THE CHINA VISIT AND SUN WU "THE MASTER"

"The Sunzi" or the book of the Master Sun was written the last quarter of the fourth century BC
In thirteen chapters, and wrapped in an aura of exotism, his teachings collect "The Art of War", as it is popularly known in our day this text.
The dating of this brief treatise is part of the period "The Warring States (480-221 BC) which is the time when the confrontation between the Chinese nation no longer is characterized as a" tournament of values" between the exclusive warrior class (knights) of each of the states in combat. In this period it becomes an issue that encompasses the entire state, which is organized like an army, keeping correspondence with the social existing levels.

To understand the culture of China, according to experts, It´s a process that requires the knowledge of the evolution of history from a huge time scale. Any change requires several generations to push the vast inertia of the mass population. However, these periods are deeply rooted in culture, arts, writing and thinking of China.



Reading "The Art of War" at this very moment (with the symbolic visit of Chinese President to the U.S.A.) produces at least uneasiness. I proceed to enumerate the reasons:

1.-One of the cornerstones of the book is the principle that we should avoid any confrontation with the intention of “winning without having to fight”. In this sense China is not confronted with anyone economically, only advances inexorably and "wraps".

2.-In "area of convergence" (belonging to various nations) it´s necessary to use alliances to overcome an adversary. In this blog I think I've mentioned, the example China and the construction financing for the bridge across the Danube in Belgrade. We realize a growing diplomatic activity seeking strategic points in the case of Serbia, as future European Union country with great potential for growth and consumption.

3.-The Master Sun Wu also mentions the concept of using the enemy. “Make the enemy work for you." Buying the debt of Spain or any other country, is ultimately what they're doing. Whenever another country works for you and make you earn money, doesn´t work for itself. Ultimately, the “Buying-bond nation” will progress upon the effort of the selling one. Now all markets are very happy about the relocation of the debt but, has anyone stopped to think what will happen when that loop-back and refinancing of state debt is over and nations want to receive the cash. The good news should be not to achieve the selling of the debt, should be the progressive amortization.

4.-Another of the basic ideas of the treatise is to maintain strict discipline. This mechanism should be so refined, so that the orders are transmitted from the head of the general (who is not the task of wielding the sword) to the last of its soldiers without any possibility of misunderstanding or disobedience. Everyone knows the iron yoke imposed by China to its population in terms of human rights, precisely because the deprivation of the fundamental rights and basic needs was a methodology for the imposition of discipline since the days of "Warring States".

5.-The axiom of military preparation in this case is the preparation of the working masses throughout China productive improvement. In this case, the Chinese educational programs should be making progress inside the limits of the "ideological manual."

6.-The war (in this case the economy as a way to defeat other nations without resorting traditional confrontation) is an exercise of knowledge. When you buy a fighter jet Shukoi-29, the ultimate goal is not to use it in military operations, but to have the knowledge to produce many others. This simile is extrapolated to the rest of the industrial activity in the pursuit of the “know-how. " for their own brands.

7.-In a desperate situation with no way out, the enemy is forced to fight with all his forces till death. It is preferable always to leave an escape for the enemy soldiers so they are not forced to kind of "kamizake" actions. On the other hand, you must lead your troops into a hopeless situation to fight to exhaustion.
When President Hu Jintao tells President Obama that China will buy 45,000 million in aircraft, apart from extending the influence of their national airlines, it seems that he is leaving an economic output spigot to the global rival.

8.-The use of spies as a knowledge of the enemy is another key element. Apart from knowing yourself, you must fully know your opponent.
There are many urban legends about what the Chinese immigrants in each country, its lack of transparency both economically and socially. Without getting into discussions of living coexistence, the question that comes to the point of this article is, how much do they know us and how we know them? How we know them in their own country? Honestly I think that they know us better than vice versa.

9.-A perfect action has power consumption. We must therefore avoid the consistent and attack the void: For China is very profitable economically to enter African weak countries, without regulations or restriction to stop its progression.

