s historical monuments appear to be living lives quite like ours in the West.

No doubt I’m only seeing the surface, but I expected a populace of unhappy drones. To the contrary, the cafes are filled with young women texting and taking pictures of each other with their smart phones, public spaces are jammed with Chinese families during weekdays–assumably on vacation, the restaurants and shops are filled with Chinese folks–Westerners are few and far between–and enough of an anomaly that several times a day parents will ask if they can take a picture of me with their child.

The point? What we’re seeing has more to do with class and economics than a political system, and the upwardly mobile Chinese middle class have more in common with most Americans than  we could have imagined.

What’s more, as a metropolis, Beijing works–the roads are well maintained, the streets are  clean, there doesn’t appear to be any unemployment, crime is nonexistent and people take pride in their work. In short, compared with many American cities, such as New York, for example, Beijing is in a lot better shape (If you’ve ever driven from NYC to LaGuardia airport, you know what I mean).

Which is a surprise to me, having swallowed enough propaganda concerning the evils of communism. As a young college educated woman we spoke with explained, she may not be able to vote, but she is able to make all other decisions about her life–what to study, what profession she will pursue, when to get married, where to live and how to spend her money.

Yes I know the press is controlled, and the state owns all the land, and couples can only have one child, and government critics are jailed, but even so, when compared to the quality of life, standard of living and lack of personal and political freedom of people living in the Middle East  or Southeast Asia, the Northern Chinese at least, have it made.

Clearly American corporations have figured this out–there are KFCs on every other corner, Ford cars on the street, and Lay’s potato chips and Coca Cola in every street vendors wares. Just do the math: if you can sell your product to even 1 percent of 2 billion people your market is tremendous.

As the saying goes, because of their wealth (trade balance and debt holdings included), the Chinese are going to rule the world. I think it’s safe to say, there’s not as much to fear as we thought.