East Asia
Xi Jinping’s future China
[yt_dropcap type=”square” font=”” size=”14″ color=”#000″ background=”#fff” ] T [/yt_dropcap]he fifth session of the National People’s Congress and the Fifth Session of the 12th National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference are two epochal moments in the evolution of “Xi Jinping’s policy line” and China’ great transformation from great economic locomotive of the world into a multi-faceted and global power.
While, in the past, the People’s Republic of China could be considered an “Asian tiger” which, unlike the other smaller ones, had recorded large and stable economic development, currently – under Xi Jinping’s leadership – time has come to turn mere steady economic development into clear and firm international power living up to China’s new strategic role, namely being a major and fully-fledged world power.
The “tigers” which had led to the Asian booming economies had been undermined by the manoeuvres they did on the dollar. China saved itself also because it did not dollarized itself, but rather bought US public debt securities, thus becoming a “silent partner” of its main competitor.
Hence the support for globalization expressed by Xi Jinping at the recent Davos Conference.
Xi Jinping’s China does not want to reduce the globalization rate, because only the world market, as a whole, can sustain its harmonious development, without producing internal inflationary imbalances or productive crises. In the traditional Marxist thinking, the overproduction crises that Xi Jinping fears are typical of real capitalistic crises.
Those who win the Darwinian struggle between nations and strengthen their economies tend to spread their success and, hence, eliminate possible competitors.
Conversely, those who lose always want the closure of their markets, as well as protectionism and control of world economic flows.
It was also the idea of Adam Smith in his “The Wealth of Nations”, the book which is at the core of modern political economy.
Furthermore, in 1776 – namely the year of the American Revolution – Smith’s England wanted free-trade and liberalism in distant markets, but it kept its market tightly closed. Those who win are liberal (for the others), while those who lose the world economy game only want to avoid greater damage, thus becoming even more protectionist.
Therefore Xi Jinping’s China will conquer a large share of world economy, thus becoming leader of the unavoidable future globalization and outsourcing some of its assets, as well as replacing the old Western powers, which are no longer able to guide and direct economic, financial and cultural globalization.
Efficiency and representation do not often go hand in hand: the West is in the grip of “vested interests” which – through Parliamentary legitimate representation – distort and block economic, productive, financial and cultural reforms.
Thanks to its political structure, China can avoid these Western constraints and reach Xi Jinping’s goals quickly and effectively.
Incidentally, the People’s National Assembly (or Congress) is the highest State institution and the sole legislative body of the People’s Republic of China.
Unlike other Western representative institutions and structures, the current organization of Chinese representation is highly functional, considering that it provides for one single legislative House (namely the Assembly) which institutionally supervises the Presidency, the Council of State, the Supreme Court, the Army and the eight non-Communist smaller parties which, however, have pledged allegiance to the Republic founded by Mao Zedong.
In one single annual meeting, always held in March, the Congress ratifies the decisions often already taken by the Party bodies and basically discusses the “policy line” of legislation and, hence, of China’s future policy.
The Political Consultative Conference, too, is a body of the Chinese State and represents the various political parties present in the People’s Republic of China, which have accepted the direction and leadership of the Nation by the Communist Party.
It is an institution also made up of members from other non-directly political associations and includes members of political parties and many associations from Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan.
The Conference also includes major personalities, independent from the various parties.
Later the Communist Party of China (CPC) will elect a new Party’s leadership during its National Congress scheduled early next year.
Therefore this is the phase in which Xi Jinping is definitely strengthening his power over the Party and hence his specific policy line. Five of the seven members of the Politburo Internal Committee shall leave office at the beginning of 2018, and only Xi Jinping and Prime Minister Li Kekiang will remain in office.
Some outgoing members of the Politburo Standing Committee will be likely investigated on corruption charges.
Also the Armed Forces will change radically when the Communist Party of China is fully in Xi Jinping’s hands.
The four general headquarters of China’s Armed Forces have already been cut down to size and merged into the Central Military Commission.
The second military reform implemented by Xi Jinping – of which we will soon see the results – is designed to place the four Armed Forces on an equal footing, by putting an end to the primary role played by Ground Forces.
