China On the Runway of Globalization: Opportunities and Challenges - A thought from Western Europe
Bounmy Rattanavan - General Manager of Tang Freres
Nanjing, China - 17 September 2001
Thank you very much for giving such a rare opportunity to speak to the meeting.
I hope to take this chance to express the concern of a Chinese, who has been living in Europe, but has kept close links with his motherland, over the development of China and the world. The views I am expressing are not only my own, but also the inspiration from my friends, including members of the think-tanks of French decision-makers.
About Understanding Globalization
First of all, globalization is an economic phenomenon. It refers to the economic exchanges and free trade in the whole world, representing the development of human society.
As a matter of fact, globalization is not a new international phenomenon. The rapid development and telecom technology have determined the trend of globalization. High-tech development, especially the popularization of Internet has sped up the process of globalization.
In recent years, the Western countries, especially the United States, have held a very active attitude towards globalization. They hope to, through globalization, seek recognition of the Western-style political system, such as multi-party system, democratization of political system and transparency of economic system in an attempt to realize a peaceful evolution worldwide.
In the coming 50 years, globalization will bring about greater changes than in the past two centuries. Today, this process has offered everyone in the world all kinds of possibilities ¡ˇěC good or bad ¡ˇěC and triggered off more fierce disputes between those who support opening and safeguard national integrity. Those who back the opening believe that the world will be inevitably open and dominated by the values of the West, such as democratic politics and market economy. Any countries hat resist the trend will definitely suffer from economic recession and political isolation.
Those who support national independence believe that globalization will lead to the result that the world is controlled by a multi-state group headed by the US and the market economy. This will impairs independent national values, sovereignty and environment protection. Globalization is actually Americanization.
The conflict between both views can be seen at the international conferences and on the streets as well. During the international conferences, the disputes are particularly eye-catching when the World Trade Organization and World Bank meetings are held.
In my opinion, human being should not limit their future to the two choices only. They should reach understanding on the basis of maintaining diversification to avoid conflicts. Asia, especially China, should play an important role in this regard.
So long as we have a clear judgement of the situation and make full use of the cards in hand, the 21st century would belong to the Asians just like the 19th of the Europeans and the 20th of the Americans.
A Series of Foreseeable Consequences from the Globalization
With the growth and aging of world population and slowdown of urban development, women will play a more and more important role in all aspects of social life. Scientific and technological progress will lead to a more popularization of Internet in various countries, and new telecom technologies will be rapidly used in work, consumption and entertainment. The enterprise activities of information industries could be spread over, and part of them might be transferred to the places with low production costs. This will not only greatly affect the economic growth in the first half of the 21st century, but also promote the exchanges among various continents. The application of genetic achievements and progress of micro technologies will also have an unpredictable impact in the latter half of the 21st century and may fundamentally change the way of life of human society.
In the near future, we can predict the following consequences from globalization.
First, the market globalization will speed up. Any country will find it more than ever difficult to close itself to international exchanges. The growth of wealth will increase at an astonishing speed: The world's output value will increase by 1.4 trillion US dollars a year. Huge transnational corporations will keep emerging. The nationalities of the enterprise owners will no longer be important. Everything is determined by the demand of the world market. If everything goes well, the world will enter into an era of economic prosperity by 2010. With economic growth, the peoples of all countries are expected to control their own destiny.
Second, inequality will get even more serious. At present, some 2 billion people are living under the poverty line of one dollar a day. By that time, this figure might exceed 4 billion.
Third, refuses will greatly increase, especially the carbon dioxide discharged into the atmosphere (7 billion tons a year at present), and the greenhouse effect will get further worsening.
Fourth, economic globalization will also give rise to crime globalization. New forms of violent crimes, Internet crimes and crimes using chemical products will become aggravated, making the world even more insecure.
Finally, a change will take place in the geopolitical structure of the world. The ideological confrontation between the East and the West last century will be replaced by more complicated regional conflicts and the disruption of unstable countries. In the countries in Africa and Asia, the border disputes will trigger off their disruption just like the former Soviet Union and Yugoslavia. The main global confrontation will be between the poor and rich in the Southern and Northern countries and between these countries.
In Western European countries, the biggest problems from globalization lie in agriculture and employment. As a result of overproduction, farmers rely on government subsidies to keep their living standard. Globalization has led to a large amount of import of cheap and good farm products, which has dealt a shock do the domestic market. Therefore, farmers are the direct victims and strongest opponents of globalization. Employment is another problem caused by globalization. Western Europe has been highly developed. The people's living level and social welfare are at a high level. The production costs are naturally high. The prices of Western Europe-made products are by are higher than those imported from developing countries. The consumers of middle and upper classes are seeking high quality products, while the low-income consumers who make up a larger proportion are satisfied with cheaper products.
Despite the foregoing worries, the world in the future will not be without vigor. On the contrary, people will intensify the construction of globalized organizations and popularize a good code of ethics. The gradually improved international law network will link various countries together. Beginning from building global free trade and free capital flow, we can even imagine there will be only one unified currency in the world.
