Producing wealth in the modern world requires extensive and large scale teamwork. It requires teamwork on the job, it requires teamwork in private social organizations and it requires teamwork in government. Individuals must have the ability to quickly and easily work within teams both large and small. A society of pure Chinese cannot provide such high levels of organization without the high overhead cost of a political autocracy.

That is why Chinese struggle in a country dominated by cultural Chinese but prosper so much when they come to America. Non-Chinese American’s propensity for teamwork provides the organization that the Chinese need and they provide it at a low economic and political cost. America is a paradoxical nation in which voluntary, bottom-up collective cooperation creates an environment in which atomized individuals can thrive (as long as there aren’t to many to many of them in the overall population.)

Chua should be applauded for breaking the contemporary taboo against admitting that cultures differ and that those differences mean that some cultures produce individuals better at some task than other cultures. She should also be applauded for taking a stick to the ridiculous runaway self-esteem movement. However, she errs when she says that Chinese mothers are “superior.”

She forgets that tradeoffs dominate everything in life. When a culture specializes for proficiency in one area of endeavor, it must sacrifice proficiency in another area. Cultures noted for their food, music and sociability often fall short in economic endeavors. Cultures noted for economic endeavors usually don’t have very interesting cuisines, food or music. Southern Italy is a great place to vacation but its hell trying to get anything built or maintained. Germans get things done by few go to Germany for the food. (There aren’t a lot of German cookbooks on bookshelves outside of Germany but almost everyone has an Italian cookbook.) Examples abound in comparisons of any two cultures. All cultures represent some type of tradeoff and therefore all cultures relatively excel in some areas but fall relatively short in others.