10.-The war is also the art of being "inscrutable." You have no shape so you can adapt to the enemy and the enemy cannot chase you. In this case is very important on “the art of deception”. We must continually try to confuse the enemy.
So what's behind, what the real intention behind all diplomatic activities? Clearly China is now the friend with money that everyone wants to have. It´s the entity that has made the leap to a higher economic and financial dimension but, haven´t we realized by now what this is all about?

The open discussion will be to express ones view about China conquering the World (I know that this parallelism with the book is frightening and I put it in a very hard and maybe not fair way, just to encourage the debate) or it is only just a gradual opening of China to the global coexistence.

A last idea to mention is that the period of the "Falls and Springs" (770-480 BC, the predecessor of the period of the "Warring States"), as I´ve mentioned, warriors were knights in a contest of values and virtues (which also involved the safeguarding of peace). Today, keeping the pseudo-economic comparison, there are large companies.
But China's leap into the next phase in which the company is the entire country, will also mean that whole nations will be forced to compete structural, legislative and economically in the same way, but not necessarily following the same criteria.

UN CACHORRO PARA EL EMPERADOR

Sábado 13 de noviembre. Voy en coche hacia el centro por Tsarigradsko Shosé y el dispositivo policial que se observa es asombroso. Hay policías casi uno en cada árbol. Y un policía a ambos lados de la vía cada 20 metros, en una avenida de 6 km desde el centro de Sofía a la altura del aeropuerto, son muchos policías. También hay vehículos antidisturbios y el centro de la ciudad está totalmente acordonado para el tránsito rodado, ocasionando consecuentemente un gran desbarajuste de tráfico.

Lo primero que pensé fue Obama!!, pero no podía ser, por aquel entonces estaba de gira por la India y demás países de Asia. Cuando volví al apartamento y vi las noticias comprendí. Putin había venido a firmar un acuerdo para pasar una tubería de Gazprom por Bulgaria.

La nota amable fue que el Primer Ministro Búlgaro le regaló a su homólogo ruso un cachorro con el que se mostró entusiasmado, la nota negativa fue que el Premier ruso se mostro disgustado por la persistente fabricación de armas en Bulgaria (se continua fabricando AK-47 en Kazanlak) sin respetar la patente y licencia rusa.




Este acontecimiento me lleva a proponer dos reflexiones:
1.-Dos países firman un acuerdo persiguiendo un beneficio mutuo. Cabría pensar que Bulgaria, estando dentro de la Unión Europea, también llega a ese tratado defendiendo el interés comunitario. Pero, enmarcándonos en la situación económica global en la que estamos, la pregunta que hago es ¿Hasta qué punto hacen los países la guerra por su cuenta?

A primera vista, parece que ha tenido más trascendencia esta visita que cuando vino la Canciller Merkel, lo cual lleva a pensar que los “antiguos vínculos” históricos son más fuertes que los “nuevos vínculos”.

No olvidemos que Rusia, es Rusia. Y para Bulgaria es más fácil entender que cualquier país occidental, que Rusia es un imperio latente.

2.-Si dos partes firman un contrato para hacer algo implica movimiento, y el movimiento por definición es positivo. China hace un puente en Serbia, Rusia pone un gaseoducto en Bulgaria, movimiento para infraestructuras que conllevan mayor movimiento económico.
Quiero resaltar a estos países que teniendo una estructura socialista se han reconvertido (para bien o para mal) en una gigantesca empresa. Estamos hablando de una combinación de recursos naturales, factor trabajo y capital a unas escalas enormes, que unidos a un criterio de dirección económica más que política, forman (en el caso de China, formarán en el caso de Rusia) unos monstruos económicos invencibles, pero no sabemos si con pies de barro.