Obviously, today China is no longer a regional power that must be defended mainly from ground invasions – which are the most geopolitically likely invasions – but a global and globalist power that must protect its new status with a large Air Force and a strong “blue-water Navy”, as experts call it.
Hence separate Commands also for the ground forces that previously led the whole Chinese military structure.
Basically, Xi Jinping wants to cut the Armed Forces down to size (300,000 soldiers and officers have been dismissed), but he wants them to be always “combat ready”, namely capable of combined operations and, above all, suitable for operating outside the traditional Chinese scenarios.
Furthermore, Xi Jinping knows the structural weaknesses still threatening China’s development: corruption, which has taken huge liquidity away from China’s productive economy, through one million officials investigated to date on severe corruption charges; technological innovation so as to avoid China remaining the old “world factory”, as the dollarized “tigers”, but excluded from the new production trends; finally agriculture and, above all, the stable growth of people’s wellbeing.
China runs the risk of experiencing the “middle income trap”, as economists call it, namely that development stops when everyone has reached a satisfactory income.
It happened to most Eastern developed economies. After the “middle income trap”, another trap inevitably comes, namely the “poverty trap”, as in current Latin American economies.
In Xi Jiping’s mind, this project includes the State reform, streamlining and simplification, which go hand in hand with China’s full entry into the group of economies recording the highest rate of innovative technologies, which – in many respects – is the economic face of the State political reform that Xi Jinping has undertaken.
This project also includes a financial market with private equity and the other forms of cash and private debt management; the increase in competition between companies; a skilled workforce capable of moving between different technologies and factories; the readjustment of the hukou traditional agricultural welfare; finally, the entry of traditional rural overpopulation into the urban labour force.
As Mao Zedong accelerated China’s development, often with mixed results, Xi Jinping wants the “Fifth Modernization”, the modernization not written by Deng Xiaoping but the most important one – namely the State Modernization, which will inevitably drive the modernization of civil society and the economy.
The relationship between rural and urban areas is the issue which is at the core of Mao Zedong’s thought and the best Marxism – the issue that General Marshall took into due account in his famous Harvard speech in which he outlined the “Marshall Plan” for Europe in the aftermath of the Second World War.
If Xi Jinping succeeds in reducing corruption – and so far he has managed to do so – but particularly in reforming the State to eliminate the old protectionist privileges and near monopolies of the centralized economy, China will not fall into the “middle income trap” and will still have huge development opportunities that Xi Jinping will focus on the technological innovation of products and processes.
As often happened in the history of Socialism, if the State preserves large pockets of unproductive income, inefficiency and unnecessary costs – all problems that we Italians know all too well – Xi Jinping’s fight, which is the only one currently possible in China, will take too long to be won.
Nevertheless the current rationale of the Chinese leadership – that will also deal with pollution (which is a serious obstacle to globalization, not its natural by-product), as well as with manageable and livable cities on a human scale, with the coordination, wanted by Xi Jinping, between Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei for investment in infrastructure – is still the traditional, Confucian and Taoist one.
Everything is based on the link between “Minyi”, namely public opinion, and “Minxin”, namely people’s hearts and minds.
Xi Jinping is undoubtedly a global leader beloved by the Chinese people, but certainly the impact of the old apparata, privileges and near monopolies will still be felt.
The visit of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad to China to participate in the opening of the Asian Games came as a serious step to try to break the diplomatic isolation from Syria. Syrian President “Bashar Al-Assad” was keen to meet his counterpart Xi Jinping in the city of Hangzhou in eastern China, where the Asian Games are being held, as this was the Syrian president’s first visit to China since 2004. According to the Syrian regime’s Al-Watan newspaper, Al-Assad will attend the launch ceremony of the (nineteenth edition) of the Asian Games, which will open on September 23, in the Chinese city of Hangzhou. This visit to Bashar al-Assad reflects the great coordination between Moscow and Beijing, as it is likely that the Russians pushed for this visit at this precise time. Perhaps, through his visit to China, Bashar al-Assad is trying to deliver a specific message about the start of “international legitimization” of his regime. Syria’s accession to the Belt and Road Initiative in January 2022 is an indication of the possibility of implementing vital Chinese projects, especially since it is located between Iraq and Turkey, making it a vital corridor for land routes towards Europe.
