China Unveils Vision For A New World Order

TITLE: China Unveils Vision for a New World Order CHANNEL: The China-Global South Project (CGSP) DATE: 2026-06-19 ---TRANSCRIPT--- Hello and welcome to another edition of the China in Africa podcast, a proud member of the Sinica Podcast Network. I’m Eric Olander and as always I’m joined by CGSB’s [music] head of research Cobus van Staden. Coming to us today from what looks like a bomb shelter in an alleyway and for those of you listening at home try to imagine two brick walls with Cobus squeezed in between. A very good afternoon to you Cobus.

Good afternoon. I’m hiding from the Cape Town wind which is which is at full volume. So so I’m trying to be in a quieter part of the apartment. Well, yes, so I think our viewers do not be alarmed. He is in a safe space. It’s okay. So we’ll go from there. Uh two topics today on the agenda for the show. First we’re going to talk about the new initiatives from China and the white paper about global governance which has a very strong African component to it. And then we’re going to talk about the drama that unfolded this week which we reported last week. We were one of the first to call it that Taiwan delegates were barred from attending an Oceans Forum in Kenya and there’s been quite a bit of drama about that this week. So we’ll get to that in the second half of the show. Uh the highlight of the week came for us at least in purposes of this program is the publication of a new white paper with a typically Chinese government name on it. Bear with me here. More just and equitable global governance China’s principles, and actions. This is one of a series of white papers that the Chinese government publishes. They’ve done these on Africa policy. They’ve done these on Latin America policy. In many ways it’s very helpful for us on the outside because they lay out in quite extensive detail precisely what they want to do and how they want to go about doing it. So this is a very important one on global governance, and Beijing said it would continue to focus on the central role of the United Nations in the global governance architecture. Uh it also sought no need to rebuild or replace the existing international system. This has been a concern of many people in the US and Europe and to some extent even in Japan that are wondering, “Does China want to replace the West as the global hegemonic power?” And China is coming out very clearly in this white paper and saying, “No, that is not the case.” Let me give you three highlights from the new white paper. And really at the core of it is the global governance initiative. And if you recall, the global governance initiative was something that Chinese President Xi Jinping announced last September at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Summit as part of the suite of initiatives or global initiatives that the Chinese are promoting. So, they’ve got the global development initiative, the global security initiative, and the global civilization initiative. What they’re saying in this white paper is that the GGI is the umbrella that is atop all of those. Because without strong global governance, you cannot have security, development, or what they call civilization. Civilization, by the way, is the Chinese language for human rights. That is what the GCI is really focused on. The white paper argues that emerging economies, in the global south in particular, deserve a larger role in international decision-making and calls for correcting what it sees as the historical imbalances in representation. So, this is really this uh alliance that China sees itself as the largest developing country in the world, and it’s very much in partnership with countries in the global south. And the third point that I want to raise from the white paper, and Kobus, we’re going to get your take on all of this very soon, the emphasis is shifting from these broad principles to actually doing something to mechanisms of implementation is what they call it. So, they are going to implement new initiatives like the International Organization of Mediation. That’s the new center that they have in Hong Kong. And they want to bring together dialogue platforms, dispute resolution mechanisms, AI governance, cooperation, sustainable development coordination frameworks. These are all the things that various global initiatives are coming together. That’s what they want to do. So, they’re saying they want to move beyond rhetoric to actual implementation. Let me play a little bit of sound from Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s press conference this week when he announced this new white paper. And we want to give you a little bit of background before we get into our discussion as to where the Chinese are coming from. The GGI once proposed has quickly received warm responses from the world. And it has been welcomed and supported by nearly 160 countries and international organizations. And over 60 countries have joined the group of friends for global governance. As we have seen, the GGI has shifted from a Chinese proposal to an international practice showing increasing strong vitality. Let me explain some of those numbers that Wang referenced. So, he said 163, I think. Uh I have 150. So, there are two numbers that are important here to understand. There are the uh globe the the the support from 163 countries. That was the language he used. That’s a very vague, you know, description of it. So, but that’s one set of countries and organizations. Then there’s a smaller group called the Friends of the Global Governance Initiative that has 43 founding members. And the difference between the two groups is that those 43 founding members are more willing to attach their names and their countries to GGI policies rather than just express this vague support. Now, this is where it’s interesting, Kobus, when it comes to Africa. The largest group of countries that have signed on as founding members of the GGI are from Africa. Nearly half. 21 out of the 43, including Zambia, Kenya, Morocco, Senegal, and Zimbabwe, among others. Interestingly, only four Latin American countries and only three Southeast Asian countries. So, this is very popular in Africa. Again, almost half the continent is signed on to this. Out of 54 countries, 21 are founding members of it. So, I think it was just important to to kind of clarify that. I also want to play here some sound from Professor Wang Xinsong from Beijing Normal University, and he appeared on Chinese state media broadcaster CGTN to explain what are China’s motivations for the white paper and the GGI. And I think this will be an important baseline for us to set up our conversation. I I do think that the white paper is issued at a very timely manner because we are faced with the international global governance situation where the international law is not well respected. Sovereignty and other norms that have been maintaining global peace are being side-stepped. And we’re also seeing many multilateral institutions becoming more and more dysfunctional because some of the countries are either not following the rules or leaving those institutions. So, at this critical moment uh the world is experiencing