fischer172_XinhuaWang Ye via Getty Images_xi jinping

The End of Western Opportunism

Aug 24, 2020 Joschka Fischer

For the past 50 years, the West has clung to the hope that modernization would automatically transform China into a capitalist liberal democracy. For decades, maintaining this illusion was good for the bottom line, but now the implications of China's ascendancy have become disturbingly clear.

BERLIN – The confrontation between China and the West is escalating almost daily. The conflict is about technology, trade, global market share, and supply chains, but also about fundamental values. Underpinning this economic and ideological competition is the goal of global predominance in the twenty-first century.

But why is the current escalation happening now? It is not as though the West suddenly had some epiphany about the implications of China’s rise. The fact that China is a Leninist one-party dictatorship is not news, and it did not stop Western countries – led by the United States – from steadily deepening their trade and economic ties with China since the 1970s.

Likewise, China’s leaders have long dismissed outside criticism of their human-rights record and oppression of minorities. Rampant industrial espionage and theft of Western technology and intellectual property are other well-known problems that the West has more or less tolerated for decades in exchange for access to China’s vast market and low-cost labor. Western governments and investors remained sanguine even after the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre in Beijing. No sooner had the dust settled than Western businesses poured into the country like never before.

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The West’s Final Countdown?
Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images

The West’s Final Countdown?

Joschka Fischer worries that Europeans are too complacent about the possibility that US President Donald Trump will be re-elected.

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0 Comments on this paragraph, 37 in all 37 Comments on this article

Claudio de rossi Aug 30, 2020

One thing that is never mentioned about China incredible economic and technological growth is its environmental cost. Asian economic development model, Chinese in particular, poses a serious threat to life on this planet. None of the western countries ever had such an impact. They managed to block the sunlight , and it was only reported as a folklore story. The infamous Pacific trash vortex, the plastic island large 3 times Texas is not in front of China just for a coincidence.
Today China possess cultural and financial means to understand in full the consequences of their actions, and they decided to do nothing. Only hope is embargo to China goods, but as Mr Fischer, head of the German green party, knows very well, it will never happen as German car industry sell 30% of their cars in China.
The planet is dieing, China is giving the biggest contribution to kill it, and we have to hear stories about how strong their economy is. That development model is just public enemy n. 1.
- A. van Vugt Sep 7, 2020
  
  Some have absolutely no clue about the supply chains between China and the rest of the world and how this all started since the end of the 1970s...
  Some live in a country with ancestors who traveled to the Middle Kingdom centuries ago and brought back gunpowder, the early compass etc. It’s said that even the famous pasta culture in this particular country originated in Asia.
  Hyper globalization had it’s time but trade and outsourcing will always exist no matter how populists and fascists in the developed word dream about decoupling or embargos.
  Inhabitants of a continent that dumps all kind of garbage in development countries are not in the position to assess another polluting country based on a xenophobic agenda.
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Peter McLoughlin Aug 26, 2020

It is clear the US and China are moving towards war. But no war has been fought over “fundamental values”: they are all fought over interests. “The end is in sight for the West, [the] monopoly of global power gone”; except it is power that nations go to war over: to gain it or retain it. That is why a Sino-West world war looks inevitable. That is the pattern of history.
https://www.ghostsofhistory.wordpress.com/
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Margaret Bowker Aug 26, 2020

A stimulating and productive essay by Joschka Fischer. One of the candidates for the WTO DG position talked about an all-round, holistic approach to world trade. Living with different political systems requires a degree of mutual acceptance. Perhaps the West might consider accepting that China's one-party political system and state capitalism are set and secure, and concentrate on areas of global agreement that can be reached. Similarly, perhaps China might acknowledge and be sensitive to the fact the West has an equally unalterable democratic, multi-party system. However, when the two political systems get anxious, there is the potential for provocation to occur. Hopefully, there is room for compromise in order to enable effective global trade and the ability to function well alongside each other in various areas going forward, especially during the recovery period needed by a post-pandemic world.
- Susan Robinson Aug 30, 2020
  
  Indeed.
  
  China respects other countries' systems of governments, China certainly does not want to change or interfere internal affairs of other countries.
  
