In an article,
titled "Iran-Russia hit maximum strategy", Pepe Escobar
sums up the gist of the anxiety that characterizes the present
Geopolitical moment :
“One of the crucial geopolitical questions of our time is how an emergent, supposedly Chinese hegemony will articulate itself. If actions speak louder than words, then Sino-hegemony looks loose, malleable and inclusive, starkly different to the US variety”.
Nations are presently navigating rare and difficult contextual settings which explains the bursting of public anxiety. This YouTube video illustrates better than a thousand words how the West is collapsing right under our eyes while this other video shows the contrast of the Chinese promise in what comes after “Western-Modernity”.
Were it not for US statistical massaging China should already be recognized as the first economic power on earth by whatever method of calculation. Having said that, within the next decade or two, the country is destined to dwarf the size of Western economies. In light of this, in my view, the comprehension of China's development strategy is assuredly the most reliable remedy to
relax one's mind amidst this ambient anxiety.
Here is how Pepe himself, in his own words, describes the present context :
- “A new Eurasia-led order encompassing the vast majority of the world’s population is a work in fast progress. China using Eurasia as the larger stage to upgrade its global role, in parallel to the fast-evolving Sino-Russian-Iranian interaction, carries larger than life implications for the Western gatekeepers of the imperial ‘rules-based order.’
- “a Eurasian-based clearing network designed to compete with SWIFT”
- “The de-Westernization of globalization, from a Chinese point of view, does involve a completely new terminology (‘community of shared destiny’).”
In all respect to Pepe I’m afraid that this kind of vision is emotionally trapped into the noise of the day and it is thus not accurately reflecting the big picture of the Geopolitical reality of the moment.
Let me try to sketch what I mean by that.
1. Swift is old technology :
Swift is an old
technology that was developed in support of the role of the US
dollar. Technologies evolve rather rapidly. According to insider experts China today has taken an advance of 10 years
on the US (6-7 on the EU) in the field of Fin-tech and the country is taking the opportunity of the Winter-Olympics to announce to the world that its
international payment solution is available for international commerce as a free, or nearly free, of charge service package combining –
the digital Yuan – and block-chains managing transportation matters, import tax matters, and other.
These technologies don’t impose the adherence of users to a Chinese institutional platform that would be in competition with a Western platform. Chinese are pragmatic. What they offer is available on a case by case base. And the cost of transferring money, or filling documents, is merely cents in comparison to the dollars that it takes today using banks and Swift.
To grasp how this system works in real life watch the following 2 interviews of Richard Turrin who is one of the most knowledgeable English speakers about the subject :
These technologies don’t impose the adherence of users to a Chinese institutional platform that would be in competition with a Western platform. Chinese are pragmatic. What they offer is available on a case by case base. And the cost of transferring money, or filling documents, is merely cents in comparison to the dollars that it takes today using banks and Swift.
To grasp how this system works in real life watch the following 2 interviews of Richard Turrin who is one of the most knowledgeable English speakers about the subject :
- ”China’s Central Bank Digital Currency by Fat Tail Investment Research”
- "Big Techin China and the Digital Yuan by Oriol Caudevilla".
2. “A new Eurasia-led order”.
Let me start by stating the obvious. China’s vision is holistic, pragmatic, and is rooted in the priority of its own “internal circulation”.
What does that mean ?
It means that Foreign trade is no longer China's first priority. What happens inside China is now recognized as what matters most to ensure the country's smooth sailing into the territory of higher well-being for its citizens. Here are the determinant reasons that eased this recognition by the Chinese leadership :
-
US sanctions :
US sanctions against Huawei, and other Chinese companies, have taught China that, to avoid being bullied, the country needs to be self-sufficient in technology. Not only are Chinese manufacturers rapidly catching up to existing chip technologies for example; they are leapfrogging them in the technological routes of the future... - Chinese Animism+
Chinese Animism+, or Chinese Traditional Culture in Chinese parlance, will be the cultural impetus for the production of new goods that are adapted to the order of priorities of human life. This order of priority views the reproduction of the species as the prime target of human governance then comes individual happiness and the reproduction of societies. But this second objective is viewed as a derivative of the reproduction of the species. The individuals who yearn for happiness, as well as their societies, go extinct a lot earlier than their species. So it is well the species that has the last word after all in nature...
This Chinese order of priority stands in stark contrast to the present priorities of Western corporations that are focused on the generation of profits while left free to poison the habitat of life and life itself.
