Brussels talks China without talking China
By Jorge Liboreiro
Today the Briefing presents a new game: how to talk about China without talking about China.
The rules are simple: you can use words such as “non-market policies,” “malicious practices,” “technology leakage” and “challenging geopolitical context” to enrich your speech and convince your audience. Just please, under no circumstances must you mention China.
This was – to a lesser or greater extent – the atmosphere that surrounded the European Commission’s presentation of its economic security strategy, the first ever of its kind.
The strategy, which runs for 15 pages and is non-binding, was described as a “clear-eyed” analysis of the main threats and risks the bloc faces in the twisted politics of the 21st century, where old and new powers vie for supremacy.
The document is intellectually stimulating and offers a matter-of-fact assessment of the many perils the EU has to navigate, like the manipulation of energy supplies and the sabotage of critical infrastructure, two obvious allusions to the events of 2022.
“The world has become more contested and geopolitical,” said Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, while presenting the long-awaited paper.
By far, the most interesting part of the strategy is the section that deals with economic coercion, foreign investment and advanced technology. Here, the document speaks of “destinations of concern that operate civil-military fusion strategies” and of actors who might exploit Europe’s capital, expertise and knowledge to “undermine international peace and security.” The accusations are of extreme severity but the culprits remain unnamed.
Where are these destinations of concern? Who are these actors?
Besides a handful of references to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the strategy does not mention one single country by name. However, it doesn’t take long to realise the document’s main target is no other than China, a superpower with whom the EU maintains very lucrative commercial relations but also very strained diplomatic ties.
The list of grievances is well known: in the last couple of years, the EU has accused Beijing of taking the side of Vladimir Putin, endangering the stability in the Taiwan Strait, launching trade retaliation against Lithuania, spreading online disinformation, stealing intellectual property from European companies and distorting market competition through massive state subsidies, to name a few.
Brussels worries tensions could one day spiral out of control and wreak havoc across the entire European economy, depriving companies and citizens of essential products on which we heavily rely on China, such as solar panels, batteries and rare earths. This explains why one of the key purposes of the economic security strategy is to “de-risk,” meaning eradicate, or at least mitigate, the most problematic aspects of EU-China relations before the damage is done.
“We’re discussing how to balance the relationship,” von der Leyen said when asked about China, the only moment in the presentation that she mentioned the country by name.
The European Commission president insisted the new strategy was “country-agnostic” and the vast majority of EU-China trade was “uncomplicated” and would remain “business as usual.” But she did concede that certain EU-made technology products and investment flows should be subject to additional oversight if they’re bound to the Chinese market.
“We're looking at a limited, small set of cutting-edge technologies. And here we want to make sure that they do not enhance the military capacities of some countries of concern,” von der Leyen said.
The strategy is now up to member states to discuss. The 27 capitals have widely diverging opinions on how to deal with China, how hard or how soft their joint approach should be. Now, they will be asked to put their differences aside and build a common scale to balance economic interests, on the one hand, and national security, on the other.
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Euronews 23-6-2023
