Shared by Shantanu Bhagwat (from his blog, global-themes), December 17, 2006
Starting with an intro to an IHT article by Thomas Freedman, who discusses the problems with and concequences of China’s inability – at least so far – to innovate; Shantanu flags up the comparative scenario in India, arguing that India has an edge thanks to its ’3D Advantage’…
China, India and the “3D Advantage”
Thomas L Friedman writing in yesterday’s NYT (“Tough Choices” or “Learning to Keep Learning” Pg 7, 13th/14th Dec ’06) about the many changes that China will need to make to get into the “rank of innovation-oriented countries by 2020″ had a very interesting comment to make:
“…I still believe it is very hard to produce a culture of innovation in a country that censors Google – which for me is a proxy for curtailing people’s ability to imagine and try anything they want,”
As Friedman goes on to say, “You can command K-12 education. But you can’t command innovation. Rigor and competence, without freedom, will only take China so far…”
And this is where India may have an edge with its vibrant democracy, a culture of “questioning” and its tradition of free thinking…all of which gets turbo-charged when coupled with our enormous diversity…
In the long-running discussion of India vs. China, India’s “3D Advantage” (Democracy, Demographics and Diversity) may well prove to be decisive.
Thanks for sharing this Shantanu!
How about spend the time you wrote that article to use your “culture of free thinking” to figure about how to provide electricity to the other half of your population.