Category: CV EN REAL

Context:

Recently, Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the US House of Representatives and the third most powerful US politician, visited Taiwan, despite China's strong opposition and multiple warnings. However, Ming Jinwei believes that Pelosi's visit, whose aim was to boost Taiwan’s separatists’ movement, is an opportunity that enables China to redefine the rules of the game as the rightful response against US aggression and speed up the process of national reunification.

Key points:

• The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) was fully capable of shooting down Pelosi’s plane; but if the plane had been shot down, the consequences could have been a direct military conflict between the US and China and this could have led to World War III. The goal of both the PLA and the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is, first and foremost, the reunification of China without engaging in war with the US. China will only engage with the US militarily should it use force to stop China's reunification.
• Allowing Pelosi's plane to land in Taiwan also showed that China’s focus was not to stop her visit at all costs, but to gain a more favorable strategic position in the military struggle against Taiwan’s separatists’ movement. China’s response to the visit is analogous to its reaction to Japan's so-called nationalization event of the Diaoyu Islands in 2012. In that situation, China's strategy was not to seize the Islands immediately and provoke a war with Japan. Instead, China chose a delayed but more persistent response, which was to send Coast Guard Ships to regularly patrol the Diaoyu Islands’ territorial waters. Using this strategy, China has frequent access to the 12-nautical-miles around the Islands and has defended their right to sovereignty.
• From the moment Pelosi set foot on Chinese territory – Taiwan Province – the rules of the game changed: The so-called "median line of the Taiwan strait" was abolished, as indicated by the six marked locations of the PLA’s military drill. Faced with the increased collusion between the US and Taiwan’s separatists’ movement, China has finally decided to break the tacit agreement and its restraint regarding the "median line".
• China’s unification with Taiwan is one of its key strategic goals, while the US is using the separatists’ movement to disrupt and undermine the speed of China’s development. This implies that the strategic determination and resources with which China and the US can devote to this question are not of the same order of magnitude. Therefore, if one side is a "paper tiger", it must be the US.
• To solve the Taiwan question once and for all, the central government must choose the time best suited to advancing China’s national interests. Many Chinese people may feel stifled during this waiting period. But this is not the first time the central government has had to bide its time to implement the best strategic option. In 2019, during the violent waves in Hong Kong, many clamored for the government to ''clamp down''. However, the central government instead introduced the ''National Security Law'' whose implementation took almost a year but was a definitively strategic response that was much more effective. Thanks to Pelosi’s reckless visit, China now has gained the historic momentum to redefine the rules of the game in the reunification struggle!

Context:

As a result of Pelosi’s insistent visit to Taiwan, the author of the article has identified three main points to which China should pay attention when forming its Taiwan reunification strategy and especially its attitude towards US interference.

Key points:

• First, despite China's repeated stern protests and serious warnings, that Pelosi visited Taiwan indicates that China still lacks sufficient deterrence power in the eyes of the US. Her visit to Taiwan has seriously violated China's core interests, and the country must calmly determine its strategic retaliatory response.
• Second, Pelosi's visit proves that the US may be willing to go to war with China over the Taiwan question. While the US has taken the position that it cannot directly participate militarily in the Ukrainian-Russian conflict due to the risks of nuclear war, some say that the US is afraid of direct military conflict with other nuclear powers. Therefore, it will not challenge China militarily for defending Taiwan. The author says that such a judgment is dangerous and could paralyze China’s combat readiness. China must prepare itself to meet US hostility as it did in the Korean War in resisting the US-led alliance of aggression. The core interest of the US is global hegemony and China is the only country that has the potential to challenge the US on all fronts. So, the future foretells that the US will definitely become increasingly provocative against China, and a group of US allies will follow them down that perilous road.
• Third, as the strategic game between China and the US is deepened in all directions and escalated to higher levels, and with the passing of time, the chance of peaceful reunification is drastically reduced. Pelosi's visit to Taiwan has made it clear that solving the “Taiwan separatist’s question” ultimately will depend only on military force, a decision that cannot be postponed much longer. The US has forced China’s hand and through its naked interference in China’s sovereignty has dictated the military form of reunification.

Context:

The launch of the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment (PGII) at the recent G7 summit is another example of the Biden Administration's relentless push to try to undermine the Chinese-led Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). To fund PGII, the West declared its intention to provide US$600 billion in infrastructure investment to developing countries by 2027. Guancha interviewed Ma Hanzhi about his assessment of PGII’s possible impacts on the African continent.

Key points:

• The PGII’s allocation goal of US$600 billion is more credible than the B3W initiative launched at last year’s G7 summit with an obviously incredulous figure of US$40 trillion. From a funding perspective, PGII has already integrated the US$300 billion promised by the EU’s Global Gateway Initiative, whereby US$150 billion is ear-marked for investments in African projects. Its focus is on four main areas: clean energy, health systems, gender equality, and information and communications technology (ICT). It also demonstrates a more pragmatic approach.
• The US hopes to use PGII as a threshold to compete against the BRI, reshape its soft power position in the global development field, and pave the way for US capital to enter the African market, thus attempting to weaken China's position in the development of infrastructure projects.
• Washington wants to reaffirm its foreign policy with "value-oriented diplomacy", especially in the focus sectors. Under the slogan of "fair and transparent communications technology”, the US is trying to exclude Chinese ICT companies from the African market, so that US technology giants can establish digital hegemony and gain easy access to the data assets in Africa. Overall, this will result in a privatization wave of key public projects, as demonstrated, in recent years, by the “Electricity for Africa Initiative”.
• The key investment pilots announced by PGII are all in Africa, because the continent has a very large potential for investment in the cross-border infrastructure construction market. It also has a particularly large young population, and, in general, its economy is growing rapidly. However, the US mainly focuses on selected countries that are already more structurally developed. This deliberate choice of pilot projects will lead to further aggravation of the regional development gaps.
• The PGII strategy is a direct hedge against China's newly launched Global Development Initiative (GDI). Rather than work with BRI on the four focus areas, the PGII program will force some countries to reject Chinese project proposals, unless they are willing to face different forms of US-led sanctions, including destabilization of government power.
• China should improve its BRI efforts in three ways: 1) to understand and meet the real needs of local people, especially through tangible gains in small scale local projects, 2) to explore and enhance the sustainability of financing tools to reduce the long-term debt burden on African countries, and 3) if manageable, to try to work with some European companies and leverage their expertise in possible cooperation.
• Finally, Africa can choose its own partners for economic development. The US-led West should give up its neocolonial and Cold War mentality of telling and dictating to Africa what it should or should not do. More investments are welcome in Africa, and all parties should shift the focus to generating real benefits and tangible gains from those investments in supporting Africa’s development.