  Likewise, China does not allow other countries to change or interfere China's internal affairs.
  
  This is a multilateral world governed by UN Charter, so all countries (and their systems of governments) should co-exist mutually whilst not imposing one's own values/systems on others and not interfering internal affairs of other countries.
  
  China wants to have good relationship with all other countries to create peace and stability to allow all countries (especially poor countries) to develop, to eradicate poverty and hunger, create wealth (growing the pie bigger) and to bring shared prosperity to the people.
  
  There are gains from trade with increase of consumer surplus and producer surplus (the pie grows bigger and bigger) that make the trade-participating countries better off, China wants to work cooperatively with US and other countries to achieve win-win outcomes.
  
  But all countries must work cooperatively, unilateralism and bullying will not work.
  
  So, indeed, there are many global problems (climate change, etc.) that need all countries accepting and respecting each other's system of government, and focus on cooperation and areas of global agreement that can be reached.
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David Donald Aug 26, 2020

Fischer asks: "But why is the current escalation happening now?" His answer is generally, but not specifically, correct. There is no reason to wait for a wave of revisionists to get facts straight. Following the global financial crisis, the US started putting pressure on China through its "pivot to Asia" while China tried to build its own network of relations though the AIIB and the Belt and Road initiative. The US used long-practiced techniques in Hong Kong to work for regime change. China reacted, forced to damage its own cash cow conduit to the West.

The "difference in values" is far less important than the attempt to retain power. That is why things blew up around 5G and Huawei. Both legal and economic analyses show that the US becoming less a liberal democracy and more an oligarchy with large inequality and racial tension, moving toward the weak government model found in South America or India, while China is organized with strong planning along the lines one finds in Germany or France. The main "difference in value" is whether the government should intervene to protect the weakest people from the strongest. Now, it is difficult to find a Western media source that gives China the benefit of the doubt on this point - they generally declare China "evil" just as we heard about the USSR for years, despite the enormous differences. The "values" argument is part of cold war rhetoric and ignores facts that are plainly visible, even on other posts in this blog.
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j. von Hettlingen Aug 26, 2020

