Professor Wang Gungwu: China, the US and the search for a new world order

Professor Wang Gungwu: China, the US and the search for a new world order


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173,237 views Apr 4, 2025 #asean #xijinping #tariffs

Professor Wang Gungwu, in an interview with ThinkChina editor Chow Yian Ping, suggests that Trump’s rise was a reaction to global shifts post-UN formation. 

As the US redefines its global role and China adapts to internal demands and historical influences, both nations face tough choices. Who will succeed, and who will lead the way?

  00:00 Introduction 02:00 The post-WWII world order 06:54 The US superpower under siege 08:52 The rise of China and the decline of the US 12:26 Trump was not an accident 16:55 Threat to American democracy 20:03 Will Trump get his way in America? 22:02 America strategies against China 25:16 Xi Jinping did not seek to be a dictator 30:21 Control of businessmen is a Chinese tradition 33:22 Balancing between party control and economic growth 37:17 Will the Chinese lose global space under Trump? 40:45 Factors that could derail China’s development trajectory 42:05 Youths in China will not accept the status quo 45:58 Will China become more democratic? 49:09 Two civilisations, two systems 53:22 Crises may bring people together 55:40 Selfish nations and all for themselves 59:50 What can Singapore and SEA nation-states do? 1:01:32 ASEAN's strategic importance in the Indo-Pacific 1:03:09 US-China rivalry will be about the dominance of maritime power 1:05:06 ASEAN's potential to influence the US-China dynamics Full story here: https://tinyurl.com/yh2tebrn #china #us #trump #xijinping #politics #war #tariffs #geopolitics #democracy #competition #unitednations #asean #economy #maritime #globalisation #government #ThinkChina
00:00 Introduction 02:00 The post-WWII world order 06:54 The US superpower under siege 08:52 The rise of China and the decline of the US 12:26 Trump was not an accident 16:55 Threat to American democracy 20:03 Will Trump get his way in America? 22:02 America strategies against China 25:16 Xi Jinping did not seek to be a dictator 30:21 Control of businessmen is a Chinese tradition 33:22 Balancing between party control and economic growth 37:17 Will the Chinese lose global space under Trump? 40:45 Factors that could derail China’s development trajectory 42:05 Youths in China will not accept the status quo 45:58 Will China become more democratic? 49:09 Two civilisations, two systems 53:22 Crises may bring people together 55:40 Selfish nations and all for themselves 59:50 What can Singapore and SEA nation-states do? 1:01:32 ASEAN's strategic importance in the Indo-Pacific 1:03:09 US-China rivalry will be about the dominance of maritime power 1:05:06 ASEAN's potential to influence the US-China dynamics Full story here: https://tinyurl.com/yh2tebrn #china #us #trump #xijinping #politics #war #tariffs #geopolitics #democracy #competition #unitednations #asean #economy #maritime #globalisation #government #ThinkChina
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[Video] Professor Wang Gungwu: China, the US and the search for a new world order
04 Apr 2025
politics


By Chow Yian Ping
Editor, ThinkChina

Professor Wang Gungwu, in an interview with ThinkChina editor Chow Yian Ping, suggests that Trump’s rise was a reaction to global shifts post-UN formation. As the US redefines its global role and China adapts to internal demands and historical influences, both nations face tough choices. Who will succeed and who will lead the way?
ThinkChina editor Chow Yian Ping speaks with Professor Wang Gungwu of the National University of Singapore. (Yi Jina and iStock)



On one side of the globe, newly elected US President Donald Trump aims to make America great again, while on the other, Chinese President Xi Jinping foresees the rise of the East against a declining West. Both leaders face domestic challenges and foreign relations issues. In this era of disruption and unpredictability, who is better positioned to lead the future world order? What could derail China’s current development trajectory?


The ThinkChina team interviews renowned historian and sinologist Professor Wang Gungwu, University Professor at the National University of Singapore, to gain his insights.



So what we should be looking at is not just what he does each day, but at what lies behind it all. And I believe that what lies behind it all is that this is not just Trump.


Chow Yian Ping (Chow): Thank you Prof Wang for this interview with ThinkChina. I want to start the discussion with President Trump. He’s talking about buying Greenland, retaking the Panama Canal, turning Canada into the 51st state, renaming the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America, and even taking over Gaza. So I’m just wondering: what is he aiming for with this expansionist agenda? And do you think Trump actually has a bigger plan for a new world order?


Wang Gungwu (Wang): It’s hard to understand this man. I mean, I’m not sure that he knows what he’s doing himself. Because he certainly seems to be living from day to day, and he’s creating all kinds of turmoil for everybody because he’s so unpredictable and uncertain. What I feel is that the dramatic events are his way of showing how decisive he is prepared to be. But at the same time, he’s capable of changing his mind at any time. So what we should be looking at is not just what he does each day, but at what lies behind it all. And I believe that what lies behind it all is that this is not just Trump.



The UN’s paradox: a world of unequal nations?


Wang: This is something that is happening to the world as was created after the Second World War, when the United Nations was created and the victors, as it were, dictated the world order. And the victors were led by the United States. But there were also Britain, Soviet Russia at that time, and somehow, they included France, because France had a very great empire. So basically, it started in a very peculiar structure, in which there were two powers which were anti-empire, anti-imperialist — the Americans and the Russians — and two empires — the British and the French. And those four countries basically determined the shape of the United Nations.


And I was a young student then, and when it was first announced, we were all very thrilled and excited because it gave us — the former colonies that had been under these empires — a chance to be independent and to have our own nations. At least, to build our own nations on the principle of being sovereign and equal. Now that pattern was, I think, what was supposed to be the world order, a new world order.