Context:

Fourteen years have passed between the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics and the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics and China's zeitgeist and national mentality have dramatically changed during this period. From Yao’s perspective, the fundamental reasons are threefold: 1) the capitalist world system is undergoing significant economic and political crises; 2) China's position in the world is becoming front and center; and 3) the Chinese people's perception of their own country, the West, and the US in particular, has experienced a dramatic turnaround.

Key points:

• Over the past two centuries, the world system has undergone several structural shifts. The most recent began at the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics, where the world witnessed the amazing achievements of the Chinese people. Around the same time, the biggest global financial crisis since the Great Depression erupted, which deeply undermined confidence in the capitalist system and its liberal values.
• In the first years following 2008, China-US cooperation continued unabated. Chinese elites still held the belief that a rising and prosperous China could be integrated into the so-called international community. However, by 2014, the China-US relationship gradually evolved into a "great power rivalry”. Since the West is afraid of losing its dominant role in the old world order, it shifted its policy from cooperation to containment, and significantly disrupted China’s development agenda.
• China's economic power is also the basis for building cultural and political self-confidence, and since CPC’s 18th National Congress, China has firmly demonstrated the will to continue along the path of socialism. The US political and cultural elites then reversed their policy and advocated a decoupling strategy – both economic and technological. China has turned to a dual circulation development strategy to continue its economic progress. In this way, the Chinese and US economies have, in fact, partially decoupled.
• Developing Marxism within a Chinese context and reviving the “DNA of Chinese culture” – especially the new political interpretation of Confucianism – is emerging as the main direction of intellectual efforts. This demonstrates that China’s academic circle has begun to re-establish its own philosophical foundation for social science disciplines and to “liberate” itself from neoliberal doctrine.
• As the world's largest industrial producer and commodity trading country, China has proposed the Belt and Road Initiative, the concept of a Community of a Shared Future for Humankind, and the Global Development Initiative. A new "developing world system" is taking shape. In opposition to this internationalism, the US is advocating its "America First" agenda, based on racism as the dominant value in both domestic and international policies. This deprives the US of its universal moral appeal and its guardianship of the international order.
• The unipolar, neoliberal capitalist world system is collapsing. In the future, we will see the emergence of two systems: One is the "developing world system" led by China, with equality as its core value and development as its goal, providing the necessary technological and industrial support to the Global South; the other is the shrinking and moribund capitalist system led by the US, striving to safeguard the vested interests of a few developed countries, and exercising its technological and industrial monopoly.
• The post-epidemic era will be marked by a fierce, long-term struggle between the two systems. Only through the Great Struggle that breaks the US-led military, technological, and economic monopoly, can we unite more peoples and countries and light the path forward in building a new form of global human civilization.

Context:

As China ascends economically and politically, its struggle with the US has grown fiercer. Huang Renwei points out the inherent weakness of the US power structure and argues that, starting in 2020 and potentially lasting for the next 30 years, China and the US have entered a strategic stalemate phase that will ebb and flow.

Key points:

• The concept of a "strategic standoff phase" was coined by Mao Zedong in "On Protracted War". Mao’s theory was that the war against Japan consisted of three stages: the Japanese offensive, the Chinese-Japanese strategic stalemate, and the Chinese counter-offensive. However, today's China-US stalemate phase is of a different nature: the strategic competition between China and the US has not yet entered a state of hot war; and China has not set the strategic goal of complete military defeat of the US, but rather, China’s goal is to fight for a just and equal new world order with common prosperity for all countries.
• The reason this relationship is entering a strategic stalemate lies in the so-called “duality” of their respective power structures. The “duality” of the US is characterized by the fact that, on the one hand, the country is undergoing a process of economic and political decline, but on the other hand it is still a relatively strong military power. China's duality is the opposite: it is in a process of ascending, but also showing many weaknesses of its own. The “duality” gradually evolves over time.
• The hegemony of the US dollar has historically greatly benefited US strategic interests. However, the US has overreached with this power and its credibility has been called into question.
• In the next 30 years, China will face the harsh reality that the US-led Western countries will reject and malign China‘s role and participation in the old-world order. China must take the initiative to change the existing international landscape to create a new world-order. It may take generations before such a new system is established.
• Can the US win with this decoupling strategy? It is doubtful, as the US' ability to confront China is both limited and constrained. If the US were to engage in military aggression against China, war related costs would be astronomical. The war could bring a collapse of US financial markets. In the end, the US cannot beat China militarily, provided there is no nuclear war.
• The length of the strategic stalemate phase depends on how quickly the balance of power shifts. It is assumed that the decade between 2030 and 2040 will see a decisive shift in the global power balance as China's economy, measured in GDP, surpasses the US. Huang believes that in the decade between 2040 and 2050, China will catch up with the US in the areas of science and technology.
• He also believes that in this strategic stalemate phase, the US will make greater use of its soft power advantages, whose cost-benefit ratio far exceeds that of hard power confrontation. Thus, the intensity of the US-China soft power competition is expected to take center stage.

