Could Joe Biden put a world divided by Donald Trump back together again?
- Suggestions that the Sinosphere and the Amerisphere can coexist separately and should be left to their own devices are dangerous and naive. With the global economy in a precarious position, Biden must restore worldwide collective action if he wins the presidential election
Fortunately, there have been some quite promising auguries from the Biden camp in this regard. His advisers have reportedly said they would prioritise domestic issues to enable the US to compete with China from a position of economic strength rather attack it on trade and other fronts.
This is precisely the kind of “make America grow again” approach that has been advocated on many occasions in this column as an alternative to Trump’s more destructive “make America great again” by cutting off its rivals’ legs (figuratively speaking).
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“I don’t think the question is who’s tough or who’s weak on China,” former US deputy secretary of state Tony Blinken said. “The question is who has the most effective strategy to protect and advance [US] prosperity, values and security.”
That makes good, constructive sense and if Biden can practise what his advisers preach, then the chances of a return to sanity in US-China relations look more promising – always assuming that such wise counsel prevails over more foolish and (increasingly) warmongering talk in the Trump camp.
Even so, economic logic doesn’t always dictate political outcomes. The Amerisphere and the Sinosphere continue as of now to pull (or be pushed) further apart, and if the Trump administration endures beyond the presidential election (no minor risk) then the world must brace themselves for the worst.
US failed with China tariffs, should rejoin Pacific trade pact: Obama aide
The impending debt crisis will loom very large at this month’s (virtual) annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank in Washington. As IMF managing director Kristalina Georgieva has bluntly put it, “The world is at a critical juncture and should not sit idle waiting for a crisis.”
This, as Hung Tran, a non-resident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council in Washington has observed, “is an unhealthy state of affairs, undermining the basic tenets, efficiency, and dynamism of a capitalist market economy – basically repeating Japan’s experience of the slow growth decades.”
Once freed of political obligations to pander to voters in middle America, Biden, as president, should view the world and not least the global economy as a Humpty Dumpty not yet shattered by a fall but poised to crash and break into fragments that cannot easily be put back together.
Anthony Rowley is a veteran journalist specialising in Asian economic and financial affairs