Acton Institute Powerblog Archives

Post Tagged 'china'

August 21, 2006

China: The Economics of Religious Freedom

Here’s a summary of a piece over at Forum 18: Economics has a large effect on China’s religious freedom, Forum 18 News Service notes. Factors such as the need of religious communities for non-state income, significant regional wealth disparities, conflicts over economic interests, and artificially-induced dependence on the state income all provide the state with alternative ways of exercising control over religious communities. Continue Reading...
August 02, 2006

Religious Freedom in China

Do economic, political, and religious freedom go together? Rodney Stark, writing in his recent book The Victory of Reason, says that “It seems doubtful than an effective modern economy can be created without adopting capitalism, as was demonstrated by the failure of the command economies of the Soviet Union and China.” Continue Reading...
June 01, 2006

China-Vatican dispute addendum

In an earlier post on illicit Catholic ordinations in China, I noted that there appeared to be a rift developing between the Patriotic Association and the rest of the government. Chinese Cardinal Joseph Zen confirmed that impression in remarks he made yesterday in Rome, as reported by AsiaNews: The Patriotic Association wanted “it to be a slap in the face, but actually, they were defeated by the clear statement of the Holy See, to which the government responded very mildly”, continued Cardinal Zen. Continue Reading...
May 12, 2006

China-Vatican dispute

It’s been in the news for a few days already, but the charges and countercharges continue to fly. Anyone familiar with Catholicism in China knows that the Vatican and the Chinese Communist government have been more or less at loggerheads ever since Mao Zedong drove Catholicism underground. Continue Reading...
January 27, 2006

Agog and Aghast at Google

A number of bloggers have expressed grave concerns over Google’s decision to accomodate the demands of the communist government in its web search offerings in China. David Mills at Mere Comments writes that Google is “serving a brutal government and helping it oppress its people, even if its service will prove only partially effective.” Continue Reading...