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CHRIS PATTEN, the last British governor of Hong Kong and a former EU commissioner for external affairs, is chancellor of Oxford University.
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COMMENT | The China ‘constrainment’ doctrine
Chris Patten
Published 6:24 am
Modified 6:25 am
COMMENT | It is necessary to know some history in order to draw the right lessons from it. All too often, alleged parallels and similarities seem far-fetched on close examination. So, when it was suggested recently that China’s recent behaviour – bullying, lying, and violating treaties – was similar to that of Germany prior to World War I, I was doubtful.
In 1911, for example, Germany’s Wilhelm II provoked an international crisis by deploying a gunboat to Agadir, Morocco, to try to squeeze concessions out of France and drive a wedge between that country and Britain. Instead, the episode convinced France and Britain of Germany’s aggressive intentions – a conclusion borne out three years later by the outbreak of war.
Maybe it is too pessimistic to draw similar conclusions today about the behaviour of the Communist Party of China (CPC). But the events of the last few months surely call for a coordinated response by the rest of the world, and especially by liberal democracies. If Chinese President Xi Jinping’s aggressive behaviour is to be discouraged, we need to get together and stick together.
The list of China’s transgressions is long. While the rest of the world has been distracted by a pandemic that spread in part because of the CPC’s secrecy and lies, China has increased its military threats against Taiwan and reneged on treaty-based promises to respect Hong Kong’s traditional freedoms under the rule of law.
Xi’s regime has also harassed other countries’ ships in the South China Sea, which China claims as its own despite rulings against it by an international tribunal in The Hague. And most recently, Chinese forces ambushed and killed Indian soldiers on the countries’ disputed Himalayan border.
All the while, China has maintained its policy of economic extortion, issuing mafia-style threats to international companies to accept its own narrative of current and past events as the price of doing business. And when countries have the temerity to cross China’s government (for example, by seeking an independent inquiry into the origins of Covid-19), it imposes economic and trade sanctions against them.
So, what should the rest of the world do?
First, we should reject the idea that trying to deter or prevent this sort of behaviour amounts to Sinophobia. It is not hostility to China that should motivate us, but rather a desire to push back in a measured and coherent way against the aggression of Xi and the CPC.
Second, we should be more clear-sighted about the nature of what is happening and what needs to be done.
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The aim is not to start another cold war, but to practice what the late Gerald Segal called “constrainment” vis-à -vis China. Liberal democracies must defend their belief in a global order based on credible international agreements and the rule of law. So, although we should be prepared to offer China incentives for good behaviour, we must be prepared to deter bad behaviour vigorously.
Above all, we must not allow China the opportunity to divide and rule. The world’s democracies must unite and openly show Xi’s regime exactly what we stand for. – Project Syndicate
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