Comment: China sees itself as a �speedboat�, claimed the entrepreneur Sir Tom Hunter at the weekend, as he urged Scotland to become �bold, belligerent and ballsy�.

China sees itself as a "speedboat", claimed the entrepreneur Sir Tom Hunter at the weekend, as he urged Scotland to adopt that same marine metaphor and become "bold, belligerent and ballsy" in pursuit of a new enlightenment to rival the luminous days of Hume and Hutcheson, Smith and Ferguson.

An enlightenment that would enable us to compete with the Chinas of this world and not just settle for mediocrity, he argues. Hunter describes himself as apolitical. That means acknowledging that all political parties have some good ideas.

But when you are as frustrated as he clearly is with the "supertanker" thinking that currently dominates our politics, being apolitical also involves striking out in bold new directions - ignoring the conventions of incremental mainstream politics, parking any concerns about accountability for taxpayers' money, and placing some "huge big bets" in the belief that, if they come off, they will transform Scotland's economic prospects.

Among the proposed "bets", a minimum of £500m-a-year should be invested in each of four sectors - biotechnology, renewable energy, tourism and financial services. Some 20% of the education budget should be handed over to a small group of people - Hunter already has all their names, apparently - to deliver for that group of young people who are not in education, employment or training.

The Careers Scotland budget should be doubled, a surprise since that body is currently being demerged from Scottish Enterprise, with a remit to focus its energies on the so-called NEET group of school leavers too.

In addition, Hunter argues that another £100m a year from the Scottish Enterprise budget should be handed over to The Prince's Scottish Youth Business Trust, to help more young entrepreneurs realise their dreams.

Hunter, who has backed its work with his own money, calls the trust "arguably the most efficient business builder in the world".

I too have huge regard for what Mark Strudwick and his team at PSYBT currently achieve. But as every business knows, over-rapid expansion of a great idea can sometimes spell disaster. In the past year PSYBT helped 631 young people to start up 570 businesses. The trust invested an average of £3323 in these businesses. That adds up to £1.89m. If it was suddenly asked to scale up its investment operations fifty-fold - because that's what this Hunter proposal implies - could it cope?

I ask, not because I'm gripped by the "we cannae dae that" negativity that can characterise so much of our national discourse, but because, as Hunter himself says, we need an "informed" debate about the nature of the challenges we face and the most credible ideas for upping our game.

So, in that same spirit, I wonder whether Hunter's analogy with China as "speedboat" is really credible?

Will Hutton, whose 1995 polemic on Britain in crisis, The State We're In, enjoyed commercial success, has just published his major new study of the great Asian tiger.

"Speedboat" is probably the last word Hutton would use to characterise one of the fastest-growing economies on the planet. He argues that China is neither the socialist market economy its ruling communist party projects nor the waking behemoth zooming to embrace capitalism our western consensus prefers.

"Rather it is frozen in a structure that I would describe as Leninist corporatism - and which is unstable, inefficient, dependent on the expropriation of peasant savings on a grand scale, colossally unequal and ultimately unsustainable," he argues.

"It is Leninist in that the party still follows Lenin's dictum of being the vanguard, monopoly political driver and controller of the economy and society. And it is corporatist because the framework for all economic activity in China is one of central management and co-ordination from which no economic actor, however humble, can opt out."

He also accuses the Chinese Communist Party of being one of the most corrupt organisations the world has ever seen. In 2003, 794 judges were among those tried for corrupt practices. "To characterise China as an unstoppable force whose economic model is unbeatable and set to swamp us - the stuff of almost every ministerial and business lobby speech - is to make a first-order mistake," Hutton writes.

"Rather, the west needs to understand the depth of China's problems and the possibility, if not probability, of an economic and political convulsion as China seeks their resolution."

It is possible that Hutton is overdoing his contrarian analysis of China's prospects. But the downsides of China's economic progress - social repression and environmental degredation - are well documented elsewhere. For all its frustrations, living in a democracy is to be cherished.

As a very successful entrepreneur, Hunter does not invest his own money in ventures without carefully assessing the risks involved. Indeed, in many of his investments, he has spread that risk by co-investing with other, bigger players. I can see how his talk of Scotland's government taking "huge big bets" on selected sectors is designed to shake up the national mind-set.

But since it's our money he's talking about, he should be saying more about who is accountable if the chosen horses come in near the back of the field.