#NLDhulai: Abhinandan’s train of thought seems flawed

Hello!

Just wanted to write to say that I really liked Manisha’s views on the #MeToo movement. More power to you!

Also, I think Abhinandan’s train of thought that:

1. China aggressively surveils its citizens.
2. China will become a dominant economic superpower in a near future.
3. Economic superpowers call the shots.
4. 1, 2, 3 imply that India is fucked too.

seems flawed. India might be screwed anyway, but the logical implication as above does not seem to hold.

These things are more a consequence of how much “soft power” a culture hold over another culture. And the problem is that China has absolutely no cultural soft power over India. We don’t watch Chinese TV shows, Chinese movies, read Chinese books (not even translated)—heck, zero per cent of our intelligent population can read Chinese, we don’t actively immigrate to China, a majority of our universities don’t have embedded “Confucius Institutes” run by Chinese governments. China already is an economic superpower but is and will be far away from being a cultural superpower—at least in India.

Compare this to America/Europe: it is far easier for Western values to flow to India; even when the American economy sinks (2008), even when the EU disintegrates, even when Brexit happens, etc.

Btw, just renewed my subscription for this year.

Keep up the good work!

Best,

Shashank Kanade