Context:

The 25th anniversary of Hong Kong's reunification is the midpoint in the 50 years’ “one country, two systems” principle. This is a new chapter in the reformation of the government and legislative council according to the new election regulations. However, separatist incidents like "Occupy Central" in 2014 and the “Violent Waves” in 2019 that blocked the city’s functioning for months, require us to reflect on the past and look forward to the future.

Key points:

• In 1997, when Hong Kong’s sovereignty was rightfully returned to the People’s Republic of China, the central government in Beijing was very concerned about maintaining the stability of Hong Kong society. Consequently, it decided that the entire government structure and its civil servant personnel system would remain unchanged. A few years prior to the handover, the political forces representing the “old colonial” rulers, introduced a so-called political democratic system, fracturing the political parties and complicating the election process for the Hong Kong’s Chief Executive and legislative council members’ appointment. This was a fundamental change for the once only commercially-oriented island. These changes laid the groundwork for the polarization of the past 25 years. Last year, the central government proposed and implemented new changes to the election process, which secured the Hong Kong government’s political alignment.
• There has been heated debate in Hong Kong and in Beijing on whether the central government should intervene in Hong Kong’s local political affairs. In the early days, after the handover of Hong Kong, Beijing restricted itself to a policy of “non-intervention”. History has shown, however, that this cautious policy couldn’t prevent the anti-central government and separatist activities. This even led to the large-scale outburst of the “Violent Waves” separatist movement in 2019 that stopped the functioning of the city for months. After the 2019 riots, the central government finally intervened. It changed the national security law and equipped police and law enforcement agencies with new tools to expedite the filing of charges against individuals in the separatist movement and to incarcerate them when appropriate. It also changed the electoral system, ensuring that only people who were proven to be loyal and patriotic could run for political office. The interventions helped the people of Hong Kong understand the central government's positive role in local political affairs.
• The “one country, two systems" principle allows Hong Kong to operate under a capitalist system for 50 years in order to maximize its unique location as a free port city and in so doing provide value to the socialist construction of the mainland. Shao believes that the policy of “one country, two systems" has not caused the island’s problems, rather, it was the antagonistic political forces opposing the intervention of the central government who were responsible for the political disruptions. Very recently, Xi Jinping asked the CPC to study this concept thoroughly, because it could also provide the transitory political framework when, in the future, the Taiwan Island is unified with the mainland. According to Shao, 2047 may not be the end of "one country, two systems" if its vitality and superiority can be proven by praxis.

Context:
In the new era, beginning in 2013, young, grassroots cadres across China are moving in a positive direction as exemplified by their proactivity and work among the people. However, the road to getting promoted to higher positions is not always easy, as some cadres still struggle with thoughts of “self-protection” and “blame avoidance”. Yang Hua’s investigatory report looks into the promotion process of young cadres and their new understanding of what it entails

Key points:

• Before the 18th Communist Party of China (CPC) National Congress in late 2012, the dominant perspective of young cadres was that the “personal relationship” factor within the Party’s ranks was considered the first determinant for successful promotion in some regions of China. Although it may not be completely true in the overall promotion process, this perception made hard-working cadres that were not promoted feel aggrieved and disappointed, and led to many complaints.
• After the 18th CPC National Congress, the personnel selection and appointment mechanism was corrected through a series of initiatives launched by the CPC's Central Committee that reshaped the internal political climate of the Party and the government.
• The environment for young cadres’ development has improved significantly in the following four ways: 1) Unit (单位 dānwèi) or branch leaders took the initiative to build a positive and united working atmosphere for young cadres to work together and cooperate closely. 2) Unit or branch leaders intentionally built a development mechanism within which young cadres can grow and be more carefully mentored. 3) Unit leaders frequently pay attention to young cadres’ work, life, learning, and development. 4) Competency and work attitude are regarded as the only criteria for personnel selection and appointment, which generates a new environment and new thinking – if you work hard, you will have a chance for promotion.
• Since 2000, young, grassroots cadres born in the 1980s and 1990s, have been promoted to many leadership positions. They are thoughtful, experienced, energetic, and ambitious, but still feel a lot of pressure stemming from assuming misplaced “political accountability”, a requirement that is often projected onto the young cadres.
• According to the survey conducted by Yang, in certain regions, young cadres feel demoralized by this misplaced accountability; some said in the survey interview that it felt like a kind of Sword of Damocles that could fall at any time: If your efforts cannot deliver the expected results, you may be replaced, relocated, and downgraded very soon.
• Usually, this demoralizing pressure stems from the following four erroneous practices: 1) Rights and responsibilities are often mismatched. 2) Sometimes, there are too many so-called “must win” tasks given to grassroots cadres: any failed task means the cadre is not promoted and is possibly downgraded. 3) The accountability mechanism may be abused by more senior cadres, who are used to shifting the burden and blaming their subordinates. 4) Grassroots cadres could be burned-out by requests to accomplish all their tasks at the highest level of quality.

Context:

The trade frictions in the world all center around the manufacturing sector. Over the past five years, the trade war between China and the US has intensified and will continue to escalate further. Yan Peng offers a point of view based on a historical analysis of events: The bedrock of US political hegemony was a strong manufacturing sector. In recent decades, US manufacturing has shown an irreversible decline, despite government efforts to revive it. This decline has become one of the important sources for today’s global political and economic tensions.

Editor's note: While the author has pointed out how competitive weakness has contributed to the decline of US manufacturing, a deeper analysis of the rules that govern production in the age of imperialism is needed. Since the mid-1990s, with the dominance of finance capital’s drive to maximize profits, US imperialism accelerated the move of their industrial base overseas, especially to the Global South and to China in particular. In parallel, there were other factors at play: productivity gains eliminated many jobs in the US and the lack of manufacturing investment resulted from finance capital investing where profits were greatest.

