The Economist February 27th, 2021|Asia|China and Asia|”Life in the doghouse” “Asian countries are learning to cope with Chinese bullying”
Xi Jinping image Xinhua/Ju Peng
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Summary of the article
As it is, China participates widely in “Tit for Tat” with neighbors and trading partners. Essentially China wants all to consider China’s wishes first before taking any action and if you disfavor or what they might consider disrespect you will suffer some punishment.
Examples are many. Start with Australia,”charged with 14 offences”, suddenly losing 90% of its lobster market when China issued “a sudden and unofficial ban in November. Similar restrictions were applied to imports of wine, coal, barley, sugar, timber and copper ore. The offences include “condemnation of China’s human rights abuses in Xinjiang and Hong Kong, its rejection of various Chinese firms’ proposed investments and the supposedly anti-Chinese bias of Australia’s media and think-tanks.” More specifically Australia excluded Huawei from its 5G network and they passed a “law against foreign interference in politics, following …[a Chinese] influence-buying scandal involving a senator” and the coup-de-gras was prime minister Scott Morrison calling for “an independent inquiry into the origins of Covid-19…” Toss in Sweden, Norway, Canada and South Korea have all, for various reasons, suffered at least temporarily similar punishment.
Temporarily, in some cases, because if something is really needed, what country in these times can be self-sufficient, China will relent as in the case of needing Australian Iron Ore or South Korean chip-making even though South Korea has not removed American anti-missile batteries meant to protect against North Korea but to which China remarked were capable of intruding across China’s radar. All the boycotts though can obviously be damaging as an example South Korean products and services losses reduced its GDP by 0.5%. Yet there is a price to pay in the court of public opinion. Such disruptive and impactful retaliatory moves have “caused ordinary people’s opinions of China to plummet.”
So what are the lessons learned in dealing with China as a bully?
“Businesses susceptible to economic pressure are diversifying away from China” as a market and as a supplier.
“Like-minded countries acting together provide both safety in numbers and leverage against Chinese bullying.”
Having said that smaller countries are less able to resist and in total neighbors and partners are likely to “think carefully before embarking on any course likely to displease China.”