It is at this point of the reasoning about the big picture in governance that originates the idea of “a community of nations with a shared future”… and an addition to this idea is presently germinating in China that calls for the future to be ecological because otherwise there shall be no future at all. So the terminology will necessarily be adapted to “a community of nations with a shared ecological future”. -
The Chinese market :
The Chinese consumer market is so vast that, by its size alone, it is destined to form the bulk of China’s activities and what works in China shall then like by osmosis be adopted by the rest of the community with a shared ecological destiny… -
The polarities of the Chinese nation :
“Internal circulation” has been recognized not so long ago as the Yang polarity of the Chinese nation while its Yin polarity was recognized as its “External Circulation”. This Yin polarity follows the lines of the “flying geese pattern of development” that had been developed by Kaname Akamatsu in the 1930s and that was a hot topic of study, since the end of the nineteen-eighties in Chinese research institutions, if my memory serves me well.
So how is China applying this flying geese pattern to its own development ?
This brings us to the observation that Russia and China have their own perspectives that are rooted in their own specific context which explains why these countries feel better off with a very close relationship, based on the deep trust between their leaders, than with an official alliance that would only hamper their present strategic and tactical agility…
- First step : Chinese internal circulation.
The internal circulation, operated by a well-to-do 20% of the world population, will unmistakably procure a solid “Internal Background” for the external circulation. The internal circulation strengthens the nation economically, socially, and culturally while the external circulation satisfies China's needs in energy and resources from the rest of the world and satisfies also its population who wants to have access to externally produced goods like fashion, arts, and commodities - Second step : “East-Asian Regional Economic Bloc” (REB).
With this second move the Chinese internal background is expanded into an “East-Asian Regional Economic Bloc” or REB that comprises some 33% of the total world population, GDP, trade and this figure is continuously growing:
- First move was with ASEAN (10 South-East Asian countries). Presently ASEAN plays the role of a backstage for the Chinese internal background. In other words ASEAN has become an extension that amplifies the core of Chinese production chains
- The second move was the RCEP free trade agreement = ASEAN + North-East Asian Confucian Area (South-Korea, Japan, China) + some borderlands (Australia, New Zealand)
- The third move comes in the near future and concerns the North-Eastern Economic development area (North-Korea, Eastern Siberia, three Chinese Northern Provinces), that was in negotiation since a long time already, and will soon enough be bursting into the most active economic area in the whole world with investments from Japan, South-Korea, China, Russia, and so on
- Third step : Eurasia
From a Chinese perspective the geographic location of Eurasia is the obliged passage of its communication lines with the Inter-Continental-Area, Africa, and Europe. This consideration is central to Chinese calculations because the potential exchanges with Africa, Europe, and the Inter-Continental-Area are nearly limitless …not only for China but also for the East-Asian Regional Block and for the Eurasian nations themselves. This is how the New Silk Roads are seen as a win-win opportunity maker for all participants.
From a Chinese perspective Eurasia is one ensemble of nodes, in an open system, wherein information flows freely from node to node inside their own ensemble and with the nodes from other ensembles. In such a system each node is doing its own business (internal circulation) while freely exchanging with the other nodes (external circulation).
In light of this the idea that the future Geopolitical order will be an “Eurasia-led order” badly misinterprets China’s vision. This idea, in reality, rather better corresponds to an ideal Russian vision of development.But that is another story.
This brings us to the observation that Russia and China have their own perspectives that are rooted in their own specific context which explains why these countries feel better off with a very close relationship, based on the deep trust between their leaders, than with an official alliance that would only hamper their present strategic and tactical agility…
So the next summit between President Xi and President Putin, in good logic, should not conclude with the announcement of a formal alliance between the two countries. They will continue to focus on pragmatism and most probably they'll announce some specific and concrete actions like for example — the adoption of the digital Yuan as favored International payment system — the announcement that China will stand firmly behind Russia’s eventual technical and military measures against some infrastructures of Nato, the US, and Britain — the announcement of new long term oil and gas supply contracts — the deepening of communication lines between the two armies — the deepening of their cooperation in the fields of science and technology — etc...
3. The De-Westernization of globalization :
Pepe is evidently right that China’s vision comes at the cost of “The de-Westernization of globalization” which will also come with a completely new terminology. The same can be said about the coming rejection of Euro-centrist concepts in the sciences, in the arts, and so on…But when will Pepe finally integrate “the great convergence of Late-Modernity” in his analysis ? Geopolitics can indeed no longer escape the side-effects that Western Modernity has accumulated over the last centuries and that now start to threaten life on earth…
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