Napoleon Bonaparte once said of China, “Let her sleep, for when she wakes, she will shake the world.” A spate of articles and books has appeared on the rise of China and its possible domination of the world. The Middle Kingdom has received special attention because it is ideologically and culturally different from the West. Military strategists and geopolitical thinkers have their own concerns: the country’s leadership does not make its political ambitions clear, nor has the military been open about the degree of its expansion.

The United States still remains the sole superpower but with the rise of “the rest,” particularly China, the present structure of the world order will eventually be reconfigured. In reality, China is not rising but as Aaron Friedberg states, “it is returning to the position of regional pre-eminence that it once held.” Indeed, China dominated that region for centuries. Among those who argue that China will rule the world in the near future is Martin Jacques – a British journalist who is the author of When China Rules the World: The End of the Western World and the Birth of a New World Order.

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There is an overwhelming assumption in the West that China’s Achilles heel is the state: that it lacks legitimacy. This is the underlying reason why Westerners believe that China’s transformation is unsustainable: that the political system cannot survive. It would be wrong to suggest that attitudes have not shifted: the endurance of the reform period, now over 35 years old, and the scale of its achievement have bred a growing if still grudging respect, and a less apocalyptic view of Chinese political change. Few now regard it to be imminent and many have extended their time horizons somewhat into the future.

Nevertheless, most Westerners still regard China’s present political order as lacking legitimacy and as ultimately unsustainable. In the post 1945 period, Westerners have come to believe that Western-style democracy – essentially universal suffrage and a multi-party system – is more or less the sole source of a government’s legitimacy. This is a superficial and ahistorical position. Western-style democracy does not ensure the legitimacy of a regime in the eyes of its people: Italy is perhaps the classic example, with successive governments over a long historical period experiencing a chronic lack of legitimacy. And what of China? Although it does not have Western-style democracy, there is plenty of evidence – for example the Pew Global Attitude surveys and the work of Tony Saich at the Harvard Kennedy School – that the Chinese government enjoys high levels of support and legitimacy, much higher indeed than those of Western governments.
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The Western portrayal of China’s future tends to “blow hot and cold”, but the heat of China’s rise is here to stay, British scholar Martin Jacques said in a recent interview with Xinhua.

Commenting on a resurfacing “Chinese Century” debate among global media, Martin said that the reason behind this hot discourse is simple: the fact that China’s development continues.

“The Western commentary about China’s rise is erratic, and tends to be a bit negative. And then from time to time, they sort of wake up and realize that the trend continues,” said the author of the international best-seller “When China Rules the World”.

In an article for the Vanity Fair magazine, U.S. economist Joseph E. Stiglitz, a Nobel laureate, foresaw the arrival of a “Chinese Century” in 2015 on the grounds that China has surpassed the United States to become the world’s largest economy in terms of GDP based on purchasing power parity.
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The UK’s decision to become a founder member of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) is a major historical event. Until then no Western country, with the exception of New Zealand, had signed up to join, not least because of intense American pressure. The UK, moreover, cannot be counted as any old Western nation; on the contrary, ever since 1945, it has been the US’s closest ally. For British politicians, Conservative and Labour alike, the ‘special relationship’, as it has been known, was sacrosanct. A decade ago, the UK stood shoulder to shoulder with the US in the disastrous invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.

So how do we explain Britain’s about-turn?

The UK is certainly not what it was. Along with the other major European nations, its relative strength in the world has declined precipitously, accelerated in the recent period by the western financial crisis. Today its economy is barely bigger than it was in 2007. Unsurprisingly in such circumstances, economic and commercial considerations have loomed ever larger in the public mind while foreign policy concerns have come to be seen as something of a luxury. This shift in priorities has been accentuated by the dismal failure of the military adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan, not to mention the more recent one in Libya.
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China Premier Rutte brengt volgende week een vierdaags werkbezoek aan China. De Britse Chinakenner Martin Jacques zou in zijn plaats nú aanhaken bij de Chinese concurrent van de Wereldbank.

Martin Jacques verslikt zich in zijn met veel melk aangelengde thee. „Wow, de altijd trouwe Britse poedel loopt opeens weg van zijn Amerikaanse baasje. Dit is zonder overdrijving een historisch moment”, grijnst de Britse auteur van When China rules the world, het meest geciteerde, bediscussieerde en bekritiseerde boek over de onstuitbare opmars van China.

Als eerste westerse natie besloot het Verenigd Koninkrijk de toorn van de Verenigde Staten te trotseren door politiek en financieel kapitaal te investeren in het Chinese initiatief om een concurrent van de Wereldbank op te richten, de zogeheten Aziatische Infrastructurele Investeringsbank. Volgens de historicus Jacques een „zeer opmerkelijk moment in de wording van de nieuwe financiële institutionele wereldorde”. „Ik word er vaak van beticht dat ik de snelheid van de opmars van China als wereldmacht zwaar overdrijf, maar mijn grootste fout is eigenlijk dat ik niet heb voorzien hoe snel de oude pikorde aftakelt. Die orde, opgebouwd door de Amerikanen vanaf 1944, is op veel verschillende manieren aan het afbrokkelen, om niet te zeggen aan het desintegreren. De Wereldbank is aan het afglijden en wie weet nog van het bestaan van de G7 of de G8?” Duitsland, Frankrijk en Italië hebben inmiddels het Britse voorbeeld gevolgd.