Bashar Al-Assad’s visit to China also comes in an attempt to attract it to reconstruction projects in the affected areas in Syria, as China has the ability to complete reconstruction infrastructure in residential and civilian areas with exceptional speed. This is the same as what the Chinese ambassador to Syria “Shi Hongwei” announced in August 2023, that “Chinese companies are actively involved in reconstruction projects in Syria”. The war in Syria led to massive destruction of infrastructure and the destruction of many vital sectors of the Syrian economy, including oil, while the Syrian government is subject to harsh international sanctions. We find that the Chinese side has shown great interest in the reconstruction projects in Surba, such as the presence of more than a thousand Chinese companies to participate in (the first trade exhibition on Syrian reconstruction projects in Beijing), while they pledged investments estimated at two billion dollars.
China played an active role through diplomatic movements in Syria, as it participated in the “Astana” process, and obstructed Security Council resolutions related to Syria, to confirm its position in support of Damascus, using its veto power more than once in the Security Council, against resolutions considered to be a blow to Assad’s “legitimacy”. In September 2017, the Syrian regime classified China, along with Russia and Iran, as “friendly governments” that would give priority to reconstruction projects. Therefore, Al-Assad affirmed during his meeting with Chinese President “Xi Jinping” that: “this visit is important in terms of its timing and circumstances, as a multipolar world is being formed today that will restore balance and stability to the world, and it is the duty of all of us to seize this moment for the sake of a bright and promising future”.
According to my analysis, China follows the policy of “breaking diplomatic isolation on presidents and countries against which America is angry”, so the visit of “Bashar al-Assad” comes within a series of visits that China witnessed during the current year in 2023, to presidents who are isolated internationally by the United States of America, such as: Venezuelan President “Nicolas Maduro”, the Iranian President ”Ibrahim Raisi”, and the Belarusian “Alexander Lukashenko”.
China is also keen to conduct interviews in its newspapers and official websites affiliated with the ruling Communist Party with many presidents and officials of countries isolated internationally and diplomatically by the United States of America and the West, such as the Chinese keenness to conduct and publish an interview with Syrian Foreign Minister “Faisal Mekdad” on September 21, 2023, and the Chinese reviewed his statements, saying that “the United States of America has plundered oil, natural gas, and other resources from Syria, causing losses worth $115 billion”. The Chinese newspaper “Global Times”, which is close to the ruling Communist Party, also focused on the United States’ greater role in the deterioration of “Syria from stability to chaos” . The Chinese newspaper compared this to China’s policy, which constantly calls for peaceful dialogue and opposes “foreign interference” .
Through his visit to China, Syrian President “Bashar Al-Assad” is trying to lay the foundations for joint cooperation between China and Syria within the framework of the Belt and Road Initiative, with full Chinese support for Syria’s accession to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization as a dialogue partner. China has always affirmed its firm support for Syria’s efforts against foreign interference, with the Chinese rejection of the stationing of illegal forces on Syrian territory. China is also making great efforts with many countries to lift sanctions and the illegal economic blockade on the Syrian people, in addition to Chinese support for building Syrian capabilities in the field of combating terrorism. Knowing that despite its alliance with President “Bashar Al-Assad”, China did not participate in supporting him militarily, but it used the right of criticism to obstruct the passage of resolutions against him in the Security Council.
We can reach an important conclusion that Bashar Al-Assad’s visit to China has a greater political track, and that Beijing is trying to play a greater role in the issue of resolving conflicts or to have a greater actual role in negotiations related to sensitive issues in the region. The implications of Assad’s visit to China are also politically significant, as China is trying to play a greater political role in the region, as China has been trying since the start of the Russian-Ukrainian war and the emergence of a vacuum in the Middle East as a result of the decline of Russian influence due to its preoccupation with the war, so Beijing is trying to expand in the Middle East and Africa.
