VIDEO TRANSCRIPT: Trump- Xi Jinping Summit: No to Thucydides Trap; A partnership of stability and dialogue
GUSTAF: Hello, and welcome to a podcast by the Belt and Road Institute in Sweden. My name is Gustaf Lansner, and I’m joined today by our chairman, Mr. Stephen Brewer. Welcome, Stephen.
STEPHEN: Thank you, Gustaf. Pleasure to be back.
GUSTAF: Today we will focus on the recent state visit by China, and Xi Jinping, to the US. What do you think is the significance of this visit?
STEPHEN: Beyond the theatrics, or the idea that is generally presented in the mainstream media, it’s not simply optics. First of all, this was the first time since the administration of John F. Kennedy that an American president actually met a foreign president directly at Andrews Air Force Base to welcome him, with red carpet treatment, for President Xi Jinping. This was significant because it also defined the nature of what you could call a new type of relationship, which was based on partnership.
And this was explicitly stated: that we can both advance the interests of our two countries without ending up in what they call the Thucydides trap, the inevitable conflict between a rising power and an established power. He made that reference because there are a lot of individuals who operate on the principle – it could also be called the law of the jungle – that when you have a rising power, there must be an established power which will suppress it, or end up in a conflict or a war. That was immediately negated in Xi Jinping’s initial remarks, which established the basis for both countries to move forward, that China does not see the United States as an enemy.
This also, in a fundamental sense, questions the whole geopolitical nature of how world politics is often discussed: that there have to be countries which are not operating on a common interest, but only on their own self-interest, and how that can be manipulated for one country’s best interest as opposed to another’s. So these points were established in the initial framework of the discussion, and this meant that, for the first time, the United States was in principle accepting the idea that China is a world power, equally a world power with the United States. That is something that has not happened in the post-World War II period. So this is a game changer. This is a new, fundamental aspect, and it has implications – or should have implications – for the European theatre, for us here in Sweden as well as the EU, because it means there is a potential for a different type of international dialogue, not necessarily based automatically on war and conflict.
And then, of course, this was the first time a Chinese president visited the US since Xi Jinping did so in 2016, I believe, when Trump began his first term.
GUSTAF: That’s ten years ago. Quite a long time.
STEPHEN: Or eleven. In any case, the point is that there is a different constellation that is potentially now at play. How that emerges and develops is yet to be determined. But these kinds of strategic questions matter for what we do at the Belt and Road Institute in Sweden: how can we inform and help give the Swedish population a more accurate picture of how world strategic policies are unravelling? Because at the moment, unfortunately, there is no public discussion or debate about the Belt and Road Initiative. It’s more or less ignored, or even forbidden in certain contexts. And that is not good for Sweden, and it’s not good for having an informed citizenry that needs to be able to handle these kinds of questions and how they will impact Sweden. In my view, this could have been something far more significant to take up in the political debate before the election that just occurred.
GUSTAF: Yeah. We had a recent election here in Sweden, and these questions were hardly discussed. Now Trump is signalling that China is basically an equal power to the US. Here in Europe it’s hardly discussed, but when it is, it’s discussed as a sort of abstract threat – we don’t know much about it, but the only thing we know is that it’s a threat. Why do you think that’s insufficient, and why should European and Swedish leaders take these questions seriously, about the Belt and Road and China’s development? Why is that relevant for us here?
STEPHEN: They have an underlying, fundamental significance for the future of economic development in the world, and this is already being openly discussed among the great majority of nations – the so-called Global South – the BRICS countries: Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, and other countries, including Iran, Egypt and Ethiopia, which are now active members, with several others in partnership with them. And the idea of a multipolar world challenges the general idea that only the power of the United States and its allies – including the British-American special relationship – has, since World War II, more or less dominated all decisions and policies in one form or another. Now that’s changing, and the recognition of that is something that is clear, whatever way people wish to interpret it – that’s another question.
But the rise of Asia, and the development of the great majority of the world’s population, is now well beyond fifty percent of the world economy. To say that this isn’t going to have a clear impact on the future of Sweden is just silly. It’s naive, because it obviously will. So the question is: what kind of discussion should we be having here in Sweden, which would be debated? You could have an open forum – maybe even one we would host – where the Swedish public could ask questions about how the Belt and Road Initiative could potentially impact Sweden, and how we could work together with it.
