'Peaceful modernization': China's offer to the Global South

The work report presented by President Xi Jinping at the start of the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) last Sunday in Beijing contained not only a blueprint for the development of the civilization-state, but also for the entire Global South. 

Xi's one hour and forty-five minute speech presented a more concise overview of the full work report – see the PDF attached – which deals in much greater detail with a range of socio-political issues.

This was the culmination of a complex collective effort that spanned months. Upon receiving the final text, Xi commented on it, revised it, and edited it. 

In summary, the CCP's master plan has two aspects: to complete "socialist modernization" between 2020 and 2035; and to develop China – through peaceful modernization – into a modern socialist country that is "prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced, and harmonious" by 2049, marking the centenary of the founding of the People's Republic of China (PRC).

The central concept of the work report is... peaceful modernization – and how to achieve it. As summarized by Xi, "it contains elements that are common to the modernization process of all countries, but is more marked by characteristics unique to the Chinese context."

Consistent with Chinese Confucian culture, "peaceful modernization" contains a complete theoretical system. Of course, there are multiple geoeconomic paths to modernization – depending on the conditions of each specific country. But for the Global South as a whole, what truly matters is that the Chinese example radically breaks with the TINA (no alternative) monopoly on the practice and theory of modernization.

Not to mention that it also breaks with the ideological straitjacket imposed on the Global South by the self-proclaimed "golden billion" (of which the truly "golden" barely reach 10 million). What the Chinese leadership is saying is that the Iranian model, the Ugandan model, or the Bolivian model are just as valid as the Chinese experiment: the important thing is to pursue an independent path to development.  

How to develop technological independence 

Recent history shows that any country attempting to develop outside the Washington Consensus is terrorized by a myriad of levels of hybrid warfare. Such a country becomes the target of color revolutions, regime change, economic blockade, NATO sabotage, or simply bombing and invasion.  

What China proposes resonates throughout the Global South because Beijing is the largest trading partner of no fewer than 140 countries, which easily grasp the concepts of high-quality economic development and self-sufficiency in science and technology.

The report highlighted the categorical imperative for China from now on: to accelerate technological self-sufficiency, since the Hegemon will resort to anything-goes tactics to ruin Chinese technology, especially semiconductor manufacturing.

In its infernal sanctions package, Hegemony has been betting on crippling China's drive to accelerate its technological independence in semiconductors and the equipment to produce them. 

China will therefore have to engage in a national effort to produce semiconductors. This need will be at the heart of what the working report describes as a new development strategy, driven by the tremendous challenge of achieving self-sufficiency. In essence, China will strengthen the public sector of the economy, with state-owned enterprises forming the core of a national technological innovation development system.  

'Small fortresses surrounded by high walls' 

Regarding foreign policy, the working report is very clear: China is against any form of unilateralism and against any bloc or group that turns against specific countries. Beijing refers to blocs like NATO and AUKUS as "small fortresses surrounded by high walls."

This vision is inscribed in the emphasis given by the CCP to another categorical imperative: the reform of the current system of world governance, which is extremely unfair to the Global South. It is always fundamental to remember that China, as a civilization-state, sees itself simultaneously as a socialist country and the largest developing nation in the world.

The issue, once again, is that Beijing believes in "safeguarding the international system that has the UN at its core." Most actors in the Global South know that the United States subjects the UN – and its voting mechanism – to relentless pressure of all kinds.

It is enlightening to pay attention to the very few Westerners who actually know anything about China.

Martin Jacques, until recently a senior lecturer in the Department of Politics and International Studies at the University of Cambridge, and author of what is perhaps the best book written in English on the development of China, is impressed by the fact that China's modernization occurred in a context dominated by the West: "That was the crucial role of the CCP. It had to be planned. We can see how extraordinarily successful this process was." 

The implication is that, by breaking the Western-centered TINA model, Beijing has accumulated the instruments that have enabled it to help countries in the Global South implement their own models.

Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, is even more optimistic: "China will become the leader in innovation. I hope and believe that China will become the leader in innovation in sustainability." This will contrast with the 'dysfunctional' American model, which is becoming protectionist even in the business and investment sectors.

Mikhail Delyagin, vice-chairman of the Economic Policy Commission of the Russian State Duma, makes a crucial point that certainly did not go unnoticed by actors in the Global South: the CCP "has managed to creatively adapt 19th-century Marxism and its 20th-century experience to new demands, and implement eternal values ​​with new methods. This is a lesson of great importance for us." 

