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| The Economist on China's rise to global economy supremacy |
The news hit the world this month that China has become the world's largest economy by Purchasing Power Parity(PPP) Measures. The calculations by the International Monetary Fund(IMF) puts the value of the Chinese economy at $17.6 trillion while that of the US is $17.4 trillion.
The think-tank I run Strategy3 focused as we are among other issues, on China and future studies was among the first institutions to highlight this information. Scanning the media in cyberspace it seems the news has not been given much prominence like the protests in Hong Kong which had more of a burlesque feel than serious political agitation. This steadied ambivalence or stoic blindness does not undermine the fact however that this news is one of the most significant in modern economic history. For the first time in the last 120years a country which is not part of the Euro-American Order has risen to the position of the preeminent economic power on earth. Few experts had given China even a dog's chance to build her political stability after the spasmodic contortions of the 19th and early 20th centuries let alone outrun the formidable US economy 65(in just two generations) years after the People's Liberation Army stormed Beijing's Chang'an Avenue and took state power.
I have been monitoring the leading media outlets in the Euro-American heartland. Keith Fray(http://blogs.ft.com/ftdata/2014/10/08/chinas-leap-forward-overtaking-the-us-as-worlds-biggest-economy/ )writing for the Financial Times engaged in affected sophistry. Straining to simply accept this new fact of global economic life he is at pains to tell us that China is " far from the richest" economy in the world. And adds the phony tired caveat that China has always been the leading economy at least two millennia before our time( if you know your Pomeranz, Maddison and Gunder Frank it is preaching to the converted). to soften what seems a difficult blow to take. Of course if China was dirt poor and backward her shiny economic past will be reason enough for pride and disdain for those upon whom she will be depending.
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| Hong Kong determines China's future? |
The Economist also plays games with this news. In its October 4 edition the Economist had bannered the Hong Kong protests in its pages(cover and lead story). The lead story was just too heavy on shrill hyperbole and outright insults for a respected paper as the Economist. In the lead story China's history was described as "grim" and the country as a "violent" one. In its October 11 edition however the report on China's rise to global economic preeminence is uncharacteristically, for the Economist which has lately been focusing on that country, buried in nondescript manner in a story focusing on Ukraine and Venezuela and "Soverign Defaults." For decision makers with no time it is easy to miss this. In an ill disguised dampener that takes a direct aim at China's economy the column Free Exchange pontificates on why " weakening productivity is casting doubt on the sustainability of China's growth."
My take from these deliberately angled takes is that China's prosperity and growing power matter deeply to the Euro-American Order. In a recent article in Foreign Policy retiring Under-Secretary of State William Burns indicates how the Pacific(which China has made important) has become vital to America's long term strategic interests. African countries need to take a cue if the big boys are plotting and ride the Chinese wave. It will be no easy ride for sure requiring as it will strategic vision backed by the necessary operational infrastructure. Recognizing the major tectonic shifts now underway is however an inevitable necessary condition.