a lot of geopolitical turbulence as well as deficit in global governance. Uh the Chinese government rolls out the uh white paper, which is based on the global governance initiative uh that was announced by President Xi Jinping last year. Uh this is a very critical uh white paper in which uh the Chinese authority uh uh proposes to the world about what global governance should be and uh how it can be restored to promote more global cooperation. And uh if I were to summarize uh the main points from the white paper as well as the global governance initiative, uh I would I’ll do two things. I mean, there it’s a full package it’s a full agenda, by the way, but there are two things. One is to restore to go back to the fundamentals of global governance. That is, go back to the United Nations. Go back to the UN Charter. Go back to the major norms and principles in the UN Charter, including sovereignty and respect for international rule of law. Um and I’ve explained the background of why China is proposing this. Obviously, uh many norms and rules are being disrespected. Uh and the second major agenda is that there’s got to be more uh active and equitable participation by the larger majority of the global community because for decades the global rule of law and the rule making uh were sort of the privilege of a few countries in the West, but uh if you think about United Nation was when it was founded, many of the countries that exist today did not exist back then. So, we’re talking about a global governance system that worked to a great extent, but increasingly becoming dysfunctional. Okay, Kobus. So, two key takeaways from what we’ve heard both from Wang Yi and from Professor Wang there. Number one, sovereignty, and this has been a long-standing Chinese political priority. So, there the idea of universalist values should be replaced by sovereignty as the priority, and then expanding the global representation beyond just the elites from, say, the US, and Europe, and Japan, who have really run the global system for much of the past 75 years. You covered this this week. What is your interpretation of the white paper? Is it important, or is this just another piece of Chinese kind of vaporware policy that’s a lot of flowery rhetoric, but short on actual substance? I think it is important, but I think it is also it’s important to us part of a kind of a larger iterative process, right? So, so, you know, I was There is an aspect there of reading it when when, you know, kind of when they like they like in the title they’re promising concrete actions in the title, and then you read through 35 pages, and then you’re like, “Where are the concrete actions?” And um, you know, so, there is you know, it still is in the same in the same vein as the global as a global governance initiative. You know, kind of which, you know, when when it was launched, it you know, we were also making the point that it it paints in very broad strokes, right? Kind of it’s it it makes this kind of broad calls for greater sovereignty, greater inclusion, multipolarity, and so on. And this one does that, too, but it takes a few extra steps towards becoming a bit more concrete. Um, so, and and what and it gives a kind of a feeling that a year or two down the line, there’s going to be more and more concrete versions of this of of of maybe pieces of this emerging. So, so, it is still a feeling that one doesn’t 100% kind of see the the big picture, but I do think it’s important because particularly also because it’s happening at this moment. You know, in the same week as the as the the kind of peace deal, you know, between the US and Iran. Um you know, at a moment when there’s a lot of questions about how international law is going to work from now on. Like who was who was going to enforce what? And so on so so it is almost it does commit itself to greater discussion. You know, kind of so so one one of the thing one of the next steps that it suggests is is is greater kind of consultation and and coordination between all these different people to start moving towards a system that that that will be that the world should be building together. It doesn’t necessarily be like, “Okay, here’s China’s system. This is what we’re proposing. Let’s go.” You know? Like it it it it it doesn’t it doesn’t take that kind of like leadership line. It it it it it does make the point that it is that these things need to be set up, but it is outlining the parameters of what needs to be set up. I think in in in slightly more detail than we did before. It’s interesting to note that they released this on the same week. And I don’t know if this was by intent or coincidence that the G7 was meeting in France. And this is very much what the GGI stands in opposition to. These small groups of European, Asian, and American leaders who get together and in a previous era they would decide the rules for everybody else. This is exactly what the what they’re talking about, what they want to change. So So I I again, I don’t know if that was by design or by coincidence. Who knows if it was like that, but the optics were favorable for the Chinese to release it at this moment. It does seem to me that the GGI is very much a reaction to Trump and the and and you have talked about at length how the rules-based international order was under duress for a long time before Donald Trump came to power. It was under duress even in the Obama administration who did extrajudicial killings without any process using drones. And again, this is ironic because the United States, long a defender of the rules-based international order in the pre-Trump era, again was very selective as to what rules it wanted to follow and what rules it didn’t want to follow. To be sure, China itself is also selective as to what rules it wants to follow and what rules it doesn’t want to follow. When the United Nations speaks out on the South China Sea or on human rights in around the world, China recoils. And it blames the West. So, this this endorsement of the UN system does have an asterisk next to it at certain points so long as it favors a Chinese position. The Chinese are not entirely enamored with a lot of the universal declarations of the United Nations. Nonetheless, this GGI is and like the GDI, the development initiative, are firmly anchored in the United Nations. It’s interesting because the United Nations right now is on life support. I think Secretary-General Guterres said that it was on the brink of financial collapse. So, if the United Nations should collapse or become weaker, it undermines all of these initiatives. What do you think about that relationship between the United Nations and these global initiatives and the complex relationship that China has with global governance that was built by the United Nations? Yeah, this is very interesting because I think the you know, the the document as a whole is like puts a lot of support into the global multilateral system. Well, it kind of it it it it expresses support for it all like like throughout while saying that it’s been weakened, it needs to be strengthened, it needs to be kind of like returned to kind of like first principles and so on. And it’s not only the UN, like