This article does not aim to compare China and the Philippines because there is no need to emphasize the obvious. The latest Olympics just displayed what China has become and what it can do in the near future.

Three scores ago, China was just a large geographical unit in Asia. It posed no significant threat nor did it reflect much significance to the world order. It was indeed a dormant giant with all the mystics of the Orient trapped in it. In fact, a century earlier, China was a puppet state for Western colonization, just like the rest of Asia then. But somehow, China realized its “enslaved threshold” more than any other nation. It realized that it cannot kowtow anymore to any other nation. China came into a self-realization to be a great nation and the Chinese government was determined to reach that goal. Generations passed and that ideal remained strong and their leaders followed the framework set by their predecessors with consistency and loyalty. After years and years of being a Western slave, the Chinese could no longer take it and was a nation tired of bowing.

The remarkable thing about Chinese history is China’s capacity to stand up while being stepped upon by other nations. After being ravaged by the Opium War, China stood up to rebuild itself without any foreign aid. After being mocked for its Maoist ideals, which largely failed during China’s Cultural Revolution, China still bounced back under the same socialist framework. China’s deviance to the Western liberalism even made the Chinese State an international outcast which was not recognized as a state until 1971. But nevertheless, China remained true to its Socialist ideals as opposed to the more popular Western Liberalism. Who’d have thought before that the Socialist framework will never work in an industrializing world whose world order is dominated by Western Liberalism? The consistency in Chinese nationalism helped China to become what it is now — a powerful nation which finally gained respect.

The key factor that contributed largely to China’s growth is not its iron clad rule over the Chinese people. It’s the Chinese government’s consistency in its national policy. From the day China dreamt of being a strong nation, it followed the single framework of socialism, which placed the State above the people, no matter how much it was criticized until now. This is not to condone Chinese Communism or human rights violation. This is to emphasize consistency in governance – consistency that is passed on from generation to generation.

It really does not matter what framework or what idealism a country should follow. Powerful Western States took on Liberalism with consistency and they progressed. The Scandinavian states took on the Welfare State Theory and produced strong nations out of it. And China of course, took its own brand of Socialism and succeeds on it. The key is consistency because it is what drives a nation to be great. Unlike in our case where we pretend to be consistent.

We are not, our leaders are not. A new generation of leaders deviate from their predecessors and so on and so forth each tying to impart his five cents worth creating a filibustered government — each wanting to start something and the predecessor not wanting to end it. We claim to be advocates of democracy yet people get paid to vote. We claim to be liberals yet are opposed to changes that are vital to a country’s success. Regimes blame their predecessor for the country’s wobbling status and not do something about it as if stating that damaged has been done and can no longer be undone.