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The above title is of a new captivating book by Kishore Mahbubani, a professor in the practice of public policy at the National University of Singapore. He is also the author of other books including; Has the West Lost It? And The Great Convergence: Asia, the West and the Logic of One World, plus other tittles. Mahbubani has been listed among the world’s top public intellectuals by Foreign Policy and Prospect magazines, and also among the top individuals who would shape the debate on the future of capitalism by the Financial Times.
Kishore takes a look at the two superpowers; US and China, their relationship and the impact both domestically and on the world stage geopolitics, and observes that the geopolitical contest is both inevitable but avoidable.
On US positioning in the world arena, He argues that the US has become over-reliant on military muscle and entangled in perpetual wars in the Middle East. “The US may account for half of global defence spending, but how much use is its military hardware in a software age? US aircraft carriers, which can cost up to $13bn to build, can be easily sunk by one of China’s DF-26 missiles, costing a few hundred thousand dollars”, Kishore writes.
The author goes on to say that, the long two-thousand-year record of Chinese history clearly shows that China is fundamentally unlike America as it is reluctant to use the military option first. It is also fundamentally different from America in another regard. It does not believe that it has a “universal” mission to promote Chinese civilization and encourage everyone else in humanity to emulate it.
On the social and economic model of the US, the author notes that the social and economic model of Unites States has stopped delivering for most of its people.
“America is the only developed society where the average income of the bottom 50 per cent of the population has gone down over the past 30 years. In the same period, the Chinese people have experienced the greatest improvement in their standard of living ever seen in Chinese history,” he writes.
The former Singaporean diplomat adds that US politics has been captured by a short-sighted plutocracy that would not survive long if the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, criminalizing bribery of officials abroad, applied at home. In the past 30 years the Chinese people have experienced the greatest improvement in their standard of living ever seen in Chinese history, he writes.
Commenting on the book and the relationship of US and China, Martin Wolf, Chief Economics Commentator at the Financial Times says that, “Humanity desperately needs these superpowers to co-operate’’. Although this golden wish may not be realized soon, Mahbubani, argues that the endless friction between the two powers are more likely to put the US in a severe disadvantage, “not so much because of China’s inherent superiority, but rather because of US mistakes, not least a failure to grasp the Chinese reality.”
The author, talks about the image of America under president Trump compared to China. In his view, “While China projects an image of being a stable and predictable member of the global multilateral order, America, under Trump, is increasingly perceived as a chaotic and unpredictable actor. In the Western mind, any undemocratic political system that deprives citizens the ability to choose or remove a leader is by definition evil.”
On the other hand, Kishore says that, while Chinese leaders want to rejuvenate Chinese civilization, they have no missionary impulse to take over the world and make everyone Chinese. China’s role and influence in the world will certainly grow along with the size of its economy. Yet, it will not use its influence to change the ideologies or political practices of other societies. “Two thousand years of Chinese history have created a strategic culture that advises against fighting unnecessary wars in distant places. The likelihood therefore is that, while China’s strategic weight and influence in the world will grow significantly, it will not behave as an aggressive and belligerent military power,” Kishore states in his book.
He also pauses a question whether America’s primary goal is that of improving the livelihood of its 330 million citizens or to preserve its primacy in the international system, and if there are contradictions between the goals of preserving primacy and improving well-being, which should take priority?
On the part of China the author gives the view that the primary goal of China’s leadership is to preserve peace and harmony among 1.4 billion people in China, and not try to influence the lives of the 6 billion people who live outside China.
The author’s piece of advice to the Chinese people, is that they need to realize that it serves China’s long-term strategic interests to continue opening up the economy even while the Trump administration has been creating more difficulties for foreign businesses to either invest or export to America. Over time, he says, this will mean more countries will be trading and investing more with China than with America.
When China built walls and cut off communication with the rest of the world, it fell behind. When China opened up to the world, it thrived. To guarantee its continued long-term success, China should completely abandon its two-thousand-year-old Middle Kingdom mentality and decide to become the most open society in terms of economic engagement with the rest of the world.
Kishore, further notes that the common cause of the massive blindness of the Chinese officials in the nineteenth century was a huge Chinese philosophical assumption that China was a great self-sufficient Middle Kingdom that did not need to engage the world. As the Chinese emperor Qianlong famously told Lord Macartney, China had everything it needed. It didn’t need the rest of the world. That painful century of humiliation finally led to China opening up.”
While comparing the political systems of US and China, the author says that, “Americans hold sacrosanct the ideals of freedom of speech, press, assembly, and religion and also believe that every human being is entitled to the same fundamental human rights. The Chinese believe that social needs and social harmony are more important than individual needs and rights and that the prevention of chaos and turbulence is the main goal of governance.”
David M. Lampton, Professor Emeritus at John Hopkins-SAIS, says that Americans should heed Kishore Mahbubani’s astringent advice, unwelcome as it may be, and, “Cast away illusions about eternal U.S. primacy and exceptional virtue protected by high walls. Instead, Washington should adopt a long-term international strategy anchored in balance and cooperation; reestablish sound internal leadership and governance; win friends abroad instead of driving allies away; avoid over-commitment; and express moral modesty. Military power is not the most important weapon in the Arsenal of Democracy.”
Chinese communism is not a threat to American democracy. Instead, the success and competitiveness of the Chinese economy and society is the real challenge, Kishore observes. In his recent article, “Why the Trump administration has helped China”, published in, The National Interest, an international affairs magazine owned by the Washington based public policy think tank, Kishore Mahbubani, argues that the Trump administration has been the most aggravating administration that China has had to deal with since the normalization process that Henry Kissinger began in 1971.
Kishore takes on the US administration by giving examples of the mishandling the COVID-19 pandemic and the death of George Floyd as critical issues that raised the stature of China, which is now perceived as the more competent country in the world. The Trump administration has no thoughtful, comprehensive and Long-term strategy to manage an ever-rising China, Kishore wrote, nor has it heeded the wise advice of key strategic thinkers, like Kissinger or George Kennan. Mahbubani’s key observation on US foreign policy on China, is that the USA does not have a coherent strategy for dealing with the rise of China.
Africa-China Review Editorial