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Friday 14th February 2020
Interviews
Where does China stand? Henry Bowler evaluates China’s current global position in light of a discussion with Prof. Steve Tsang, Dr Yu Jie, Benedict Rogers and Nigel Inkster, as well as the FT Future Forum on the US-China trade war
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n hursday 16th January, Prof Steve Tsang, Dr Yu Jie, Benedict Rogers and Nigel Inkster discussed the question ‘Where does China stand?’ in a panel event at Peterhouse, which I chaired. Between the director of Europe’s largest university, China Institute, a senior think tank expert on China, a prominent human rights activist and a former assistant chief of MI6, they covered a wide range of different experiences and expertise. But I was struck by how much they actually agreed upon – and by the message they were giving. Above all, their answers showed nuance and caution beyond the usual hysteria. I was also very privileged to attend the Financial Times’ ‘Future Forum’ event on the US-China trade war. here, Gideon Rachman chaired a discussion between Dr Yu Jie, Martin Wolf and George Magnus, with an audience of business leaders contributing their own experiences. his panel agreed with that at Peterhouse on China’s current state, but – along with the fascinating perspective of business leaders – ofered a more worrying view for the future than we had seen on the 16th.
China now China’s extraordinary rise – remarkable both for its rapidity and for the heights to which it has now climbed – is much discussed in the West. Various journalists, academics and politicians have written about an inevitable and dramatic shift of political power eastwards and a ‘new world order’ emerging, centred on China. Others have prophesied a meteoric trajectory for China, with an even more abrupt collapse to follow its dazzling progress, but few have given the sort of subtle, intricate, nuanced picture to which we were treated last Thursday. Our speakers at Peterhouse refused to be tied into either of the catego-
ries upon which so many writers have based their analysis, shying away from melodrama at both extremes. There was recognition of and admiration for the stunning success China has enjoyed. Nigel Inkster and Steve Tsang agreed that there had been, until recently, a period of at least fifteen years without a serious policy mistake. What other country can make that claim, they asked. Yu Jie highlighted China’s newfound supremacy in many areas of technology, from Huawei to TikTok. She argues that this marks an important difference from the Cold War relationship between the USA and USSR: today’s superpowers are intertwined in ways which were simply impossible across the Iron Curtain, and China is ahead of the USA in areas where the USSR always struggled to keep up. On the other hand, the speakers all agreed that the narrative of inevitable Chinese dominance, even in its own region, is overblown. When I asked whether they saw the growing authoritarianism of Xi Jinping’s regime as a sign of strength or weakness, the speakers’ unanimity surprised me. They all agreed that the CPC’s return to repression – stifling both dissent and debate – is a sign of serious weak-
▲ China's rise has been much talked about in the West, but do we truly understand China? (XIAOCHEN0/PIXABAY)
ness. Benedict Rogers gave the example of his own treatment: he is constantly bemused at the Chinese government’s obsession with what he says. He receives regular anonymous abuse to his home address, an address which is not publicly available. His neighbours have been sent letters telling them to ‘watch him’. Even his mother has been sent smears about and threats towards her son. On another level, he told us that Chinese officials, in high-level diplomatic meetings with their UK counterparts, have, on occasion, wanted to talk about Ben Rogers’s irritating campaigning rather than apparently bigger governmental issues. As well as entertaining the audience, Ben was making a serious point here: namely, that the CPC seems to take even distant foreign individual dissent far more seriously than might seem rational. He compared this very minor case to the infinitely bigger cases of Xinjiang and Hong Kong, where the speakers all agreed that growing Chinese repression belied a fundamental weakness and anxiety. Steve Tsang demonstrated the heavy-handedness of the mass internment policy in Xinjiang by noting that the number of
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It is worth reminding ourselves how much China has changed ❞
terrorist incidents originating from Xinjiang can be counted on one hand. Nigel Inkster went further, warning that – although there was no significant Islamist threat in Xinjiang when the camps began – Xi’s brutal policies risk creating an irredemable hatred of the Han Chinese Communist authorities among the Uighur Muslims there. This was one reason why Steve Tsang talked of a period of 15 years without a serious policy mistake – until recently. All four agreed that Xi Jinping has handled issues in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Xinjiang very badly. Tsai Ing-Wen has been re-elected as President of Taiwan in a landslide win, for which she should be thanking Xi Jinping. The polls showed her to be in serious trouble a year ago, but Chinese aggression – in the form both of incursions into Taiwanese airspace and waters, and of a clear demonstration in Hong Kong of the real meaning of their offer to Taiwan of ‘One Country Two Systems’ – consolidated support for her hardline pro-independence and pro-democracy position. When discussing Hong Kong itself, Steve won the biggest laugh of the night with his claim that, because Carrie Lam and Xi Jinping have made the