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Macroscope | Cool and calculating China is trying to build up global trade even as things fall apart around the world
- Against Trump’s trade-destroying tactics and a splintering EU, China’s efforts to forge trade pacts and build infrastructure links are constructive, rational and the best chance of surviving a new cold war
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With the United States in the midst of presidential impeachment hearings, Britain locked in self-destructive Brexit combat, the European Union suffering severe internal stresses and Hong Kong seemingly melting down, economic developments have understandably taken a back seat from the viewpoint of world attention.
“Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold; mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,” the Irish poet W.B. Yeats wrote in the aftermath of World War I. If he were alive today, he might lament even more loudly the collapse of global trade, investment and economic cooperation, not to mention growing civil unrest.
But once things begin to settle (unless they escalate into even more vicious conflicts), the need to tackle seemingly more mundane economic issues, such as rebuilding trade, investment and business confidence, will reassert itself and the issue of who is best placed to do this will be of primary importance.
Setting aside for a moment the authoritarian nature of Chinese rule (although key figures in international finance who visited China recently suggest that growing internal stresses there cannot be ignored), the Beijing government at least appears to be following a rational economic game plan.
It would be bold or rash to suggest that this plan can materialise when there is turbulence all around. But in comparison with a US that seems to have lost its economic and political bearings and an EU some argue is disintegrating, China’s cool and calculating approach is vaguely reassuring.
It does not take a China apologist to appreciate the logic of Beijing’s external economic policies, especially with regard to the Belt and Road Initiative and related developments. Assuming that the world does not go completely mad, this logic seems likely to assert itself once the smoke clears.
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