Joschka Fischer says confrontation between China and the West “is escalating almost daily.” A year ago the West still kowtowed to China’s economic clout, and put up with its bullying. And “while China has grown stronger, the leading Western power has become relatively weaker,” dismantling the naive assumption that “modernization and economic development would lead China eventually to adopt democracy, embrace human rights, and the rule of law.”
The author says, “this illusion was good for the bottom line.” Yet in recent months “the implications of China's ascendancy have become disturbingly clear.” In the past the West had turned a blind eye to China’s “human-rights record and oppression of minorities. Rampant industrial espionage and theft of Western technology and intellectual property are other well-known problems”. All for the sake of trade – “in exchange for access to China’s vast market and low-cost labor.”
The change of heart can be explained that Covid-19 was the final straw that broke the camel’s back. Instead of pandering to China, the EU has adopted a hard-nosed approach. Europeans are increasingly leery of China’s state-led economic and governance practices, and the associated security risks. This wariness is converging with US concerns, at a time when the Sino-American confrontation is deepening, which opens the door for greater Transatlantic coordination.
The author says the conflict between China and the West is not just about technology, trade, global market share, and supply chains, but also about fundamental values. “Underpinning this economic and ideological competition is the goal of global predominance in the twenty-first century.” As the communist regime will not become “a capitalist liberal democracy,” China’s rise does raise concerns, given the ambition of its Leninist dictatorship to lead the world.
There was apprehension about China’s rise. “Western governments and investors remained sanguine even after the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre in Beijing. No sooner had the dust settled than Western businesses poured into the country like never before.” Strong economic ties with the West helped China join the WTO in 2001. Since then it “has evolved a novel hybrid development model consisting of a one-party dictatorship, a highly competitive economy, and a consumer society.”
Before Xi Jinping came to office in 2012, the regime had been spared from a revolution by governing reasonably well to keep the population content, so they have no desire to revolt, and through controlling information and repression. In recent years Xi has been ruling with an iron fist. A controversial constitutional amendment passed in March 2018 removed the 10-year limit, spread over two five-year terms, so that he could rule indefinitely.
China’s Communist Party is seen as the most sophisticated regime in terms of repression and controlling and distorting information with the use of the Internet, AI technology, censorship and propaganda. The party’s main task is to censor and eliminate what it sees as threats to its legitimacy. Economic growth is crucial to its survival, as a strong economy justifies its grip on power. Learning from the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, Xi opposes reforms.
The author says, “many in the US foreign-policy establishment want to prevent or delay China’s rise to economic and technological leadership. Yet it is too late.” Instead of containing a “world-leading economy of 1.4 billion people”, which could be self-defeating, he urges the West to abandon its “strategy of adaptation, accommodation, and economic opportunism – an approach that has often bordered on naiveté.”
To start with, “the West must shed its illusions about China – both those based on strategic ingenuousness and those grounded in the power politics of a bygone era. The West will have to find a way to live with China as it actually is…. finding a path between kowtowing and confrontation, with Western values and interests serving as the guide…..China’s ascendency is forcing Western countries to pursue their own industrial policies. Crafting them will require deciding which technologies to share and which direct investments from China to accept.”
The West must not put trade before values, that are non-negotiable. “Any concession that entails a sacrifice of fundamental principles….. must be rejected…..By the same token, the West should abandon the conceit that it can push, force, or cajole China to become a democracy wrought in its own image.” If necessary, Western democracies should join forces to “limit the scope of geopolitical cooperation with China,” if Beijing indulges in “expansionist behavior in its own neighborhood, especially in the South China Sea and regarding Taiwan.”
China needs to cooperate “on global issues such as climate change and pandemic prevention,” because no country can tackle these problems on its own. “To preserve its own interests and peaceful coexistence in the twenty-first century, the West will have to acknowledge and defend the genuine sources of its staying power.” This requires a strong Transatlantic commitment to democracy and along common values.
While an end of Western hegemony may be in sight, but will it induce China to take the mantle of global leadership? Being a leader means to have the soft power to persuade others to follow her or him. Will Xi be able to convince on the global stage?
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alex Finch Aug 25, 2020

This message is for China! Over 14% of China’s workforce is tied to construction. China still produces more steel, more cement than all the rest of the world combined. In 2020 the price of Iron Ore has again been pushed well over $100/t thanks to China again importing record amounts (mainly from Australia). They did the same after the 2008 great recession. The Chinese leadership has been trying for years to get out of this cycle but it didn’t work, they have to keep building or the economy might collapse, and the power brokers would lose a lot of money. However, long term an economy relying so heavily on construction will steadily weaken more and more. What originally made them rich, will now slowly drag them down. The longer they wait to tackle this problem the worse the outcome will be. Till now, zero success, just pretend there’s no problem. There will be no confrontation with the rest of the world. The leadership of China will soon be struggling just to survive and deal with the problems within China. Losing everything, for fear of losing face? How is that clever? How much longer do you want to wait to address the problem? Importing more iron ore is definitely not the solution. The international iron ore price is now a gauge for China’s problems.
- jef ford Aug 26, 2020
  
  What can I say after reading your mumbo-jumbo which is very confusing...
  
  China has a very big population so the market size, demand/supply, daily basic needs (food, etc.) and myriads other things are all big.
  
  Market forces of supply/demand are wild beasts that no one can tame.
  Throughout human history, people of all sorts have been trying to tame these wild beasts of market forces...
  
  So dismal scientists of all schools are relentlessly trying to predict economic cycles with all kinds of fancy models.
  
  Profiteers of all kinds invent investment products (CDO, MBS, CFD, etc.) to lure you to give you ever more chances to lose your shirt (remember the sub-prime crisis, the great recession, etc.)
  
  Investors (or speculators) poring over books, articles and all kinds of information to divine the future performance of shares, options, etc.
  
  After all is said and done, no one knows what is going to happen in the future...you do your very best to study, to analyze, to model, to predict...to make your decisions, then try your very best to monitor and take actions to ensure you are on the winning side (or at least not losing)...at the end if not successful, you try to salvage (if possible) or write it off...this is how markets are behaving anywhere...welcome to capitalism with its ups and downs, laughter and tears, joy, anguish, sorrow...
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- jef ford Aug 26, 2020
  
  What can I say after reading your mumbo-jumbo which is very confusing...
  