And that is the added value of a model geared towards the national interest, and not towards the exclusionary policies of Global Capital.

ICR or nothing

Implicit throughout the working report is the importance of the broad concept of Chinese foreign policy: the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and its corridors of trade connectivity crossing all of Eurasia and Africa.

It fell to the Chinese Foreign Minister to clarify the course to be taken by the BRI:

"The BRI transcends the outdated mentality of geopolitical games, having created a new model of international cooperation. The BRI is not a closed group that excludes other participants, but rather an open and inclusive cooperation platform. It does not represent just the isolated work of China, but a symphony performed by all participating countries."

The British Cooperation Initiative (BRI) is intrinsically linked to the Chinese concept of "openness." It is also important to remember that the BRI was launched by Xi nine years ago – in Central Asia (Astana) and later in Southeast Asia (Jakarta). Beijing has learned from its own mistakes and continues to calibrate the BRI in consultation with its partners – from Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Malaysia to various African countries.  

It is not surprising that, in August of this year, China's trade with the countries participating in the BRI reached the extraordinary sum of 12 trillion, and that non-financial direct investment in those countries exceeded 140 billion. 

Wang is correct in pointing out that, following the BRI's investments in infrastructure, "East Africa and Cambodia have highways, Kazakhstan has [dry] ports for exports, the Maldives has its first transoceanic bridge, and Laos has gone from a landlocked country to a connected one." 

Even under serious threats, ranging from zero COVID cases to sanctions of all kinds and the disruption of supply chains, the number of China-European Union express freight trains continues to grow, the China-Laos Railway and the Peljesac Bridge in Croatia are now operational, and work on the Jakarta-Bandung High-Speed ​​Railway is underway.

Mackinder, high on crack.

Across the extremely heated global chessboard, international relations are being completely reshaped.

China – and important Eurasian actors from the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), BRICS+, and the Russian-led Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) – are now proposing peaceful development.

The Hegemon, on the contrary, imposes an avalanche of sanctions (it is no accident that the three most affected countries are Eurasian powers: Russia, Iran, and China), highly lethal proxy wars (Ukraine), and all possible strains of hybrid warfare to avoid the end of its supremacy, which barely lasted seven and a half decades, an insignificant amount of time in historical terms.  

This dysfunction – physical, political, financial, cognitive – is reaching a climax. As Europe plunges into an abyss of devastation and darkness largely self-inflicted – a neo-medievalism expressed in politically correct terms – an internally destroyed Empire resorts to plundering even its wealthy "allies". 

It's as if we were witnessing a scene from a crack-addicted Mackinder.

Halford Mackinder, of course, was the British geographer who developed the geopolitical "Heartland Theory," which strongly influenced United States foreign policy throughout the Cold War: "Whoever controls Eastern Europe controls the Heartland, whoever controls the Heartland controls the World Island, whoever controls the World Island controls the whole world."

Russia spans eleven time zones and sits atop up to a third of the world's natural resources. A natural symbiosis between Europe and Russia seems like a given. But the oligarchy of the European Union has ruined it all.

It is no wonder that the Chinese leadership views this process with horror, because one of the essential platforms of the BRI is to facilitate uninterrupted trade between China and Europe. Since the Russian connectivity corridor has been blocked by sanctions, China will prioritize corridors that traverse West Asia. 

Meanwhile, Russia is completing its eastward turn. Russia's immense resources, coupled with the manufacturing capacity of China and East Asia as a whole, project a sphere of trade/connectivity that extends even beyond the BRI. It is at the heart of the Russian concept of a Greater Eurasian Partnership. 

In another of history's unpredictable twists, Mackinder, a century ago, may have been essentially correct in stating that whoever controls the Great Interior/Island of the World dominates the entire world. Nothing indicates that the controller will be the Hegemon, and even less so his European vassals/slaves.

When the Chinese say they are against blocs, Eurasia and the West are, in fact, the two blocs. Although not yet formally at war with each other, they are, in reality, already mired up to their knees in the territory of Hybrid Warfare. 

Russia and Iran are on the front lines – militarily and in terms of absorbing relentless pressure. Other important actors in the Global South, without fanfare, try to maintain a low profile or, even less fanfare, help China and other countries to ensure that a multipolar world prevails in economic terms. 

As China proposes peaceful modernization, the hidden message of the working report is even more categorical. The Global South now faces a serious choice: between sovereignty and peaceful modernization – embodied in a multipolar world – or outright subservience. 

Translation by Patricia Zimbres