China and the Common Good
As part of our work on a common good internationalism as an alternative to both nationalism and globalisation, we are publishing a report authored by Director of Research Tobias Phibbs unpicking the alliance between Western capitalism and Chinese communism. It argues liberal universalism has failed to account for the real nature of Chinese political economy, sovereignty and statecraft, and a new approach is required to build the common good at home and abroad.
We reproduce the introduction the report here:
The West has told itself a story about China. It goes something like this. In 1949 the Chinese civil war was decisively settled in favour of Mao and the Chinese Communist Party. The Mao era was defined by rural hardship and political tyranny. From the late 1970s, however, the tyranny of Maoism was tempered by economic growth, and rising prosperity led in turn to a more liberal China. In the early 1990s, Deng Xiaoping opened up the Chinese economy to the world, ushering in an era of free markets and globalisation which lifted the great mass of Chinese people out of poverty. Relations between the West and China were normalised through China’s accession into the WTO in 2001 and it was seen as an adult in the room on the global stage, a nation to be trusted, set inexorably on a path towards liberalism and democracy (or, if they weren’t, then this didn’t matter; China had its own idea of freedom and that was to be respected).
It was a reassuring story. It eased any moral qualms Western leaders might have had about dealing with a dictatorship – it wasn’t so bad, maybe it wasn’t even a real dictatorship, and anyway it was well on its way towards becoming a mature liberal democracy. It is presumably the story that encouraged George Osborne to argue the UK should “run towards China” and be its “best friend in the West.” The great and the good of British liberalism became entangled in China’s web of lobbying and influence and it must have offered them relief too.
The trouble is the story doesn’t hold up. From Xi’s accession in 2012 and the subsequent nationalist turn, cracks began to show. Now, with its cover-up of coronavirus apparent, China finds itself subject to newfound scrutiny. When the outbreak began in Wuhan, China banned internal flights with Wuhan, while allowing international flights to carry on as before. The cost of outsourcing our manufacturing base and our subsequent dependence on insecure global supply chains for everything from PPE to chemicals production has become clear too.
This reckoning is welcome and overdue. The UK, along with the rest of the West, will have to rethink its relationship with the totalitarian regime. It will not be enough to simply comment on their human rights abuses – awful though they are, particularly towards the Uighur Muslims. Instead, it is worth reflecting on the nature of Chinese society: its class relations, political economy and industrial policy; the social conditions of its workforce; its governing ideology and statecraft; and the influence it exerts on the West.
The Common Good Foundation works to build the ideas, institutions and relations that reconcile estranged interests around a shared notion of mutual flourishing. In China the body politic is denuded and there exists only the individual (denied individuality) and the state. There is no room for political dissent or religious faith; and engagement with the rest of the world on equal terms. What relationship with China, then, would best express the common good internationally and domestically?