Luego la segunda pregunta es: Si debemos maximizar los recursos de cada país, aprovechar al máximo la capacidad de los trabajadores, mejorar la competitividad laboral proporcionando una educación de vanguardia, aumentar la concertación social porque redundará en un mejor bienestar, ajustar los sectores productivos a la capacidad real del país, aumentar la calidad y cantidad de los productos y servicios ofertados, etc.. ¿No necesitamos empresarios en lugar de políticos? Por decirlo de alguna manera menos radical. ¿No hace falta menos política y más dirección empresarial (entendiendo esto como una dirección a una escala mucho mayor)? ¿No debiera ser la capacidad demostrada de gestión el criterio de elección de nuestros gobernantes?

No debemos olvidar que el objetivo final es el “incremento sostenido de movimiento”, el aumento de la producción y la competitividad. Cualquier situación en contra, ya sea por medidas erróneas, autocomplacencia, paternalismo, dejación o relajación de la auto-exigencia (demonios empresariales todos ellos) debiera ser prevenida y evitada.

Se deben tomar medidas rápidamente para renacer y volver crecer, porque ahora solamente parecemos un cachorro a merced de gigantes.

A PUPPY FOR THE EMPEROR

Saturday 13 November. I drive to the center by Tsarigradsko shose and the police presence is amazing. There is nearly one in every tree. And a policeman on either side of the road every 20 meters, in an avenue of 6 km from downtown Sofia to the crossing with the airport gateway, are many policemen. There are also anti-riot vehicles and the center of the city is completely cordoned off to vehicular traffic, causing a massive traffic jam.

My first thought was Obama!, But this was impossible, at that time was in India with his “Asian Tour”. When I returned to the apartment and watched the news I realized what was happenning: Putin had come to sign an agreement to pass a Gazprom pipeline through Bulgaria.

The Friendly moment was that the Bulgarian Prime Minister gave his Russian counterpart a puppy and he was enthusiastic about it. The negative note was that the Russian Premier showed annoy because the continued manufacture of weapons in Bulgaria (Still producing AK-47 in Kazanlak) without respecting the patent and Russian license.




This event leads me to arise two questions:

1.-Two countries sign an agreement to pursue mutual benefit. One might think that Bulgaria, being within the European Union, also comes to the treaty to defend the European Community interest. But, taking in consideration the global economic situation we are involved, the question I ask is: Is it really like this?

At first glance, It seems to have had more significance this visit that when it came the Chancellor Merkel, which suggests that the "old links" of history are stronger than the "new links".

Do not forget that Russia is Russia. And for any bulgarian is easier than occidental people to understand, that Russia is a latent empire.

2.-If two parts sign a contract, they move, and movement is by definition positive. China makes a bridge in Serbia, Russia put a pipeline in Bulgaria, movement in infrastructure that result in greater economic movement.

I want to highlight these countries that having a socialist structure have been converted (for better or for worse) into a giant, massive enterprise. We're talking about a combination of natural resources, labor and capital to such large scales, joined together with an economic management criteria rather than politics. They form (in the case of China, will form in the case of Russia) economic invincible monsters. We don´t know yet if they stand on feet of clay.

So the second question is: If we maximize the resources of each country, maximize the ability of workers, improve labor competitiveness by providing advanced education, increase social advantages, adjust the productive sectors to country's real capacity, increase quality and quantity of products and services offered, etc. .. Don´t we need rather than political people, general managers? To put it in a less radical way: Do we need politics or business management (understanding this in larger scale)? Should not be the demonstrated ability to manage the criterion for choosing our leaders?

We must not forget that the ultimate goal is "a sustained increase in movement”, another way to say that we have to increase production and competitiveness.

Any situation of either erroneous measures, complacency, paternalism, negligence or self-relaxation (business demons all of them) should be prevented and avoided.

We should take action to return to the growing path again, because now, we only look like a puppy at the mercy of giants.

LA RECETA DEL TÍO PAUL

El año pasado falleció a la edad de 94 años el famoso economista y Premio Nobel Paul Samuelson. Conocido defensor de la tradición Keynesiana y co-fundador de la economía neoclásica moderna, nos legó una obra de obligado estudio.


