3 August 2023
China
Could you rule it?
By Robert Kilconner
Imagine, for the moment, that you ruled China. No, not the Victorian China of the emperors, but the modern China we read about in our daily newspapers. Of course, if you happen to be President Xi reading this you will not have to do any imagining at all, but, for the rest of you, run a hot bath, close your eyes, let your imagination run riot and reflect on the political position generally.
What you will see is a vacuum. Well actually you won’t, because a vacuum is not the sort of thing you see, but you will become aware that it’s there. This particular vacuum is a vacuum of power. Following the last war there were two great hegemons, the US and the Soviets, and the second in its current form of Russia is now clearly in decline. Whatever you think of President Putin, the ideas he once entertained of working beside the Americans to dominate the international stage have clearly died and for the moment at least his country seems to be set on a path of diminishing influence. So who is stepping into the gap? Why, China of course. After years of strategic investment and the development of manufacturing capacity, it has lifted itself to the top rank of economic powers and is in the process of converting that status into a military and political one. As the soap suds rise around your toes you devise your plan for the “great leap forward” which will achieve this.
The starting point, of course, must be to define what it is you are trying to achieve. Colonisation is very much last year’s game and has become harder to achieve as information technology carries news and ideas down to the colonised. What about proxy regimes, then? Regimes which jump at Beijing’s call and yet have some discretion in the running of their countries. That sounds more like it but it has two shortcomings as a system. First, what happens when the puppet regimes are ousted? Does your influence go too? Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, it gives you little influence over the rest of the world and nowadays policies in one country increasingly affect conditions in another. Further cutting of trees in the Amazon may mean appalling heatwaves in central China.
No, neo colonisation won’t wash – oh yes, a little more warm water, perhaps – but what about colonising issues rather than land? After this year’s weather it must be dawning on the US population, as well as on that of the rest of the world, that unless real welly is put into environmental policies, much of the world will become uninhabitable. Suppose that China and the US took a joint stance on the topic, no NIMBYs, no democratic crap but the two greatest powers on earth laying down a plan to deal with the issue. Of course there would have to be fig leaves for other governments, committees of this and that stuffed with Europeans, Indians, Africans and everyone else. In in the end, however, the shots would be agreed by a committee of two. Could such an arrangement work?
Until recently one would have said not. Such an intrusion on sovereignty would be unthinkable. But then, up to now panic has not really broken out over environmental matters and countries have to be panic-driven to accept such a change. Still, environmental issues are rapidly forcing themselves up the agenda and soon a dictatorship of the environment run by two great hegemons might be widely accepted as a better alternative to burning alive. Why not go for it then? Why not seek to use this central issue to put China in its place at the centre? The very urgency of the issue would answer those who say that they would not do business with countries who oppress minorities or which are run on a dictatorial basis. No, joint world domination on a big an issue like this could well attract international support.
And if that was a success, what about the other “world threatening” issues? Nuclear proliferation for one. Isn’t that an area which is becoming increasingly dangerous and where new “super regulation” is required? Then there is the control of pandemics. We have all had a lesson on that one but luckily the virus diluted in its later stages. It could have been very different and next time it may, unless some joint authority has the power to deal with it.
Creep, creep; creep, creep; like the water from your dripping tap the power of the hegemons could drop into the political system. Always working for the good of all and restrained by the need to keep popular support it would still have the muscle to make itself felt. The trouble is that it doesn’t sound very likely.
Oh well, the bath is getting colder now. Time to get out and shiver, but not really a problem. The weather is unseasonably warm for the time of year. What is on the news? A gradual reengagement between the US and China. I wonder why.
