Predictions for 2012: China Steps Up
Chinese Astronaut Todd Baxter The U.S. spent some $400 billion on research and development last year, well over twice the amount invested by China, its next closest rival. But as the U.S. rolls back research budgets in 2012, China will take another approach: When its current leaders step down next fall, their replacements will oversee a major increase in science spending. It will be the latest in a long series of efforts to modernize. Premier Deng Xiaoping opened China to foreign trade in the 1980s, bringing market forces to bear on rural production. In the 1990s, president Jiang Zemin oversaw a low-wage production boom in China's coastal factory towns. And current president Hu Jintao has focused on spreading growth to inland cities. Now the incoming generation of leadership, likely to be headed up by vice president Xi Jinping, is confronted by a paradox. China's rapid growth is imperiling its status as a...