The Structure of the Chinese State

Old World Order - Japan

Population: 127 million
Area: 378,000km2
GDP: $5.9 trillion
GDP (per capita): $35,000

Japan is unique in the countries that I am reviewing; it is the only Asian country and the only one never to have beenm controlled by Europeans. Japan has a very large economy, behind only the USA and China. This, seemingly successful, economy is in part thanks to US investment following WWII out of fears that Japan might fall to the Communists. The truth is that although the Japenese economy is large, it is also stagnant and has been since the early 1990s. Japan is also facing problems in the future; the rise of China, fear of North Korea, and an ageing and shrinking population.

The rise of China is a serious threat to Japan, it already has a larger economy and higher military expenditure. China also has the world's largest standing army. China and Japan are currently arguing over the rights to fish in the waters between the two nations. A stronger China would find it easier to bully Japan. Thankfully the Japanese have the Americans backing them.

Another issue I mentioned was fear of North Korea. This may never amount to anything, but could prove disastrous for Japan if things do fo wrong. Nobody id quite sure what nuclear capability North Korea has, but we can be pretty certain that within the next decade (if not already) that it will have nuclear weapons that can reach anywhere in Japan. This is really worrying as tensions between the two Koreas is at a high and rising. If the regime in Pyongyang were to send nuclear missiles to Japan, the result would be devastating.

The North Korean problem may never come to fruition, but one problem Japan is already facing is an aging and declining population. The fertility rate in Japan is very low, which means the working population is shrinking whilst the dependent population is increasing. Fewer people working means lower government revenue, whilst more retired people means higher government expenditire through pensions and healthcare. This is a recipe for disaster as Japan's debt to GDP ratio, at 214% of GDP, is the highest in the world, even higher than Greece and Zimbabwe! Japan's stagnant economy is not helped by its declining population, currently Japan is the 10th largest country in the world with 127 million people. By 2050 this is expected to decline to 107 million people, making it the 17th largest.

Low growth has been the standard for the Japanese economy over the past two decades. Japan has never really recovered from a crash in the early 1990s. If a government were to actually pull Japan out of the doldrums then it would be a miracle.

So Japan faces three main problems; challenges from Asian neighbours, poor economic performance and a declining population.

North Korean Craziness

If there was a prize for craziest regime, I believe North Korea would win that prize. In the past week several stories have emerged of the regime threatening catastrophic war. A couple of days ago North Korea threatened to void the armistice that ended the devastating Korean War in 1953. North Korea threatened both South Korea and Japan with war if certain conditions are not met, the regime claimed that they would turn the Seoul Presidential Palace into a "sea of fire". The issue over which North Korea is getting so aggressive about is joint sea and land exercises by the South Korean and US military which are due to take place on the 11th, four days away. In response South Korea has said that any attack would be taken as an act of war and South Korea will defend itself.

But even North Korea managed to top its own craziness and has threatened the US with nuclear war. The regime claims that the US is using the military drills as a cover to plant nuclear weapons. "Since the US is about to ignite a nuclear war, we will be exercising our right to pre-emptive nuclear attack against the headquarters of the aggressor in order to protect our supreme interest." Paranoid, right?

It is true that the North Korean regime always uses aggressive rhetoric when it comes to South Korea and its allies. Yet this seems to be a new level, threatening nuclear annihilation. This heightening of rhetoric occurred when the UN Security Council was discussing new sanctions on North Korea due to their nuclear test last month. The heightened rhetoric probably helped to push China into agreeing to the new sanctions earlier today, this will put real pressure on the small, isolated nation.

The big problem with North Korea is that no-one knows how to deal with it. An invasion would be totally out of the question, China is unlikely to agree to it so an invasion from the north is out of the question. The border between South and North Korea is too heavily defended and an amphibious invasion would be extremely costly to the invader. We have to see how sanctions go but I feel that eventually different actions will have to be taken. The US may be forced to place nuclear weapons in South Korea and Japan to try and act as a deterrence against North Korea. In the mean time, let's hope they don't do anything stupid! 

Chinese Leadership Change

The once-in-a-decade change in the leadership of China took place last year in the capital Beijing. It was revealed in November that Xi Jinping would become the next leader of China. There were no surprises in who else got promoted; many media organisations such as the New York Time correctly predicted the exact results. China seems to be somewhat institutionalising its system of governance, this was only the second time since the Communists won the revolution in 1949 that there has been a peaceful change of power! That doesn’t mean that China doesn’t face enormous challenges.

