There is a theme park in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen in which many of the world's most famous landmarks are recreated on a smaller scale. Visitors can stroll from the Eiffel Tower to the Pyramids, the Coliseum to the Taj Mahal, Stonehenge to Mount Fuji, Angkor Wat to the Kremlin and scores of other attractions all without leaving an area of 48 hectares. It may not be the real thing, but if offers a vision of the world in a controlled environment.
In that aspect, the park prefigures elements of China's evolving financial reforms. As it progresses, a plan unveiled earlier this year to turn Shanghai into a global financial centre by 2020 appears more concerned with bringing a controlled version of the world to Shanghai than with allowing Chinese money to engage with the real thing beyond its borders.
This may change, of course, but for now China appears to be seized more with reform than liberalisation. Indeed, its vigorous programmes to internationalise the renminbi, boost the size of its domestic futures markets and expand the Shanghai Stock Exchange are animated more by a desire to project power than to integrate China with the global financial system. Control is still the watchword.