US-China relations: China more likely to seek harmony

Comments on Ron Huisken “US-China relations: The outlook for harmony”, 24/03/2011, http://www.eastasiaforum.org/2011/03/24/us-china-relations-the-outlook-for-harmony/

Ron Huisken' point that "In one way or another, governments strike a bargain with the governed", seems helpful to understanding the rulling politics in China.

Any government has to try to find ways to keep in power.

In the first 30 years, there was no effective challenge from other political parties to the communists rule and all difficulties came from within the ruling communist party itself.

To be frank, they were unlucky in many ways during that period:

1. The Korea war not only caused China dearly in human and economic terms, but also politically as well as militarily that laid a long term underlying problem, made it impossible to unify Taiwan and further increased external threats so it had to have spend more on military, as well as more reliant on the former USSR and prolonged difficulties in its diplomatic relations with the US and the West.

2. The failure of the Great Leap Forward campaign both economically and politically - the internal struggles between Mao and Peng first, then against Liu through the launch of the Cultural Revolution campaign, and subsequent with Lin, as well as with Deng on and off.

3. The double waming of its worsening relations with the former USSR that turned each other to enemies and the continued isolation from the West since the late 1950s to about early 1970s.

4. The Cultural Revolution brought China to the edge of nearly total economic collapse.

Notwithstanding those internal difficulties and some external military threats, the legitimacy of the Chinese communist rule was not in serious question.

Since the late 1970s, however, the fortune of the Chinese communist rule has changed, experiencing much more challenges within China, but externally they had more luck than the first period.

The 1980s was characterised by contrasting economic growth between China and the former USSR. China benefited from faster economic growth, but unfortunately ended with the Tiananmen Square unrest. The faster growth and the existence of the USSR and East Europe communist states meant the the legitimacy of communist rule was not really question.

The collapse of the former USSR initially caused the Chinese communists great shock, but the persistent problems in the disintegrated former USSE countries particularly in Russia in the many years in the 1990s provided a breathing space for the Chinese ruling communist party. The initial threats by the collapse of the former USSR turned to relief for them.

In the past decades, the 9/11 and the war against terror led by the US, in Afghanistan and subsequently the invasion of Iraq, has created further opportunities for them. The joining of the WTO improved China's access to the world market and enabled the rapid growth to continue. The GFC may turn out to be positive to China in justifying its economic approach.

All these have been accompanied by breath taking rapid economic growth that has greatly raised the living standards for more than a billion people.

Now China has become world's second d largest economy, probably effectively producing more manufactured goods than any other single country in the world.

What will be in store for the Chinese communist ruling party in the coming decades and how will they bargain their way ahead to continue their ruling legitimacy? It is likely continued rapid economic growth to catch up with the industrialised countries on the per capita terms would be the main political strategy to reconcile the continued one party rule with a sea of liberal democracy.

No matter what the advocates of liberal democracy can do all over the world, the fact will continue that it is impossible to change the economic fortune for the majority of the world population over a short period of time faster than what the Chinese government could. That would always provide a very strong argument for the continuation of its current rule.

Will the external environment be favourable to them, as they have been over the past 20 years or so?

The future is uncertain and unexpected events, like 9/11, could emerge. Probably no one can answer that now.

The danger for the Chinese communist government is that it may make mistakes either in dealing with the external world or to deal with its governed, to cause difficulties for itself.