h/t Instapundit
[Business Insider] - Crises always have a habit of clarifying things. The coronavirus crisis is no different.
Once a treatment for the virus has been found, the debates about shutdown and easing restrictions have passed, and the recession has reared its ugly head, nothing less than the world order itself must be clarified. Or to be more specific: the matter of alliance. Where does Europe stand? On the side of the US or China?
Let us first look at a few assumptions and a few facts. America, the democratic world power, is currently governed by a narcissistic president — a man seen to be vulgar, uneducated, and with a volatile character who lacks any sense whatsoever for institutions. Half of Americans and three quarters of Europeans have no respect for him.
And yet, whether by accident, thanks to good advisers or a keen instinct, this president has managed to make some correct decisions. He lowered taxes to stabilize the US economy, withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal, supported Israel, increased pressure on Europe to show more solidarity in NATO funding, and pressured the dysfunctional WHO.
China, on the other hand, the non-democratic world power, is currently controlled by a president with a measured vanity — a man who is supposedly sensitive, highly educated and cultivated, a personality who thinks and acts with a highly consistent and long-term perspective demonstrating great sensibility for the interests of China's unitary state.
And because Xi Jinping is said to look a little like Winnie the Pooh, the bear from the eponymous children's book, Chinese censorship forbids the use of either the name or the image of Winnie Pooh. Anyone who explicitly criticizes the government is punished.
Xi Jinping has been General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party and Chairman of the Central Military Commission since 2012, and President of the People's Republic of China since 2013. In 2018, he lifted all limitations on his term of office, meaning he could continue to rule China for life.
He is a politician who, more than anything else, has continued and accelerated the economic reforms that were first introduced by Deng Xiaoping in the 1970s and reached new dimensions under Jiang Zemin. And thanks to tightened digital surveillance, he has been able to push China towards a position of global dominance as part of a seemingly friendly and peaceful international expansion.
The key date of this strategy is December 11, 2001, when China was accepted as a full member of the WTO following 15 years of negotiations. A great decision for China. But perhaps the biggest mistake made in recent history by the western market economies.
Since then, the US's share in the gross world product (GWP) dropped from 20.18% in 2001 to 15.03% (2019). Europe's share dropped from 23.5% to 16.05%, a drop of 7.45 percentage points in less than two decades. While China's share increased from 7.84% to 19.24% in the same period, with an average annual growth rate of around 9%.
The big mistake was to expose democratic market economies to a non-democratic state capitalism that exploits easier trading and competitive conditions without subjecting itself to the same rules. Asymmetry instead of reciprocity was the result.
The process of "change through trade" actually did take place. However, not quite in the way expected by the West. China has become even more authoritarian and economically stronger, while the West has become weaker.
What is our conclusion from all this? America has clearly decided to pursue a policy of 'decoupling' from China. If Europe does not want to see its freedom subverted by Beijing, it must decide which of the two countries to ally with, and it must do so soon.
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