Much more to consider than economic growth

The Year of the Ox will prove to the world once again the resilience of the Chinese economy, and will perhaps dispel once and for all any misgivings about the success of its unique model of development. Putting aside this non-question of whether China will attain its target growth rate of eight percent, which it certainly will, there remains a more stringent requirement: we need good GDP growth not toxic GDP growth.

No 1 on the list of criteria is cleanliness, and we want to prevent corruption arising from a huge injection of liquidity into the system to boost growth. Many projects that may be immature or even redundant are likely to be commissioned in a hurry without going through proper planning and scrutiny, and the supervision of their execution might be somewhat sloppy. This is fertile ground for corruption.

Announcing the stimulus package of $586 billion, Premier Wen Jiabao stressed the utmost importance of public scrutiny and monitoring, but on the whole, our society still lacks the institutional framework and the tradition of doing so. As a result, some put high hopes on the Internet, which has recently helped expose some scandals. Cyberspace is however known for its anonymity and unprofessionalism. Like all power, if totally unchecked, it will inevitably lead to abuse.