What I think we have seen is that it hasn’t worked, not to the satisfaction of the creators — neither the United States nor the Soviet Union were really happy with what happened. Of course, Britain and France didn’t have much say in it. They were having to decolonise, get rid of their empires. But they accepted that, as long as they had a say in the United Nations. So they created this idea of a security council with veto power. Now that in itself was a fundamental weakness, which at the time we thought was necessary; it could not be helped. But now we see what has happened is that, that meant that any one of those four powers, in theory, could block any decision made by the United Nations. So it’s really not a United Nations of equal, sovereign nations after all.


And in any case, at the beginning, there were only about 50 or 60 of them. Now it’s 180. In other words, more than 140 new nations were created after the United Nations was established. And most of us are new nations with expectations that we’ll be treated as equal and sovereign, with clear borders and a voice which is respected. But of course, that is the theory; in practice it never was like that.


And what has happened is that all that time, the four powers that controlled the United Nations were adjusting to each other. The Cold War determined that three were on one side and one was on the other. Britain, France joined the United States against the Soviet Union, and it became ideological.



The Soviet Union collapsed. And then the Americans saw themselves now as the sole superpower. Now, this is not entirely what the United Nations was about.

A screen grab from a video featuring the United Nations San Francisco Conference, which included delegates from 50 nations, 25 April 1945. (United Nations website)


The Cold War was an ideological war. It was an ideology that was determined by political assumptions about what was more important. Coming from the enlightenment project of the French and American revolutions of the late 18th century, liberty, equality, and fraternity were the principles of new nations. But what happened, as you know, after that they became empires.


Britain and France became the most powerful empires in the world. And now you want to get rid of the empires and replace them with nation-states, and then you couldn’t quite accept that all these nations would be genuinely equal and sovereign. So you created these reserved powers of the four powers. And at first, when they didn’t agree, and the Cold War went on for quite a long time, what was happening was they were trying to set a balance, so that they could ensure world peace. And I think they were quite successful.


There were wars, but the wars were fought by the proxies, not between the two major powers. Because they were both nuclear powers, and they knew that that would be very dangerous to the whole world. So they never fought — always through the proxies. But what happened was that through that time, the ideological war was won by the Americans. And the Cold War ended. The Russians failed. The Soviet Union collapsed. And then the Americans saw themselves now as the sole superpower. Now, this is not entirely what the United Nations was about.




A superpower tested: the US in the post-Cold War era


Wang: When the Cold War ended, the United States emerged as the sole superpower. And in that context, of course, the Americans thought they had basically solved the world’s problems. They now had a world order, which is what they wanted, with the United States as the sole superpower. And they were now in a position to show the world what the world should be like. And they had their own ideals, as they defined it, and they expected others to behave according to those ideals — at least they should be moving in that direction. That is what I think they expected.


And in that context, they began to, in a way, dictate to countries what they should and should not do. And those countries that did not conform, did not do what they were expected to do by the Americans, they started to intervene. And they intervened in the Mediterranean with the North African states. They intervened in the Middle East. And in particular, they got caught up in the Iraq and Afghanistan war following the attack on the Twin Towers in New York.


That actually was the beginning of the test of that world power, the superpower, the sole superpower: could they really determine the shape of the world as they chose? And what was clear was, it didn’t work. They failed. And the interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan made no difference whatsoever. If anything, they lost credibility. Because in both those wars, they came out actually gaining nothing from it. At great losses, tremendous costs. Lots of soldiers died — Americans and other soldiers, Allied soldiers, sent to fight those wars — and they gained nothing from it. So their credibility was greatly diminished by that. That’s one level.



Rise of China and East Asia


At another level, other people were changing; people were not just standing still. The whole modernisation process was adopted by many countries, some countries more successfully than others. And, of course, the most successful part was in East Asia, led by countries like Japan, which had started very early; and after the war, they recovered very, very well. With the help of the Americans, of course. But East Asia recovered very well. And then we had the Four Tigers — Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore — and they were doing very well.


And the Chinese had failed with their Cultural Revolution. And Mao Zedong’s failure confirmed to the ideologues that, of course, that would fail, and now that they were a sole superpower, there was nothing to worry about; they were triumphant. But at the same time, they were quite surprised that the Chinese were doing very well. And not only that — the Chinese were learning from the Americans. They sent their best students to study in America. They, in fact, learned about capitalism. Deng Xiaoping’s reform policies meant that they opened China to foreign investment; they joined the World Trade Organization. The Americans, after some hesitation, agreed to let them join the World Trade Organization under certain special conditions. But with those conditions, the Chinese economy really took off. So these things were happening at the same time.



So by the time 2008 came and Obama became the president, he inherited a system that was already in trouble. With, as I said, a loss of credibility and economic, if I may say, failure.

British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s historic meeting with Deng Xiaoping in September 1982. (SPH Media)


So at the same time the Americans were losing their credibility as a sole superpower, China was developing its economy at a rate which was unbelievable. Almost, if I may say, miraculous, how they could take advantage of that WTO entry to advance their economic development at such a fast rate. So that decade, the first decade of the 21st century, with American credibility going down — failures in the Middle East — and the American economy going into a kind of bubble, which — I’ve never been able to fully understand it — but it declined so badly that when they had the financial crisis of 2008, the American economy really had a very big blow.


So by the time 2008 came and Obama became the president, he inherited a system that was already in trouble. With, as I said, a loss of credibility and economic, if I may say, failure. So in the eyes of the world, the American economy was undergoing some terrible tragedies for lots of people.


And in the middle of all that, the Chinese did not suffer from it. They used their method of funding their economy and supporting the economy. They came out of it extremely well. It did not stop them from going through that time, while the Americans were struggling to recover from the 2008 economic failure. So all that had determined a set of conditions which, by the time Obama’s second term ended and, to everyone’s surprise, Trump came in — he was representing the dissatisfaction of the American people at what was happening.



Trump was not an accident


Wang: So Trump was not, in a way, an accident. Trump was actually capturing, as we now can see looking back, he was capturing the voice of some pretty angry people. And most of all, the anger came from the fact that the liberal economic order that was brought about under Clinton, when they became the sole superpower, the liberal economic order was open, WTO was open, and it meant that the capitalist system was flourishing. Because it expanded their liberal capitalism across the world on capitalist principles, which meant that all the industries would move to where labour costs were the cheapest, and the advantage was that they could make things cheaper, make more, and as long as the quality could be maintained, the prices were cheaper, the consumers would benefit.


