One expert predicts the Asian giants will stumble
University of Toronto economist Wendy Dobson is basically upbeat about the prospects for China and India in her new book, Gravity Shift: How Asia’s New Economic Powerhouses Will Shape the Twenty-First Century. But in this trenchant review, Jonathan Holslag, an expert on the two Asian powers at the Brussels Institute of Contemporary China Studies, contends their future success is far from certain. He predicts Indian and Chinese politicians will “slide once more into a new downward spiral of protectionism and nationalism.” It’s a bracing, sophisticated argument, and a welcome departure from clichés about an inevitably Asian-dominated near future.