My Take | Tomayto or tomahto? You say decoupling, but I say de-risking
- Washington’s economic warfare may or may not work against Beijing, but it is already hurting allies as the US dictates to them what to de-risk
De-risking or decoupling? It’s hard to tell the difference, or what they mean in the first place. Some publications have gone to great lengths to explain their different meanings and subtle nuances. I would argue it’s precisely because of their malleability in meaning, or rather meaninglessness, that Western politicians have been happy to keep using them to give the appearance of seriousness when they are saying nothing.
That’s the whole point of jargons, or bureaucratese. They are either meaningless or you can make them mean whatever you want; it’s great for deniability and unaccountability.
So far as I can tell, if a Western politician wants to push for a hard line against China, she says “decoupling”. If she wants to sound more moderate, it’s “de-risking”.
Perhaps we can use an analogy from investment. Decoupling means cashing out your whole portfolio; de-risking means selling what you consider the riskiest assets, say, deleveraging on your margins.
European leaders such as Ursula von der Leyen and Annalena Baerbock have been selling de-risking as the policy to deal with China. The Americans, who for a long time declared decoupling was the only way to contain the Chinese bogeyman, have suddenly decided to follow European usage.
A substantial change in policy? I doubt it. It just sounds less belligerent; the underlying hostility remains.
And so National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said this week that his boss, President Joe Biden, sought de-risking but not decoupling from China.