Ten years ago, foreigners were nearly as rare as pandas throughout much of China. Canadian Mark Roswell's ability to speak Chinese fluently rocketed him to national superstardom under the name Da Shan, because people were surprised a foreigner could do it. Most foreigners who lived in a Chinese city knew each other, and there were tight restrictions on where they could live and work.

A decade later, cities like Beijing are almost unrecognizable, literally. In the capital, entire districts of new skyscrapers dominate the skyline, while the once ubiquitous hutong neighborhoods are so endangered they have legal protection. Foreigners are flocking to the city, in many cases not to study the language or culture but for economic opportunity. Better Western food is available in the capital than in many of their small towns back home. Taxi drivers expect that any foreigner they pick up will be able to speak some Chinese.

With the fast changes and economic development in China, the situation in major cities could go in several directions.

Euro collapse

In in one case, if China's economic power keeps growing, but the West can't shake its economic blues, or perhaps stumbles because of a euro collapse or similar crisis, foreigners in top cities may come to be regarded with the same racism that Latin American economic immigrants face in cities like Los Angeles.

Many will work in low-skill, low-wage areas. Some will run popular US food restaurants that will pop up in every neighborhood and small town. Others will be nannies, housekeepers, jobs that require manual labor and English teachers. They will in many cases be unable to find better jobs because of their inability to speak good Chinese. Only adventurous Chinese will dare venture into the neighborhoods where foreigners cluster, seeking a walk on the wild side or a taste of exotic culture.

Global melting pot

Another possibility for the China of 2023 is that some top-tier cities will become multicultural hubs like London, Toronto or New York.

Riding on the subway, you would see a rainbow of skin colors, with people from all different backgrounds speaking in different languages.

People from all parts of the world would be drawn to work in technology, creative industries, and business, or to study China's rich culture. Foreigners would hold key jobs in many industries, with China's growing wealth drawing top talent from around the world. Whether on a public bus or in an office, a quick glance at the surrounding people would not make it obvious whether you were in Vancouver, San Francisco or Shanghai.

Top cities would be checkered with a diverse range of neighborhoods like Little Portugal or Americatown, but they would be well integrated into the whole.

Next generation

China in 2023 will probably fall somewhere between those examples.

It will look a lot like the China of today, except the foreigners will be better integrated, and mostly speak good Chinese.

The first generation of people with one or two foreign parents to grew up in the People's Republic of China is coming of age and entering the work force.

In 10 years, their influence will be increasingly felt. Because of their bicultural fluency, they will be able to better integrate into Chinese organizations, and figure out ways to introduce the best of foreign ideas in a way that is useful and acceptable in the Chinese context.

These people's wide vantage point will make them extremely valuable in terms of productivity and vision.

Between Westerners who grow up in China and returning Chinese who spent a long time in the West, the demand for imported foreign talent will start to fade.

Counterculture

Many of the Westerners who move to China will have good language skills, having started to study the language in university or even high school. Only tourists and the old generation of foreigners won't know the language.

Many foreigners will come with the intention of building a life here and immigrating. Certain fashionable neighborhoods like Gulou will be dominated by foreigners.

They will be part of  a flourishing counterculture that will influence China, like Harlem in its heyday or Paris's Left Bank.

From this scene, China will see its first successful second-generation  novelists, pop stars and social critics writing in Chinese, like Amy Tan, Frank Sinatra and Noam Chomsky were in the US.

Foreigners with green cards will integrate into the society, having a voice in the education system, getting positions in the government, and universities and at Chinese corporations.

Foreigners will move into 2nd, 3rd, and 4th tier cities. They will be regarded as exotic at first, but Chinese people will eventually grow to expect that every little town will have  foreign food restaurants, English schools, and Irish pubs.

Fruits of wealth

Like Tokyo from 1975 to 1985, air pollution will clear up as the country adjusts to its new wealth. Also, like Japan in the late 1980s, aspects of Chinese culture will spread throughout the world. This will spark a vogue for Chinese culture in the USA, Europe and Japan, similar to the ones that happened periodically in the past, like at the turn of the nineteenth century.

One aspect of this will be that more Hollywood movies will have sections shot in China and feature Chinese actors, in part to cash in on the largest movie-going audience in the world.

There will be a renewal in interest in Chinese classics, but Chinese will be surprised to find that Westerners will assemble a different canon of literature than they are accustomed to.

Tension between the US and China will dissipate, as China comes to regard America benevolently, and even try to learn from it,  like the ascendant Romans did from the Greeks, or the United States did from the British.