GOOD MORNING FROM LONDON
“DEMOCRACY
CHINA AND THE WEST”
The UK has travelled a long path from Autocracy to Democracy. The narrative begins with the Magna Carta in 1215 when a group of powerful landowners clipped the wings of the autocratic King John and compelled him to govern with their approval. Democracy remained remote but power resided no longer in the personal fiefdom of the King but was shared between the King and the feudal landowners.
The Civil War of 1642-49 witnessed a major struggle between the King and Parliament with many of the nobility supporting the King. Parliament was victorious and the King was executed. Democracy was boosted. The power of Parliament grew and the power of the Monarch reduced. Parliament gained further status by extending the right to individual citizens to vote in the Great Reform Act of 1832 – a process completed by the confirmation of universal suffrage in the Representation of the People Act of 1949.
China’s journey was quite different. The key period was 1927-1949 when China was pre-occupied with two Wars – the Civil War between the Communist Party (CP) led by Mao Tsetung and the Kuomintang (KMT) led by Chiang Kaishek culminating in the defeat in 1949 of the KMT and their flight to Taiwan. There was a pause in the Civil War when between 1937 and 1945 the CP and the KMT came together to create a United Front against Japan. With the defeat of Japan, the Civil War resumed and the CP was successful and the KMT fled to Taiwan in disarray The creation of the Communist-led Peoples Republic of China took place on 1 October 1949.
China was at the cross roads. Which path to take? Democracy with one man one vote, political parties and regular general elections. Or a continuation of the Communist Party policy that had brought success in the Civil War against the KMT and the Patriotic War against Japan in World War II.
China chose the latter. It turned its back on Western representative democracy and continued with a form of government based upon the leading role of the Communist Party in the Civil War and World War II. The West shouted “Foul”. The authoritarian way is the wrong way – they argued. But today, 75 years on from the coming into effect of the Communist Party led People’s Republic of China, the Party and its authoritarian government structure remains firmly in place with sturdy foundations and a real record of achievement – The Sick Man of Asia of 1949 is now about to replace the US as the largest economy in the world
By Western standards China is not a democracy because it does not believe in the Separation of Powers as between the Executive, the Legislature and Judiciary. It does not follow the Rule of Law or observe the principle of Habeas Corpus. China, in Western eyes, is therefore a dictatorship and not a democracy.
The West disapproves and takes every opportunity to undermine China’s status, presence and role in international affairs. With much reluctance, the West recognizes the existence of China in world affairs. But it does not approve. Why? What is it about China that triggers such deep seated contempt and outright opposition? Is it the proclaimed non-democratic nature of China’s government or is it something more serious?
Quite simply it is the same fear that was generated by the Communist Manifesto of 1848, the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the Chinese Revolution of 1949. Warning bells rang in Washington, London, Paris and Berlin in 1848 when Marx and Engels published their Manifesto because of the fundamental challenge The Manifesto made to the Capitalist system of society and its replacement by the Marxist inspired Socialist system.
The Soviet experiment failed and was dismantled. There was rejoicing in Washington, London et al. The world was safe from the Socialist experiment but then China began to make an impact. Deng Hsiaoping redirected its path of development and reaffirmed the importance of the Communist Party. China took off. It joined the World Trade Organisation and its economy surged. Shortly, China will become the largest economy in the world with the 98 million members of the Communist Party of China leading the country.
China, in the eyes of Western governments, remains a threat. Its presence is a threat. It suggests to the rest of the world that there is an alternative model of development to the Western model. Capitalism – one man, one vote; universal suffrage; the Rule of Law; the Separation of Powers – has a rival and it is alive, alert and continuing to grow. As Professor Kishore Mahbubani writes in his book – Has China Won? –
“The Chinese Communist Party is not run by doddering old apparatchiks. Instead it has become a meritocratic governance system, which chooses only the best and brightest to be promoted to the highest levels…the Chinese governing class generates more good governance (in terms of improving the well-being of its citizens) than virtually any other government today. Since the Chinese Communist Party is constantly vilified in the Western media, very few people in the West are aware that the members of this Communist Party have delivered the best governance China has ever enjoyed in its entire history.”