It’s a similar issue in the US. They don’t discuss it. For the most part, despite Trump’s acceptance of the meeting with Xi Jinping at the summit, the general political view of China is negative, as it tends to be here in Sweden. There is a kind of schizophrenia, because at the same time that there is a negative political label on China and its so-called violations of human rights or authoritarian policies, the market economy that China has opened is essential for Swedish companies. The Wallenberg group is openly and actively supporting this and is very favourable to it. So it’s rather odd, in a way: you have leading economic forces in Sweden which understand the importance of the emerging market in China, and yet you have political views that are completely at the opposite end. But these things can be better understood if there were a debate or a discussion, and I think this is something we in the Belt and Road Institute in Sweden can help to facilitate, because at the moment I don’t see any other organizations or individuals actively doing that.
GUSTAF: I think that’s a very important point. These are very big, profound questions, and you shouldn’t have clear-cut, simple answers to them. The point is to start having a real discussion or debate – but I think even just a discussion would be a great start, because, like I said, it’s always viewed simply as a threat. People don’t know much about the Belt and Road Initiative or China’s development. But what’s the potential, if we put it that way, of the Belt and Road Initiative for Sweden – or even for the US? You said we should have a discussion, but surely you see some potential here. What could that look like?
STEPHEN: On our website we have a picture of how the world’s continents could be interconnected – not simply by rail or modern fast trains, where China is way ahead of anything we have in the West because of their commitment to economic and technological development – but this picture of connecting the world’s continents through these kinds of interactive, economic, infrastructural developments, with the goal, in principle, of eliminating poverty. I don’t have that picture here to show people directly, but it’s on our website, which is www.brixsweden.org for those who wish to visit it.
This is a concept that, in terms of the Belt and Road Initiative, came from China and Xi Jinping in 2013, and there are 150 countries in the world which are operating in cooperation with it. I don’t think anyone here in Sweden knows that. They’re not being told that by the mainstream media, nor are they being told what the implications would be for Sweden and for Europe if we chose to integrate and cooperate with that kind of global development perspective. This global development perspective was initiated by China, but it is not something that China controls. Each and every sovereign nation, including Sweden, can determine how they would wish to cooperate with it. That is not the picture being given to the public here, and I think that needs to be corrected.
GUSTAF: Agreed. Can you say something more, in broad terms – because this should be a fairly short video and interview, just to give people a general idea – how come China is so successful economically, internally, and how can those principles of their internal success be used to create a more positive, global development perspective, as you say?
STEPHEN: What China has accomplished is unique to China. They have a history as a civilization going back more than five thousand years. I’ve studied it to a great extent – it’s an unbelievably fascinating and rich culture, based on times in history that are maybe not immediately accessible to us today. But, for example, in the late sixteen and seventeen hundreds – not that far back in Swedish history – you had a situation where China was the most developed civilization in the world, in terms of population and trade, in terms of porcelain. What was that era called? The Old Silk Road. This history has not suddenly gone away.
What China did under Deng Xiaoping in 1979 was to make the decision to open China up to a market economy, which they did. And in those forty-plus years, with varying types of guidance and decision-making – which of course is crucial to how you allow market developments to work for the common good – they have emerged as perhaps the leading nation on the planet in terms of physical, economic infrastructure. I mentioned fast trains: they have over forty thousand kilometres of high-speed rail. They are developing even magnetically levitated trains, and other forms of innovation: in fusion technology, and not least, of course, artificial intelligence. So they are constantly on the move forward, and their perspective is that this is important for their own internal development, but as a civilization they also want to extend their hand to show how other nations can participate.
But that would also require a certain recognition, which has been a problem in Western Europe and in Sweden: an inherent, in my view, arrogance that tends to think that other Asian or African countries are inferior, or less potentially capable of technological innovation, for example. That has now been proven to be a completely false story – they are innovating beyond what we have – but at the same time, they are openly wishing for more cooperation and friendship. And I think this is the way forward. I think if more people in Sweden were informed of this potential… Take the idea of what it would mean to modernize Africa. If the things people in Sweden take for granted – sewage systems, water systems, electrical power infrastructure – if those conditions were to emerge in other parts of the world, in Africa as well, then you would have a transformation. This is a vision for minimally twenty-five to fifty years into the future, but it is one that, as one of the previous popes – I believe it was Pope Paul VI – said: the new name for peace is development. And that is actually the case. Without development, you are not going to resolve the problems of the environment or poverty by sending care packages, or charity. Simply sending charitable contributions will not alleviate the problems, and that has to be understood and discussed, because there are potentials where Sweden, both economically and industrially, could make major contributions.