  China has a very big population so the market size, demand/supply, daily basic needs (food, etc.) and myriads other things are all big.
  
  Market forces of supply/demand are wild beasts that no one can tame.
  Throughout human history, people of all sorts have been trying to tame these wild beasts of market forces...
  
  So dismal scientists of all schools are relentlessly trying to predict economic cycles with all kinds of fancy models.
  
  Profiteers of all kinds invent investment products (CDO, MBS, CFD, etc.) to lure you to give you ever more chances to lose your shirt (remember the sub-prime crisis, the great recession, etc.)
  
  Investors (or speculators) poring over books, articles and all kinds of information to divine the future performance of shares, options, etc.
  
  After all is said and done, no one knows what is going to happen in the future...you do your very best to study, to analyze, to model, to predict...to make your decisions, then try your very best to monitor and take actions to ensure you are on the winning side (or at least not losing)...at the end if not successful, you try to salvage (if possible) or write it off...this is how markets are behaving anywhere...welcome to capitalism with its ups and downs, laughter and tears, joy, anguish, sorrow...
  - alex Finch Aug 26, 2020
    
    Jef you are absolutely right. Bill Miller says it best: “The world is much more complicated than we have any idea, so predicting anything is a waste of time, because nobody has any idea”. Once voted the smartest investor of the decade, if he doesn’t know, I certainly don’t. China will probably still be producing more steel and concrete than the rest of the world combined, in 10 years from now, even though the rest of the world has 5x the population of China. As you say, market forces are unpredictable (and can also be irrational for long periods of time). China’s building boom has confounded many experts for many years. If the rest of the world would require as much steel and concrete per Capita as China, in the future, well it’s just hard to imagine. That would require steel production worldwide ex-China to quadruple!!! It would add the equivalent of three more Chinas. Greta Thunberg would have a fit. Inflation and interest rates would surely rise. Thank God the rest of the world is holding back. That makes China very special and unique, ......which it is.
    - jef ford Aug 26, 2020
      
      More mumbo jumbo from you to confuse people...
      
      When we look/compare data, we should use per capita data.
      
      CO2 emissions in tons per capita for some countries:
      Australia = 16.8 US = 16.1 Canada =16.1
      S.Korea = 13.6 Russia =12.1 Japan = 9.4
      China = 8.0
      
      Both China (1.4 billion people) and India (1.38 billion people) have big populations.
      China's fertility rate (1.7) is dropping and less than India's fertility rate (2.2).
      So, India will soon have the biggest population in the world.
      China GDP growth rate is slowing.
      Given India's potential, I think India GDP growth rate may be higher than China's rate in the future years, so India will need all the steel, cement, energy, etc. etc. to grow the economy to lift many hundreds of millions of Indians out of poverty or to higher GDP per capita.
      
      And poor people in any countries have every right to lift themselves out of poverty or to higher GDP per capita.
      
      Global issues (like climate change) cannot be solved by individual country, such global issues need all countries to cooperate and work together (and countries with big populations (like India, China, etc) should not be penalized).
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  - jef ford Aug 26, 2020
    
    Moderator, Please delete this duplicate.
    I posted my comments, I did not use my computer (it auto hibernated after perhaps 20 minutes), then I re-started using my computer and my login session still active but I saw that my post disappeared, so I re-posted, then after another 10 minutes or so, now it shows this duplicate...
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- A. van Vugt Aug 25, 2020
  
  The access t
  - A. van Vugt Aug 25, 2020
    
    The access to the latest semiconductor developments are more important for China than the construction market. As a development country they will continue to build more ghost cities if you wish using the argument that more people from rural areas will move to the cities.
    You’re exaggerating the importance of the sector and underestimate the manufacturing industry as part of the supply chains that will remain important for the developed world and China despite the call for decoupling especially in the US of A.
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G B Aug 25, 2020

What i wrote are not fake news, why did you delete my post?

Please do not delete my post as the public and the international community have the right to know, the right to voice their concerns.