But what happened to America was: American industry basically moved to China. Not because the Chinese just asked for it, but the American capitalists found it to their advantage to do that. But the consequence was that the American industries suffered a terrible blow. Manufacturing just became not worthwhile. Everything was cheaper to make in China, and consumers benefited. So for a while the American people didn’t complain because everything was cheaper, so that was fine. But they lost their jobs.


All the jobs in manufacturing were disappearing. And so the net consequence was the middle class in America did not benefit from that. The upper, rich capitalists benefited tremendously. They got much, much richer than ever. So the liberal economy actually, you might say, fulfils the principle that the rich will get richer, and the middle class will stagnate, and the poor get poorer. And that was beginning to happen when the financial crisis came about. And the impact was considerable on the American people.



The net result was the American economy was facing all these things — money going out, money not spent in America — and American people feeling that they are not getting anything out of it. So Trump came along and essentially captured that feeling of dissatisfaction.


And at the same time, America was playing the role of a sole superpower, intervening in all sorts of things outside, spending a great deal of money fighting wars, supporting, providing aid, support, trying to influence the world, telling the world that they are number one and they can provide leadership in everything. The net result was the American economy was facing all these things — money going out, money not spent in America — and American people feeling that they are not getting anything out of it. So Trump came along and essentially captured that feeling of dissatisfaction. And he was really saying, “This must end.” Why is America spending all this money and losing their own interest? Not bearing their own interest in mind? So I think that was his first term.

Joe Biden meets with Donald Trump in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, on 13 November 2024. (Saul Loeb/AFP)


He didn’t quite fully understand how to do it. So while he did some of the things that he wanted to do, many things, he made a mess of that as well. But his general principle was that they must stop China from getting further, more wealthy, more powerful because of the economic growth that was taking place and alarming the businesses in America. And at the same time, to bring back whatever industry as possible to America.


But he didn’t quite know how to do it correctly. So when he lost it, he was frustrated. And to everyone’s surprise, Biden more or less continued with his policy. He didn’t fundamentally change it, essentially recognising that China was potentially a threat to America’s hegemony, in the sole superpower position that they had won for themselves at the end of the Cold War. And I think that led to tremendous frustrations inside the country.


Then when the Ukraine war came and so on, America was putting even more money outside. And all these dissatisfactions came to a head and Trump really, I would say, gained the support of half the population of America.



... when your democracy, the moderate middle shrinks, and both sides, the extremists gain against each other, until the middle is very little, extremists dominate — extremely liberal, extremely anti-liberal become the dominant views — then the democracy doesn’t work.



Threat to democracy in the US


Wang: Now that is a fundamental challenge, I would say, to the American political system. Because a democracy, in history, it’s quite clear: a democracy works best when the vast majority of the people are in the middle. They may disagree, but they’re basically moderate and disagree on details on both sides, with extremists on the one side on the left, and extremists on the other side on the right — those extremes. But they are very small minorities. The majority, in the middle.


And they may change their policies; you can change governments from Democrats to Republicans; it doesn’t matter very much because they are basically, very moderate, in the middle. So that is how a democracy really works. But when your democracy, the moderate middle shrinks, and both sides, the extremists gain against each other, until the middle is very little, extremists dominate — extremely liberal, extremely anti-liberal become the dominant views — then the democracy doesn’t work.


So what we’re looking at today is a Trump that has won spectacularly, surprisingly well, how he won with half the population basically on one side, and the other half of the population on the other side. And there’s no compromise. They’re now bitterly opposed to one another. And one side has now won. And so triumphant that Trump has become, he now feels that he has the power and the right and the duty to America, to his supporters, to make America big again. And his slogan about making America great again is basically a nationalist slogan. It’s basically saying, “America First”. Everything for America’s interests. We should not spend any money which is not in the interests of America. And our allies, if they want any help, they must pay for it.


So this is his formula at the moment. How long that will last, how long those allies can be trusted to stay with him, all these things are still open. I’ve no idea how it will develop because I’ve no idea how long Trump can carry on this very upsetting and terribly disturbing, tortuous way of dealing with the world order.


But at the moment, what I see is that it’s not something accidental. It is the result of being a sole superpower and unwilling to see themselves being pushed aside or become just equal, or other powers should have any equal say in matters, and that dominant number one position should be in any way challenged. And to that extent, to the extent that they believe that China wants to take over or to challenge their number one position, is totally unacceptable.



Will Trump get his way?


Chow: So do you see the rationale in the things that he’s doing? Is that going to help America actually stand up to the challenge that China has posed? Because some people are saying that it is actually the start of the US decline.


Wang: Well, I don’t think I would put it quite so simply. I would say that the Americans themselves are divided into two very powerful groups. One group is basically still ideological; I mean those Democrats under Biden and so on. They’re still ideological; they like to fight the war in terms of liberal values, that the value system that they believe in should be the world’s values. Whereas Trump represented the other half, which is transactional, based on America’s interests alone -– how America protects its own interests. And it’s more narrowly focused on the national interests of America. So those two are not actually agreed. And to that extent, we are not sure who will win in the end inside America.


If Trump’s group actually becomes the vast majority, then of course America’s a different America, no longer the America that we have known for the last 50 years. But if that group actually finds that that doesn’t work either — they have to live with a world in which you have to accept that there are other possibilities, that other nations will also be nationalistic, and the whole liberal economic order of globalisation, which all the capitalists took advantage of, will come to an end — they may change their mind.


So they are, I would say, at the moment still at the stage where they could still go either way. It’s not yet firm. Trump is trying to push them in one direction. But I’m not sure that the vast majority of the American people will, in the end, be comfortable with that. So this uncertainty, it remains. And I can’t predict.