New leader Xi Jinping shaking hands with the former
leader, Hu Jintao
Source: bbc.co.uk

The next decade will prove to be a very important one, it is predicted that the Chinese economy will gallop ahead and overtake the American economy in size. The past decade has been phenomenal for the country, consistently producing double digit growth, even as the West faced economic catastrophe. Unfortunately this growth has come with problems, corruption has spiked in China with high ranking members becoming extremely wealthy. The change China has undergone in the past two decades is astounding, it has gone from a strictly government controlled economy to one in which there is market capitalism. As a result a middle class has emerged in China, unfortunately for the leadership of China this will cause serious trouble. China is not a democracy, and as the middle class grows; the people will demand more control over their lives and more control over the government. This could cause serious problems for China, a struggle over who controls the country would destroy the economy and dash any hopes of overtaking America in the next decade. As well as these struggles, there are serious debates to be had in the ruling Communist Party. On one side are the old-style Maoists who already are frustrated with the increasing amount of capitalism in the Chinese economy, on the other side are people pushing for more market reforms. This fight could tear the party apart, the fall from grace of Maoist, Bo Xilai, will have far reaching affects within the Party.

The problems posed by corruption, a burgeoning middle class with no say in governance and arguments within the Communist Party make the next decade unpredictable, but one thing we can all agree on; it will decide where China will end up.

Terrorism

Terrorism did not slow down in 2012 unfortunately, thousands of people were killed across the globe in terrorist atrocities. Yet most of those attacks took place in just a handful of countries:

Country	Attacks*	Dead
Iraq	55	1,676
Afghanistan	35	543
Nigeria	21	511
Pakistan	30	425
Yemen	14	328
Somalia	11	78
Russia	9	51
Kenya	8	47
Colombia	5	31
China	2	26

*Co-ordinated attacks that take place on one day are counted as one attack.

Looking at this rather horrifying table you can see that Iraq had the worst year of any country. Terrorists killed over three times as many people as in Afghanistan, the second worst affected country. One of the most prominent terrorist attacks of the year was not in Iraq or Afghanistan, but Pakistan; the shooting of 15 year old Malala Yousafzai. Thankfully Malala survived and is recovering well in a British hospital. There were protests all across Pakistan against the assassination attempt and 50 Islamic clerics issued a fatwā against the perpetrators. Despite this the Taliban claim they still want to kill her and her father. So what was her ‘crime’? Trying to get young girls into education in Pakistan, this infuriated the Taliban who are anti-education especially when it comes to women. As Malala rose to fame in Pakistan, the Taliban increasingly sent death threats to her home and on the internet. But she continued in her struggle, in 2011 Desmond Tutu nominated her for the International Children’s Peace Prize and later won Pakistan’s first National Youth Prize. Time magazine recently selected her as the runner up of Time Magazine’s person of the year.

There was some pleasant news on the terrorist front, Anders Breivik, was finally sentenced to Prison for this mass shooting and bombing in July 2011.  There is finally closure for the families of the 77 killed and those that were on the island of Utøya on that fateful day.

Up until November 2012, Northern Ireland was relatively quiet on the terrorism front, apart from the odd bomb scare. Then on the 1^st of November a prison officer was shot dead. Then trouble began after Belfast City Council voted to fly the Union flag on certain days of the year. That seriously upset some unionists who for the past few weeks have been causing chaos across Northern Ireland, but particularly in Belfast.

Terrorism is something that will likely always exist, it will never go away but certain places such as the Basque region, Northern Ireland and Sri Lanka all prove that things can be done to improve the situation, to show the terrorists that talking produces better results. The West should learn from these if it ever wants to truly ‘defeat the Taliban’.

Malala Yousafzai's page in Time Magazine

North Korea Launches Rocket

The world condemned North Korea this morning after it successfully launched a rocket into orbit. This has terrified South Korea which shares a hostile border with its northern neighbour and Japan which is also in close proximity. Both nations are aware that North Korea has nuclear weapons and with this successful satellite launch, may have a means of delivery.