President Xi Jinping’s address at the recently held 2023 CIFTIS resonates as a powerful call for inclusive development and cooperation in the services trade sector. China’s commitment to expanding market access, increasing connectivity, and aligning policies with global standards demonstrates its commitment to ensuring a level playing field for all nations.
This commitment extends across different sectors, including telecommunications, tourism, law, vocational examinations, and the larger services sector. President Xi’s address emphasized China’s intention to expand broader, broaden market access, and support inclusive development in the services trade sector. His sentiments resonate with the global world as China seeks to create new prospects for openness, cooperation, and economic equality.
Over the last few decades, the services trade landscape has changed drastically, becoming an essential component of international business. However, this expansion has not been uniform, with developing countries frequently encountering difficulties such as limited market access, complex rules, and capacity limits that prevent them from fully participating in international services trade.
Notably, China is committed to promoting inclusive growth in the services trade sector. It assured of taking continuing steps to accelerate Chinese modernization through high-quality development, to open up new avenues for openness and collaboration for all countries.
Through openness, cooperation, innovation, and shared services, China emphasized the need for inclusive growth and connectivity. Recognizing that a rising tide in services trade should raise all boats, particularly those from nations with limited resources, China has launched a series of ground-breaking initiatives. Additionally, China is actively expanding its network of high-standard free trade areas, participating in negotiations on the negative list for trade in services and investment.
China is setting an example by aligning its policies with international standards. President Xi highlighted in his speech that national integrated demonstration zones for increased openness in the services sector, suitable pilot free trade zones, and free trade ports will be at the forefront of aligning policies with high-standard international economic and trade regulations. These zones demonstrate China’s commitment to fostering an atmosphere conducive to international cooperation and growth.
Real-world examples vividly demonstrate the practical impact of China’s assistance to developing countries in the services trade. China’s investments in transport infrastructure, such as the Standard Gauge Railway, have considerably facilitated the flow of goods and people in Kenya, boosting the services sector indirectly.
Pakistan’s experience with the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) is similar, with improved physical connectivity catalyzing the expansion of digital services and e-commerce. Various infrastructure developments in Indonesia have resulted in spectacular advances, opening up new potential for services trade.
Ethiopia, too, has reaped the benefits of China’s commitment, with active participation in industrial parks reviving the services sector, which includes logistics, banking, and education. These real-life success stories highlight China’s critical role in facilitating the expansion and development of services trade in developing countries.
China’s commitment to capacity building and technical aid is critical in its support for developing countries in the services trade. China provides these countries with the knowledge and skills they need to participate effectively in the services trade by offering specialized programs. Furthermore, China’s significant investments in infrastructure projects such as ports, logistical hubs, and telecommunications networks play an important role in facilitating the smooth flow of services.
Furthermore, China’s commitment to reducing entry barriers and optimizing regulations indicates the country’s persistent commitment to creating an equitable environment. This approach not only promotes equitable possibilities but also simplifies market access, making it easier for developing countries to export their services to China’s enormous and dynamic market.
Furthermore, China gives significant financial support in the form of loans and grants for service trade-related initiatives, recognizing the financial problems that many developing countries confront. This financial assistance enables nations to overcome economic challenges and invest in the expansion and improvement of their service sectors, thereby encouraging economic equality and cooperation.
As the world continues to evolve, services trade will play an increasingly important role in global economic growth, and China’s leadership in this realm is helping to shape a future where opportunities are shared, disparities are reduced, and cooperation knows no bounds. It is a vision worthy of appreciation and support since it is consistent with the ideals of justice and equality, moving the globe closer to a more linked and wealthy global community.
The recent G20 Summit in India has once again taken center stage, attracting global attention as it gathered together leaders and delegates from the world’s 20 most powerful economies. This high-profile event was significant in shaping international relations and addressing serious global concerns due to its broad presence and crucial talks. This high-stakes gathering occurs at a pivotal juncture, marked by escalating divisions among major powers on a multitude of pressing global issues, including the Russia-Ukraine conflict, global economic recovery, food security, and climate change.