So nobody wants to go to war. So assuming that nobody wants a military confrontation, in the context of non-military confrontation, what are the possibilities?



China-US relations: is war imminent?


Chow: But while there are all these uncertainties, according to what you have shared, to be able to stand up to China’s challenge is one thing that both sides and everyone is very certain about. So how do you think this very key relationship will proceed from now on?


Wang: I think this is a question of strategy. What strategy do you use to keep China down? One strategy is to have allies and so on to contain China so that China can’t expand, by limiting China’s capacity to do things. And that’s having a whole alliance system to contain China. The other is to actually push China, force the Chinese to give up some of the things that they are doing outside and lose their capacity, economic capacity, to become much richer. And so it’ll still kind of contain them, but using economic means of checking their economic growth.


I’m using the assumption, which I believe is correct, that neither side wants to go to war. I think this is genuine. It’s like the Cold War period. Because they know that with nuclear power available on both sides, both sides will lose. Everybody will lose. The world will lose if there’s a third world war. So nobody wants to go to war. So assuming that nobody wants a military confrontation, in the context of non-military confrontation, what are the possibilities?


Political containment and economic containment are both possibilities. Which one you emphasise is different. The ideological one emphasises a political one. Political side. In other words, you gain allies from those who are ideologically on your side. And so you use things like democracy, human rights, and rules-based order against communism — evil communism — and authoritarianism, and so on. So you use ideological standards to gain allies against China as a threat to your system, of your value system.

Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) soldiers patrol outside the Great Hall of the People before a press conference for the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) in Beijing on 3 March 2025, ahead of the country’s annual legislative meetings known as the “Two Sessions”. (Pedro Pardo/AFP)


The other way is to simply say, China’s getting too powerful. Their navy is too strong. Their air control of the air space and cyberspace, all that, they’re advancing too fast. We must technologically stop them from catching up with us and surpassing us, somehow. So then you, in terms of national security, you start to block the Chinese on every aspect of technological advancement, to make sure that the Chinese can never technologically be better than you.


So as long as you have that superiority, you can always feel relatively safe. So these are choices still being made. And I’m not sure that all the American leaders agree on which one is better. I think they want to exercise both. Both are being used at the same time.



Is Xi Jinping a dictator?


Chow: I want to further talk about China. Because some China watchers believe that China is entering into one of its most uncertain and perilous periods as well, while the US is also facing so many disruptions. They are talking about President Xi’s consolidation of power through the removal of term limits, mandatory retirement ages along with economic challenges, like local government debts, a struggling property market, a crackdown on key industries. Do you agree with this assessment of China’s current situation? That it is actually in a very uncertain and perilous period as well?


Wang: I think the fundamental thing is that all countries worry about their security, their own safety, and the stability of their own central government. And China is no different from any other country. And from Xi Jinping’s point of view, the question was very simple.


Before he came to power, he was observing how China was becoming corrupt. And the corruption is not just a corruption of the business people, but the corruption within the Chinese Communist Party itself. And it was really quite extraordinary how quickly the Chinese communist leaders had become corrupt. Not only the political leaders of the Central Committee in the Political Bureau and the Standing Committee, but even in the People’s Liberation Army, which is a branch of the Communist Party.


So the Communist Party was being corrupted by the fact that they were entering a capitalist system, in which it was without enough checks and balances. It was possible to be corrupt, until the whole system was corrupt. You could not get anything done without bribing somebody or, not calling it a bribe, but using “gifts” or other terminology, to enable things to be done. And that degree of corruption meant that nobody was doing it for the country’s interests, but doing it for their own personal interests or their group’s interests. At least this was what Xi Jinping saw.



So when he adopted his anti-corruption campaign, it wasn’t just to get rid of his enemies, it was actually a genuinely popular move to clean up the corrupt system. And throughout the country, people appreciated it.


And I noted that when he first came in, and many other people have noted that too, his first concern was the survival of the Communist Party itself. And he’s concerned, he took the example of the Soviet Union. He said: Why did the Soviet Communist Party fail? Because of corruption. The leadership had lost their sense of purpose. They had lost their commitment to the revolution that they had fought for. They had lost their support for the ideals that they fought the revolution, died for. They all became privately rich and were seeking more benefits for themselves. And therefore the Soviet Communist Party splintered into different factions and eventually just self-destructed. So he asked the Chinese Communist Party to look at that model.


If the Soviet Communist Party, which was our model, could collapse like that, it could happen to us too. And he, you might say again, he’s a filial son to his revolutionary father. He could not imagine that his father and all his comrades had died for nothing. And just for people to get rich. Even the Communist Party. And the survival of the Communist Party as the legitimate ruler of China was, to him, of prime importance.


So when he adopted his anti-corruption campaign, it wasn’t just to get rid of his enemies, it was actually a genuinely popular move to clean up the corrupt system. And throughout the country, people appreciated it. He was one of the most popular leaders anywhere in the world for his anti-corruption campaign. And I will say the first few years, this was very successful. But fundamentally, corruption cannot be completely removed that way, by just through an anti-corruption campaign. You must have something more positive.


And his positive side was to control. To ask the Communist Party to be disciplined, to return to their roots, to be dedicated to the country’s interests, dedicated to the revolution and ideals, and so on. So in order to do that, he needed to control. He needed to actually promote people who would support those ideals and get rid of those people who were corrupted, and so on.



So you can say that he’s a dictator, but I don’t think he sought to be a dictator.


And in so doing, he began to amass his powers into a very narrow group of people under his leadership. So you can say that he’s a dictator, but I don’t think he sought to be a dictator. He had no choice. If he wanted to save the Communist Party, if he did not control the party, he couldn’t succeed. So as a result, his primary purpose was more political than economic.



