The New York Times has a fascinating profile of Vietnam's current economic climate. Currently, the economy of Vietnam is growing faster than almost any other economy in the world. It's standard of living is rising rapidly, especially for skilled laborers; the stock market is booming; and their tax code will soon be superior to the United States' tax code in some ways. Not bad for a Communist country that was on the verge of starvation fifteen years ago.
And who deserves a good chunk of the credit for this? Certainly Vietnam's leaders do (more on them in a bit), but I'm thinking of a particular American president with a not-so-stellar reputation, namely Richard Nixon. His decision to engage China in an attempt move it away from the Soviet Union politically hastened the end of the Cold War and laid the groundwork for China's embrace of something like capitalism. If this had not happened, I don't believe either China or other states in Southeast Asia, such as Vietnam, would have had the wherewithal to look to Western capitalism as a cure for the ills of their economic systems.
On thing omitted from the profile (not surprisingly, as the piece was about Vietnam's economy), is the question of whether the increase of economic liberty in Vietnam has been accompanied by an increase in political liberty. Has Vietnam made progress in granting its citizens rights such as freedom of religion and freedom of speech, or is it following the Chinese model of vibrant economic growth accompanied by large-scale supression of religious and political freedom? WIll Vietnam become a free and open society as it continues to grow economically, or will the Vietnamese state exploit new technologies and expend great energies to keep its people under its thumb?
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