What China is doing in Africa is very good. In Ethiopia, in Kenya, in South Africa, they are on the ground doing rail development and other technologies which are very important, but they cannot do it alone. So if Western Europe, and Sweden in the best case – even if the EU would suddenly recognize the significance of this and cooperate with China in this kind of enterprise – it would be an essential move away from conflict and in the direction of a better world circumstance for everyone.
GUSTAF: We started off this talk by discussing the recent state visit of China, and Xi Jinping, to the US. Does one dare to dream that one day even the US would consider joining the Belt and Road Initiative – and what would that mean for the world?
STEPHEN: That’s a tough question, because there are many political factors in the US which do not accept that it is in the interest of the US to cooperate with the Belt and Road Initiative. But there are other, more diabolical factors, which hold that making America great again means that America should dominate the world militarily, as well as through financial sanctions and other dollar-based operations. Well, the world isn’t accepting that anymore. And that’s important for Sweden to understand, because the decision, for example, to join NATO, and to even discuss the idea of a war against Russia, is in my view total madness. Russia, like China, is a nuclear power. If you threaten the existence of Russia, you are inevitably going to end up with a war that will ultimately destroy all of us. So the idea of continuing along these lines of military engagement, or attempting to define Russia as a threat to Europe – which it is not; it has not been a threat to Europe – that has to stop.
But the US can return to its initial founding. That has not been the way US policy has worked in the post-war period. I was born and raised in the United States, born towards the very end of World War II, and the US has been playing an imperial political role, together with allies like the British, based on the idea that the world should submit. That is not what I mean when I refer to a history that goes back further, to the beginning of the US, when they established the republic. Under George Washington, the first treasury secretary, Alexander Hamilton, had an economic policy referred to as the American System of political economy, which was built on the idea of internal development – in that time, technological and industrial improvement of canals – financed through a national bank which would issue credit to the private sector. But the private sector had a responsibility to do things which would represent the benefit of all the people, the common good.
Now, if the US would dare to go back to that… There have been times even more recently, under the American president during World War II, Franklin Roosevelt – and unfortunately, when he died and decision-making went into the hands of Harry Truman and allied forces, that concept of what had been a progressive idea of the American System was lost. It is not something people today even know about, because it’s so far back, and it’s not something in most people’s present lifetime that they’ve seen in any active way. But it could be done. One doesn’t have to reinvent the wheel. These things worked for the US, and they could work, in different ways, even for Sweden, which has a very important and unique entrepreneurial history. I’m a citizen of Sweden, and I’ve studied this to a degree, starting with the emergence of Gustaf de Laval and Alfa Laval. This kind of entrepreneurial development – improving the conditions of life for the public in general – is not something completely foreign to Sweden, and it could be re-established. But it would mean a shift in the thinking of economic policy which we have fallen into, including the US in the post-war period. And unfortunately, in the more recent period, Sweden has also embraced this kind of radical free-market economy, which has not been working for the common good, and represents an obstacle to how Europe and the US could together join hands with this global initiative, the Belt and Road.
As I said, the map of the concept is on our website, and it could be elaborated and discussed further. My colleague will be here to discuss more about Europe’s and China’s capacities to work together. But unfortunately, there are powerful thinkers who do not embrace these ideas. They have a much more geopolitical view of division: that our interests are not the interests of Russia, China, Iran; that we have to have a military defence build-up to protect ourselves from what they see as the dire threat. And this is a strategy that leads towards catastrophe if it is not stopped.
GUSTAF: Thank you. I think that will do it for today, but we’ll be back to discuss these things in greater detail.
STEPHEN: I look forward to that. There’s a lot happening every day, and we will be most interested and determined to help present some of these discussions for informing the Swedish public and the international audience. I’m grateful for your presence and for the interview, and I look forward to our next chance to discuss in the not-so-distant future.