few diplomats and businesspeople go to the middle kingdom anymore. tourists have basically been banned. this is a major reversal of decades in which china reached out to the world and tried to integrate itself into global institutions. when they began china's reforms the phrase that was used to often that it became a mantra was reform and opening. that opening feels like a distant memory now. today it's crack down and close up. in some ways covid highlights a central flaw in the chinese model. beijing can operate with ruthless efficiency which often makes western democratic policy making seem chaotic and second rate, but when a dictator's chosen policy needs to be changed, it's very hard for a dictatorship to correct course. the best example of this rigidity is china's one child policy which gained momentum in