US leaders were contemptuous of multilateral institutions long before Trump: Bush (along with Cheney, Blair, etc) were lying, cheating, breaking laws attacking/invading (Iraq, etc which are war crimes).

US Army and CIA personnel committed a series of human rights violations against detainees in the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq including physical and sexual abuse, torture, rape, sodomy, and murder.

The Mahmudiyah rape and killings were war crimes involving the gang-rape and murder of 14-year-old Iraqi girl Abeer Qassim Hamza al-Janabi and the murder of her family by US Army soldiers on March 12, 2006 which occurred in the family's house to the southwest of Yusufiyah.

The Haditha massacre (also called the Haditha killings or the Haditha incident) was a series of killings on November 19, 2005, in which United States Marines killed 24 unarmed Iraqi civilians. The killings occurred in Haditha, a city in Iraq's western province of Al Anbar. Among the dead were men, women, elderly people and children as young as 1, who were shot multiple times at close range while unarmed.

Two unarmed civilian Afghans, Habibullah and Dilawar, were repeatedly tortured, chained to the ceiling and beaten by U.S. military personnel in December 2002 at the Bagram Theater Internment Facility, resulting in their deaths.

The 2007 Helmand province airstrikes were a set of airstrikes conducted by NATO and resulted in death of at least 45 Afghan civilians.

The Maywand District killings were the murders of at least three Afghan civilians perpetrated by U.S. Army soldiers from June 2009–June 2010.

On 2012.03.11, United States Army Staff Sergeant Robert Bales murdered sixteen civilians and wounded six others in Afghanistan. Nine of his victims were children, and eleven of the dead were from the same family. Some of the corpses were partially burned.

Then, of course, Trump is just following the footsteps of earlier US leaders (Bush, Cheney, etc.) to break laws, to lie, to cheat repeatedly...

Exhibit 1: Contemptuous of Palestinians and world opinions, Trump deliberately ignore the volatile and explosive Israel-Palestine conflict, provoking and escalating the bloody conflict to unprecedented dangerous level, betray the world declaring Jerusalem as Israel's capital, reversing nearly seven decades of American foreign policy, devastating the Middle-East peace process and destroying US credibility.

Exhibit 2: To rub salt in the wound, Trump's 1-sided "deal of the century" Israel-Palestine peace plan (without consulting any Palestinian officials) is antagonizing billions of people worldwide that will only cause more violent conflicts. This peace plan has long been criticized internationally. This plan has failed to resonate among masses who called it non-sense and conspiracy thus sparked protests in the Middle East already making the plan dead on arrival. This is US leaders' "scam of the century" which is totally unacceptable and it simply destroys Israel-Palestine 2-state solution. Duplicitous US is now a totally unacceptable peace broker, US must be kicked out of this region and elsewhere to give peace a chance.

Exhibit 3: With on-going US help, Israeli occupation of Palestine, Golan Height, colonization of the Palestinian West Bank & sentencing of Palestinians to being stateless, helpless & without rights, killing of Palestinians, perpetrating a humanitarian crisis in the Palestinian territories.

Exhibit 4: US recognizes the Golan Heights as part of Israel which the international community has condemned the capture and annexation as an illegal military occupation by Israel.

Exhibit 5: US unilaterally breaking/withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal, illegally sanctioning Iran, selling more weapons to Saudi, sending more troops to the Middle East to escalate the crisis.

Exhibit 6: Totally disregarding all the countries around the world (especially the ones threatened by rising sea levels and climate change), to hell the billions of people who are going to suffer the deadly results of climate change, US leaders shrug and recklessly break off Paris Climate Agreement.

Exhibit 7: US leaders murdering of Suleimani who was on peace mission discussing diplomatic rapprochement that Iraq was brokering between Iran and Saudi Arabia

Exhibit 8: Israel-UAE deal, a diplomatic coup for Israel but another stab in the back of Palestinians, it swapped one Palestinian nightmare — annexation, which many world leaders had warned an illegal land grab — for another nightmare, even bleaker prospect for Palestinians of not being counted at all.