De la página 395 de su “Curso de Economía Moderna” se extrae el siguiente párrafo que, aunque escrito para lo que actualmente nos referimos como “países en vías de desarrollo”, se puede sacar de contexto, extrapolar a la situación económica actual e invitarnos a la reflexión:

“Los países quieren conocer los ingredientes de la receta para obtener el éxito en su crecimiento económico. Entre los factores clave para un rápido crecimiento económico se encuentran la preponderancia de los mercados libres, tasas altas de ahorro e inversión, bajas barreras comerciales y un gobierno honesto junto con derechos de propiedad bien definidos”

UNCLE PAUL´S RECIPE

Last year, died at the age of 94 years, the famous economist and Nobel laureate Paul Samuelson. Known guardsman of the Keynesian tradition and co-founder of the modern neoclassical economics, he gave us a legacy mandatory to study.


From page 395 of his "Foundation of Economic Analysis" is the following paragraph which, although written in reference to the not-developed countries, you can take out of context, extrapolate to the existing economic situation and invites us to meditate:

"Countries want to know the ingredients of the recipe for success in economic growth. Among the key factors for rapid economic growth are the preponderance of free markets, high rates of saving and investment, lower trade barriers and an honest government with well-defined property rights "

UNA PERLA "VINTAGE"

Uno de los atractivos de trabajar en un país en desarrollo es observar cómo se reproducen los mismos fenómenos que en otros países se produjeron hace tiempo.

A muchos de ustedes le he comentado que el año pasado en Rumanía fue el año de las puertas blindadas. Se acuerdan cuando en España hace 25 ó 30 años todo el mundo se dedicó a poner puertas blindadas.

El razonamiento lógico nos dice que al incrementarse la clase media y al aumentar su poder adquisitivo y el valor de las propiedades que posee, también desee proteger las mismas.

De esta manera, una observación cuidadosa de la estructura económica en paralelo con el conocimiento histórico de la evolución de otras naciones, nos puede hacer deducir cuál será la próxima oportunidad de mercado.

Sin embargo, resulta más curioso encontrarse casos como el de a continuación, ya en el nivel del Olimpo de los cazadores de tendencias. Esta imagen está tomada el pasado 2 de octubre y es de un cartel publicitario que promociona la venta de un pack de DVD´s de la serie que ahora triunfa en Bulgaria. ¿adivinan cuál es?



Ya ven, 25 a 30 años en el caso de Bulgaria. Todos los ciclos se reproducen con desigual intensidad y trasladados en el tiempo según en qué países. En África se vuelven locos con la compra de móviles. Las camisas aquellas de lana gruesa para el invierno que estuvieron de moda hace mucho tiempo, si les queda alguna, no la tiren. Algún gurú de la moda decidirá devolverlas a primera línea.

Pero lo más asombroso de todo es que, aunque ya sabíamos que “Chanquete” era capaz de resucitar, no sabíamos era que capaz de “clonarse” con tanto éxito en el extranjero.

"VINTAGE" PEARLS

One of the attractions of working in a developing country is to observe how they reproduce the same phenomena occurred in other countries long ago.

To many of you I have mentioned that in Romania last year was the year of the security doors. Remember when in Spain, 25 or 30 years ago, everyone put security doors.

The logical reasoning tells us that increasing the middle class and increasing purchasing power and value of the properties they own, heads to the willing of protection.

With careful observation of the economic structure in parallel with the historical knowledge of development in other nations, we can infer what the next market opportunity.

However, we find more curious cases like the one following, reserved for the best level of trend hunters. This image was taken on 2 October. It´s a poster that promotes the sale of a pack of DVDs of the TV serial that now rules in Bulgaria. Guess which one?



As you see, 25 to 30 years in also the case of Bulgaria. All cycles are repeated with varying intensity and differed in time according to what countries. In Africa they go crazy with the purchase of mobile phones. Those thick wool shirts for the winter time that were fashionable a long time, if you got any left, don´t even think to throw it. A fashion guru will decide to return them to the showcase.

But the most amazing of all is that, although we knew that "Chanquete" was able to resurrect, we didn´t know that he was able to "clone" with such success abroad.