Martin Jacques, die gastcolleges geeft aan de Nationale Universiteit van Singapore, wil weten of Nederland ook aandeelhouder en mede-stichter van de Chinese tegenhanger van de Wereldbank wordt. „Nog geen beslissing? Echt niet? Ik kan Nederland alleen maar adviseren de knoop snel door te hakken, dit is een heel belangrijk moment om Chinese bonuspunten te winnen. Het is niet slim om in het slinkende Amerikaanse kamp van refusniks te blijven hangen.” Bovendien, voegt hij er aan toe: „China wil niet langer wachten op hervormingen van de Wereldbank en het IMF die er toch niet komen door de blokkade van het Amerikaanse Congres. China accepteert niet langer dat bijvoorbeeld Nederland en België een zwaardere stem hebben in Washington.”

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The Western portrayal of China’s future tends to “blow hot and cold”, but the heat of China’s rise is here to stay, British scholar Martin Jacques said in a recent interview with Xinhua.

Commenting on a resurfacing “Chinese Century” debate among global media, Martin said that the reason behind this hot discourse is simple: the fact that China’s development continues.

“The Western commentary about China’s rise is erratic, and tends to be a bit negative. And then from time to time, they sort of wake up and realize that the trend continues,” said the author of the international best-seller “When China Rules the World”.

In an article for the Vanity Fair magazine, U.S. economist Joseph E. Stiglitz, a Nobel laureate, foresaw the arrival of a “Chinese Century” in 2015 on the grounds that China has surpassed the United States to become the world’s largest economy in terms of GDP based on purchasing power parity.

Similar predictions of a “Chinese Century”, often initiated by foreign observers, have occurred on and off since the turn of the century. While most Chinese stay cool-headed, the proclamation has once again aroused heated argumentation among scholars and policy-makers around the world over the potential of China’s future.

“From time to time, the West is reminded that China is growing rapidly and is bigger and bigger, and then you get some discussions about the ‘Chinese century’,” added Jacques, who is also a senior fellow at the department of politics and international studies at Cambridge University.

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CHINA’S increasing involvement in the economy of The Bahamas is inevitably attracting controversy here. Having already invested heavily in Freeport (the harbour, container port, airport and hotels) and in New Providence (the huge Baha Mar project, new roads, a sports stadium, the British Colonial Hilton hotel), it now has plans for the redevelopment of downtown Nassau.

Then, the Prime Minister’s visit to Beijing in January – in order to discuss, among other issues, an air services agreement, opportunities for investment in sectors of the economy like tourism, financial services, agriculture and energy (including BEC), together with assistance in restructuring the country’s debt – has put the bilateral economic relationship under even greater scrutiny.

Not surprisingly, such growing involvement by the Chinese induces fear about a distant foreign country, which is still a communist state but has become an economic powerhouse, acquiring too much control of the affairs of a small nation already closely beholden in many ways to its giant and influential neighbour.

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Once again, Western media misunderstands China’s political system.

A recent commentary from The Sydney Morning Herald’s international editor, Peter Hartcher, described China (along with Islamic State and Russia) as “fascist,” sparking an angry response from China’s Foreign Ministry. Yet the piece likely sparked cheers among people with similar views. There’s no problem with being so straightforward, even as China celebrate the 70th anniversary of victory in the “World Anti-Fascist War.” But the logic behind this piece does not stand firm.

The article gives three defining characteristics of fascists to support its argument: authoritarianism, highly centralized power structures, and exalting the nation above the people.

Becoming authoritarian was not the inevitable path for China to stand as an independent, sovereign state after being forced open by the West. Why then is China’s political system this way? As Martin Jacques explains, China is a unique civilization-state, rather than a Western style nation-state. If people attempt to analyze China through a Western lens, there will always be problems. Criticizing China for its political reality, developmental model, and “non-cooperative” behavior is easy, but seeing and truly understanding the differences and divergences between civilizations is far more difficult — so much so that quite often people choose not to even try. Instead, they import a Western concept (in this case, fascism) to try and conceptualize a non-Western system.

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Deal could spark other similar negotiations: analysts

China and South Korea are inching closer to implementing a bilateral free trade agreement (FTA) with a draft agreement, the two countries announced on Wednesday, a move that experts said will help promote China’s similar negotiations with other countries and regions.

China and South Korea confirmed the draft agreement on Wednesday, China’s Ministry of Commerce (MOC) announced on its website on Wednesday, noting all FTA negotiations have been completed.

The English-language draft agreement will be translated into Chinese and Korean before being signed, South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency reported on Wednesday.

The two governments have agreed to work toward signing the FTA in the first half of 2015, South Korea’s Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy was quoted as saying.

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China and South Korea are inching closer to implementing a bilateral free trade agreement (FTA) with a draft agreement, the two countries announced on Wednesday, a move that experts said will help promote China’s similar negotiations with other countries and regions.

China and South Korea confirmed the draft agreement on Wednesday, China’s Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) announced on its website on Wednesday, noting all FTA negotiations have been completed.

The English-language draft agreement will be translated into Chinese and Korean before being signed, South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency reported on Wednesday.

The two governments have agreed to work toward signing the FTA in the first half of 2015, South Korea’s Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy was quoted as saying.

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