For many decades, we've US leaders lying, cheating, breaking laws, attacking/invading illegally (Iraq, Libya, etc) committing war crimes, creating killing fields leading to humanitarian crisis.

US leaders (and their senior officers/advisors/generals) have a lot of blood on their hands and the UN must take actions to charge/jail these war criminals for life otherwise such alpha male leaders will continue thumping their chests to commit more war crimes.

The UN cannot continuously turning a blind eye to all these war crimes.

US leaders are serial liars and serial cheats.
When you're dealing with US leaders, always remember they'll lie, they'll cheat, they'll break laws, they'll attack/invade illegally and committing war crimes (in Iraq, etc.), they'll use you as useful idiots well then throw you to the wolves... this is how US leaders operate.

Iran was complying the nuclear deal with major powers, the IAEA had said.
All along, Iran was complying in good faith.

US is the guilty party that unilaterally breaking/withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal with sinister intentions, US leaders are the thugs that routinely bully/trample any countries that the US dislikes, repudiate the JCPOA, impose illegal sanctions, US leaders must be condemned and held accountable.

Iran's door is always open but first thing first, US must return and must fully comply with the Iran nuclear deal in good faith, stop all illegal sanctions, stop all illegal attacks.

Iran will stand firm in solidarity with Palestinians (and others) who are continuously being terrorized by US leaders with all the war crimes they committed (overthrowing of Iran's democratically elected government in 1953, helping/backing Saddam attacking Iran, shooting down of Iran passengers Airbus Air flight 655, etc.etc.).

I'm not telling fake news.

US leaders and US armed forces are the goons, the biggest terrorist organization in the world spreading fear around the globe.

US leaders have committed war crimes, they have a lot of blood on their hands, they must be held accountable, they must face the music, they must be charged/jailed for life.

The mainstream media deliberately self-censor and/or avoid all these ugly truths, some media even abet these attacks/invasions (unbiased reporting, journalism ethics, what a sick joke), these journalists/authors have blood on their hands too, since these media are deliberately turning a blind eye, it is even more cogent and necessary that these ugly truths must be told and re-told.
- Prashant Kotak Aug 25, 2020
  
  If you want to make your case in this way and be taken seriously, the least you can do is not be an anonymous poster. Put your name forward and a bio so we can see who you are. Go on, I challenge you.
  - jef ford Aug 26, 2020
    
    I think we believe in rights of individuals which include the rights of making comments anonymously if he or she chooses.
    
    It is more important what you say is true or not true.
    - Prashant Kotak Aug 26, 2020
      
      Of course. If someone puts forward an idea, or a thesis, or a line of argument, that stands or falls on it's own merits. If you put forward a mathematical proof on PS (unlikely as that may be), I will look at the proof and not care who you are. But the OP is making accusations of systemic rape and murder, moreover, not on behalf of themselves but on behalf of others. I think in that situation I would like to know who the accuser is to judge if I am being gaslighted. After all, governments also know what you are saying, and there is nothing stopping them planting paid shills to sow disinformation and confusion on fora like this.
      - jef ford Aug 26, 2020
        
        If they are true, how can you say it is disinformation?
        
        If they are true, thou shalt not distort, you should respect the truth.
        
        As a matter of fact, just see the mud-slinging by US (or UK, etc.) politicians distorting facts for their own vested interests...
        
        Any person has the right to express himself or herself and it is his/her privacy to be anonymous or not as he/she chooses, how can you infringe his/her privacy to express himself/herself anonymously or not?
        
        Prashant Kotak Aug 26, 2020
        
        Jef Ford, which part of the world are you posting from? Asking for a friend, you understand.
        
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  - jef ford Aug 26, 2020
    
    I think we believe in rights of individuals which include the rights of making comments anonymously if he or she chooses.
    
    It is more important what you say is true or not true.
    - jef ford Aug 26, 2020
      
      This comment was removed by a moderator. Replies to this comment may also be deleted. Please note that we moderate comments to ensure the conversation remains topically relevant. We appreciate well-informed comments and welcome your criticism and insight. Please be civil and avoid name-calling and ad hominem remarks.
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Susan Robinson Aug 25, 2020

The gang-rape and murder of 14-year-old Iraqi girl and the murder of her family by US soldiers which occurred in the family's house...