it talks about the World Trade Organization, for example, as well as China is clearly putting a lot of investment in the global system and there being a global system. Um you know, China doesn’t seem to be to have much appetite for for kind of going it alone, you know? Um because and and and it is interesting how it’s not only you know, expressing support for the current multilateral system, but some of the other things that China have been setting up including for example the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank is different versions, different iterations of other kinds of multilateralisms, right? Kind of rather than just a China-centric kind of like thing. So in that sense I think that that that is very interesting. Um it like it does read I think the document reads as you know, it it does explicitly acknowledge that that these systems are in crisis. Um and you know, because it doesn’t mention any other country by name or very few of them by name, it it kind of leaves it kind of open, you know, certain countries have been [laughter] have been kind of like you know, kind of like warping the stuff. We know what they’re talking about. Um but you know, kind of but it but it is I I think it is also I think addressing a reality, right? Kind of that in like one can be one can be as anti-UN as you want. You that that doesn’t take away the fact that that increasingly as we as the world is is you know, becoming more and more sophisticated as the global economy is becoming more sophisticated, it’s impossible to solve any of these problems on a country level, right? Like how are you solving climate change on a country level? Like there needs to be a country level in like in like a plan and you know, kind of and and you know, kind of strategy to do it, but those strategies have to make sense at some higher level. And that’s true for anything from like AI regulation to dealing with plastic pollution to like sea temperature, like everything, right? Kind of like like so like there’s most things at some stage raise above a kind of a national level. And I think this makes clear that there has to be some way in which one runs these things where it doesn’t feel like it’s only certain countries are in control and others are just tagging along. You know, so it does raise that question, I think. You know, kind of and and it’s a valid question to raise because because no one else is raising it. It’s interesting because all week there’s been discussion in some of the global south media about this. Some of it promoted by the Chinese government itself and some of it like the discussion that you were on Al Jazeera to talk about this. Here in the United States and I’ve been traveling in the US this week, nothing. No no coverage. There’s no awareness of it. Not even in kind of some of the elite media circles of the New York Times and Washington Post. Maybe an article here or there, but no real meaningful discussion about it. What’s interesting is I’ve been thinking about other middle power states like the Australians, the Europeans, the Canadians and others who have come out very very strong in favor of the multilateralism. They’re very similar language as what we heard from Wang Yi saying we need to protect the rules-based order. We need to have multilateralism. We don’t want to follow the United States and kind of abandon this system. It puts these middle powers in a somewhat awkward situation because much of the rhetoric that is in this white paper and the GGI, I think over a glass of cognac and and and and and and a closed door in a quiet bar somewhere, they’d be like, “Yeah, we kind of agree with this.” But they will be very very pained to come out publicly to endorse this. They too, the middle power states, have endorsed a UN at the heart of the global system. They have endorsed this idea of rules-based order. They’ve endorsed the idea of even greater representation. Maybe not to the extent that they lose power, say kicking the French and the British off the Security Council, but this idea of rejecting a US-led unilateralism is something that’s been very common in Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Canada. Remember Mark Carney said, “We’re taking the sign down, right?” Yeah. Who knows if Mark Carney really took the sign down. It doesn’t In practice, doesn’t really feel like it it was that way. But, if you’re sitting in the United States, you’re thinking this is just a bunch of BS, forget it. And I think most people in Washington don’t pay any attention to this. But, I’d be curious what you think if you’re sitting in Ottawa, London, Brussels, [clears throat] Canberra, what do you think of something like this? Do you in Do you stay away from it because you don’t like the Chinese? Do you kind of you know, understand it? What What’s their position do you think as middle powers who also believe in this multilateralist UN-based system? I think two things is probably true at once. One is that I think there’s a lot to find a lot of a lot to like, I think, for middle powers in this document. You know, it’s not it’s not particularly being like, “Oh, you rich countries, you need to you need to kind of like step aside.” Right? Kind of it’s not, you know, it’s it’s not particularly setting up the kind of global north global south against each other. Right? Kind of like taking for the moment the global north outside of the US. Um You know, so so I think I think European countries like it it it makes space for both for for both ambitious global south countries and and kind of like multilateralism-minded global north countries to find a kind of a to kind of a to find a shared space. In reality, though, I think that that in those countries, in Canada, in Australia, in Europe, I think still culturally, um people are so so they’ve grown up so much in the American orbit that I think it’s it’s would probably only be around the margins where they like, “Oh, yeah, like this this is perfect for us.” Right? Kind of like I think I think they they be like, “Oh, good. Okay, it’s not as radical as we as we worried, but yeah, exactly. Yeah, it’s politically impossible in Australia and Europe to publicly endorse it, but privately I wonder, that’s what I was saying in the over a glass of cognac in a private bar, they might actually be like, yeah, we prefer this direction than what we see coming out of Washington. Yeah, I think so, you know, and I think you know, and and and so so the the question though is, you know, is is that the multilateral system as we know it now grew up so fundamentally a around kind of Western power, but particularly like like, you know, the US was always the pivot point of Western power, and a lot of a lot of that of the logic wasn’t just oh, we are we’re rich democracies, right? Kind of that that was in play, but there is there is a kind of a okay, like I you know, not to sound very South African about this, but like there is a racial aspect to this, right? Kind of where these countries because they all for like most of them either [snorts] former colonial powers or settler colonial societies or both, right? Of them only Japan is you know, is is not is not European of extraction, and they they