The judgment, however, about what is best for China is made – not by Western politicians with a lifelong commitment to the defeat of all things Communist – but by the people of China. The West likes to believe that China exploits its own people; that China today is the Soviet Union of yesterday, that China is one big prison camp with the people at the mercy of a draconian Communist Party that lays down the law, and locks up the its critics and opponents.
This is where the ‘137 million figure’ comes into play which at a stroke demolishes the argument that the people of China are yearning for Western freedom. This is the number of Chinese tourists that left China to tour and visit foreign countries in the last full year before Covid. At no stage have any reports appeared in the Western media that any of the tourists had used their travel overseas to escape the clutches of the Chinese government. If even one of the 137 million tourist had sought political asylum and “freedom” in any one of the more than one hundred countries that the 137m Chinese citizens visited it would have been headline news in the US/UK media. There have been no such reports.
This narrative triggers recollection of the Jeremy Paxman Moment. He was sent by the BBC to Beijing to cover the Olympic Games of 2008 – not the stories of sporting excellence but the society in China. No question he was keen to ascertain the negatives and in one memorable interview he met with four middle aged well-dressed female entrepreneurs. He was hoping to pick up expressions of negativism about their lives in China but he made no progress. In frustration he blurted out – “but you can’t even get rid of your government”. The reply rocked Paxman back on his heels – “but why would we want to get rid of our government?”
China is not a panacea. It is not a dream state of abundance, easy prosperity, or trouble-free lives. China has its criminals. Marital breakdowns do occur. There is corruption. There is unemployment. Many people have to work very hard to enjoy the fruits of their labour. But China is on the move and the beneficiaries are the people.
One billion Chinese have been lifted out of poverty – think what that means in terms of new roads, new houses, improved sanitation, more parks, more clothes, more travel and a longer life span. Take one more step and enquire what it means to the internal dynamism of Chinese society that China is fast outstripping the US with its annual production of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) PHD graduates from Chinese Universities.
These significant achievements could not occur without challenging minds and creative talents. China is not a society of automatons appearing on the international stage on a par with Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. China’s progress comes from ingenuity, imagination and hard work. It cannot have reached the apex of economic power by relying on a work force that is dull, predictable, short-sighted and dim-witted. China has achieved because its people have willingly co-operated with the Communist Party.
But what about the Great Leap Forward, The Cultural Revolution, the Tiananmen Deaths and the persecution of the Uighurs of Xinjiang? These are significant blotches that tarnish the record of achievement? – Don’t these negatives tarnish China’s claims to be building a society on principles that challenge the very essence of the Western Capitalist system?
It is alleged by Western critics (Jesper Becker) that as many as 30m people died as a result of Mao Tsetung’s misconceived economic policies in 1959/60/61. It was the author of China’s growth surge – Deng Hsiaoping – that ordered the troops to clear the centre of Beijing of protesting students in June 1989 and, finally, isn’t China guilty of genocide in its harsh repression of the Uighurs?
These questions need to be addressed. They cannot and should not be overlooked and in the next three issues of Good Morning from London each of these issues will be addressed – the Great Leap Forward; the Cultural Revolution; the Tiananmen Deaths and the alleged genocide of the Uighurs.
We can adopt a Micro Approach and see events and developments in terms of decades or we can adopt a Macro Approach and view history in perspective in terms of the life of man – three score years and ten – 70 years. Historians will say that the British Empire was at its peak in 1895 and the US Empire in 1965 (just before the blow to US morale with the defeat in Vietnam in 1968 and the scramble to leave Saigon in 1972). This Column adopts the long term approach and views todays events in the context of the passage of time and the ebb and flow of international power. The US remains the most powerful military in the world though a casual read of Foreign Affairs highlights its decline and its replacement over the next fifty years by a multi-polar world with emerging centres of power across the globe.
But the issue today is China and why the West and Japan and Australia will be compelled by the inexorable power of History to revive its assessment of China and find channels of communication that will pave the way towards closer association and a deepening grasp of international political relations.
GRAHAM PERRY
