Egalitarian cure?

"Responding to Chinese challenge with democratic socialism" by Thomas Piketty, 13 July 2021. In a recent blog post, Piketty argues that the most salient way for the West to address the supposed "Chinese challenge" is to be honest about chronic shortfalls at home and launch big investments into human capital and physical infrastructure. This will…

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Reflections on Vietnam’s 35 years of reform

In the past week, Vietnam's 13th Communist Party Congress has been taking place. It is also 35 years ago since the country's reform era (officially termed "renovation" or Đổi mới) was launched during the 6th Communist Party Congress. A former editor-in-chief of Communist Review, the party's flagship journal, said that this congress should be viewed…

Gan Yang on liberalism

21 years later, and still a text as relevant as ever: Liberalism: For the Aristocrats or for the People?, translated by Reading the China Dream. "On this point, Tocqueville famously concluded that people in the democratic age would cherish equality far more than they cherish freedom. The kind of “freedom” that Tocqueville insists on here…

China and inequality

In many developing countries with a deeply rooted legacy of socialism and egalitarianism, debates about choosing between the policy preferences of economic growth, equality and social justice remain as contentious as ever. Within economics, unanimity is really never meant to be achieved when studying the following questions: What is the optimal tax rate? What is…

Bo Songvisava and the future of Thailand

A colleague of mine recently introduced me to “Chef’s Table”, a Netflix series documenting different world cuisines through stories of individual chefs and their chosen cuisine of specialization. The first episode that I watched featured Duangporn “Bo” Songvisava, a female Thai co-chef and owner of Bo.Lan, a Bangkok restaurant. This was not a random choice.…