kind of were playing in some of the other logics there too. So there is there’s always been in in that grouping there is this kind of like family grouping feeling, right? Which you know, which which is makes it harder, right? Kind of for for them to to question that to question that kind of that that that connection, no matter under how much stress it’s gotten, right? Kind of like we’re getting there with Europe something because they’re now literally worried about the invasion of Greenland, for example, but it’s still a way away, right? Kind of before before it’s possible for solidarities with with the kind of non-West to count as much as, you know, kind of as and you see it even in economic planning, right? Kind of so So, for example, like like we’ve gotten like I’ve I’ve written quite critically about about the European reaction to a a big industrial build-up fueled by a lot of Chinese money in North Africa. Um and, you know, and and sure, like I I can see I can see why like I come from an African perspective, you know, kind of I I can see why some of my points weren’t landing among European stakeholders. But at the same time, what one is seeing there, right, is still a tunnel vision focus just on the European market itself rather than looking at the more realistic, to my mind, more realistic view of Europe as embedded in a series of of of markets that is that includes the Eastern Mediterranean, Western Asia, North Africa, you know, as a kind of a a zone of of embedded embedded kind of um development and and industrialization where Europe remains a leader, right? That’s a much harder view of Europe for for Europeans to take than Europe island, right? Kind of that needs that needs to be that needs to be protected from all of these people who are trying to get in and trying to undermine it. You know, and I think that thinking we still see that thinking in Australia, New Zealand. We still, you know, and and and and the positioning of Japan in relation to China at the moment, I think is strengthening that in Japan as well. So, you know, so so I think it’s still it’s culturally very hard for them, I think, to make it across that moat and to and to think of the think of of a place like like the northern part of Africa as oh yeah, this is, you know, potential investors, potential kind of, you know, like that’s much harder. It still is, I think, coded as the other, as foreign, as not us. It It’s good you brought this up because I think it’s important to also discuss the background setting that this is all taking place in. Europe and China are on the verge of what could potentially be a very significant trade war. Uh the Europeans are now apparently are a number of US-style tariffs against the Chinese. Uh China has vowed to retaliate. Uh China’s relationship with Japan is souring by the minute now with concerns about Japan emerging as a remilitarized power in Asia. That’s making Beijing very, very nervous. And obviously, the ongoing tensions between the US and China, even though there was this kind of lovey-dovey, uh you know, summit which, you know, Trump just couldn’t be more, you know, you know, effusive in his praise of Xi Jinping. Uh behind the scenes, the United States government has been steadily been taking action all week against the Chinese in any number of of areas. So, those relationships are very, very tense. So, in that sense, you can see how China’s relationship with the G7 powers is worsening. And so, leaning into the global south makes a lot of sense at this point in time. Let’s shift the focus now to Africa. As I mentioned at the top, 21 out of the 43 founding members of the GGI are African states. Not all small ones. Even some of the big ones like Kenya are on that list, and Zambia is on that list as well. What do you think this means to African countries? In in terms of governance and in terms of the white paper, is this something that they are following? I didn’t see a lot of authentic coverage in the African media about it. I saw a lot of paid coverage by the Chinese and a lot of the content-sharing agreement coverage where People’s Daily and Xinhua stuff would flow through African news sites. But what do you think the reaction, if any, was there this week to to the paper? I think one should firstly be realistic and realize that a white paper published by the Chinese it’s going to be abstruse, no matter no matter how [laughter] how revolutionary it is. So, I kind of like that is that is something I Anything where people have to press conference from Wang Yi, though. I mean, there was some media that was generated from this. So, they they don’t have to go for the white paper, but they could talk about the the press conference and and at least some of the rhetoric. I think in Africa, you know, for the the people who notice, right kind of which which is this this is going to be off the radar of most African publics, but like for for the people who notice, I think in lots of ways I’m not surprised at the at the number of African countries in friends of the GGI at night group because it hits exactly the points that Africa wants to hear, right kind of like Africa is like post-colonial Africa is obsessed with sovereignty. Obsessed. Obsessed. Right kind of this is this is the is one of the biggest cross-cutting like shared themes in African discourse, you know, and it’s one of the biggest worries actually that they have about China, right kind of is that is that China is is kind of impinging on African sovereignty. Like one one hears that a lot from from kind of China critics in Africa. Um Can you start on that? And what what do you mean by that? So, maybe just dive into that. What are the concerns that people have about China infringing on sovereignty? Because this is one of the complaints that you hear from the West. The the attacks on China in Africa is that they do impinge on sovereignty. What are Can you expand on that just so people understand what you’re talking about? Well, you know, in in some in some cases, like one would get exactly that same discourse that one gets in in you know, from from Western stakeholders also repeated by African stakeholders, right? So, for example, like for like the the one the example that we go back to always is is the the debt trap narrative. Um the idea that that that China uses debt to extract assets from Africa, which you know, kind of which has been debunked numerous times, but it it still is a very powerful narrative. So, so that would be an example that, you know, where where where you know, where frequently picked up from from US discourse where Africa some African stakeholders would be worried that oh, if you take out this big loan from China, then we’re giving up some of our sovereignty. I think where it where it’s it’s really different is that there’s a the second half of that sentence which in you know in the African cases we’d be our sovereignty would be taken away from us as it was by Europe and the United States, right? So you know so so in that sense like like they’re seeing it through the lens of of of damaged African sover- sovereignty through the decades. Um and so so so they’re they’re they’re they’re hedging against against other kinds of