'Subtle power' reshapes global village

[Tigershark]

By David Gosset

The administration of United States President Barack Obama has rebranded American foreign policy around the grand concept of "smart power", an expression which envelops great confidence if not self-satisfaction, and which, to a certain extent, presupposes a strategic dominance.

However, if the West wants to maintain a real capacity to influence the world affairs, it should not assume a position of intellectual superiority but try to comprehend what makes the


success of the new global forces. While the US public diplomacy apparatus works to persuade the world of its benevolent "smart power", China is quietly reshaping the global village with the effectiveness of its "subtle power".

In the first half of the 21st century, the major redistribution of power and the great game for influence are obviously taking place between Washington and Beijing. At the end of each decade which followed Deng Xiaoping's opening up, the China watcher had to formulate the same observation: the gain of Beijing's relative power in the international system anticipated at the beginning of the period had always been underestimated.

Fundamentally, the analysts have been unable to assess and anticipate accurately the Chinese momentum because they were preoccupied by what they viewed as China's structural inadequacies and did not apprehend Beijing's "subtle power" or its extraordinary adaptability.

Forty years ago, the Chinese Communist Party ordered the destruction of Confucian symbols, but the legacy of the Chinese president Hu Jintao - who was 24 years old when the Cultural Revolution exploded - will be arguably neo-Confucianism: a massive statue of the Chinese thinker has now become one of Tiananmen Square's major attractions. Beijing's leaders are not only in charge of the People's Republic of China but they are responsible for the renaissance of a civilization-state.

Amid unavoidable ups and downs in domestic affairs, Beijing has certainly been able to create the conditions of a rapid development but the evolving geopolitical environment favored China's re-emergence: the collapse of the Soviet Union offered to the Chinese leadership new strategic options in Central Asia, in Northeast Asia but also in Southeast Asia, the post September 11 geopolitical tensions allowed Beijing to advance its interests without too much American attention, the financial crisis exposed Wall Street's excess but underlined Beijing's prudence, and the disorder in the Arab world is not a major cause of concern for the Chinese policy-makers but constitutes a real challenge for the West and its allies.

While China's re-emergence corrects a development imbalance triggered by Europe's industrial revolution in the 18th century - Kenneth Pomeranz's "great divergence" - the re-entry of one-fifth of mankind at the center of history marks also the beginning of a period where different types of modernity have to coexist. Beyond more tangible economic or political multipolarity, one should pay great attention to a global contention of ideas without complacency nor condescension, and realize that China's role in the global intellectual debate will be proportionate with the depth of its ancient civilization.

The unique combination of size, speed and scope that characterizes China's transformation has no equivalent in world history. At the end of March 2011, Justin Lin, the World Bank's vice-president declared at the China Economic Development Forum in Hong Kong that China's economy will be the world's biggest by 2030; in 1978 China's economic output was less than 2% of the world economy. When American investment bank Goldman Sachs made its first forecasts for the BRIC economies in 2003 the experts predicted that China would overtake America in 2041 but they currently mention 2027 as being the year of the highly symbolic shift. Financial services company Standard Chartered announced that the change will happen by 2020.

Thirty-three years after the beginning of Deng Xiaoping's policy of reform and opening up Beijing has regained a position of centrality in Asia, and China's hard power is certainly already considerable. In a relatively short period of time, China has become the top trade partner of Japan, Australia, South Korea or Kazakhstan but also of Brazil and South Africa - after only 13 years of diplomatic relations between Beijing and Pretoria! In the Fortune Global 500 ranking, not one single Chinese firm was ranked in the top 20 in 2005, three companies headquartered in Beijing were ranked in the top 10 in 2010.

Some figures are more explicit than lengthy prose: in the first month of 2011, China's central bank announced that its foreign reserves, already the world's biggest, soared to US$2.8 trillion. Beijing owns currently US$1.1 trillion of American debt - in Niall Ferguson's words the globalization of finance has turned "China into America's banker, the Communist creditor to the capitalist debtor in a change of epochal significance".

In the 1980s, China's contribution to total world GDP (gross domestic product) growth was 3.6%, in the 1990s 9.6%, and in the first decade of the 21st century 25.5% . With such a momentum the results of a 2010 Pew Research Center survey are not a surprise: 74% of the Chinese people are optimistic about the future against 52% for Americans and 40% for Europeans.

Despite the acceleration of a process that puts China in a position of growing strength, many still insist on Beijing's weak soft power. This is, for example, the view of the venerable American political scientist Joseph Nye. However, such an emphasis might be explained in relation with a perceptive remark made by Italo Calvino in Invisible Cities: "It is not the voice that commands the story: it is the ear."

Or, more precisely, the China story is often rewritten in a fiction which can be reassuring for the Western ears but which does not always reflect the reality. One should not approach China as an intrinsically imperfect entity whose reach will be limited by some essential inadequacies but let us look at it as a developing force on the way to fully realize a truly unique potential.