Key points:

• As a result of their inability to manufacture basic necessities during the Independence War from Great Britain, American military and political leaders quickly learned the vital importance of having a strong manufacturing sector that could supply strategic materials and manufactured goods. Thus, "The American Production System” was born, first developed by the military, and then introduced into the American industrial sector where it continued to develop.
• The "The American System" has two connotations: the first refers to 19th century US economic protectionist ideas and policy practices against British free trade, known as the "Institutional American system"; the second refers to the rise of the 19th century US manufacturing system of mass production.
• Mechanization of mass production – a standardized production system based on interchangeable parts and modules – is one of the main characteristics in the evolution of US manufacturing.
• The military and political hegemony achieved by the US after World War II became, over time, a paradox for US manufacturing. To maintain their political hegemony, the US was forced to make economic concessions to its allies, opening up its domestic market to the allies’ manufactured goods. As a result, foreign competitors gained greater market share and this contributed to the decline in such industries as auto, steel, and machine tools.
• The US, however, maintained its innovative and long-term leadership in the military, aerospace, and electronic information industries, which generated high profit margins by leveraging the large amount of accumulated knowledge capital.
• For the US government, the problems of unemployment, the loss of skilled workers, a lack of self-sufficiency in defence-strategic goods, and the deterioration of regional economies brought about by the decline of domestic manufacturing are severe. Since the 1980s, the US has been waging trade wars, first against its allies and then against emerging developing powers.
• The economic contradictions within the US, represent an important reason why the world political and economic order has entered an era of conflict and turmoil, which US hegemonic power is unable to resolve.

Context:

During his visit to Tokyo in late May, Biden affirmed that the US would defend Taiwan if it were attacked by China. This apparent gaffe sparked debate about whether the US is shifting away from its long-standing policy on Taiwan. However, it was not the first time Biden “unintentionally” sent the wrong signal on the Taiwan issue. The author suggests that Biden's repeated "gaffes" need to be taken seriously, but any intention that is in opposition to the One-China Principle cannot survive.

Key points:

• Despite the fact that the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has three aircraft carriers and more ships than the US Navy, Biden still persists in provoking a potential war with China, as opposed to his attitude toward Russia, which is to avoid direct conflict. The reason for this is likely rooted in the fact that Moscow has threatened NATO with nuclear attacks, while Beijing vows it would never be the first to use nuclear weapons under any circumstances. If it is true, Beijing might have to shift its official military doctrine from a “small and effective” nuclear arsenal to a large-scale one, to theoretically enable an effective retaliatory second strike after surviving the enemy’s first strike.
• Biden’s apparent gaffe in Tokyo – the third in nine months – would seem to signal a burgeoning US policy of “strategic clarity” on the Taiwan issue, a shift from its decades-old policy of “strategic ambiguity”. Nevertheless, China has strong confidence in the eventual reunification with Taiwan, demonstrated by its 2022 defense budget, which is within 2 percent of GDP, as it has been in recent years.
• According to China’s 2005 Anti-Secession Law, which declared that any separatist action by Taiwan is illegal and punishable, the government would never allow "Taiwan Independence". The possibility of the country resorting to non-peaceful means in its attempt to reunify with Taiwan exists only because, in the past few years, Washington has been trying repeatedly to create “incidents” to impede the mainland’s efforts for peaceful reunification. The “incidents” have given Beijing a good reason to suspect Washington is only paying lip service to its “one China” pledge.
• The reunification with Taiwan represents one of China’s core interests. This means that the PLA cannot afford to lose in a war fighting for China’s sovereignty. The PLA will be prepared for any intended conflicts led by the US in the Taiwan Strait and fight to the very end to stop Taiwanese secession.

Context:

Currently, the world economy is facing downward pressure and China's domestic economic development is confronting many challenges. In his speech at the 2022 Global Venture Capital Conference, Eric Li discussed the characteristics of China’s new economy’s development in the first two decades of the 21^st century and what changes are expected for the following two.

Key Points:

• The first phase of the new economy’s development was from 2000 to 2019 and was characterized by less state regulation of capital, meaning the state supported rapid economic growth and capital grew with the expanded economic scale; however, investment in research and development grew relatively slowly. The new digital economy was driven less by technology and more by maximizing the external benefits created by the socialist state, such as the increase in people’s disposable income, the improvement in logistics and transportation, and the expansion of the digital information infrastructure. The state had to absorb all the societal negative social impacts including the widening income gap.
• Starting in 2020, the new economy has been characterized by significantly greater state regulation of capital, meaning that both the investment industry and business owners of the new economy should follow the state-defined principles of promoting “quality development” and the "inclusive society".
• Eric Li suggests that investments in this new period should focus on three main priorities: 1) smart optimization of the supply chain, 2) import substitution of foreign-made technologies, especially in areas like industry-specific chip manufacturing, and 3) sustainable development, especially in those technologies facilitating the use of green energy.
• The Chinese investment industry should not blindly pursue the finance-driven game in the new economy. They should pay attention to the qualitative development of the economy, based on a deeper understanding of the entire supply chain.
• Business owners, and especially the investment decision makers, should closely align the benefits of their investment returns with the interests of the country and the well-being of the people and contribute to the sound development of the socialist market economy.

Context

Since the beginning of the 2018 US-China trade war, Western countries have sought to decouple from China in terms of economic, technological, and people-to-people exchanges. According to Cheng Yawen, the recent Russian-Ukrainian conflict marks the end of the US-led globalization wave. Facing the possibility of full decoupling by the West in the future, China urgently needs to make a new choice in its diplomatic and strategic priorities to downgrade the importance of Europe and the US and to promote a new international system based on South-South cooperation.