like you know you know impinging on sovereignty too, but but the language I think also from from China that you know that that you know because China has now also has a long record of non-intervention in Africa, right? Um so I think I think that also counts for something and you know so so so if if when when China’s using this this this word of international equality equality between countries that the respect like the the the sovereign international sovereignty lying at the core of it rather than say you know universal values, you know Africa has a long history of different kinds of sanctions and and interventions on you know on the back of quote you quote unquote democratic backsliding for example from Western donors. So so that chimes very very powerfully. I think in Africa that language. Um the other one that I think chimes also very powerfully is that throughout all of this the the document really hones in on development issues. Like the like shared development development cooperation right to development and on top of that you know cross-cutting environmental management and so on. All of these all of these different things that Africans African countries see particularly in the after the end of USAID and other forms of of that kind of aid-based cooperation, they are worried about the big parts of of agenda 20 2063 and you know and and the UN 2030 development goals fully just falling off the table. So you know so in that sense I I that language is also encouraging to them. Um, you know, so so in the in lots of ways I think I think that the the document talks the language of the global south, you know? Um, but there’s of course a lot of a lot of anxiety about Chinese power as a whole, you know? So so that I think undercuts its objectives. I think in the we’re going to wrap up this phase and and we’ll move on to Kenya-Taiwan because that touches on the sovereignty questions that you’re talking about. Uh, but my final takeaway from this is that maybe this is vaporware. Maybe this is just all rhetoric, no substance. And again, the Chinese have a long history of putting out these kinds of big pronouncements about they are the, you know, the the largest developing country in the world, which by the way is going to be a problem for them next year. Uh, none other than Justin Yifu Lin, the famous economist at Beijing University, who was the former chief economist at the World Bank. I was at a Boston University lecture with him last month. And he was very proud that next year China will cross the important threshold of moving into a high-income country, to be more than $13,000 per capita income. That is going to present a very complicated narrative challenge for the Chinese cuz they will now no longer be able to say that they are the largest developing country in the world because you cannot be a developing country and a high-income country at the same time. As far as I know, those are incompatible. Really? Do you think there’s a a a developing country that’s a high-income country as well? Mm, well, okay. So this is, you know, so so this is kind of the kind of complicated part, I think, because so yeah, definitely on the one hand, you know, it doesn’t make sense. On the other hand, what we still see in China is very large geographic gaps, right? Kind of like very large kind of like like developmental gaps. No doubt. I mean, Gua- Guizhou has the famously has about the same per capita income as Botswana. But Shanghai is ahead of most industrial economies. So, there are those those discrepancies. But on a macro level, it’s changed. It It has changed, but it’s but it’s but it’s also it’s in it’s in the process of changing, right? Kind of so So, it is this kind of long trajectory. And I think this is this is part of what what I think also makes sense in you know in in looking at looking at this white paper itself is that as you say it like there is a there is a way in which one could just read it as just more rhetoric. But one needs to see it you know China’s always moving in a direction, right? Kind of and and that’s that’s the the the thing with that one has to keep in mind with the C- CPC run system is that it it may seem static all the time, but but it is moving in a direction and it has plans. And it’s slowly but surely kind of over the years putting putting things into place and moving in in a direction. So, I think this is another step that you have to kind of zoom out in order to to see that it is a step. So, you know that that’s my feeling. I think in relation to the develop develop to developing country thing, I think what we actually seeing and well this is my line. So, so so [laughter] you know so I’ve I’ve I’ve I’ve been pushing this for a while, but I think what we actually seeing is the the developing the emergence of a new kind of superpower where it where the two things that you were saying is going to be true at once. It is going to be a high income country. It’s going to be a massive manufacturing power, but it’s still going to be a developing country in the in the way that in in the way that you know in international solidarity is in how things work in inside the country in the logic of what it means to be Chinese. Like some of these things are going to continue. Um and we’re seeing the emergence of a new kind of power category emerging, right? Which is which is the developing superpower. Like India is on its way there, Indonesia is on its way there, Brazil is on its way there. That’s it’s a new form of power. And the thing that we need to keep in mind is our idea of a developed country versus a non-developed country. Like that that distinction and and you know, that is fundamentally based on a Western-centric world that that saw itself and the rest of the world through colonial terms, right? Kind of so and and some of those are not to say that those are all colonials. Some of those were people who were fighting to try and dismantle that colonial system, but still that colonial system provided the logic through which we understood the world. And that logic is now coming into under under pressure because of the rise of China. So So what we’re seeing is is not only China being It’s not China becoming country in some kind of preset, sent from God distinction between countries. What it is is the emergence of a new kind of power, I think. You know, kind of and and and you know, kind of and the process, the the possible waning of a different kind of power, which is the idea of a rich developed country that is just developed. You know, like that itself I think is coming under stress. And I’ll correct myself on this. When I asked the question, is there such thing as a high-income developing country? I think Malaysia and Singapore definitely are in that that that middle space. I mean, Singapore is the wealthiest per capita country in Asia. And I think even probably close to being the wealthiest, if not the wealthiest in the world, but very much operates in a context of the global South given its geography and its history in Southeast Asia. So and Malaysia is very much on the verge of also being a high-income country if it isn’t already. But the the reason why I think that this is important is that and