Under UN sanctions North Korea is banned from launching rockets, immediately Japan called on the Security Council to hold meetings over the event. Morocco, which holds the rotating presidency of the Security Council, announced that that there would be closed door discussions today. The US was swift in its condemnation of the launch, the White House made the following statement this morning: “The international community must work in a concerted fashion to send North Korea a clear message that its violations of UN Security Council resolutions have consequences.” We won’t know for a while what those consequences will be yet. It will be important to watch what China does in this situation, China is North Korea’s closest ally, and although it warned North Korea strongly against launching the rocket, its response has been noticeably tamer than those of the other Security Council members. China will likely be angry at North Korea for following this path; this launch will likely cause North Korea, Japan and the US to increase military cooperation in the area which could weaken China’s position. Getting a resolution past China, which has a veto, could still prove difficult.

This is all happening in the context of starving North Koreans who have been brainwashed to believe that the North Korean state, and in particular its leaders, are saints. The rare glimpse we get of North Korea from the outside world is truly shocking, people praise their leaders for their guidance but unbeknownst to them their leaders don’t care about them. With the knowledge of widespread brainwashing, the type Hitler tried in Germany; it’s hard to see a revolution occurring in North Korea for a long, long time. With that in mind the West, and in particular South Korea and Japan, must prepare for a world in which North Korea can wipe out whole cities in its neighbouring countries. Would the US placing nuclear weapons in South Korea or Japan be out of the question? North Korea may be less likely to use a nuclear weapon frivolously if it thinks Japan or South Korea could launch an immediate counter strike. Could we see a revival of the Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) Doctrine in North East Asia? It is early days yet, but the craziness of the North Korean regime should not be underestimated, the West’s reaction needs to be swift. Very swift.  

Leadership Change in China

In China, a once in a decade change of leadership is taking place. Today the Chinese Communist Party selected a new Central Committee; tomorrow it will reveal who will lead China for the next decade. The Chinese economy has expanded rapidly over the past ten years, its economy has increased over fivefold from $1.5 trillion in 2002 to $8.3 trillion this year! It has overtaken France, the UK, Germany and Japan to become the world’s second largest economy. Despite all this success, the future is far from certain. China has a terrible track record on human rights and democracy and the growing middle class there is getting increasingly upset at the lack of control over their government. The new Chinese leadership will have two options, introduce some reforms to appease the middle class or crush dissent lack they did in Tiananmen Square in 1989. The problem with the latter is that crushing dissent is harder to do in the internet era and could slow China’s rapid growth.

One of China’s major problems is the high level of corruption in government; the fact that the leaders’ families have become extremely wealthy does not sit well with the poor and middle class. In his address to the Communist Party last week, the outgoing leader, Hu Jintao, brought up the problem of corruption and said that the new Chinese leadership would need to tackle it. The issue of corruption was flung into the centre of Chinese politics earlier this year when Bo Xilai was accused of rampant corruption and his wife, Gu Kailai was convicted of murdering British businessman Neil Heywood.

Hu Jintao speaking to the Communist Party

Nobody really knows what the next decade holds for China, ask ten different ‘experts’ and you would end up with ten different answers. Some are predicting that growth will remain at its current stratospheric levels; some predict that it will begin to slow due to problems in its two main export markets, Europe and the USA. Others predict total economic and/or political collapse. One thing everyone agrees on: The next decade will be extremely important China. 

New World Order - China

China

Population: 1.3 billion

Area: 9.6 million km²

GDP: $11 trillion

GDP (per capita): $8,400

Economic Growth: 8.2%

Democracy? No

When it comes to developing nations, China is one of the first to come to mind. It is the world’s largest county in terms of population and the second largest in terms of GDP, set to overtake the USA within half a century. The rise of China worries the West more than the rise of the other nation, China is not a democracy and it doesn’t look like it will become one anytime soon. For the last two hundred years the top country has always been a democracy, first Britain and then the United States. In international affairs China could become top dog in the not-so-distant future.

China certainly wields the most influence of the countries I am reviewing; it is the only one with veto power on the UN Security Council and already has the second largest economy. One thing China is doing, that I would advise the West to pay close attention to, is investing in Africa. China has recognised that Africa has big potential, the continent is full of resources and it has a booming population.

China’s disadvantage is this; it’s not a democracy. China is the only one of the five rising nations that I’ve mentioned that isn’t a democracy, and doesn’t claim to be a democracy. The problem this poses for China is that the enlarging middle class will start to demand a say in government. Once this begins growth in China will slow and the country could descend into violence. Although it is unlikely that China will descend into violence any time soon, it will have to happen eventually. The citizens of China can see many fully functioning, wealthy democracies in the world and they will begin to ask; why not us?