Key points

• The explicit rule of the international order is the principle of the sovereign equality of states, but the center-periphery hierarchy of the West has been perpetuated as an implicit rule. China and Russia, because of their strict capital controls, are the last two obstacles to further U.S. control of the global periphery, and are, therefore, subject to focused Western repression.
• Beginning in the 20th century, China and other Asian countries, and African and Latin American countries have supported and assisted each other in resisting colonial rule and nation building. China actively participated in the Bandung Conference and introduced the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence in 1955, which were echoed by Asian, African, and Latin American countries. After the reform and opening up in 1979, China has been committed to cooperating with all countries, forming a partnership strategy of "major western powers are the key, neighboring countries are receiving major attention, and other developing countries are considered very important"; but this strategy made China’s technology and economic development overly dependent on Western countries and this cannot continue any longer as the world is facing "the end of globalization".
• Given a future of possible decoupling, China should focus on constructing a new global system by forming a "three-ring" international system: the first ring is China's neighboring countries in East Asia, Central Asia, and the Middle East; the second ring is the vast number of developing countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America; and the third ring extends to the traditional industrialized countries, mainly Europe and the United States.
• The basis of China's international relations for the construction of the "new three-ring" international system is "South-South cooperation". In recent decades, the economic base and trade flows of developing countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America have changed significantly. Between 1980-2021, the economic volume of developing countries rose from 21 to 42.2 percent of the world's total output; in 2021, trade between China and Africa and China and Latin America increased 2 times and 2.5 times respectively compared to 2010.
• Yet the current trade flows and mutual investments of developing countries are still heavily dependent on the financial and monetary institutions/networks controlled by the West. In order to break their dependence on the West and further enhance economic and political autonomy, a broader financial and monetary cooperation, and new sets of instruments among developing countries should be constructed in key regions between China and leading economies in the region.

Summary

One hundred years ago, CPC leaders proposed the revolutionary path of "encircling the cities from the countryside". Today, China and the developing countries need to overcome the West's preventive measures and cooperate with the global "countryside" – the peripheral countries – in the same way. The emergence of a new global system and the deepening of South-South cooperation will create favorable conditions for China to build a "three-ring" international system, to resolve international pressure, and to break through the siege.

Context

In April 2022, two units of Hualong One, China's first nuclear power project exported overseas were put into commercial operation in Pakistan. With the completion of the Hualong One, China became the fourth country to have independent intellectual property rights for third-generation nuclear power technology after the United States, France, and Russia. In the interview, Wei Feng talks about the arduous process of the project's R&D.

Key points

• In 1955, Mao Zedong made a strategic decision to develop the nuclear energy industry. From 1964 to 1970, China successfully launched "Two Bombs and One Satellite" and the nuclear- powered submarine, laying the foundation for China's nuclear industry. In 1970, in order to promote economic development and solve the problem of power shortages in Eastern China, premier Zhou Enlai proposed the construction of nuclear power plants.
• At the beginning of the economic reform, China's government departments were still divided on whether the country should develop its nuclear power technology independently or introduce the technology from overseas. In 1991, China's first self-developed Qinshan nuclear power plant (300,000 kilowatts) was connected to the grid in Zhejiang, making it the seventh country to build its own nuclear power plants after, among others, the United States, Britain, and Russia.
• After the 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan, voices in opposition to nuclear power plants were raised. China decided to conduct a comprehensive safety review of its nuclear power plants and vowed to build their plants with the "highest safety standard", which led to the design of Hualong One.
• In May 2015, the first nuclear power unit (No.5 unit) of Hualong One started construction in Fuqing city, Fujian province. In January 2021, the unit was put into commercial operation, with 88 percent of all equipment built in China.
• Hualong One has three physical barriers and two sets of safety systems, which can avoid the leakage of radioactive substances in extreme situations internally and withstand external and weather-related attacks such as large aircraft impacts, magnitude 9 earthquakes, and severe tsunamis and typhoons.
• With an installed capacity of 1.161 million kilowatts, Hualong One can meet the annual production and living needs of about one million people. It is equivalent to reducing standard coal consumption by 3.12 million tons per year and planting more than 70 million trees, which is necessary to achieve China's carbon neutrality target by 2060.

Summary

Wei Feng points out that the construction of Hualong One took only 68.7 months from the start of construction to operation, breaking the world record for the speed of building third-generation nuclear power plants. Behind this success is the strong national industrial system. At the same time, Hualong One meets the world's highest safety standards, making it one of the most widely accepted third-generation nuclear power plants on the market.

Context

On May 1, China enforced the newly revised Law on Vocational Education, the first major revision of the law in 26 years since its promulgation in 1996. The new law specifically emphasizes that vocational education has the same importance as general education. Taking into account China's talent needs and the goals of socialist education, Yao Yang analyzes the necessity and urgency of reforming the vocational and compulsory education systems in China.

Key points

• After the implementation of the new law, the previous "one size fits all" provision – where 50 percent of junior high school students go to general high school (普通高中 Pǔtōng gāozhōng) and the other 50 percent go to vocational high school (职业高中 Zhíyè gāozhōng) – will be abolished. In the past, based on their scores on the high school entrance exam (中考Zhōngkǎo), those who were not able to meet the entry score for general high schools had to enter vocational high schools where students have fewer opportunities; a mere 4-5 percent at the province level enrolled in a university. The new law guarantees that vocational high school graduates will have more equitable opportunities to receive higher education.
• The gap between urban and rural education in China is still wide. Higher education is universal in large cities. China's gross enrollment rate in higher education reached 57.8 percent in 2021, with college acceptance rates for general high schools in first-tier cities like Beijing and Shanghai reaching 80–90 percent. By contrast, many young people in rural areas have not yet completed nine years of compulsory education.
• The compulsory measure to divide junior high school graduates transfers the pressure on Chinese students from the high school stage to the junior school stage. As a result, many parents are anxious from the time their children attend elementary school until they take their junior high school exams. From a very young age, the talent selection system forces students to study like mad and "to crush" their competition while stifling their creativity.
• Vocational education becomes a tool for class stratification. A troubling fact is that 90 percent of the students in vocational high schools come from rural families. Since they rarely get opportunities to enter the middle class through higher education and higher-paying jobs, students from rural families are often locked into low-paying jobs in low-value producing industries as blue collar workers. This cycle must be broken before achieving the goal of common prosperity.
• China's industries are upgrading with the share of low-end manufacturing gradually declining, while high-end manufacturing and production services suppliers requiring more highly educated personnel are growing. An excellent high school education for all Chinese students is a top priority for China to achieve full modernization by 2035.

