China is cutting cheques for global stability

Note: The following is an edited translation of an article from the Chinese-language "Commentaries on International Affairs."

Global governance [Photo: VCG]

The UN General Assembly recently passed a resolution deciding that the proportion of China's contribution to the United Nations general budget from 2019 to 2021 will increase significantly from 7.92 percent to 12.01 percent, while China's share of the UN peacekeeping budget will be 15.2 percent. China will become the UN's second largest contributor next year.

Asked about the change, the Chinese Foreign Ministry was quick to point out that this is the result of China's economic growth and increase of per capita gross national income in recent years, and that it shows the increasingly important international role China wants to play.

Over the years, the average annual economic growth rate of 9.5 percent has brought Chinese society from high levels of poverty into a new era of moderate prosperity. Over the past ten years alone, China has dispatched 31 escort missions to the Gulf of Aden and the waters off the Horn of Africa to battle piracy in the dangerous waters. China's Navy has provided escorts for 1,191 flotillas which included 6,595 Chinese and foreign vessels. Chinese teams were able to directly assist more than 60 ships which had been threatened by pirates. The Chinese Navy also took part in the eventual destruction of Syria's chemical weapons stockpiles by providing maritime transshipment escort, assisted in the search for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 and provided emergency water supplies to the Maldives during a local crisis. As the country with the largest number of active peacekeeping troops among the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, China has participated in 30 peacekeeping operations. All this has drawn praise from the international community, and has helped cement China's reputation as a builder of world peace.

In 2013, Chinese President Xi Jinping proposed the "Belt and Road Initiative" to provide an outlet for China to spread its products, ideas and approach to the rest of the world for the needs of global governance. While some countries try to discredit the "Belt and Road" initiative - mostly due to fear of China's international influence - the program has proven a resounding success, with more than 100 countries and regions actively supporting and participating in the initiative. More than 70 national and international organizations have signed Belt and Road cooperation agreements with China.

In Ethiopia, which has been dubbed by some as "the China of Africa," data from that country shows that from 2012 to 2017, 279 Chinese companies were operating in Ethiopia, creating 28,300 jobs locally. Their investment has allowed Ethiopia to generate an average annual economic growth rate of more than 10 percent in recent years.

Kenya's Daily Nation newspaper wrote in September that China is a valuable partner for Africa, which is striving to break the ancient poverty trap based on centuries of underdevelopment. This runs counter to the "debt trap" argument which is being perpetrated by countries like the United States. In rebuffing the suggestion, the Daily Nation instead notes that a developed Africa will be able to repay its debts and lift people out of poverty, as China has done over the past 40 years.

A report from Washington-based think tank, the Brookings Institution, has suggested that China's investment in development projects can help create new paths for global growth. The report cites a survey of 4,300 Chinese-invested projects in 138 countries. The analysis found that most of these projects created ultimate benefits to the countries where they are based. The Brookings study noted that if Chinese investment doubled in the two years after the initial project was approved, it helped boost the economies of the respective countries by an average of 0.4 percent.

In 2018, unilateralism, protectionism, and populism began posing serious challenges to the international order and global trading system that grew from the ashes of World War II. Trade frictions provoked by the United States have caused global capital markets to fluctuate and confidence fell, which is ultimately dragging down the global economy. Even the most optimistic analysis anticipates a slower global economic growth forecast for at least the next two years as a result.

Today, the world economy is at a crossroads, and the reform of the international governance system is at a critical juncture. The international community's confusion and anxiety about the future is on the rise. The world needs leadership. But it does not need leadership which is based around which country has the deepest pockets or the largest axe to yield. China has no intention or desire to take on the mantle of global hegemony which the United States has carried with it since the end of the Cold War. Instead, China wants to see leadership based on the needs of the people. Its global society needs politicians from around the world to agree on a way to build a new world order which is based around mutual respect, fairness, justice and cooperation and win-win, rather than one where the biggest kid on the playground sets the rules.

At a time when China is about to become the UN's second-largest financial contributor, leaders in this country are also able to draw lessons from the challenges it had to overcome over the years. China has fought hard to get where it is today. But the country hasn't forgotten where it came from. This is the main reason why the Chinese government maintains a policy which precludes it from developing on the backs of others. And while China will defend the gains it has made over the past 40 years, it will also keep fighting for world peace and the maintenance of international stability.