this is something we’ve talked about in the past. And I put this challenge to US and European stakeholders when I have a chance to talk with them. That these initiatives, maybe they’re just flowery rhetoric. But they are initiatives that bring global South countries like Zimbabwe and Togo and Zambia and put them at the table as near equals. The United States and Europe do not have anything similar to that. And so I think one of the reasons why 21 African countries for example sign up for this because well, they get a seat at a table. And as you’ve talked about African countries are among the most marginalized in the world in the diplomatic space and are rarely invited to be to have seats at the table kind of these things. And I think that’s very empowering. And these initiatives like the AIIB, like the New Development Bank, like the BRICS, the SCO, the the 4G development initiatives are all forward-looking. And and at least at some level of optimism whereas when you hear from the US and Europe and the G7 for example, minus the United States, let’s take them away for now. Um they talk about preservation of the rules-based international order which is backwards-looking which is they want to preserve the way the things the way they were, not forward-looking. And I don’t think this is a big problem. Just one last thing that the West and so at the last Europe-Africa summit in Angola last year as far as I know they didn’t even have a joint statement that came out of it. And so the question is where is the vision? And so you can criticize China all you want about the implementation of these and that they’re not there’s it’s just politics. Sure. But it’s a vision and it’s literally written down now in a white paper. And I think there’s a lot of credit that that they deserve for that because we’re not seeing that same kind of vision for the global South come out of Japan, the US, Europe and other advanced countries. And I think that’s something that is a very important distinction. One of the reasons why I think the Chinese are getting traction with this among global South countries. Final thoughts to you on this before we move on. I Yeah, I fully agree. You know, kind of the the very fact of putting out this kind of language in this kind of comprehensive way that they’ve been doing. Leave aside even the the actual initiative themselves, but like just putting out the language itself is already valuable because no one else is doing it. Um and you know, kind of we also we we’re at Look, you know, like global capitalism and the US-centric global capitalist system has done great stuff, right? Kind of like this you know, kind of like I you know, like I’m I’m a a lefty, but you know, kind of but I you know, and I have a lot of criticism of it, but there’s it it it delivered a lot of stuff. But we’re in the same week as this happened, you know, we now have our first trillionaire, right? Kind of like our first trillionaire in the world who I saw some I I I you know, I I’m I’m not good at good enough at maths to be able to say that, you know, this is true, but like like people were making the point that the the gap the wealth gap between Elon Musk and the second most second richest person in the world and the gap between is actually now larger than the gap between the second richest person in the world and the poorest person in the world. Um you know, so that So so the the global system having produced that level that extreme level of of wealth inequality, that’s not a success. Kind of that’s not a success for the global system. like that that global system maybe needs some retweaking, you know, and and you know, and and and we’re seeing those kind of like red lights flashing everywhere, right? And environmentally we’re seeing it like, you know, kind of public safety-wise we’re seeing it just in terms of like happiness, like birth rate-wise, like no one is feeling good, right? And I think I think that that is this larger kind of like systemic malaise I think that’s this that’s running through the world that I think China’s responding to. Well, we’re going to put a link to the white paper in the show notes. I encourage everybody to read it. And it is an important document. Again, we don’t know how important, but as Kobus has mentioned, there’s something there and especially for global South countries. It was a very dramatic week at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi. Uh a number of Taiwan delegates were detained for more than 20 hours in some cases. Their cell phones were confiscated and this was part of an effort by the Kenyan government to deny entry to a group of Taiwan government officials, uh scientists, and researchers to attend an Oceans Summit in Mombasa. This is something that we reported on last week. We forecasted that this was going to happen and it happened. This, of course, is now the third incident related to Taiwan that’s happened in the past several months where first it was the Indian Ocean island states of Madagascar, Mauritius, and the Seychelles that refused overflight permission for the President Lai Ching-te’s plane to fly to Eswatini. Then it was uh Chinese pressure on the Zambian government to uh to shut down the Rights Con conference that took place or that did not take place in Lusaka. That was ultimately canceled. And now we have this third incident. Let’s get an overview of how the story was covered by Formosa Television in Taiwan. The 11th hour ocean conference has been marred by allegations that Kenya, the host country this year, unreasonably obstructed the participation of the Taiwan delegation. Ocean Affairs Council Minister Guan Bi-ling took to social media to voice her outrage in a post titled OOC tarnished. She slammed the actions as brutal, noting that not only was the option for Taiwan removed from the registration system, but entry permits for two delegates were also abruptly revoked. Furthermore, Taiwan’s delegation members from academia were detained at the airport with their cell phones and passports confiscated in a virtual house arrest. Although fortunately, they have since been able to return to Taiwan. Observers have pointed the finger directly at pressure from China. We deeply regret this. We hope that if China wants cross-strait relations to ease, then such petty actions will be unnecessary. