China Impressions 2025 – Part I: Street Life, Science, and the Rule of Law

A Personal Return

On December 6, 2019, I left China. Nearly six years passed before I set foot on Chinese soil again, and the fascination I had once felt returned instantly. This travelogue begins with two statements:

1. If I were a Chinese citizen living in China, I would be a member of the Communist Party.
2. The policy of Western nations—and I care particularly about Europe—toward China is fundamentally wrong. Instead of containment and suspicion, what we need is cooperation.

Western antagonism—bans on advanced chip exports, restrictions on Huawei, and other punitive measures—has backfired. The Chinese are quicker at overcoming these obstacles, mostly set by the USA, than the West is at inventing them. And the world will go with China.

China is ready for collaboration, but the West keeps shooting itself in the foot. In sectors like EVs and infrastructure, China’s agility puts Europe to shame.

Wuhan: A Mirror of Change

Wuhan, my host city, embodies China’s transformation. One of the first things I noticed: in 2019, Chinese cars and EVs were rare. Today, they dominate the streets. Half the fleet appears to be electric and domestically produced. China doesn’t debate endlessly—it decides and acts.

I lived this time in the old concession area—the part of the city once expropriated by the imperial powers. The names remain: Russian concession, German concession, and so on. The government has placed the entire area under cultural protection. This means no new high-rise buildings, only a slow process of restoring the old structures. My guess is that two-thirds still need renewal.

The following gallery shows impressions from that area.

The flat that we rented:

The beauty of Wuhan lies in the marriage of the city with the Chang Jiang (Yangtze River) and the many lakes within its limits. Wuhan is built as a “sponge city,” constructed to absorb large amounts of water without sustaining damage. Strolling through the wild vegetation along the river is one of Nixy’s favorite activities.

Some pictures of the modern skyline with the spounge nature.

Eating, Drinking, and Living Spaces

Wuhan’s food culture reflects a broader socio-economic paradox:

• Traditional street food remains cheap and beloved. I enjoyed a bowl of noodles for 5 RMB (around €0.70).
• But the “next level”—stylish cafés and restaurants—feels oddly inaccessible. Beautiful, but empty, and charging New York prices, unaffordable for the average Chinese citizen.

Food

What’s missing is a comfortable, middle-ground venue: affordable, inviting, and social. The concession-era architecture of Wuhan holds enormous potential for developing this “third space.”

The Westernization Dilemma

The influence of Starbucks and Luckin Coffee is not just aesthetic—it’s cultural erosion. Massive cups of overpriced, bad coffee packed in plastic dominate the landscape. China should reclaim its own tradition of tea houses, and perhaps evolve them into hybrid spaces for wine and coffee—places of quiet reflection and shared conversation.

Law and Governance: The Rechtsstaat Question

Is China a Rechtsstaat (rule-of-law state)? I asked both ChatGPT and DeepSeek. ChatGPT said no, citing well-known Western arguments. DeepSeek dodged the question, noting that China’s system is simply different. That, in itself, is a valuable perspective.

We had our own experience. Two months after returning home, Nixy was arrested by a police commando from another province. Through no fault of her own, she had become entangled in a fraud case, where scammers had used the identity of her company for illegal activities.

I won’t go into details, as Nixy will write about this herself. But I will say: it was not an arbitrary action by the state. The procedures followed Chinese law. Chinese law allows police to hold a suspect for up to 37 days in custody. Most Western countries allow no more than 72 hours. Thirty-six days is harsh—and it perfectly illustrates that, in China, the protection of the community is considered more important than the protection of the individual.

The murder rate in China is 10% of the murder rate in the US.

Science Needs Freedom

I believe science is intrinsically linked to freedom of thought, tolerance, and rationality. The ideological dictatorships of the 20th century partly failed because they could not embrace science. Germany’s fall in WWII stemmed in part from rejecting quantum physics and relativity as “Jewish.” Stalin’s disdain for Darwinism led to agricultural catastrophe.

Science thrives only where it is free.

The CCP’s embrace of science—despite ideological constraints—is a paradox, but also a promise. It may be the very factor that opens the door to broader freedoms in China. China’s massive investment in science is a sharp contrast to the West: the U.S. is undermining its leadership because of ideology, while Europe never strove for leadership—due to laziness and inertia.

The Internet censorship in China is one of the oddest reminders of old-style communism. If Chinese citizens had easy access to all Western web resources, they would only accelerate their progress.

Final Thoughts for Part I

Western models of governance are not universal truths. Our obsession with individual liberty and elections often results in corruption, inefficiency, and poor leadership. Monsters like Hitler, dictators like Mussolini, and many other unpleasant or incompetent governments have come to power through general elections.

China’s path is different—and that difference is worth understanding, not dismissing.

---

In Part II, I explore deeper reflections on capitalism, meritocracy, and why—if I were Chinese—I would join the Communist Party.