Asia in Globalization
Asia should take an important position in the globalization process. The proportion of Asian population to the world's total population has been increased from 50% in 1950 to 60% in 1990. It will reach 70% in 50 years. In 1650, Asia maintained this proportion. At that time, Asia dominated the world while Europe and North America had just got started.
Of course, Asia will also face its unique problems: aging population, red tapes, waste of resources, pollution and low efficiency of public organs and enterprises. Some experts estimate Asia will see a way for resources (water or land). Similar wars had occurred in Europe in the 20th century.
Economic development is extremely important for Asia to solve these problems: It is easier to talk about peace when everyone is not hungry. But economic power is not the cure-all pill to solving these problems. Each Asian country should make more efforts in building democratic mechanism and a more transparent and open financial system.
We can imagine an ideal dispute settlement model. When poverty is reduced, we can build a stable conversion mechanism among major currencies. We can solve disputes by diplomatic means, even with a political consultative mechanism like EU or the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe (CSCE). The purpose is to settle disputes before force is used.
To realize this goal and seek a due position in the world, Asia should also strengthen exchanges with other countries in the world and accept the moral and value codes different from their own, such as the ideas of human rights and democracy. At the same time, Asia should also share its own fine values, such as unity and valuing families, with the rest of the world.
If that is the case, Asia will see a vigorous socio0economic development in the new century. By 2025, Asia will turn out 60% of the world's gross national products. By the end of the 21st century, it would be likely to restore its leading position as it had in the 17th century. Asia will have the world's largest city and financial centre. At least three of its currencies ¡ˇěC renminbi, yen and rupee ¡ˇěC will join in the rank of strongest currencies in the world. It will also be the home to many major technological inventions and high-tech products. Asian culture will be widely popular in the West in the course of being blended with the Western culture (People with Asian origin will make much contribution in this regard). Asia's medicine, art, cuisine, music, way of life, philosophy and aesthetics will be more influential in the whole world.
Encountering Globalization: China's Countermeasures
To some well-noted Western scholars, so long as its society is stable and developing, China will become the world's No. 1 economic power in the 21st century. If China's economic growth keeps at an annual rate of 10%, while the US' economic growth cannot exceed 2.5% by 2015, China's GNP will keep up with that of the US. If China's economy is developing at an annual rate of 7%, it will catch up with the US in 30 years.
However, we should be clearly aware, that will be the wealth the whole country produce, not the wealth of each Chinese citizen. By 2020, China's per capita income cannot match the current level of Argentine and Portugal. Even if the economy grows at the current speed, China can reach the level of per capita income by the middle of the 22nd century. In another word, China needs to make persistent effort if it wants to become the world's leading power.
Major social progress has been made from China's economic development, but many problems still exist, such as population control, agricultural modernization, grain problem, state enterprise reform, traffic, laid-off workers, education and environmental protection. It seems that the Chinese are not quite aware of the severe situation. In the course of globalization, these will no longer be mere domestic problems. They will hinder China's development in the international context.
In this sense, China's strategy of western development should not only serve to balance the economic growth between the coastal and western inland areas. It will also determine its competitiveness in the course of globalization.
China needs a rapid and long-standing economic development. Nobody could slow down this trend. But to protect the environment and control social and regional disparity, the new development must rely on systematic renovation and application of new technologies.
Globalization will probably deal a series of severe shock to China's society and economy, even bring about very bitter experiences just like the pains from giving birth to a baby. But fear will be useless. Going against the trend of globalization means going against the historical trend. Either out of political consideration or the consideration of he state's and nation's future, China should support globalization and develop itself by making use of this process.
Globalization Cannot Do without China
Entry to the international organizations, especially those that formulate rules about globalization, has become a key to a successful country.
The World Trade Organization will become stronger than ever. Nearly all the countries will join in this organization. Some new international organization will also merge, such as International Criminal Court or some stronger NGOs, which will work in the whole world.
The United Nations will play an even bigger part in controlling those international financial organizations ruled by a few Western powers. To balance the interests of various continents, G8 will also develop. At present, it only accepts most developed industrial countries. Some day, it will be open to China and all the members of UN Security Council.
Domestic media seem to be worried that China would lagging behind in the course of globalization and be excluded from the game of international competition.
Actually, there are not sufficient reasons for such worry. Most far-sighted personages in the Western Europe agree to this view: without the participation of China having a population of 1.3 billion, globalization will be nothing but an empty talk. Without the participation of China, WTO will see no future.
We are relieved to see that China has been clearly aware that the country must be further opened up in order to speed up the reform. The entry to WTO is a good opportunity. China can make good use of this opportunity to join in globalization, attract more foreign investment, adjust the neighborly relations and use high-tech to improve its administrative efficiency.
China is also having a unique card to cope with globalization. That is the thousands of overseas Chinese. They are the reliable and worth developing resources. The support and suggestions of overseas Chinese to the country's modernization can be seen as one of the favorable international conditions.
Modern China is developing towards the goal of a world power. The advent of the new century is also offering her inestimable development opportunity. As an overseas Chinese, I firmly believe that China will make greater contributions to the mankind with the advance of globalization.
|
