U.S. History

U.S. firms chased shareholder value, boosting profits and elite innovation while shedding factories—leaving supply chains efficient, fragile, and hollowed out.

GE Compared: Why Some Conglomerates Broke and Others Adapted

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General Electric’s trajectory can be best understood in comparative perspective, alongside other major conglomerates that confronted the same late-twentieth- and early-twenty-first-century economic environment marked by financialization, technological disruption, regulatory change, and intensified global competition. While some conglomerates collapsed under excessive leverage, opaque financial arms, or strategic overreach, others fragmented deliberately, dismantling diversified structures that had … Read more

Why GE Failed When the Economic and Political Tides Turned

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As Lights Out: Pride, Delusion, and the Fall of General Electric makes clear, GE’s decline cannot be understood in isolation from the economic environment and political landscape in which it operated. These external forces did not cause the company’s internal failures; rather, they amplified and exposed them, and once conditions shifted, they ensured that those … Read more

Why GE Fell and What It Reveals About the U.S.–China Tech War

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In Lights Out: Pride, Delusion, and the Fall of General Electric, GE’s decline, set against Huawei’s rise, highlights a fundamental divergence in how large organizations confront pride, complexity, and long-term strategy. As Gryta and Mann show, GE became captive to its own legacy and to Wall Street expectations, relying on financial engineering and optimistic narratives … Read more

U.S. Skilled Labor Crisis: Learning from China’s Gaokao Logic

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The United States cannot replicate China’s Gaokao-centered talent model in its institutional form, but it can reproduce several of its functional effects within a liberal-democratic, market-based system. The binding constraint is not technical capacity but political structure: what China achieves through centralized authority and direct administrative control, the U.S. must pursue through federated incentives, funding … Read more

How Huawei Beat Sanctions by Adopting US Military Thinking

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Within Huawei’s organizational philosophy, advanced equipment and high-quality resources positioned in the rear are designed to provide rapid, effective support once front-line targets and opportunities are identified, rather than allowing those who control resources to dominate decision-making or hoard forces for their own interests. This approach is encapsulated in Ren Zhengfei’s principle of “letting those … Read more

The Learning Gap: Huawei Absorbs U.S. Strengths America Can’t

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Ren Zhengfei has long regarded the military—both Chinese and Western—as a critical source of organizational and managerial insight, and this influence has deeply shaped Huawei’s development. While Western media often fixates on Ren’s past service in the People’s Liberation Army, Huawei is criticized less for being “military” in nature than for learning exceptionally well from … Read more

The Irony of Huawei Learning from U.S. Military Doctrine

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Huawei and its founder, Ren Zhengfei, have faced criticism over alleged ties to China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA), despite the absence of public evidence that the company is controlled by the military. This scrutiny stems less from proven wrongdoing and more from Ren’s past PLA service, China’s legal system, the strategic importance of telecom infrastructure, … Read more

The Misread China Model: False Assumptions Debunked

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In their August 19, 2025 Foreign Affairs article, “The Real China Model: Beijing’s Enduring Formula for Wealth and Power,” Dan Wang and Arthur Kroeber challenge a set of simplified and reassuring beliefs that long shaped Western interpretations of China’s rise. What they call “The Real China Model” is not a new doctrine but a corrective: … Read more

Huawei’s AI Strategy: Turning China’s Strengths into Power

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In her December 2025 New Year address, Huawei Rotating Chairwoman Meng Wanzhou (Sabrina Meng) framed the company’s recent trajectory as a deliberate strategic reorientation. Reviewing Huawei’s resilient performance in 2025 across 5G-Advanced, HarmonyOS, intelligent driving, AI computing, and digital energy, she outlined seven priority arenas for 2026 that mark a shift from broad-based technological expansion … Read more

How Chinese Americans Stay Financially Resilient in the U.S.

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ALICE—Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed—refers to households that are working yet lack sufficient savings and financial buffers, leaving them highly vulnerable to shocks such as illness, job loss, or family disruption. The concept centers not on income alone, but on exposure to financial risk and the capacity to absorb unexpected setbacks. Understanding ALICE therefore requires … Read more