The unasked question about China

The great question - which nobody asks ­ is - what would happen if the Chinese government did grant its citizens all the freedoms which the West enjoy. We take it for granted that the Chinese quality of life would be higher if this happened.

Unfortunately, as Hobbes in the 17th century made so memorably clear, this is not necessarily the case. His famous description of human life as "nasty, brutish and short" did not refer to life deprived of freedom ­ ie tyranny, ­ but rather to life deprived of order ­ ie anarchy. In short, the presence of anarchy can be worse than the absence of liberty.

This is not to say that more liberty in China would necessarily lead to anarchy. But in a country of China's vast size, containing 36 ethnic minorities, it is more than likely that it would; in which case the great mass of the population would

soon be looking back to the present un-free conditions as a golden age; rather as today some of the former subjects of the Soviet Empire may be doing very much the same.

Cynics may think that a break-up of China is precisely what the West wants. My own view is that its demands for more freedom in China are genuinely idealistic, springing from a starry-eyed belief in freedom as a panacea for all the world's ills. Nevertheless, it has to be admitted that this generous view wasn't helped by hearing the deeply disagreeable Dick Cheney as this week's voice of freedom.

Of course China's rulers are a nasty bunch and there is little to be said for Putin. But in each case one ought to ponder on who would fill the vacuum left by their removal. Almost certainly they would be worse; or nothing effective, which would be the worst of all.