Control of businessmen is a Chinese tradition


Wang: Although he did not give up his economic ideals that Deng Xiaoping had set up, he’s not anti-Deng Xiaoping. He’s still accepting the Deng Xiaoping idea of using the capitalist system to make money for China, while at the same time, the Communist Party continues to remain the leaders and provide central leadership to ensure the security and stability within the country is guaranteed. To be secured, to be safe. So that creates all kinds of contradictions, you might say, from within.


So when he found that the Chinese economy, while it was doing very well, all the Chinese entrepreneurs were getting more and more capitalistic, and they were the ones who were making the money for China. China’s economy would not have done as well without the private entrepreneurs; the state-owned enterprises were not doing well at all. And he knew that. But at the same time, he could not allow the capitalists to try and dictate what to do to the economy.



So he took the opportunity of Ma Yun (Jack Ma), to attack him and try to tell the entrepreneurs: Don’t you dare interfere with the political goals of the Chinese Communist Party. The political goals are supreme, are primary.


So he took the opportunity of Ma Yun (Jack Ma), to attack him and try to tell the entrepreneurs: Don’t you dare interfere with the political goals of the Chinese Communist Party. The political goals are supreme, are primary. You are supposed to make wealth to enable China to be strong and wealthy and so on, but you are not to interfere in politics.


That is very fundamentally Chinese. In many ways, that is the original Chinese traditional position, of the guan (官, officials). Very different. The shi (士, scholar officials) is very different from the shang (商, businessmen). And they must be separate. And the shang must never be allowed to take part in the politics of rule. That separation is, in a way, very traditional. It is a return, in a way, to Chinese roots of the nature of governance. There must be an order, a hierarchy. And the shi is above that. You cannot mix up the two.

Chinese President Xi Jinping (centre) applauds during the closing of the Third Session of the 14th National Peoples Congress (NPC) at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, on 11 March 2025. (Qilai Shen/Bloomberg)


And to that extent, he has intervened in the entrepreneurial world in a way that has upset a lot of the entrepreneurs, that held, pulled them back; they all became less willing to take risks. And he was making it sure that they could not go beyond a certain point. And if they are too wealthy, they must share their wealth openly. All these things have intervened to put a pause to the economy. So it didn’t help that they had the Covid thing, because the Covid thing affected the whole world.

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But it affected and tested the Chinese system in a way which exposed them to the dangers of having too much central control, and very little left to local enterprise and so on. And as a result of it all, at the end of it all, the controls were even tighter than ever.


And I think today they are recovering a bit from that. Xi Jinping is realising that if this goes on, the economy would falter. And if the economy falters, he cannot achieve his other goals, because you need wealth to do things. As Deng Xiaoping said very wisely a long time ago, “Socialism that is poor would not be attractive to anybody.” Who wants socialism if it only provides poverty? It must provide material wealth, must make people feel better, must make the standard of living, living in style, the whole population better. People must feel that they’re getting better. Then socialism would be worth something.


So I think he accepts that. He realises now that if the economy doesn’t grow as fast as it used to, it would be a real threat. So he’s doing everything he can to keep up that growth rate, but it is a great strain on the system now. How he will recover, I would not know, but we can see that his policies are now relaxing, to try and get the entrepreneurs back at work now. But it will take some time.



Will the Chinese people support Xi?


Wang: And essentially the problem is that when people within that country feel they’re not getting better off, they don’t consume. They don’t buy, and they don’t consume; that means the economy, you can’t depend on the local consumers to keep the economy going. If you depend entirely on exports, and other people start clamping down on your exports, and your local consumers are not consuming, you have a real problem with your economic growth. So that’s very fundamental.


At the same time, of course, we know how talented the Chinese people are and how well educated they are, how hardworking they are, how thrifty they are, basically, and how they are willing to go through all kinds of difficulties to advance and improve China’s security and safety. So you can see that in science and technology, their skills are now as good as anybody else’s now. They’re really very very good, extraordinarily capable of turning every scientific advance into technologically challenging things which alarm the rest of the world, and at the same time impress the rest of the world. Both at the same time.



If he can maintain that general consensus, the vast majority of people are willing to go along with him, then China’s chances of overcoming its present difficulties are pretty good.


Similarly, at another level, in terms of finance and economics, they understand it. It’s not that they don’t understand it. It’s a system that puts a limit to what they can do with their understanding of it — the capitalist system — and that is preventing them from being richer and growing faster. And so on. So how to find the right balance?


And I think most people still feel that the Chinese people are talented enough, sufficiently technologically advanced, to be independently capable of achieving the highest development. To say that the Chinese can overcome these problems. But it does depend on stability within the country. That within the party itself, within the military system itself, that there is a genuine understanding, and you might say a consensus, about what China should be doing. And this is what Xi Jinping is trying to achieve. If he can maintain that general consensus, the vast majority of people are willing to go along with him, then China’s chances of overcoming its present difficulties are pretty good.



Will the Chinese lose global space under Trump?


Chow: So do you think they can find a balance between control and giving space to entrepreneurs and creativity? Even under a CCP kind of leadership?


Wang: I don’t know. This is where one doesn’t know. Because the system has its limits. Because if you want control, you have to limit the freedom of the entrepreneurs and your capitalist system to fully benefit from the globalisation that they took advantage of earlier on. But at the same time, you have to say, China is not alone. It depends on the rest of the world. If what is happening in the United States is actually limiting globalisation, putting an end to the liberal world economy, it hurts the Chinese. Very much. Because they have grown in that system, taking advantage of globalisation.


In fact, if you talk to the Chinese today, they are very much for multilateralism, globalisation and free trade. They want that kind of free trade. They like to be able to reach out. All their ships can go everywhere, to sell goods and to bring back the resources to make more goods to sell, and increase the wealth of China. And that depends on that liberal economic system in many ways. So they’re not against the system. The system that has been achieved at the end of the 20th century, it actually suits the Chinese. After they joined the World Trade Organization, they actually worked out how the system works, and they’re taking full advantage of it. They’ve done very well out of it.