Summary

Yao Yang believes that the best education reform plan is to implement a ten-year compulsory education system from elementary school to high school. 17-year-old children who graduate from high school are mentally mature and can choose their next step according to their own situation. The author stresses that the essence of education is not pre-defining the student, but rather cultivating a complete person. As a socialist country, China's education should aim to develop its students' abilities to explore their individual potential, so that each child can realize this potential to serve the country and reach the goal of common prosperity.

Context

Recently, several top Chinese universities such as Nanjing University and Renmin University of China have dropped out of the international rankings, triggering heated debates. Lü Dewen points out that domestic universities and colleges now use the international ranking system as a rigid standard. Although, to a certain extent, the ranking system is beneficial for international academic exchanges and the expansion of Chinese academic influence, the obsession with high rankings could lead to a situation where western ideas dominate the Chinese university system.

Key points

• Some functions of universities, including academic innovation and talent cultivation, can be assessed by objective indicators. However, some indicators, such as financial stability, research reputation, and physical infrastructure cannot be the basis on which to evaluate the academic heritage and legacy of a university. For instance, the importance of Peking University in China's modern history and its significant influence on national and social thought cannot be quantified by objective evaluation systems or reputation surveys alone.
• The index-led management approach has dominated the academic circle. The evaluation of whether a teacher is valuable is also quantified through the number of his/her papers, projects, etc. Significant factors that cannot be quantified, such as responsibility to students and the substantial impact of research results on social progress, are ignored.
• International ranking agencies are essentially commercial organizations that gain great benefits through the ranking system. Moreover, these rankings are almost always a money-making scheme for the English-speaking world, which cannot be used as a tool to assess the quality of Chinese academic research.
• This is especially true for the humanities and social sciences, whose initial and real purpose was to serve the progress of the country and society. If academic research in these fields is proven to be valuable in China's society, it is also bound to make an intellectual contribution to human progress. Not many people are even aware that many institutions and the schools of humanities and social sciences in China have been rooted in colonialism.
• A more alarming practice of academic colonization is that some universities intentionally guide their teachers in the direction of internationalization, totally disregarding domestic academic standards and features of the courses. For example, the recognized top journals in the humanities and social sciences overseas may not be as good as the ordinary SSCI journals, a China-based citation index system, yet teachers are rewarded for their publications in international journals.

Summary

Of particular concern is that, today, Chinese universities and colleges have been besieged by major international rankings, although, overseas rankings and journals do have their significance and some scholars are extraordinarily good at telling Chinese stories in foreign languages. Moreover, why are "international" economic and social development and cultural values always defined by western standards? China is fully capable of establishing a Chinese-centric academic assessment system and does not need to" trim the foot to fit the shoes" (削足适履 xuè zú shì lǚ) and reflect western values within its university system.

Context

After the founding of New China, Mao Zedong referenced the development model of Soviet agricultural collectivization and creatively explored a new path for the socialist transformation of agriculture based on the Chinese reality. By the end of 1956, 96.3 percent of the country's farmers had joined cooperatives, and the socialist collective ownership system was basically established. Tao Lujia, a witness to the cooperative movement, recalls the historical process of the development of agricultural cooperatives in Shanxi in the 1950s.

Key points

• In 1951, the first 10 primary agricultural cooperatives in Shanxi caused controversy within the Party. Some said that they were utopian socialism because they lacked a mechanized agricultural system. The primary agricultural cooperatives with Chinese characteristics were viewed as the first step in developing a Soviet Union style collective farm and were later supported by Mao Zedong. The reason was that Mao Zedong realized, early on, that China's history, for thousands of years, had repeated itself and proven that a small-peasant economy would inevitably lead to polarization. The new China, under the leadership of the Communist Party of China (CPC), had to completely avoid and eradicate this phenomenon.
• A survey, conducted by the Changzhi District Committee of Shanxi Province in 1951, showed that the first signs of polarization had appeared in the countryside after the completion of land reform. Ninety-six households, mainly middle peasants in five villages in the region, sold their land, and some wealthy peasants started acting like loan sharks, lending money with annual interest rates as high as 60 to 180 percent.
• Simultaneously, however, agricultural cooperatives in Shanxi were taking the road to collectivization through land shareholding and unified management, and socialist common prosperity was increasing. After analyzing the situation, Mao believed that the CPC could avoid polarization and capitalism in the transition to socialism by supporting the socialist element in agricultural cooperatives and encouraging peasants to take the path of collectivization.
• In 1953, a total of 2,242 cooperatives were established in Shanxi province, with a total grain output of 87,597,400 kilograms, up 27 percent year-on-year, and the output per unit area in cooperatives was 1.4 times that of individually-run farms in the region.
• Socialist industrialization is also inseparable from agricultural cooperativization. After considering the lessons of China's low per capita natural resources and the Soviet model's continuous squeeze of the agriculture sector to support heavy industry, Mao Zedong proposed "simultaneous industrial and agricultural development and industrialization through collective agriculture".
• In the context of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea (抗美援朝战争 kànɡměi yuáncháo zhànzhēnɡ), agricultural cooperatives became the leader in patriotic efforts to increase production. It was with the backing of the vast number of farmers and various industries that the Party and army were able to withstand the difficult times during the War and successfully smash the enemy's economic blockade.

Summary

As early as the period of agricultural cooperativization, Mao Zedong considered the problem of coordinated development of mountainous areas and plains, and cities and villages, and believed that the comprehensive development of rural agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry, and fisheries would be conducive to attracting young people to stay and build up the countryside. The overall strategy of industrial and agricultural integration that he constructed was not only a long-term strategy for the new China to cope with the US encirclement at that time, but also an important inspiration for the development of today's urban-rural integration.