Yet the rise of China is not so certain, recent growth figures show China’s economy is beginning to slow. The problem is a drop in demand from its largest export market – Europe and poor demand domestically. Although China’s slower growth rate would be the envy of any Western nation, if China is to continue to expand rapidly it must maintain its impressive growth figures.

A Chinese City - the high rise skyscrapers are typical in modern China

The New World Order

Between the Age of Discovery in the 15^th century and World War Two, European nations ruled the world, both directly and indirectly. The colonial Empires of Spain and Portugal dominating in the early years of Empire, but they were eventually leapfrogged by the French and British Empires, and to a lesser extent the Dutch Empire. Russia, Germany, Austria and Italy also played an important role, especially in the later years. By the time the 20^th century dawned the world was changing, Japan and the US were emerging powers and Germany was threatening the balance of power within Europe itself. The two World Wars that followed devastated Europe, both economically and politically, immediately after WWII the empires of France and Britain fell apart and the UK handed superpower status to the USSR and USA. Yet Europe was far from unimportant, the USSR was a European country after all, and Germany, France and Britain still commanded significant influence. But with the fall of the USSR in the early 1990s, for the first time in modern history, the most powerful and important nation was not a European one, rather the USA.

So I think I’ve made my point, countries rise and fall and everyone has to adapt to the new world order brought about every century or so. Although Europe is still far from unimportant, of the top 20 economies, nine are European and of the five countries with a veto on the UN Security Council, three are European.

The Question is where is the world heading? Who will be the new countries on the scene, which nations will challenge western power?

The truth is nobody really knows, but there are certainly contenders. Over the next few days I will write about countries I believe could take the mantle of power from the West. The big debate surrounds whether China will eventually best the USA or will another country be the one to overtake America?

The following are the countries I believe have a chance of besting the west:

1.       China – the favourite to become the next superpower

2.       India – A rising nation with a population set to become bigger than China

3.       Brazil – the big boy of the South American economies

4.       Mexico – the rising star that may not be if drug lords have their way

5.       Indonesia – the island nation could be a surprise winner

6.       Africa – as a continent it will not take power any time soon – but its day will surely come 

New World Order Countries in red

The Death Penalty - The Facts

Last year over 4,000 people were executed across the globe, many of these were executed for petty reasons and many will also be innocent.

The following map shows the extent of execution in our world, red indicates that the country retains the death penalty; orange indicates the country retains the death penalty but has not used it in over ten years. Green indicates that the country has abolished the death penalty except for exceptional circumstances (such as war) and blue indicates that a country has abolished the death penalty in all circumstances.

 This map gives an indication over where we’re at in the world. Europe has the best record on execution; Belarus is the only country in Europe that still executes prisoners. One of the reasons that Europe has such a good record on execution is that both the Council of Europe and the European Union require members to abolish the death penalty before they are admitted.  The Americas is another continent with a good record, the majority of countries have not used it in the past ten years. Only three countries still actively use the death penalty, the USA, St Kitts and Nevis and Cuba. Australasia has mostly abolished the death penalty, with only a few (very small) states still actively using it.

Asia is the worst offender when it comes to execution: of the 21 nations that performed executions (officially) in 2011, 15 of the states were Asian.  The top four states by number of people executed were also Asian.  China carries out more executions that all other nations combined, it is thought that in 2011 China executed up to 4,000 people. Although there have been moves in China to reduce the amount of crimes that result in execution. 

Bo Xilai Political Scandal

Neil Heywood's death has serious
consequences for China's leaders

The death of a British businessman, Neil Heywood is causing earthquakes in Chinese politics. Heywood was close to one of China’s most powerful men, Bo Xilai, a possible future leader of China. Until now. When Mr Heywood died in November last year, the cause of the death was given as alcohol poisoning. No autopsy was ever performed and his body was later cremated. Alarm bells started ringing when friends described him as “not a serious drinker”.

In the months that followed, a Chinese police chief fled to an American embassy claiming foul play in the Heywood case. Since this, Bo Xilai’s wife, Gu, has been arrested, strongly suspected of being involved in Mr Heywood’s murder.

The Heywood scandal combined with the upheaval of Wang Lijun incident have resulted in China’s greatest political scandal in over two decades. Xilai’s downfall comes just as a leadership change is about to occur, if it had not been for Xilai’s downfall he could well have been made leader. Xilai was viewed as the leader of the more extreme left of the Communist Party. With Xilai gone, the next leader will likely be a more pro-market communist. 