People walk below Chinese flags in an alley near a popular shopping street in Beijing on 3 February 2025. (Greg Baker/AFP)


But now, in fact, it’s America that’s trying to end it. When Trump — and it’s not only Trump — it’s the attempts to block China’s entry, but Trump is going to the extreme. Anything that the Chinese… port entries, shipping, Panama Canal, or whatever, they’re all part and parcel of limiting the freedom of the Chinese to take advantage of a liberal economic system, which the Americans are gradually pulling out of. Because Trump, in a way, is now recreating a very protectionist, nationalist kind of economic system, in which (it is) everybody for himself, national interests first.


In that case, they said, for national security, the Chinese cannot do this, cannot have that technology, we must keep them out of all this, if they’re Chinese we cannot allow them to come in freely to have access to our secrets, and so on. So all these are putting more and more limits on the cooperation that makes the world richer, as it happened in the globalisation period. Except that what went wrong was that during that period, when the world was getting richer, the rich were getting richer, but not the poor. Then the middle class was not gaining out of it all. So that system was beginning to fail.


And there is a reaction against that that Trump is, in a way, representing today. But in order to stop that, he’s creating conditions which would land everybody in greater difficulties, economic difficulties. And making the economy, economic growth, economic development, the whole world over, much more difficult and much more unpredictable.



Social revolution within China: will the young people be satisfied?


Chow: But as you’ve said, the development of China really depends on its being able to stay stable. So what is that factor that could disrupt China’s development trajectory? Would it be external factors or would it be internal, domestic?


Wang: One has to say both. Because externally, if you feel that the American allies are getting more and more ideological and supporting America against China, China will feel it, feel the effect of it in the long run. Cannot avoid that. But economically, I think it’s probably more important. If the goods that the Chinese can manufacture are being taxed all over the world to such an extent, their profits become less and less easy to come by. That will have, in the long run, an impact on China’s economic growth. So both are happening at the same time. And to what extent the Chinese can find solutions and find ways of dealing with these challenges, depends very much on the leadership today. And I’m not sure that they can solve all the problems because they’ve got internal problems as well. Because they’ve got to satisfy the people.


And I think the reality is that there has been a social revolution within China. China is not the China that is traditional China. China is a modern China. The whole generation of young people today, I would say those that are aged forties, thirties, twenties, these three decades of people, have experienced a great deal of freedom, experienced a great deal of the advantages of modernisation, experienced degrees of individual decisions and not just always collective decisions, and taken advantage of a system which allowed them to be creative and imaginative, and make advances in technology and finance and so on.



And I think that tension will grow because these young people are not going to just sit back and accept everything. They want to do something to make sure that their opportunities can be better.


And they feel that unless this continues, all that they’ve learnt would be frustrated. So they’re also seeking greater opportunities to be creative and imaginative, in order to serve their country better. But if that collides with and goes contrary to the control and security worries of the CCP and its leadership, that contradiction can grow within the country and lead to some dissatisfaction.


And to what extent Xi Jinping can make concessions to those challenges and give more opportunities to the creative and more imaginative people that had been so well educated by the Chinese, unless you give them that chance to be creative and imaginative, would they always be satisfied to just sit back and tangping (躺平, lie flat), as it were, forget about doing anything for the country? I think that challenge has still to be met, and I’m not at all sure how it will end in the end. But right now, this tension seems to be there. And I would say it is wrong to assume that the Chinese people are content with what is happening today.


The vast majority, particularly that young generation, who have been shown how the world works in a more liberal, globalised way, and now be told — not by the Chinese alone, but by the world — because of China’s growth and success, the world is now trying to contain and prevent it from developing more naturally and normally; they’re just wondering whether this is because of other people’s evil intentions and anti-China feelings, or also because the nature of the Chinese system doesn’t allow them to gain that kind of creative position that would make China better off, and all the people of China better off. That tension is still not resolved, in my view.


And I think that tension will grow because these young people are not going to just sit back and accept everything. They want to do something to make sure that their opportunities can be better. And I think there are just too many uncertainties within that country for me to be sure if the CCP in its present condition can actually create a harmonious understanding, so that they all, as it were, there’s a consensus — a real national, social consensus — and cultural acceptance that this is the way China must go because they found the right balance. Can they come to that agreement? I’m not sure yet.



I think China has to become more democratic, but the idea of democracy is a definitional problem.



Will China become more democratic?


Chow: And would you say that to go down the route where China eventually will become more democratic or adopting democratic principles, is something that China cannot avoid?


Wang: I think China has to become more democratic, but the idea of democracy is a definitional problem. Because to them, the democratic practices of the United States is a very extreme form, in which there’s so much freedom for money politics, for the capitalists to intervene, for the money-making, the rich people to interfere in politics. It’s something that the Chinese, I think, fundamentally cannot accept. But on the other hand, if they reach a position where everything is decided by a group of people loyal to the Communist Party, who don’t understand economics and don’t understand business, and they determine, make all the decisions, that is also unacceptable. That will not work. So how to find that right balance is extremely important.

People watch performances at a street carnival on the second day of the Lunar New Year of the Snake in Beijing on 30 January 2025. (Greg Baker/AFP)


But I think they don’t want the democracy of the extreme form that they think that the United States represents. But their democracy is a governance that represents the people in better ways, that the voices of people, and care for the people, and what the people really want is taken into account in every decision that is made by the leadership. I think that is what they mean by democracy. That the government cares for the people and actually responds to how the people want their country to grow. And so when the people react, they respond. And not just by tyranny and control alone, but by trying to meet the needs of the people and satisfy (the people), and enable the people to gain what they want.


To find that right balance. I think that is still their idea of democracy. Democracy is to take the people’s wishes into account. In a way, like Mencius put it in a different way: that the people have the right to rebel. If your government fails you, you have the right to overturn it and replace it by a better government. In that sense, the Chinese always had an idea of the people having the final say. The people’s response gives you the Mandate of Heaven. And that people’s response is their idea of a democracy.