I just can't bear reading these gruesome war crimes...the ghastly ordeal the little girl suffered and endured...

Where is human decency while keep claiming how great western civilization and western values are?
This is totally unacceptable.
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toca Gomes Aug 25, 2020

"Western values and interests serving as the guide." Which ones? The one that gives economic interests supremacy over human rights? The one that gives financial markets primacy over lives? The one that dismantle democracy in the name of economic interests? The one that destabilize third world countries in order to take over their natural resources? The one that supports dictators when it allows western to deplete the natural resource? The one that dismantles a democratic elected government (Guatemala 1954, Chile 1973) to put dictator in power in exchange for the exploitation and control of natural resource? The one that close western eyes in front of human rights as it happens in Saudi Arabia? Western values to guide international cooperation? No Thanks!
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G B Aug 25, 2020

This comment was removed by a moderator. Replies to this comment may also be deleted. Please note that we moderate comments to ensure the conversation remains topically relevant. We appreciate well-informed comments and welcome your criticism and insight. Please be civil and avoid name-calling and ad hominem remarks.
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lt lee Aug 25, 2020

The West needs to understand and and accept Chinese Democracy which has real impact on the people. In contrast, many in the West frequently see their democracy as a badge or honor. But forget the people at the same time.

1. "China Is More Democratic Than America, Say the People A survey suggests that many who live in democracies don’t actually feel like they do."
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2020-06-26/which-nations-are-democracies-some-citizens-might-disagree

Chinese people recognize the importance of democracy. With this understanding, they also consider China a democracy. There is a gap between their democratic idealism and their democratic reality. But the gap is not as large as "Western democratic nations."

2. "Chinese democracy puts Western illusion in dust"
http://en.people.cn/n3/2019/0303/c90000-9551962.html

This is how Chinese leaders see democracy. Pragmatic and results oriented. Basically, a democracy is only a democracy to the extent that it can solve the people's problems, short term as well as long term. And it must serve all the people, not this or that special group.

"Democracy is not a decoration, but a means of solving problems.
The true meaning of people's democracy is finding the best way to coordinate the aspirations and demands of the whole of society and making decisions that conform to the long-term interest of the people.
It is different from a system where some here-today-gone-tomorrow politicians obtain power in turn, often failing to keep their pre-elections promises.

To govern, in China, also means to serve.

While parties in the West increasingly represent special interest groups, Chinese democracy sees people, not capital, as the most important factor in society.
Chinese leaders are listening attentively to the people and responding to their demands.
The priorities of the Chinese government are how to keep the economy growing, provide better education, housing, environment, employment and healthcare for almost 1.4 billion people and maintaining social cohesion and peace and while achieving greater prosperity for all the people.
Over the past decades, China has been improving dramatically, not only economically but also ecologically, socially and culturally. China's independence, sovereignty, security and the interests of development are well safeguarded."

3. "Understanding CCP Resilience: Surveying Chinese Public Opinion Through Time"
https://ash.harvard.edu/files/ash/files/final_policy_brief_7.6.2020.pdf

This policy brief presents the results of how the CCP led government had implement broad national policies and improve personnel performance locally to earn good rating and trust from the people.

"We find that first, since the start of the survey in 2003, Chinese citizen satisfaction with government has increased virtually across the board. From the impact of broad national policies to the conduct of local town officials, Chinese citizens rate the government as more capable and effective than ever before. Interestingly, more marginalized groups in poorer, inland regions are actually comparatively more likely to report increases in satisfaction. Second, the attitudes of Chinese citizens appear to respond (both positively and negatively) to real changes in their material well-being, which suggests that sup-port could be undermined by the twin challenges of declining economic growth and a deteriorating natural environment."
- A. van Vugt Aug 25, 2020
  
  Excuse me, ‘Chinese democracy’? That’s a ‘contradictio in terminis’ ...
  Enlighten yourself on democracy
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- Bernd Papenkort Aug 25, 2020
  