While the West would like to believe that China's progress is synonymous with Westernization, the Chinese renaissance is in fact the renewal and the reaffirmation of the Chinese identity. In other words, the West would like to recreate China in its image - and, by doing so, helping to solve the so-called China's bad image problem - but China's representation of itself can not correspond to such a fantasy.

Interestingly, the Western discourse on China's so-called lack of soft power could be another case of Western-centrism. Indeed, it can be argued that China is not trying to conform to Western models, to adopt foreign standards or to operate according to exogenous references but is developing a unique modus operandi in a permanent effort to maximize effectiveness.

If the notion of "smart power", an approach strongly advocated by US State Secretary Hillary Clinton, is generally defined as the combination of hard and soft powers, "subtle power", China's way of extending influence, can be described as the art of using three minimalist axioms - non-confrontation, non-interference and readiness for paradigm change - congenial with the Chinese classical strategic thinking.

Expecting China to adopt its behaviors, the West is especially sensitive to what it perceives as Chinese soft power deficit, symmetrically, China can be puzzled - sometimes amused - by what she frames as the US lack of "subtle power".

China can work to increase its "smart power" as much as the US or others can be inspired by the idea of "subtle power" but the US will remain more at ease with the spectacular grand principles of "smart power" and China more in its element with the restrained but penetrating force of "subtle power".

Laozi prepared the Chinese mind to a world of paradoxes 2,500 years ago: "The sage relying on actionless activity [wu wei] carries on wordless teaching'.' He also famously described the most subtle skills necessary to maintain internal political equilibrium, an ideal preparation for the infinite nuances of effective diplomacy: "Ruling an immense country is like cooking a small fish." And, he wisely noticed that "the highest good is like that of water", and explained that "nothing under heaven is softer or more yielding than water" even if "one cannot alter it". In the 21st century, China's "subtle power", softer than Joseph Nye's soft power, will quietly extend its influence and it is in the highest interest of the West not to underestimate the force of the Chinese momentum. In a sense, as it might be smart for China to increase its soft power by articulating a universal narrative, the wise thing to do for the West could be to learn from China's "subtle power" by showing less but achieving more.

David Gosset is director of the Euro-China Center for International and Business Relations at CEIBS, Shanghai & Beijing , and founder of the Euro-China Forum.

(Copyright: David Gosset, 2011.)

 

[Tigershark]

I've read western literature on China, wall to wall, in the university library, and this article about sums up their lack of insight and their western-centered narratives. They look to European history to predict the course of China's development, and every year, a book comes out on how China will collapse due to lack of a western political system. Pure rubbish.

 

[desimorty]

While the West would like to believe that China's progress is synonymous with Westernization, the Chinese renaissance is in fact the renewal and the reaffirmation of the Chinese identity. In other words, the West would like to recreate China in its image - and, by doing so, helping to solve the so-called China's bad image problem - but China's representation of itself can not correspond to such a fantasy.

Interestingly, the Western discourse on China's so-called lack of soft power could be another case of Western-centrism. Indeed, it can be argued that China is not trying to conform to Western models, to adopt foreign standards or to operate according to exogenous references but is developing a unique modus operandi in a permanent effort to maximize effectiveness.

If it is business standards?
Because while the west conceived off the modern business, corporations. Ultimately, order to do business with others China will have to handle it... appropriately and address concerns. Business standards is not entirely western, even though it is the birth place, it is entirely universal.
It is an entirely different matter, when it arrives to government, or culture.
The Chinese will now after Mao's failings, will protect their culture. And I support this initiative.
However in doing so, many Chinese confuse cultural nationalism with plain old politics.

 

[Tigershark]

If it is business standards?
Because while the west conceived off the modern business, corporations. Ultimately, order to do business with others China will have to handle it... appropriately and address concerns. Business standards is not entirely western, even though it is the birth place, it is entirely universal.
It is an entirely different matter, when it arrives to government, or culture.
The Chinese will now after Mao's failings, will protect their culture. And I support this initiative.
However in doing so, many Chinese confuse cultural nationalism with plain old politics.

I've heard that argument time and again, that they are not imposing western standards, but UNIVERSAL ones. That's plain wrong. One example is liberal interventionism. Intervening in the affairs of other countries because they do not conform to western democracy is not a universal value, but an idea unique to people who consider their political system superior to all others. The politicians then pervert this value and use it as a excuse to punish countries which do not tow the western line. They would love to see all countries, esp China, subdued this way to western domination. That won't happen--the world is quickly moving away from its unilateralist phase.

I'm a patriot. But don't confuse nationalism with a political discussion. I've seen many people blithely dismiss other points of view as nationalist propaganda. You're just another talking puppet. Yawn.

 

[gambit]

I've read western literature on China, wall to wall, in the university library, and this article about sums up their lack of insight and their western-centered narratives. They look to European history to predict the course of China's development, and every year, a book comes out on how China will collapse due to lack of a western political system. Pure rubbish.

