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China to enjoy Evian with the big
boys
By Francesco Sisci
BEIJING - May the United Nations rest in peace,
may the new world order commence its work. With the
announcement that China will join the next Group of
Eight meeting in Evian, France, next month, the summit
of the world's largest economies has completely emptied
the UN Security Council. In fact the G8 will have
together the five permanent members of the Security
Council, plus four of the largest global economies that
have no veto power at the UN, namely Japan, Germany,
Italy and Canada.
It is true, China won't be an
official member of the group, and other countries have
been invited along to the meeting - India, Brazil,
Mexico and South Africa. These latter four lack the
economic clout of China, and its political reach. In
fact China, which now boasts one of the largest gross
domestic products (GDPs) in the world, would strengthen
the G8 if it were to join. And this is clear to all
participants, but the same is not true for the other
four unofficial participants.
Furthermore, the
G8 meeting will muster the heads of state of each
country, rather than diplomats, thus it could well be
conducive to concrete authoritative decisions.
This is the end of the era in which the UN aimed
to represent all nations with special status given to
the victors of World War II. In time the permanent
members lost much of their original clout they had won
in the war as some of its losers had breached the
economic gap with some of the victors, and overcome, in
case of Japan and Germany, almost all of them.
The Americans, initiators of the UN, have in the
past years undermined its function. Twice the United
States has gone to war bypassing the UN, in Kosovo in
1999 and in Iraq in 2003. Therefore, a principle is
established: the US will use the UN when it suits it,
but it will not accept being restrained by it.
China joining the G8 would recognize this
principle, and Beijing, with pragmatic realism, has
accepted the fact that if it wants to be heard it must
join the G8, forfeiting the old claim of speaking for
the Third World or being the representative of Asia. At
the G8 China would count less than Japan, and this is an
important twist, as it could be a major step toward the
complete reconciliation of the two large Asian
economies. In recent months many in China have spoken in
favor of a major political effort to mend fences with
Japan and let bygones be bygones. China needs a peaceful
and prosperous East Asian environment to boost its
growth, and this can't be achieved without Japan. Japan,
on the other hand, can regain its pristine economic
confidence only by reconciling herself with being not
the only economic and political actor in Asia - by
playing at least on the same stage as China. As we had
anticipated, the issue of North Korea has encouraged
Sino-Japanese cooperation.
Inviting China to the
G8 summit was a necessity. China in the past two years
represents the lion's share of global economic growth in
a time of widespread recession. This year the topics on
the agenda will be the war in Iraq, where everybody will
listen to what the United States has to say, and severe
acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), with its global
economic impact, and here everybody will want to hear
from China.
With the spread of the disease in
the countryside it is already clear that SARS will be a
long-term problem, with a huge impact on China's
economy. SARS creates new fears of Chinese products
among US consumers, and this in turn could help boost US
inflation, as for instance cheap shoes from Guangzhou
will be shunned for more expensive footwear from
elsewhere.
China, moreover, will need all the
help it can garner to recover its economy and exercise
some damage control. Economic crises can easily turn
into social crises, as China needs some 5 percent growth
to absorb all the hands made redundant every year in the
countryside. This help and trust can only be gained at
the G8.
This also leaves large and proud India
out in the cold and underscores the reality that most of
the world's countries are but spectators at somebody's
else play. How to address this concern without
pretending to forget the reality that money talks is the
challenge of the new world order that will be born in
the new G8 delivery room.
This is the new game
in a town full of tricks and snares. Bye-bye United
Nations.
(©2003 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd. All
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