  This comment of LT Lee is painting a realistic picture. The "Democracy" of the West is in too many countries failing to guarantee basic needs of its people. It ends too often up in social inequality, Citizens want to have "efficiency in delivery" - and here too many governments in the West fail to deliver. Examples from US, UK, GE and other western quarters are manifold. Western democracy is like an elevator in which less experienced people try to catch posts and press the buttom for the top. As MP's to jump in senior state functions without proper background expertise. The "West" needs to look for Singapore and Bejing to realize in which way civil servants are trained. Compare the background of Trump, Johnson and Merkel with the professional background of Xi Jinping. Amateurs in the West are playing against professionals in the East....
  - A. van Vugt Aug 25, 2020
    
    It sounds like Papenkort is longing for the good, old days when One Party ruled his native country...‘efficiency in delivery’ granted.
    - Bernd Papenkort Aug 25, 2020
      
      A.van Vugt: Your comment deserves no specific reply. It speaks for the mindset of the author.
      - A. van Vugt Aug 25, 2020
        
        I think that looking into ‘mindsets’ is not your field.
        Just reacting on an ‘analysis’ that mentions ‘amateurism’ versus ‘professionalism’ without examples that make sense...
        
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Michael Public Aug 24, 2020

The author argues that China in its current form is here is to stay indefinitely. It would make for interesting reading to change every instance of 'China' for 'Germany' and the date from 2020 to 1941. I am sure that the USSR and 1981 would work too.
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Godfree Roberts Aug 24, 2020

Let's look closer at Mr Fischer's allegations:

1. "China China is a Leninist one-party dictatorship" just as the US is a capitalist one-party dictatorship. The fact that the US permits capitalist factions–Republican and Democrat–to compete for patronage is irrelevant.

2. "China’s leaders have long dismissed outside criticism of their human-rights record and oppression of minorities". Even a cursory examination of the UN Declaration of Universal Human Rights (which are actually Protestant 'rights') reveals that China leads America in 26 of the 30 catepories.

3. "Rampant industrial espionage and theft of Western technology and intellectual property". There is zero evidence of significant IP theft by Chinese entities in any jurisdiction on earth. Much smoke. Little fire.
- Michael Public Aug 24, 2020
  
  In response:
  1. Bernie Sanders was allowed to run. So was Donald Trump. Neither were a capitalists from the 'one party state' - they were political outsiders. Who was allowed to compete against the CCP again?
  
  2. But America leads in the important categories. Freedom of speech stands first and foremost among these.
  
  3. Zero evidence? Lepin literally copied Lego sets - the pieces, the designs, the product logos. This is hard evidence of copyright and trademark violations.
  - lt lee Aug 25, 2020
    
    1. Competition? What good is competition?
    Two guys running from a bear (people's problems). Neither needs to outrun the bear (i.e. solving people's problems). One only needs to outrun the other. In contrast, one party system would have to work hard to fulfill its promise to the people, it can't blame other party for its failure. There is no other party.
    
    2. Multiparty system leads to polarization which render the government ineffective. The US is exhibit # 1 of deep polarization.
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  - tojunk Aug 24, 2020
    
    1. 1 in 15 in China is a communist member, and its membership is open to all, from peasants to capitalists. Internal debate of this several hundred million members is evidence of its diversity of opinion. This is far more than the US's 2 party one mouth machine can achieve. Competition of top leadership is far more intense than the show in the US, and is based on merits and competency rather than tv showmanship.
    
    2. "Freedom of speech stands first and foremost among these." This is a self centered idiosyncrasy.
    
    3. Theft? America's lawyer per capita ratio is higher than the world average by 100 folds. Have not seen many sucessful IP cases litigated in the US. Tik top and Huawei etc are simply banned by admistration order, without evidence of any wrong doing.
    - lt lee Aug 25, 2020
      
      Freedom of speech is against human nature. All human speech has shutting up other side as part of the goal. If not, people would keep talking, and talking, and talking and ... until they all drop death.
      
      If Chinese leaders prohibit speech unreasonably , all under heaven can criticize China. But saying "Freedom of speech stands first and foremost among these" is indeed self centered idiosyncrasy.
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Petey Bee Aug 24, 2020

It is noteworthy that free movement of capital has fallen from the category of fundamental values.
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