(Chinese Voices will continue to interpret the historical context and developmental logic of Marxism's Sinicization)

Context

According to the White Paper on China-Africa Cooperation (2021), China's foreign was 270.2 billion yuan between 2013 to 2018, of which 45 percent was provided to Africa. Yet the country's international aid is often misunderstood and unjustifiably criticized by the West. Through the field study of China's Agricultural Technology Demonstration Centers, or ATDC, in Africa, Li Xiaoyun explains how the Demonstration of New Development, based on the country's own experience, contributes to agricultural development in Africa and is superior to the Western aid model.

Key points

• Western development aid is based on a theoretical framework that combines neoliberalism and neo-institutionalism. The idea is that global poverty is the result of poor political governance systems, and that changing them and providing services to the poor require the development of industrial capitalist system. This classical development logic has been used to justify Western colonialism in helping "civilize" underdeveloped societies.
• Western aid, as one of the key ways in which Western culture expands, is only provided to developing countries with strong conditions attached to it. In comparison, the Chinese aid model is a process of transferring and localizing its similar development experiences without any political preconditions.
• In the late 1970s, China introduced the household responsibility system (家庭联产承包责任制 jiātíng lián chǎn chéngbāo zérèn zhì). In 1985, Chinese agricultural experts used the same approach to develop three rice reclamation areas in Burkina Faso, with land ownership rights going to the state and land operational rights being divided among peasants. After 2000, the model, which was led by agricultural demonstration centers with technical training, became the main form of China's agricultural aid to Africa.
• Chinese aid does not follow the norms of OECD development assistance to developing countries, but rather responds to special requests from these countries. Meanwhile, the country focuses on the leading role of the government and uses commercial means and modern technology to improve the sustainability of development.

Summary

Li points out that, motivated by its national mission and economic interests, China's ATDCs and the African countries have established a mutually beneficial relationship. The demonstration centers have taken on the national mission of guiding Chinese enterprises into the African agricultural sector for investment and providing large-scale technology training and demonstration techniques. This methodology has inspired Africans to start reflecting on their own development problems and exploring the development path of each country’s agriculture.

Context

Since 2021, China has been advancing its rural revitalization (乡村振兴 xiāngcūn zhènxīng) strategy after achieving the eradication of absolute poverty. Through research on poor villages across the country in 2018-2020, Zhou Feizhou finds that the poverty alleviation campaign demonstrates a relationship between the state and the peasants that is socialism with Chinese characteristics – the relationship of "family and state as one" (家国一体 jiā guó yī tǐ).

Key points

• In traditional Chinese thinking, the state is the parent and the peasants are its children (子民 zǐ mín). At the same time, the state, as the "big family", needs to take care of many "small families". China's battle against poverty has always been government-led, while front-line cadres (扶贫干部 fúpín gànbù) represent the state. The relationship between the state and the peasants in the campaign was inherited from but also has changed the traditional relationship between the family and the state, highlighted by the current peasant-state (or peasant-cadre) relationship.
• As the "pioneer" in poverty alleviation, China's infrastructure investment helps introduce external capital and technology to remote rural areas. This, in turn, enables peasants to find jobs outside the villages. While the development of village industries helps those who are unable to leave the village to earn money locally.
• Most lesser-developed village-based industries are labour-intensive, and most of the labour force left behind in rural areas are elders and women. The state directs corporate capital to manage the upper and lower levels of the industrial chains while leaving the mid-level production chain to peasants for family-controlled operations. The strong"social base" of the countryside is carefully maintained.
• The "poverty alleviation workshop" (扶贫车间 fúpín chējiān) in Gujia village, Hebei Province is a good example of the government-led industrial poverty alleviation. The workshop provides labour opportunities for local women who have been left behind. Considering their needs to care for families, the management is flexible in time and carefully observes folkways and customs. This workshop eventually took root in the countryside and helped the enterprises turn losses into profits.
• For those who have the ability to work but are trapped in poverty for reasons such as a lack of motivation or mismatched skills, the country relies on the support of CPC cadres stationed in the village and the local residents to provide the necessary tools to inspire them to work. Policies alone cannot easily solve the problems of "hidden poverty" that stems from broken family relationships, for example, separation due to family members migrating to cities to work. Part of the anti-poverty work is to promote family ethics and healthier social practices.

Summary

The author points out that the fight against poverty has revealed a very unique aspect of the state-peasant relationship. Peasants realize that to feed their families, with the support of cadres, is to also serve the state (化家为国 huà jiā wèi guó). The state supports peasants and inspires them to move from responding to the state to loving the state. That is the relationship of "family and state as one". By immersing itself within the countryside, the government has not only helped maintain the rural family-based social structure but has also given peasants and rural families the impetus and support to participate in rural revitalization.

Context

Among all major global economies, China has one of the highest rates of female employment (60.57 percent in 2019). Recently, the government has introduced a third-child policy, triggering fierce discussion on how to strike a balance between career and family and how to protect working women's rights and interests. As a mother born in the 1970s, Wei Nanzhi analyzes the development of Chinese women's emancipation in the past 70 years since the founding of the country, and the complex reasons why many Chinese women are reluctant to have children.