The recent inclusion of the African Union (AU) as a permanent member within the G20 serves as a positive signal, signifying consensus among major economies. However, lurking concerns persist about the formidable challenges involved in achieving unity and issuing a joint declaration in the midst of these complex global dynamics.
Chinese Premier Li Qiang’s opening remarks at the 18th G20 Summit in New Delhi resonate as he underscores the paramount importance of unity and collaboration among G20 member nations. He emphasizes the critical need for effective coordination of macroeconomic policies to restore hope and generate momentum for long-term economic growth.
Premier Li eloquently highlights the interconnectedness of humanity’s destiny and calls upon nations to demonstrate mutual respect, seek common ground while momentarily setting aside differences, and work tirelessly towards peaceful coexistence. In a world characterized by profound crises and shared hardships, he aptly observes that no nation can thrive in isolation. Therefore, the only plausible pathways for guiding humanity forward are those rooted in cooperation and harmony.
The G20, originally established to navigate global financial crises and forge collective strategies for addressing economic challenges while fostering global economic development, has, regrettably, experienced a decline in consensus and a rise in differences among major powers. This shift has been particularly evident since the onset of the Ukraine crisis and the United States’ strategy of containment against China. Consequently, the G20 is increasingly devolving into a forum marked by discord, rather than the once-productive and constructive multilateral mechanism it was intended to be.
Nevertheless, the G20 retains its significance as a pivotal forum for international collaboration in confronting global challenges. With the increasing contributions of developing nations like China, India, and African countries, the voices within the G20 have diversified, no longer solely dominated by Western perspectives. As a response, the United States seeks to regain control of the multilateral process to further its agenda of great power competition. However, this approach is unlikely to be warmly received by the broader international community.
China remains steadfast in its commitment to deepen reforms and open up further to foster high-quality development and its unique brand of modernization. China views itself as a catalyst for additional momentum in global economic recovery and sustainable development. China stands ready to collaborate with all stakeholders to contribute to the well-being of our shared Earth, our common home, and the future of humanity. Despite Western media’s attempts to sensationalize China’s stance and magnify perceived differences, China continues to play a constructive role within the G20, dedicated to its multilateral mission.
To ensure that the G20 remains a platform focused on global governance rather than being overshadowed by geopolitical conflicts, China remains determined to fulfill its constructive role within the group, regardless of attempts by Western powers to politicize the mechanism. China’s efforts have expanded the G20 to include the African Union, effectively transforming it into the “G21.” China was the first nation to endorse African Union membership in the G20 and advocates for the African Union to assume an even more significant role in international governance.
The growing divisions and disputes within the G20 have eroded its effectiveness as a platform for addressing global challenges. These divisions, primarily driven by American actions and policies, have spawned tensions with far-reaching global implications, from the Ukraine crisis to escalating tensions in the Asia-Pacific region, particularly in the Taiwan Straits and the South China Sea. These developments underscore the critical role the G20 plays in promoting cooperation and unity.
Amid the current geopolitical landscape characterized by major powers’ divisions, tensions have surged, resonating globally and causing ripple effects. From the Ukraine crisis to tensions in the Asia-Pacific region, particularly in the Taiwan Straits and the South China Sea, the significance of the G20’s role in fostering cooperation and unity cannot be overstated.
All G20 member nations must recognize the urgent imperative of cooperation in building a world that is safer, more prosperous, and increasingly peaceful. Given the global challenges that transcend narrow national interests, effective responses can only be crafted through international cooperation. The G20 stands as a pivotal arena for this cooperation, with China’s positive contribution being indispensable in promoting cohesion.
Despite Western media’s efforts to sensationalize China’s position and magnify perceived gaps, China remains a committed multilateral partner within the G20, dedicated to constructive engagement. The G20 continues to serve as a critical platform for addressing global concerns, fostering unity, and promoting international collaboration. As the world grapples with intricate issues, it remains imperative that nations adhere to the principles of multilateralism and collaborate relentlessly to secure a more prosperous, peaceful, and sustainable future for all.
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