Martin Jacques: China can lead the campaign of reversing de-globalization

Martin Jacques talking to China Plus’ Tu Yun during the International Forum for Open Global Economy, Osaka, Japan, June 25th, 2019. [Photo: China Plus]

Martin Jacques, a noted China expert from the UK, says he believes China can take on a leading role in reviving globalization, which he suggests has been stalled for the moment.

CRI's Tu Yun caught up with Martin Jacques ahead of the G20 summit, which is set to get underway tomorrow in the Japanese city of Osaka, asking him about the current situation when it comes to the current trade dispute between China and the US.

Martin Jacques: A certain degree of, you can call it de-globalization, in that situation, the United States, by putting up protectionist barriers weakens competition within the United States, cuts itself off from some of the more dynamic companies and products in the global economy, particularly emanating from China. At the same time, in effect, it withdraws from the Chinese economy. And the difficulty then is that inevitably it is going to affect the competitiveness of American companies and the American economy, because you need encouragement, the incentive, the challenge of competition to be able to develop and advance. In my view, the country that is going to be most adversely affected by that is not China but the United States.

Tu Yun: You said China will have to win to live in a world that is increasingly divided and which the United State is seeking to isolate. How?

Martin Jacques: Oh, I think that China has very clear view of how it wants to develop, the industries in which it needs to do well, 2025, that kind of approach. It also invests very heavily in research and development, encouraging research and development, large numbers of science and technology students and so on. So China has its strategic vision of moving in this direction. One,two. China is an extremely competitive economy. I mean not just competitive with outside firms or with foreign firms but competitive between Chinese companies in many ways, in many areas helps boost its competition. This is only going to help China develop. And thirdly China is not going to pull out in lots of areas in the world. I mean Look at Huawei, Huawei develops first of all not only in the developed economies but also in the developing economies, so that will continue with Huawei and lots of others firms as well, because for China, Chinese companies and the developing countries are often being actually more important than the developed countries.

Tu Yun: It seems you are quite positive about China's future role in leading the world. What makes you so certain about that?

Martin Jacques: I suppose my answer to that is, it's kind of a big question, really. That is that China has been rising since 1949, but especially since 1978. This has been unprecedented globally and remarkable. When an economy has got that amount of momentum and traction, then I think it reflects much deeper processes within the society. China failed ever since, in my view, the early 19th century until 1949. But that didn't mean that China didn't have the potential to transform itself. So there was a lot of, if you like, potential, you know which had lay dormant within China. And I think this is why China now has so much momentum, whereas the United States is displaying more or less the opposite characteristics.

Tu Yun: In what way can China lead?

Martin Jacques: In governance, in new products, in new technologies, in scientific research, in ways of organizing the economy, of Chinese governance.

Tu Yun: Last but not the least, what do you expect from this G20 Summit?

Martin Jacques: I think the first thing is, a lot of the world's attention on G20 will be, first and foremost, directed on what happens in the conversation between Trump and Xi Jinping. Inevitably, that is going to really affect people's attitude towards the success or otherwise, of the G20. If it doesn't get anywhere, the danger is the G20 is sidelined. People don't that much of interest in it when they should take some interest in it. I think there could be some concrete steps made in relation to some of the key problems. I mean further development of climate change, importance of green technology, very good points in the discussions about Africa. I mean if those came through, they will be very important. And I think China obviously plays an important role in that.