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has lodged stern protests with China and Kenya. So Cobus, there you have it. It was It was something rather predictable, but this now appears to be a trend. And when we talk about these sovereignty issues and these sovereignty concerns, this is what critics will point to that China is imposing itself on African countries to make decisions that are not necessarily in the interest or at the will of of African constituents, but nonetheless, they’re making this decision under Chinese pressure. What’s your What’s your reaction and how did you frame it in your coverage this week? Well, you know, one of the things that that we that we did point out in our coverage was that there has been no reaction so far, none that I’ve seen so far from the Chinese ministry from the Chinese government. So So like one assumes that there was that there was Chinese pressure, but that is was mostly said by the one side rather than the other side. So So that that is important, you know, just as a formality to be noted. suggesting that there’s another reason that the Taiwan delegates would have been barred from entering Kenya? Yeah, no, one wouldn’t be able to really see one, you know, kind of the But but but you know, kind of like just just as a as a kind of a you know, just just as a kind of a reportorial, you know, kind of formality. Um I think you know there there seems to be like the the the the isolation of Taiwan that’s that’s that’s happening seems to be moving to a space of um you know of of kind of challenging you know it has for a long time challenged that Taiwan’s kind of you know status you know it’s it’s self-conception as a country right? And although the the kind of official framing of it as a as a country and it’s now doing that by partly by kind of by by blocking by blocking its its participation in these kind of multilateral forum forum. And it’s it’s literally it’s physical movement as well. I mean the overflight is a big change that we haven’t seen before. Yeah. Yeah. So that is so so that’s that’s notable. I think what what I what I would like to see as in the case of the Zambia rice conference right? I’ve like once after after it was it was mentioned and and it was it was mostly at that stage mostly framed you know again you know in terms of Chinese pressure and and Taiwanese victimization. What came out after that subsequently you know kind of in in conversations was a highlighting of the Zambian government’s own own issues right? Kind of in there like including including a a kind of a more authoritarian swing by the Zambian government which included a bunch of of repressive measures that were that were coming into into law roughly at the same time as the rice conference you know kind of conference was happening. So so which is not to say that again not to say that China wasn’t involved but it is to say that there seems to be emerging consensuses happening between different different African governments pushing their own stuff their own agendas and the Chinese government. What is notable for me in this particular case is that you know A Kenya is generally very open very multilateral, very very kind of like plugged into these into these things. And Kenya particularly on environmental stuff, right? So, Kenya is an environmental leader globally. It’s, you know, so so choosing like choosing to the this particular transnational oceans conference that Taiwan had participated in for more than 10 years as the particular place, you know, considering Kenya’s lead environmental leadership globally, that was notable for me. Um, and I still don’t have any real kind of like answers to, you know, what the thinking was in the Kenya in the Kenyan side rather. Well, I think when we consider the political aspect of this, we have to take into account the leverage that China has. So, number one, 5.3, 5.4 billion dollars of Kenyan imports come from China. So, hugely important for the economy. Most of that, of course, is intermediate goods that help the Kenyan economy function in many respects. Chemicals, engines, machinery, things like that. Number two is the Kenyans have a number of projects in front of the Chinese right now, namely the extension of the standard gauge railway to the Ugandan border to Kisumu. That is a point of leverage where I could see the Chinese saying, “Well, maybe we’ll reconsider that if you” And again, it’s hard to explain to people that Taiwan is the Jerusalem for China. There is no issue that is more powerful, more emotive for the for for the Chinese public and the Chinese leadership and government than Taiwan. So, would they exercise this leverage in the event that a country like Kenya went against their wishes? I have no doubt that they would. No doubt that they would. And Kenya, I think, feels particularly exposed to China because of its high levels of engagement in infrastructure, in trade, and in investment. And so, that they really was no choice for the Kenyan government but to accede to the Chinese request given how much is at stake for the Ruto administration right now. And so, and again, I can hear Jero in my head right now saying, “This was no This was a no-brainer.” Just like in the African Indian Ocean island countries, they were they weren’t coerced. So, this is one of the narratives that keeps coming out is that the Chinese coerced these countries to doing that. Now, one could take the leverage point that I just made and say that’s a form of coercion, but I don’t think it even got to that conversation to say, “Well, if you don’t agree with us, then we might exercise our leverage.” I think when the Chinese ambassador made the call to the Ruto administration and said, “Listen, we want you to block the the Taiwan delegation from coming in.” They It probably took them all of, you know, 14 minutes to say, “Yes.” is my guess. I mean, I I don’t think this was a I don’t think this was a coercive act because they’re already there. I think so, but at the same time, the messiness of the way that it happened, you know, because it it it wasn’t like if they were simply saying like 2 weeks before, right? Kind of like if they were simply say saying like, “Oh, sorry, you’re actually uninvited to this conference now. You like, you know, kind of like your your invitation has been rescinded, right?” That would have been one thing. Detaining someone at the airport, talking about how their passport confiscating their phones. It’s very messy, right? Kind of which makes me which makes me wonder whether it was a last-minute thing. It also makes me wonder how it was communicated. This is another another thing where I’m wondering how it worked on the African side, right? Kind of because it seemed like a lot of this was was seemed to be implemented by at the airport level, right? Kind of by by immigration officials. Consider Consider this. I have a source who told me last Wednesday that this was going to happen. I remember and then we recorded our show on Friday and I said, “On good authority from a well-placed source, the Taiwan delegation will be blocked from participating in the ocean summit.” Which I which I fully agree but like I fully believe but like but but why then do it so kind of clumsily? Exactly. Why didn’t they just send out a note and say, “Guys, don’t even get on the plane. You’re not going to be admitted.” And and that because we knew about it last week. Mhm. Mhm. Which makes me wonder whether there was whether you know what the what the interaction was between the the organizers of the conference and the government for example, right? Like you know this is a like the more one thinks about it the more questions pop up, right? Kind of because because sure like definitely China’s putting is putting pressure on Taiwan, right? Kind of like I mean that’s clear. But there’s a lot of Taiwanese go to lots lots of places, right? Kind of lots of Chinese Taiwanese travelers go to lots of different international conferences. Why this one particularly? Why the oceans one particularly? You know there’s there’s so many of these like