China is Asia's today but still has a long way to go

William Pesek JR

A shaky banking system and concerns about human rights may halt China's progress

China is Asia's today, Japan is its yesterday. That's the unmistakable impression one gets travelling around the region these days. It's also wrong. There's no denying China's potential - an economy growing by 8% and powered by 1.3 billion people hungry for capitalism. Multinational companies are seeing dollar signs when looking at maps of China, and big ones at that; so are Asian governments as economies ship more and more goods there. The emphasis in all of this has to be on the word 'potential'. Although China could indeed be the biggest economic success story in modern history, much co...