Key points

• Women are a great force to be reckoned with in the revolutionary cause, an important lesson exemplified by the Communist Party of China's (CPC) leadership of the Chinese revolutions. The peak of women's status in China occurred during the Maoist era. Through production teams (生产队 shēng chǎn duì) in the rural areas and institutions (单位 dān wèi) in the cities, women could keep pace with men to participate in labour and social activities. The existence of childcare centers in urban units or rural children's mutual aid organizations played a key role in supporting working women.
• After the reform and opening up, social support systems, such as childcare centers disappeared. Women either became full-time mothers or turned to their mothers-in-law for childcare. This resulted in women reverting back to the traditional structure of family relations, which is maintained by property rights. Under these circumstances, it is not the husband but the mother-in-law who tends to ask young women to play a traditional role. In this sense, the emancipation of Chinese women has suffered a setback.
• There are two extreme views in the current discussion of feminism in China: one is to compete with men in all aspects, which is, in fact, an endorsement of male-supremacy. The second is to be completely antagonistic to men, which includes refusing to get married and have children. But the issue of female emancipation and social change needs to take into account societal norms, and the problem cannot be solved simply by magnifying the gender antagonism.
• The essence of the refusal to have children is based on economic logic, large families cost more to support. In the traditional Chinese mother-in-law and daughter-in-law relationship, the younger generation of women is repressed, and after accepting the modern economic logic, refusing to have children becomes a way to rebel against traditional repression.

Summary

The author points out that as a socialist country, the Chinese government and people should jointly promote the protection of women's rights. In addition to improving laws such as the Marriage Law and the Labor Law, it is also necessary to empower women. The government must rebuild public services and social solidarity organizations that will provide support for women. On the other hand, it is important to further activate and bring into play the energy of 700 million women, and build more consensus among women, so that they have more space to balance their lives and work.

Context

In the context of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, the United States is actively promoting the "Indo-Pacific strategy" through a series of diplomatic means. Tian Feilong believes that Biden's trip to Asia will not bring peace and development but will lead to a more risky geopolitical situation.

Key points

• The geopolitical strategy of the US, with China and Russia as its main opponents, has been planned for a long time. The US had considered the policy of "allying with Russia to contain China". Given its internal politics, the myriad of differences with Russia, and the focus on maintaining its global hegemony, the US ruling elite finally decided to strike simultaneously and fight on two fronts.
• The "Western Front" of US hegemony is based on the NATO system and Atlantic liberalism, and its geopolitical target is Russia. The conflict in Ukraine is a geopolitical consequence of NATO's eastward expansion. The goal of Russia's special military operation was to try to rebuild a system of balance, order, and security based on the principles of upholding national sovereignty and multilateralism. However, the US and NATO have increased their supply of arms to Ukraine and are exacerbating the situation by admitting Sweden and Finland into the alliance.
• China is the geopolitical target of the "Eastern Front" of US hegemony. The US is committed to creating an "Indo-Pacific Strategy" structure to encircle and contain China, trying to prevent the country's continued rise and its developing regional political leadership. However, the geopolitical situation on the "Eastern Front" is more complex than on the "Western Front" and there is a risk of failure for the US Indo-Pacific Strategy.
• The Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF) is not a simple alternative to the "Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)", but a new project of Biden's global hegemonic strategy. IPEF is US-centric and aims to fragment the Indo-Pacific/Asia Pacific industrial chains and create geopolitical conflicts.
• A large number of developing countries and developed countries that aren't aligned with the US strategy and prefer peaceful development have a deep understanding and even direct experience of US hegemony and its long-term dangers. They have a legitimate need to counterbalance US hegemony and pursue an independent and sovereign development path. This is why 149 countries have signed cooperation agreements with China on the Belt and Road Initiative, based on the principles of multilateralism and independence of sovereign nations.

Summary

In the struggle against US hegemony, China is not only fighting for its own security and development, but also for the fundamental interests of all oppressed and hostage countries and peoples. Adhering to a path of peaceful development, China is not an isolated country, nor can it be easily isolated. The values of peace, and a community with a shared future for humanity (人类命运共同体 rénlèi mìngyùn gòngtóngtǐ) are the opposite to the imperialist policies based on Cold War diplomacy, and the containment of adversaries and unilateralism.

Context

After the founding of the PRC in 1949, Chinese leaders envisioned that the transition from new democracy to socialism would take 10-15 years; yet it took only three years (1953-1956). Zhu Jiamu analyzes how CPC adopted the strategy of prioritizing the development of heavy industry in accordance with the Marxist assertion that "priority should be given to the development of industries producing means of production." He points out that it was this strategy that accelerated the socialist transition and industrialization of the New China.

Key points

• CPC decided to complete the transition to socialism ahead of schedule, both in response to the need to prioritize heavy industry to develop the productive forces, and to the assistance from the Soviet Union to support China's economic priorities.
• Around 1952, through repeated comparisons and discussions of the industrialization paths of the Soviet Union and the capitalist countries, China changed its previous idea of developing light industry before heavy industry and proposed the "First Five-Year Plan" (“一五”计划 yīwǔ jìhuà), learning from the Soviet experience and prioritizing the development of heavy industry and the defense industry. This plan received explicit guarantees of assistance from the Soviet Union.
• The development of heavy industry required a large amount of capital investment, and China's very weak industrial base made it all the more necessary to implement a highly centralized planned economy so that the limited capital and other resources could be concentrated on the construction of heavy industry. As a result, China accelerated the transformation of capitalist industry and commerce into state-run enterprises, and agricultural cooperativization.
• By 1957, China's industrial output accounted for 56.7 percent of its gross industrial and agricultural output value, which was close to 60 percent of CPC's socialist industrialization target in the transition period. Moreover, by the end of the First Five-Year Plan, China had laid the initial foundation for the establishment of an independent and complete industrial system. The task of the transition period was achieved ahead of schedule.

Summary

The starting point for an early transition to socialism lies in adapting the domestic production relations and economic system to the needs of the strategy of giving priority to the development of heavy industry as soon as possible. China seized the favorable opportunity of the de-escalation of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea (抗美援朝 kàng měi yuán cháo) and the Soviet Union's promise to assist China in the construction of the First Five-Year Plan to speed up industrialization. From 1953 to 1956, the country's total industrial output increased by an average of 19.6 percent per year, while the total agricultural output increased by an average of 4.8 percent per year. The achievements of prioritizing heavy industrial development have laid an important foundation for continuing the development of socialist modernization with Chinese characteristics.

(Chinese Voices will continue to interpret the historical context and developmental logic of Marxism's Sinicization)