The West should pay close attention to what happens to China over the next few months, whoever replaces Hu Jintao as leader will have control over the emerging super power and can take the country forward or backwards.

Russia and China be Ashamed

With further killing in Homs today and yesterday the death toll keeps rising. The disgraceful behaviour of the Assad regime show that they are losing control and that the country will soon descend into chaos. The UN could have done something, but Russia and Chinas' Vetoes have paralysed the UN. Assad now feels invincible, with outside intervention seeming impossible and good relations with two major powers it's easy to see why.

Reports coming out of Homs, from trustworthy sources such as the BBC, have told us that rockets have been fired at Homs. This is the first time that the Syrian regime has done so which highlights its increasing desperation. It was horrible to watch people burying a child at night without ceremony or even prayers as it is too dangerous. The area of Baba Amr has been the worst hit area and local residents fear a ground assault is imminent. They are scared, the veto at the UN makes them feel like they have no friends and that there will be nothing to stop the brutality of the Syrian Army when they arrive.

So what can be done? There have been talks between the French and the British over a possible "Friends of Syria" alliance of the Arab League plus, France, the UK and a few other western nations. The problem with this is that it would have no real power, as to do anything they'd have to take it to the UN Security Council were China and Russia would likely veto any attempts. The tightening of sanctions on Syria will not do much to help the civilians and any attempt to sell arms to the rebels is blocked by the EU arms embargo. So, for now, the outside world is paralysed and nobody really knows what to do.

China and Russia cite the reason for wielding their vetoes is that it would cause civil war... This makes little sense as the reality is that Syria is already in Civil War, except one side is very poorly equipped. China and Russia also claim that Assad going would cause instability, this is quite the opposite as the protests would die down (although probably only temporarily) if he were to give up power.  They also point to Libya as being an example of "failure" despite being a resounding success on all fronts, maybe they intended to point to Egypt? It's also important to point out the importance of Syria to Russia, the two countries have been long standing allies and Syria buys many of their weapons from Russia, Russia also has a military base in Syria which it probably wants to maintain. Coincidence? I don't think so.

Regardless of their reasons, Russia and China have the blood of innocent civilians on their hands. Including children.

Nuclear Weapons

Since 1945, when America destroyed two Japanese cities, nuclear weapons have been central to negotiations between west and east. When the Cold War ended in the early 1990s, helped by the breakup of the USSR and Warsaw Pact, the amount of nuclear warheads has subsequently decreased significantly. To understand the place of nuclear weapons in the modern world we need to know which countries have nuclear weapons and which countries want them.

The five permanent UN Security Council members have their own weapons which they control independently (China, France, Russia, UK, USA) and are members of the NPT (Non-Proliferation Treaty). Non-NPT members who have declared that they have weapons are India, Pakistan and North Korea. Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy and Turkey have a nuclear sharing programme organised through NATO. Israel is known to have nuclear weapons, but refuses to declare this. There is strong evidence that Iran is attempting to get nuclear weapons but she denies this.

There have always been campaigns against nuclear weapons, especially in the west through CND and other anti-Nuclear organisations. The reason why the west has nuclear weapons is as a deterrent against aggressive regimes such as Iran and North Korea. I believe that all the signatories of the NPT and the non-signatories Pakistan and India would not fire weapons at a country, provoked or un-provoked. I cannot say the same for Iran and North Korea, they are rogue nations which appear to want to destroy other countries without thought for the consequences. Iran is particularly dangerous as it has promised that if Iran gets nuclear weapons it will obliterate Israel. Also, due to the religious beliefs of many Iranians, they may not mind if firing nuclear weapons at Israel results in the death of half their population after a retaliatory attack. This is very dangerous for our world and the NWS (Nuclear Weapon States) must keep their weapons as a deterrent against Iran and North Korea. Not only do nuclear weapons dissuade other countries from firing or getting them, it also dissuades them from attacking or invading other countries unprovoked and because of this nuclear warheads can be said to be helping to maintain world peace.

I believe that no nation should have nuclear warheads but in an imperfect world, the west would not be safe without them.

Light blue - NWS & NPT
Dark blue - Nuclear sharing (NATO)
Red - Declared NWS non-NPT
Black - suspected of attempting to get weapons
Yellow - Got weapons but does not declare
Green - ex-nuclear weapon states