Robert Lawrence Kuhn
Robert Lawrence Kuhn
Robert Lawrence Kuhn (born 1944, New York) is an international investment banker, corporate strategist, and public intellectual. With a doctorate in brain research and the author or editor of over twenty-five books, he is a commentator on business, finance, and China; long-time adviser to the Chinese government; adviser to multinational corporations on China strategies and transactions; and adviser to Chinese companies on capital markets. For over 20 years, he has worked with China’s senior leaders, advising on economic policy, science and technology, media and culture, Sino-U.S. relations, and international communications. Kuhn is the creator, writer and host of the public television series Closer To Truth, which presents leading scientists and philosophers discussing fundamental issues, particularly cosmos, consciousness and God.
WSJ - A New Theory for China’s Next Generation of Leaders: The Three Blurs?
From a man who helped explain China’s policy of “three represents” now comes a theory called the “three blurs.”
Robert Lawrence Kuhn, an American businessman who has written as a confidant of Chinese officials like former President Jiang Zemin, says the generation of Communist Party leaders who are expected take power in next year’s once-per-decade personnel shuffle will struggle with overlapping interests and constituencies. He dubs their challenge the “three blurs.”
Jiang Zemin’s life and leadership sweep through almost eighty tumultuous years of Chinese history: Japanese occupation, Civil War, Great Leap Forward, Cultural Revolution, Tiananmen Square, and, more recently, dramatic economic growth, tensions with Taiwan, and opportunities and confrontations with America. Jiang’s story is an epic of war, deprivation, revolution, political turmoil, social convulsion, economic reform, national transformation, and international resurgence. To Robert Lawrence Kuhn, a longtime China observer, understanding the legacy of Jiang Zemin is essential for understanding the challenges of contemporary China. By examining Jiang’s life, we observe the clash between China’s traditional culture and chaotic history, and we appreciate how its changes impact the entire world.
In The Man Who Changed China, Kuhn, who was cited by the Asian Wall Street Journal for the “unprecedented access” he was given in the course of writing this book, has produced what the Journal called “probably the closest thing to an authorized biography that’s possible in Communist China.” Here a reader will find a complex and nuanced portrait of China’s senior leader, whose policies continue to exert great influence over the course of his country. Kuhn offers insight into how the Japanese occupation during Jiang’s teenage years imprinted his psyche for life, how he became a Communist, and how, decades later, he struggled to transform the Party in the face of withering criticism.
China impacts everyone—an economic superpower competing in every arena of human endeavor. Here are those who run China, its current and future leaders. Here’s how China’s leaders think about China’s growing global strength—in trade, business and finance; in diplomacy, defense and security; in science, technology and innovation; in culture, media and sports—and what this all means for the future of the world. Here also are China’s leaders in economics, private business, state-owned enterprises, banking, foreign affairs, military, healthcare, religion, film, television, press, Internet, literature, ideology, and more.
Robert Lawrence Kuhn speaks with over 100 Chinese leaders and has inner access to Communist Party officials and material. He focuses on President Hu Jintao's philosophies and policies, and looks to the next generation of China’s leaders. Who are China’s future leaders? What are they doing today? What’s their way of thinking about China’s place in the world? What about prospects for democracy and political reform? Is there a road map for political reform?
Email Article 