once you start thinking about it like it seems Yeah, like this is it just it it it’s it’s certainly is it’s mysterious for me but at the same time it does seem to be indicating a trend, right? Kind of which is which is greater coordination maybe. Let me let me try and answer your question. If a a scholar from Taiwan is invited to the University of California at Berkeley here in California and the Chinese government calls up the State Department and says, “We’d like you to block this Taiwan scholar.” The State Department’s going to put a giant middle finger up to them and say, “Shh, forget it.” Uh same thing in Europe. And so I think they’re doing this where they have opportunity to do it. Yeah, but but but even so there’s still there’s there’s there’s a lot of lot of different conferences happening in lots of global South countries, right? So I I think what what what what what I’m honing towards is I think I think it had something to do with the climate coordination aspect of it, right? Kind of because I think I don’t I I Yeah, I disagree with What what I what I How do you explain RightsCon then? What what I mean is like like oceans governance, right? Kind of is is is is something that’s done by governor by governments, right? Kind of the RightsCon thing had a billion NGOs, right? Kind of like it was it was all NGOs. Like this kind of like like high-level like deciding what to do about our warming ocean and other kind of ocean-related issues is inherently implies government stakeholding. Which and that is what what You know, if you if you’re the point of your anti-Taiwan campaign is to attack the idea of Taiwan as a government, then this is what you would be attacking, right? Like whereas like the you know, so so so but but again, like you know, kind of like it’s it’s it’s so opaque. It’s so difficult to say. It’s so you know, um Yeah. Well, another theory might be and this is just we’re riffing on this right now is that you know, the Chinese have that old saying, kill a chicken to scare the monkeys. This is a new tactic that the Chinese are taking. Again, the Indian Ocean island states of the overflight, brand new. We’ve never seen that before. And this blocking from the conferences is new. So, it may be part of an effort to send the message to other countries, don’t even invite Taiwan delegates to come because this is what’s going to happen. You’re going to be in the middle of an international embarrassment. This is the kind of publicity that Kenya does not want. It’s going to put Kenya now on the attention of Senator Jim Risch in in Washington on the Foreign Affairs Committee, who’s going to start screaming at Kenya and saying, “Why is Kenya a major non-NATO ally if they’re doing this? That’s completely counter to our interest. This is not what that’s the line the line about Kenya. That’s already the line. and this is just going to feed this in Washington to say Kenya needs to be stripped of its status as a major non-NATO ally. I mean that and and even maybe even going even further that Kenya is tilting towards China in the us and them kind of of dynamics. This is not a place that a lot of global South countries want to be in. So you look at a country like Brazil who is trying to do very large rare earth mineral deals with United States, wants to sell oil to the United you know you know to even lots of things to the US. Maybe not oil, but other things. They don’t want to be in the middle of this. Right? So what they’re probably trying to do in my view is to scare away other global South countries from even accepting Taiwan applications to participate in these types of fora. Quite possibly. Yeah, I I I I I could I could see that making sense. Like you know it’s it’s interesting for me also or this is it’s going to be very interesting to see how this plays out in China-Taiwan relations specifically, you know, because it’s it’s been while China’s been very you know like it’s it’s it’s there’s like and then I don’t know about enough about China-Taiwan relations to talk in any form of expertise. So I kind of like but from from what I’ve been picking up just in reading um is there’s been an interesting kind of contrast between on the one hand going very hard on Taiwanese government officials and the kind of high-level high-level people and at the same time sending quite a sweet message to Taiwanese people, right? So I wonder how this plays in that space. You know kind of whether this disrupts the kind of general messaging that China’s doing in Taiwan. You know, because I think I think this is like this is must be an interesting and challenging and and and in flux moment in Taiwanese politics as well. And again, I don’t know enough about Taiwanese discourse to be able to say. But you know, I think I think from just from what I’ve picked up from Taiwanese, you know, commentators on on Twitter, which is admittedly a very imperfect gauge. But but at the same time what I’ve I’ve seen more and more kind of comparisons between the position of Ukraine in relation to support from the US, you know, being applied to the Taiwanese case. So, I kind of like this these questions like can like are we guaranteed that there’s going to be back up in the case of stuff going down? You know, so I think I think there’s we’re in a moment of flux in the in the public discussion within Taiwan about what the best kind of like future direction is. And it’s going to be interesting to see how this stuff plays into that. Okay, well, we’ll keep an eye on it. I don’t think this is the last that we’re going to see of this. I think that the Chinese government is probably going to exercise this type of pressure anytime the Tai representative from Taiwan move in Africa and other global South countries. This is probably just the beginning. We’ll continue to cover it. Kobus, thank you so much for taking time in your looks like a bomb shelter, an alley. I don’t know, but it’s it looks it looks very interesting. At least you’re you’re shielded from the wind. Kobus and I will be back again next week with another edition of the show. In the meantime, if you want to follow all the great work that Kobus and the team are doing on the CGSP website and these amazing data sets that we’re producing and infographics that are coming out. There’s just the site is so rich with great information and the kind of information that doesn’t really exist anywhere about China’s engagement in the global South, non-partisan, no agenda. We just are trying to put good information out there for you to try and make better decisions about what’s happening in the world today. Go to chinaglobalsouth.com. And of course, if you want to subscribe and get access to everything on the site, go to chinaglobalsouth.com/subscribe. And don’t forget, if you are a student or a teacher, high school, university, college, whatever, email me eric@chinaglobalsouth.com and I will send you the links for half-off discounts with subscriptions starting at just $10 a month. So, that’ll do it for this edition of the China in Africa podcast. Cobus and I and the rest of the team will be back next week with another edition of the show. Until then, thank you so much for listening and for watching. [music]