Working for the Clampdown

Josh Kurlantzick reports that the People’s Republic of China is using the olympic games as a pretext for a broad crack-down on various “enemies.” It’s always striking — and humbling — to look at the often-sorry fate of Chinese dissidents and minority groups and recall that for all the hubris of the U.S. domestic conversation about “democracy promotion” everyone knows that there’s really almost nothing useful we can do about human rights in China even as it’s clear that the internal Chinese situation is probably the single most important variable in looking at the future of democracy.