But it is a very violent way of doing things, in practice. So if you can achieve a method whereby you could do that without violence, but you can ensure that the government that is not providing the people what they need, the government would fail and will be replaced by another government who cares for the people. As long as that is still, as a principle, still the principle that the Chinese government, the Chinese people accept, that is, I think, their idea of democracy.



Two civilisations, two systems


Chow: But it seems like both countries, whether it’s the US or China, they are all facing a lot of uncertainties. In your view, do you think — which country has, you know, a higher likelihood of developing a new system? Because I see that the US is trying to disrupt the old and trying to come up with something new as well. So offering that kind of — what we have always been talking about — “universal values” that ensure the kind of sustainable progress, and to be able to lead on a global stage. And actually, do we need a global leader?


Wang: I don’t know about global leaders, but the real test is if either side — at the moment there has been talk about two sides; there may be others. Europe may recover, I don’t know. But at the moment between China and the United States — if both of them, in their own way, can find a way of making their people feel satisfied with what is happening, and that they find a system which people can be both creative and confident of development to their satisfaction, accepting that there are enough checks and balances in the system to be fair and just, and provide, as it were, the right conditions for people to do what they have to do.


This is a compromise, there’s no perfect system. And within imperfections, to achieve something that’s majority-supported. Both sides are capable of doing that, I think. And I won’t say which one is better. Because it’s which one suits the conditions of their country’s needs and the country’s traditions, cultural values, and so on. Those things do matter. America represents a tradition of 250 years of the Enlightenment programme — it has certain principles which are set out in their constitution. I don’t think they will depart from those principles. They will find some other way of operation, they will find other ways of achieving those principles.



But the two systems will never be the same, can never be the same. They have some similarities, but there will also be some major differences. Because they come from different civilisational roots.


The Chinese have their principles, which is really good governance by a genuinely caring government. It’s hierarchical, theoretically, it used to be based on a very caring ruling class of the dynastic, the emperor, as it were, represented by the emperor and the family, which is also very authoritarian to the head of a family, a clan. But they provide a kind of stable relationship which enables the country to remain socially harmonious and stable. That’s not so easy now because of new technology and the fact that the family system has been dissolved in many ways.


And so we’re now dealing with a modern generation who have different expectations, the young people. So whether the new governments under the CCP can satisfy these expectations of a new generation of people who are modern, technologically very efficient, capable of being very creative, and extremely skillful in dealing with new technologies all the time, whether the government can keep up with them and provide satisfaction for them is a real test. So that government itself has to adapt to its different population.


But the principles of stability, social harmony, a kind of hierarchical relationship in which people respect each other and develop trust and confidence in each other, the kind of, as I said, fundamentally, a caring government and a loyal and patriotic population — if that can work out, a compromise and a balanced system, they can succeed too. But the two systems will never be the same, can never be the same. They have some similarities, but there will also be some major differences. Because they come from different civilisational roots.



Crises may bring people together


Chow: So are you still optimistic in the future of the global society?


Wang: Yes, you can do that if, for example, there are fundamental changes to climate, and the fundamental problems about health, fundamental differences in the landscape, and economic resources running out, or pollution overcomes healthy living, and all these things. When these become common to all, you just have to find common solutions because it affects everybody.


Something that happens in China affects America within days, like Covid; a pandemic is a good example. But there are other examples. Climate change is something that people have predicted for some time. I don’t know enough about how accurate these predictions are, but I do believe that climate change is happening. And not because of any particular trend in one direction, but there’re shifting trends in the climate.



But at the moment there are no global problems. They are so easy to separate as national problems.

A general view shows erosion at Miami Beach after the sand was washed away during Tropical Cyclone Alfred on the Gold Coast on 9 March 2025. (David Gray/AFP)


And these are global problems when they happen, and you have to find ways of sharing knowledge and cooperating to deal with a common problem. Those problems, when they arise, I think would challenge whatever system it is — whether it’s China or the United States — will challenge their leaders there to come together to try and solve them together. But whether those problems are big enough to do that, it is at the moment not clear.


At the moment, they’re still pretending. I mean, at least the Americans under Trump are putting it aside and saying that’s a long term problem, not to worry. And they are now, in fact, basically walking out of that cooperative system altogether. So these have consequences. But whether that would change, with the serious climate change that everybody can agree on, a new leadership in America, a new leadership in China might find it necessary for them to come together to solve them as global problems.


But at the moment there are no global problems. They are so easy to separate as national problems. And it comes back, in a way, to the very invention of the idea of a nation-state at the end of empires. Because that crucial transformation was about 1945 at the end of the Second World War, when the world came to a conclusion, that we cannot have any more empires. Empires are a bad thing. They fight. They fight over territory, they create wars — the Second World War, First World War, Second World War — all these are part and parcel of the imperial territorial expansionist ideals that the empires had.


Bring that to an end. Create this system of genuine sovereign nation-states. But if you create that, you also create the idea of every nation-state having its national interests, which is borders, selfish, looking after itself, and so on. So if every country does that, and then does not participate in international cooperation, there are tremendous dangers. So you have to find a balance. There is no perfection.


Nation-states are not a solution. Nation-states actually help people to develop, but only up to a certain point. Because that development, if they do not cooperate with other nations, how can they develop? Now, how do they achieve a point whereby their national interests, when they collide, they don’t compromise? Do they just fight it out? And so if you don’t resolve, ultimately, the human problem of “might is not right” – how to get away from that problem?



... if you carry on, everybody being nationalistic — make America great again, we make China great again, make Europe great again, or whatever it is you call it, at the expense of other people, because to make yourself great at other people’s expense, you go against all the principles that were agreed before.



Selfish nations and all for itself


Wang: In the end, power, political and economic power, fu (富, wealth) and qiang (强, strength), becomes the ultimate principle, then the world is a different kind of world. Whoever is powerful dictates to those who are not. And you can say, go back to history, all the great thinkers of history, they’ve always recognised the realism of the fact is that when the powerful people determine something, the small ones, the weaker ones have to obey. And that is a terrible world to go back to.