Pure rubbish? Really? The fact that China abandoned the centralized planning economic model and transitioned over to the capitalist one, even though it may state directed, means those books had their effects. Changes do not spontaneously come to being. The spectacular, ignoble, and sudden collapse of the Soviet Union did not escaped the attention of the CCP. Those books do not say that China WILL collapse but that China COULD collapse IF this and/or that is/are not changed.

All societies evolve or they die. A war of conquest is the most radical motivator for changes so we can eliminate that for now. China is safe from such a war. That leave internal motivators for changes and evolution and in this age of near instantaneous global communications, ideas and motivations for changes are inevitable. The society then have three responses: repression, reform, or revolution. We are talking about social types so do not get all worked up over the word 'revolution'...

We know that repression is not good for a people and the collapse of the Soviet Union proved that. An example of a social revolution is when the US allowed women to enter the work force in WW II due to wartime necessities. Since then American women never looked back and continues to prove themselves valuable in the economy. That was rightly called a 'revolution' because it was a radical change from the established norm. The sexual revolution of the 1960s was not so much a 'revolution' was it was a social reformation. Since women asserted their economic independence it was inevitable that they would assert their sexual independence and aggressiveness as well. The most violent thing that happened was the burnings of a few brassieres, now Victoria's Secrets is making the cleavage popular again, another social reformation.

The 'one-child' policy and enforced by the Chinese government was a social revolution as it has been traditionally up to the family to determine how large or small it will be and usually more than one child is encouraged. Now it is state sanctioned discourage. There are enough moral debates about that already. The trend towards smaller families in highly developed countries like the US and the EU is a social reformation, not revolution. Reformation are usually less overt and take place over long periods of time. A social revolution is what we are seeing in some countries in the ME today with some variabilities in violence but nowhere as radical as an externally motivated one like the US did upon Iraq. For Catholics, the birth control pill was their social revolution as it upset the authority of the Church over its members.

There are no shortages of examples of how social reformations and revolutions occurs in any country, even in China, and China will be influenced and/or adapting Western ways in the inevitable social reformations, not necessarily revolutions, of the Chinese society. It is happening.

 

[huzihaidao12]

Pure rubbish? Really? The fact that China abandoned the centralized planning economic model and transitioned over to the capitalist one, even though it may state directed, means those books had their effects. Changes do not spontaneously come to being. The spectacular, ignoble, and sudden collapse of the Soviet Union did not escaped the attention of the CCP. Those books do not say that China WILL collapse but that China COULD collapse IF this and/or that is/are not changed.

All societies evolve or they die. A war of conquest is the most radical motivator for changes so we can eliminate that for now. China is safe from such a war. That leave internal motivators for changes and evolution and in this age of near instantaneous global communications, ideas and motivations for changes are inevitable. The society then have three responses: repression, reform, or revolution. We are talking about social types so do not get all worked up over the word 'revolution'...

We know that repression is not good for a people and the collapse of the Soviet Union proved that. An example of a social revolution is when the US allowed women to enter the work force in WW II due to wartime necessities. Since then American women never looked back and continues to prove themselves valuable in the economy. That was rightly called a 'revolution' because it was a radical change from the established norm. The sexual revolution of the 1960s was not so much a 'revolution' was it was a social reformation. Since women asserted their economic independence it was inevitable that they would assert their sexual independence and aggressiveness as well. The most violent thing that happened was the burnings of a few brassieres, now Victoria's Secrets is making the cleavage popular again, another social reformation.

The 'one-child' policy and enforced by the Chinese government was a social revolution as it has been traditionally up to the family to determine how large or small it will be and usually more than one child is encouraged. Now it is state sanctioned discourage. There are enough moral debates about that already. The trend towards smaller families in highly developed countries like the US and the EU is a social reformation, not revolution. Reformation are usually less overt and take place over long periods of time. A social revolution is what we are seeing in some countries in the ME today with some variabilities in violence but nowhere as radical as an externally motivated one like the US did upon Iraq. For Catholics, the birth control pill was their social revolution as it upset the authority of the Church over its members.

There are no shortages of examples of how social reformations and revolutions occurs in any country, even in China, and China will be influenced and/or adapting Western ways in the inevitable social reformations, not necessarily revolutions, of the Chinese society. It is happening.

Your ignorance and arrogance always surprised me.

 

[ao333]

On a serious note, the Chinese adopted state capitalism not because words on paper had their intended effects, but that top party leaders wanted to get rich as being rich became "glorious."

The One Child Policy is one of the few that receives wide support in China. In essence, resistance was met at first because Mao mingled propagation with patriotism. Years after he died, the fad subsided and people discovered that it was difficult raising children to an education level beyond primary school as they had to financially back their kids for 10 more years.

Unrestrained procreation is status quo in African states, most of which have even westernized to a degree of adopting Christianity and Latin official languages. It's the path of human development that has led China's growth, not westernization.

And as nations grow in strength, so do their ignorance. The Chinese culture will only consolidate in the future and possibly even influence its neighbours rather then your theory of inescapable westernization.

And please, the Chinese couldn't care less about your opinion. Your motherland was ruled by them for over half of a century.




MOD EDIT