Articles
There’s a well-versed rhetoric that explains China’s stellar economic growth, and it has been stated so often that it is widely accepted as fact. The notion is that its momentum will ultimately lead to the demise of many other trading nations around the world.
But according to Jeremy Haft, an adjunct professor at Georgetown University in the US, if you look beneath the shiny veneer of global dominance, China’s manufacturing miracle is riddled with cracks. In his new book – Unmade in China, the hidden truth about China’s economic miracle – he assesses how things are actually made in China, and reveals a reality that contradicts the accepted view.
Haft uncovers a startling picture of rampant non-compliance in product quality, process control, management protocols and governance throughout China’s manufacturing and supply chain. Using recent case studies and entry-level data, the book outlines shocking levels of systemic risk, whereby Chinese manufacturers struggle to make baby formula safely, much less nuclear power plants worth billions of dollars.
Why does this matter? Well Haft argues that rather than wiping out all before it, China’s manufacturing juggernaut is actually a huge creator of high-skill jobs in countries such as the US and the UK. Increasingly, China depends on the import of goods from overseas as its indigenous producers struggle to meet global standards. In the US, for example, total exports to China rose from $33 billion in 2004 to $120 billion in 2013. Haft also presents a convincing case for selling safety to China, particularly in engineering-related services.
Unmade in China provides a refreshingly different viewpoint on China’s economic miracle. Haft spent two decades building companies in China, and he clearly knows his stuff. The content is well-researched and runs along at a terrific pace. While the book has a US focus, there is relevance across nations.
Ultimately, Haft succeeds in challenging the conventional wisdom of China’s economic supremacy. When China’s president Xi Jinping came to the UK recently, Downing Street tried to spin the visit as reflecting an exciting new era of mutual trade. If Haft is right, maybe that line wasn’t so far from the truth after all.
Unmade in China by Jeremy Haft, published by Polity Books.
www.politybooks