We thought at the end of the Second World War the opportunity to create a new world in which the powerful don’t dictate to the less powerful would come to an end. We’ll no longer do that. That has not quite happened as people hoped for. And what we are now trying, see how we can avoid going back to the world in which the powerful always dictates to the less powerful. And in the end, it’s a question of who is the most powerful. I think to go back to that kind of world will be a step backwards in history, not progress at all.


Chow: Do you see that happening?


Wang: It could.


Chow: It could?


Wang: It could. It could because if you carry on, everybody being nationalistic — make America great again, we make China great again, make Europe great again, or whatever it is you call it, at the expense of other people, because to make yourself great at other people’s expense, you go against all the principles that were agreed before. For example, sovereignty. Denmark has sovereignty over Greenland, but now you say, I’ll buy it from you. I’ll take it from you if you don’t give it to me anyway. Or I’ll make it so difficult for you to keep it that you have to give it to me, that’s bullying. That’s using power.


And Panama’s the same. You tell the Panama people, you know, you’re a small country; you don’t do what I do, what I say, I will make it very difficult for you. I mean, these are different ways of doing things; they’re not quite just using a club and beat you with it, but there are different ways of exerting pressure to get what you want. And that is the powerful determining what the less powerful have to do. And that is a different world from what we wanted in 1945.



What can Singapore and SEA nation-states do?


Chow: Do you have some advice for Singapore? Like a small nation-state in this kind of era of flux?


Wang: Well, Singapore didn’t exist before 1965. So 1965, we became independent on that principle: Sovereign, equal state, nation-state in the world. So on those principles, Singapore can survive. If those principles survive, Singapore can survive. But it has, in the meantime, recognised the reality that when you’re small, you have to do things which small things, small countries do better than big countries. For example, Singapore was very wise very early on, to form groups of small nations, forming groups to talk to the big nations. It may not always work, but it at least helps.


ASEAN is another good example. It may not always work, it may be very tortuous and very indecisive in some ways, but as long as it speaks with one voice and acts together on the major things that concern them as a whole, and if they want to have any role to play in the world at all, they know that they must speak together, must stick together and speak with one voice. Singapore is very active in keeping that going because Singapore depends on that. As long as there is ASEAN, and they all treat each other like, as the United Nations should treat other, as equal and sovereign, and therefore each country’s national interests matters, and they respect that, then they have a chance.



And they can play a part even in the political role, by being in the middle, and trying its best to make sure that there is no serious disturbances and turmoil among the major powers.

ASEAN leaders pose for a group photo during the ASEAN Foreign Ministers’ Retreat (AMM) in Langkawi Island, Malaysia, on 19 January 2025. (Azneal Ishak/via Reuters)


And then of course the reality is, as many people have noted, the economic dynamism in the world today; it has moved to this part of the world. It’s no longer in the North Atlantic. It’s now in the Indian Indo-Pacific. And the Indo-Pacific is not a new idea; it’s always been there. Today, they’re emphasising it in the political context of keeping China, containing China, but that is a very narrow understanding of the Indo-Pacific. But the Indo-Pacific, the two oceans, as an ocean of free trade moving back and forth, has been there for thousands of years, and can be conducted peacefully. And if they see the area where economic dynamism is at its height, then the location of ASEAN is vital. Because it’s actually between the two oceans.


And if ASEAN can act together in all things, in all matters, that shows our importance to the region. If they can do that, they can play a vital role in this economic dynamism that is happening in this part of the world. And they can play a part even in the political role, by being in the middle, and trying its best to make sure that there is no serious disturbances and turmoil among the major powers. They can play a role. The location does matter because there’s tremendous trade that’s flowing between the Pacific and Indian Oceans both ways. And that is why the South China Sea is so vital now.



Importance of the seas


So all these are not accidental. They are actually deeply rooted in the way the world will change, changed in the 16th century from a basically continental system into a maritime system, where world power became global power, you might say, became basically maritime. Economically, everything by sea was what’s so important. Who dominated the seas and kept control of the ports and so on made all the difference. Because it is so much cheaper, it is safer once you have the technology to do this. And it creates a world in which you don’t have to bother each other’s borders — you go from port to port, and it has a kind of freedom which the continental system doesn’t allow.



And what they’re trying to make sure is that the Chinese maritime power can never challenge their American maritime power. And I think that is the crucial test of the next few decades.


The continental system, you have to cross every border, borders, many borders, to create a connectivity. But in connectivity by sea, it’s amazingly advantageous. And the amount of cargo you can carry — you can’t do that, you can’t replace that by air. By rail you can, but it needs tremendous political negotiations to provide a transport system over land. But by sea, it’s amazingly advantageous.


And both sides at the moment — United States and China — are really talking about maritime power. Because the United States cannot really disturb the continental power that China and Russia exercise. But the maritime power is where the Americans have total dominance. And what they’re trying to make sure is that the Chinese maritime power can never challenge their American maritime power. And I think that is the crucial test of the next few decades.


Chow: So Singapore — and its neighbouring countries in Southeast Asia — it has to understand and it has to be clear of its core, its position in this area.


Wang: Yes. And they know, in fact. I think that the ASEAN countries know that they’re now in that position. And therefore it adds to their voice. And if they can stay united, they can play a role in making sure that the US...and they don’t take positions on those two. They make sure that in the Pacific and Indian Oceans, transportation and communication remain safe and prosperous for everybody.


That is, they have a role to play. How they play their role, of course, I don’t know. I mean, it depends on how these ten countries can actually act together and do something important every now and then. But they now recognise that they have — that they can play that role, and that that role can be very much more flexible and more assertive in many ways, if they can find the resolve and agreement and consensus to do that.


Related: America’s ‘breaking’ and ‘building’ of the world order | Could the quest for a new world order ignite major conflict?==
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