Hello from Hamburg,
"Decoupling!", replied the CEO of a globally positioned medium-sized company when I asked him how he positions himself in relation to China. In concrete terms, decoupling means producing in China only for the Chinese market, cutting off supply and trade flows between China and the rest of the world or keeping them as small as possible. This answer is heard again and again at the moment, underpinned by uncertainty and skepticism - after all, China is the country to which Germany owes a large part of its economic growth in recent decades. However, there is an ever-growing list of complaints about China's aggressive and nationalistic attitude: Industrial espionage, strict corona lockdown, arbitrary actions by the authorities, hostile takeovers such as at the German robot manufacturer Kuka or the entry into the port of Hamburg, flooding the German electric car market with Chinese makes, securing raw materials by infiltrating African and South American economies, China's monopoly on rare earths, its behavior in the Russian war of aggression, in Taiwan, in the South China Sea - the former love for German industry's extended workbench has cooled considerably. We are offended to note that China is no longer the low-wage country it once was, but is catching up with the USA in terms of high technology and artificial intelligence, is one of the global leaders in the renewable energy sector and Chinese household appliances are no longer inferior to ours in terms of quality, only significantly cheaper. News about the slowdown in economic growth in China, rising unemployment and the threat of real estate bubbles are not commented on without malice.
I am not an expert on China, but I am interested. In the noughties, I visited China several times a year and was able to attend debates between German and Chinese legal scholars on the protection of private property. I was surprised by the openness with which we were able to discuss behind closed doors in a think tank close to the ruling communist party. I started to learn the Chinese language and traveled around the country. I've been there occasionally since then, and a lot of water has flowed down the Yangtze since then. Chinese President Xi Jinping has had his term limits lifted, making him ruler for life, had his predecessor Hu Jintao hauled off in front of cameras at the 20th Chinese Communist Party Congress in October 2022 and restricted freedom of expression.
A book published in January by economics professor Li Daokui and an essay in April by Yuan Yang, long-time correspondent for the Financial Times in Beijing, open up further perspectives on China's economic and political actions. The humiliation that the Chinese had to endure between the colonial Opium War and Japan's war crimes in the Second World War has left its mark to this day, as has the cession of Hong Kong and Taiwan. Added to this were Mao's seriously wrong decisions, which triggered a mass famine with the "Great Leap Forward" at the end of the 1950s and caused millions more victims with the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s. The opening up of the economy from the mid-1980s then showed China the way out of poverty to become a high-tech country with the clear goal of being respected by the world. Yuan Yang tells the story of her life, from being born into poverty in the countryside to growing up in the UK. In 2016, she returned as a correspondent to the country of her birth, where a communist party ruled over an ultra-capitalist society. She left again in 2022, when foreign journalists became increasingly suspicious of the state.
Today, China is a country of stark contrasts, with a significantly lower per capita income than in the USA. On the one hand, it plays a global role in financial issues and climate technology. On the other hand, the world's social and ecological problems are concentrated in China, with extreme poverty in the countryside, the super-rich in the cities and a middle class of around 400 million people who live in fear of their children losing their status. The whole thing is balanced by a unified party, which, however, as Li Daokui documents in his insight worth reading, is struggling controversially behind closed doors to master the tugging forces pulling at the country and prevent mass social unrest at all costs. The citizens of China cede their rights to freedom to the government as long as they feel they are well governed. They accepted restrictions on freedom of expression, control of the internet and surveillance of public spaces. In the midst of 14 trouble spots such as Afghanistan, Pakistan and North Korea, China, according to Li Daokui, sees itself as a huge experimental laboratory that is trying to learn from mistakes such as the one-child policy. It is so preoccupied with its internal challenges that it does not want any military or ideological expansion. China demands respect and reacts sensitively if it is confronted with a raised index finger.
Of course, China's values and image of humanity are not compatible with ours, China's indifferent attitude towards Russian aggression in Ukraine and towards Tibet is hard to bear, and industrial espionage is unacceptable. But could it be that much of the widespread anger towards China is an expression of insecurity about Europe's declining competitiveness? Fear of losing the headquarters of German companies that we can no longer afford? Lecturing, isolationism and arrogance are always signs of deep-seated insecurity. But instead of stamping our feet like a defiant child, we should perhaps see China's changing role as food for thought for our own major challenges. Instead of complaining about the Chinese car glut, we should ask ourselves: How did this happen and what can we learn from each other in a challenging partnership? Listening instead of lecturing and wanting to understand without neglecting our own points of view. Because without each other, both will lose, as numerous studies have shown. There is a lot to be said for a moderate decoupling from China, not least because it forces us to reposition and strengthen ourselves. Complete decoupling is unrealistic - and not fit for the future.
