By He Qinglian on
November 17, 2011
China has been very upset recently. The US-led APEC
summit commenced with China not being invited to sign the
Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Agreement; at the same time, the
ANZUS treaty was renewed, an
incident that upset China all the more.
China's sophists, both inside the government and outside, acted together simultaneously. They wrote many articles, and gave all sorts of bizarre responses: some of them were worried about TPP member countries, like those who thought that the TPP without China's participation would be meaningless; others wrote articles that made it hard for readers to figure out which country won in this round of diplomacy, one such example was an absurd piece written by Anthony Yuen, “Regarding the issues of TPP, China gave the U.S. some soft nails”; and there were even articles presenting the interpretation that the new TPP shown America's intention to contain China, including “U.S. launching attacks through TPP, targeting China ”, “U.S. has completed its East Asia strategic arrangements, China should be vigilant”, “ASEAN united front against China has taken shape”, so on and so forth. Those who read reports from only the Chinese media and do not realize that China's “U.S. conspiracy theories” is a recurring theme would surely think that the world is on the eve of the third world war with China and the U.S. standing off against each other.
Still, these responses conveyed very accurately a
message: China's really disturbed by not being invited to the TPP.
The Asia-Pacific Region is the front yard of China, some of the
countries in the region, like Singapore, are which China worked to
improve ties with in recent years. This time, so many guests from
afar came socializing with hosts in Asia while the region's largest
country, China, was not invited. That truly was not giving China
face, should the country put up with this or not?
Let's first look at where did
the TPP come from. It was initially a multilateral free trade
agreement signed between Singapore, New Zealand, Chile and Brunei
within the APEC framework. The agreement received little
international notice at first. It was only until after the U.S.
“returned to Asia” and kick-started the TPP negotiation in 2009
that the agreement obtained global attention. By now there are
[ten] members in the TPP. Japan, owing to its agricultural sector's
opposition, is not yet a full member and has only just announced to
join in the negotiation. The agreement could create the world's
biggest free trade zone.
In recent years, China has become the world's largest
in several areas: the largest base for low-cost commodity supply; the
largest attraction for foreign investment among developing countries;
the country with the largest energy demand; and the country with the
largest foreign exchange reserves. Thanks to these “largests”,
most of the countries have to have ties with China in one way or
another. Logically, out of consideration of their own interests, the
[TPP member] countries should not have barred China from any economic
agreement.
And
Let’s see how the United States, which dominates the TPP that
excludes China, said about this.
On
November 13, U.S. President Obama spoke at the closing press
conference of the APEC summit, using the harshest remarks to this
date, claiming that the United States is losing patience with China’s
monetary policy and trade practice, China “has grown up”, and
should act like an adult when dealing with other countries; he also
demanded China to stop gaming the international system, because
“Enough is enough”, China should know when to stop.
The Reuters ran on November 14 a report entitling “Obama On Chinese
Economy: ‘Enough’s Enough’ Of ‘Gaming’ The International
System” to cover his speech.
The
main point of Obama’s speech was that China must play by the rules
of the international community. He also mentioned the serious
infringement China has on intellectual property, stressing that
China’s leaders need to “understand that their role is different
now than it might have been 20 years ago or 30 years ago, where if
they were breaking some rules, it didn’t really matter, it did not
have a significant impact. Now they’ve grown up, and so they’re
going to have to help manage this process in a responsible way.”
China is in fact fully aware that
it has not played by the rules of the international community. Back
when China signed the WTO agreement, reportedly Premier Zhu Rongji
said inside the State Council that the most important thing was to sign the
agreement. After signing, there is leeway as to how China would abide
by the rules. Many specialists were saying something similar when
they delivered talks abroad, that is, what matters most is to get in
first. Once China is in, how the country would act depends on its
own convenience. That’s indeed how China’s approach has been in
the ten-odd years that followed the country's signing of the WTO
agreement.
Of course, it's not just economy that China is not playing
by the rules of the international community, Beijing is doing the same thing in other areas like politics
and society. For instance, China has up to now signed in total
twenty three international conventions relating to human rights; with
the exception of the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
(ICCPR),
the country has so far ratified twenty-two conventions. Yet when
looking at the real situation in China, one would find that the
country’s pledges to these conventions are mostly unfulfilled.
And then let's look at why China was not invited to sign the TPP agreement. In response to the point, “China has yet to
receive any invitation from TPP member countries, raised by a
reporter from Phoenixgf Television, a White House press secretary
stated that “TPP is not something that one gets invited to. It’s
something that one aspires to. So I think with regard to China, or
any other country, it is up to them to determine whether they are
ready to consider the high standards that are required of a TPP
partner.”
Qiao Bao, a
long-time external propaganda outlet run by the Overseas Chinese
Affairs Office of the State Council of the People's Republic of
China, published on November 14 an article in which the following
lines appeared:
“Read carefully the requirements of TPP, it's not hard to figure out the agreement has the intention to exclude China. The requirement that green products tariff be lowered is something that is hard for China to comply at this stage; that energy consumption per GDP be reduced is targeting China; that state-owned enterprises (SOEs) must operate in accordance with business practices when buying and selling goods and services is clearly singling out China's SOEs.
While recognized as its mission to spread lies that
are mixed with bits of truth and had been confusing what's right and
what's not, Qiao Bao still has to acknowledge that China is
not up to the TPP standards. Because of the products manufactured not
meeting the standards as a result of pollution, and processing
procedures not meeting the requirements for green products; of energy
consumption per unit of products far exceeding international
standards; and of the SOEs joining in international competitions with
the support of state privileges and so on, China has for years been
criticized by the international community. Countries like the United
States have been waiting for China “to come of age”, yet China is
utilizing others' kindness toward a “child” and the time given to
“learn to walk”, hoping that the preferential treatment it gets
as a child would last forever.
And the reply from Foreign
Ministry official was rather hilarious. In response to the speech by President Obama, Pang Sen, deputy director-general at China's
Foreign Ministry said on November 13 that, “If the rules are made
collectively through agreement and China is a part of it, then China
will abide by them. If rules are decided by one or even several
countries, China does not have the obligation to abide by that.”
This answer from Pang Sen was effectively the key to
understanding why China doesn't play by international rules. From
WTO to each and every of the international human rights conventions,
China has not taken part in making them, it was only a latecomer. China signed those agreements only out of the
purpose to enter into the international community. But with this
political theory of “China not being a maker of the rules and is
therefore not necessary to abide by them”, the country finds it
right and proper not to follow the rules. Only that this thought was
kept to themselves before and this time they said it out.
Therefore, if the international community, the United
States in particular, want to “make China happy”, they have a few
options: either they carry on the appeasement policy with China
before 2009 and let China continue to enjoy the privilege of not
having to obey the rules; or they might let China dominate the making
of the rules when China wants to become a part of certain international
agreements. If the international community finds these to be too hard
to do and would rather not to include China, just like
China's “not getting any invitation” to TPP, the country would
not be happy. And it is
just so very important for the world to keep China, the world's number two, happy.
