The West needs to brace for the Great Reset as new voices challenge the established world order

China’s rise and America’s failings have shifted world opinion and set the scene for Asia and the rest to clash with the US and Europe over ideologies and values
As geopolitical tensions rise, a Hong Kong used to Western voices will benefit by more deeply understanding Asian perspectives

Christine Loh

Published: 9:15am, 9 Sep, 2022

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We have entered the Age of the Great Reset. We are likely to come out at the other end with a world quite different from the one we have become used to. Let’s hope it will be a better one.

The perspectives of non-Western experiences are increasingly being articulated and heard, and new voices are challenging the dominant narratives.

History can explain the collision of ideologies and values between the East and West, and between the North and South.

The second world war was followed by a period of decolonisation in the Asia-Pacific and Africa between 1945 and the 1970s. Many new nations struggled to establish stability after long periods of imperial rule when their land, resources and labour were exploited.

Civil war broke out in China after Japan was defeated. Just as in much of Asia, Chinese people were dirt poor when the People’s Republic was created in 1949 and they remained among the poorest in the world until relatively recently.

The era of decolonisation coincided with the Cold War, a period of intense rivalry between the United States and Soviet Union. America was wary of Soviet communism and its expansion, and the USSR resented the US for its policy of containment to check its power.

The Cold War may be said to have ended with the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. The dominant narrative then was that the superiority of the American democratic-capitalist system enabled the US to “win” because it could outdo the Soviets in amassing weaponry and generating material wealth.

Asia has become a fast-growing economic region. It’s advancement has been a result of improving education of the people, integrating Asian economies into the global system through export production, and strengthening the capacity of public institutions.

African countries have been making strides too, especially since 2000, in their socio-economic advancement and governance performance.

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Top Chinese diplomat tours East Africa to promote peace, ensure stability for belt and road allies

As a result of the progress being made in these parts of the world, diverse perspectives about ideologies and values, as well as how countries are conducting their international affairs, have come to the fore.

The US has been forcing the pace of the Age of the Great Reset. Its seemingly orderly governing system and successful market-capitalist economic and financial systems used to be seen as the model to emulate. That has changed.

The US invasion of Iraq in 2003 and the financial crisis of 2008 may be seen as watershed moments that started to shift world opinion.

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More than 100 lavish palaces and villas of Iraq’s former dictator Saddam Hussein lie in ruins

The claimed intent of the Americans was to free Iraqis from their authoritarian leader, and Iraq supposedly had weapons of mass destruction that endangered the world. However, Iraq did not possess such weapons – the claim was later exposed as a lie – and the US actions destabilised not only Iraq but the Middle East as a whole.

The 2008 financial crisis gave rise to doubts and a distrust of Western financial practices, and exposed the weaknesses, especially of the American regulatory and supervisory systems.

Hank Paulson, former head of the US Treasury, wrote in his book that Wang Qishan – now China’s vice-president – said to him in June 2008 that perhaps the Chinese didn’t have much to learn about finance from America any more.

Fast forward to today, and how the world sees Russia and the Ukraine war provides a good example of the difference in perspectives between the East and West, the North and South.

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Putin tells pupils why Russian troops are in Ukraine in a speech to open school year

Last June, when asked why Europe should stick up for India if China were to present a challenge, if New Delhi didn’t take a tough stance on Russia now, India’s external affairs minister S. Jaishankar provided a harsh retort: “That’s not how the world works.”

He stressed that India’s problems with China had nothing to do with Russia and Ukraine. And he told Europe to grow out of the mindset that its problems were the world’s problems, but the world’s problems were not Europe’s problems.

The West is unused to hearing such forceful, disagreeing non-Western voices. China is much criticised for what the Western media calls “Wolf Warrior” diplomacy. It is a convenient label for China’s more assertive and combative style in recent years.

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How can China and US stop stumbling towards war? David Shambaugh on Talking Post with Yonden Lhatoo

The pace of the reset is being framed today in simplistic terms – that democracies must fight autocracies, with the US leading the charge together with its Group of 7 allies, and that the “rule-based international order” must be maintained.

That narrative may resonate in the West and North – but not necessarily in the East and South. This can be seen with the G20 meeting scheduled for mid-November – host country Indonesia has insisted that Russia and its leader, Vladimir Putin, should not be excluded from the gathering.

Hong Kong used to be a spot of the West in the East before 1997 when it was a British colony. The city is used to taking note of the mainly Western voices. Hearing different and opposing voices can be uncomfortable because it forces reflection. Hong Kong will benefit by more deeply understanding Asian perspectives.

The reset also has much to do with the US seeing China as the biggest “ threat” to “democracy and the international order”. It is corralling allies to fight together, and Taiwan has become a stalking horse to goad Beijing.

The reset will continue and it can be unsettling, especially for Hong Kong, if fighting should break out in the neighbourhood. The world needs better angels to cool geopolitical tensions.

Christine Loh, a former undersecretary for the environment, is an adjunct professor at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology