Amy Chua

I'm willing to be different than other parents and go against the mainstream.

I see my upbringing as a great success story. By disciplining me, my parents inculcated self-discipline. And by restricting my choices as a child, they gave me so many choices in my life as an adult. Because of what they did then, I get to do the work I love now.

Everything I do as a mother builds on a foundation of love and compassion.

In Chinese culture, it wouldn't occur to kids to question or talk back to their parents. In American culture, kids in books, TV shows and movies constantly score points with their snappy back talk. Typically, it's the parents who need to be taught a life lesson - by their children.

Oddly enough, I'm not a particularly judgmental person. I just don't have a lot of filtering when I'm in 'tiger mother' mode. I say what comes into my head.

China is doing lots of things right. It's investing in education and R&D, it's opening up, it's more cosmopolitan than it's ever been. I think it's very likely that China will continue to explode economically and certainly become a superpower.

China cannot pull in the best and brightest from all over the world. It's an ethnically defined nation, the opposite of an immigrant nation. You don't see a lot of American engineers trying to be Chinese citizens.

I was raised, myself, by extremely strict but also extremely loving Chinese immigrant parents. To this day, I believe that their having high expectations for me, coupled with love, was the greatest gift that anyone's ever given me. And so that's why, even though my husband is not Chinese, I try to raise my own two daughters the same way.

You can't invent Google, Facebook or the iPod unless you've mastered the basics, are willing to put in long hours and can pick yourself up from the floor when life knocks you down the first 10 times.

There's a lot of rudeness and sullen behavior and kids that are very entitled and spoiled, just buy me more stuff. I didn't want to raise kids like that.

I once won a second prize in a history concert. My parents came to the ceremony. Somebody else had won the prize for best all-around student. Afterwards my father said to me, 'Never, ever disgrace me like that again.' When I tell my Western friends, they are aghast. But I adore my father. It didn't knock my self-esteem at all.

I think the biggest difference is that I've noticed Western parents seem much more concerned about their children's psyches, their self-esteem, whereas tough immigrant parents assume strength rather than fragility in their children and therefore behave completely differently.

Once you get to the Enlightenment, the way that powers get to be hyperpowers isn't just by conquest. It's through commerce and innovation. Societies like the Dutch Republic and the United States used tolerance to become a magnet for enterprising immigrants.

The Romans thought of themselves as the chosen people, yet they built the greatest army on Earth by recruiting warriors from any background.

I'm suggesting that, ironically, the secret to becoming a world 'hyperpower' is tolerance. If you look at history, you see great powers being very tolerant in their rise to global dominance.

You know, I think it's so ironic that we're calling hard work, striving for excellence, don't blame others, you know, don't give up, that we're calling these, quote, 'Chinese values,' 'cause I always thought of them as American values.

We all want to do the right thing for our children. We all don't know what that is and we all - you know, you won't know until the future.

Questioning authority is, I think, a great thing to instill in children. I just didn't have enough of that when I was little.

Both of my girls have very high self-esteem because they were both able to master certain things; I should think that's good for their confidence.

Instilling a sense of self-discipline and focus when the kids are younger makes it so much easier by the time they get into high school.