Putting Europe Last?

For all the criticism that the policy paper was lacking strategy, its critics themselves also failed to address the deeper strategic issues that had prompted them to request the paper the previous year. Perhaps this is not surprising in light of the deep-seated political reflexes in parliament and the then mounting concerns concerning Xinjiang and Hong Kong. But it does reflect a serious failure and a precious opportunity missed. A failure, firstly, by the government to produce a strategy that could satisfy parliament. But also, far more significantly, a failure by the legislature to initiate a much-needed debate on the strategic choices that will be critical for guaranteeing the competitiveness and future prosperity of the Netherlands.

Instead of doubling down on old policies that have previously proved not just to be ineffective, but often also counterproductive, the question that should have been at the heart of the debate, as several colleagues have pointed out, is how to “prepare for China’s superpower status and leading position in science, technology, the economy, and geostrategy.”

Putting Europe Last

This critique may be taken to a further level. If there is consensus that multilateralism and concerted EU action are indispensable for a pertinent national response to the threats arising from China’s global ascendance, then the EU is where any strategic discussion should begin and end. Seen from this standpoint, it is difficult to understand why the government should have chosen to forgo the AIV report and willingly remove a discussion on policy feasibility and effectiveness from the orbit of public debate. True, the cabinet did make an official response to the AIV report in September, but this could hardly be considered a real attempt to do justice to the wide-ranging and potentially far-reaching advice of the AIV. Illustrative of the perfunctory handling of the report is that during a subsequent roundtable discussion in parliament, the president of the committee for foreign affairs neglectfully mistook the advice for a response paper to the policy document.

At least two fundamental questions should be at the heart of a national discussion on China strategy. The first is: what are the implications of such a national paper for the consistency and effectiveness of EU policy on China? The idea that the Netherlands should simply proceed alone or mobilize “leading groups” with “like-minded partners” in areas where other member states express reservations, to give one example, may be tempting and seemingly effective on the short-run. But the long-term impact on EU cohesion of such cherry-picking should not be ignored, as will be shown below. European politicians and observers are often quick to criticize China for its alleged “pick and choose” diplomacy and divide-and-rule tactics, but tend to gloss over the fact that it are the actions and inactions of member states that sustain and deepen the existing fault lines between regional groupings within the EU. The rows that erupted during the 2009 eurozone crisis over the Greek “bailout” and austerity measures and, recently, over the EU’s Covid-19 response and “coronabonds,” are poignant reminders of how deep north-south, east-west, and creditor-debtor divisions run across the union.

There is thus a compelling case to be made that championing “like-mindedness” is not conducive to the long-term interests of those states that use the term. The term smacks of ideology, and is more likely to reinforce existing divides than overcome them. Assigning oneself to a morally or otherwise superior “leading group” may strike other member states as self-righteous and offensive, and has the potential of further eroding EU cohesion. More importantly, narrowing one’s focus to like-minded partners suggests an inward-looking and, indeed, narrow-minded response that cannot provide any solution to global problems. Agreeing with one’s peers, after all, is not the main point. The real challenge in today’s world – be it over WTO reform, human rights, climate change or global health – is how to engage effectively with countries beyond one’s preferred groupings so as to secure sufficient critical mass for effective change. This leads to the second fundamental question: how can a national strategy contribute to the goal of building sufficiently large coalitions of (like-interested) partners, both within and outside the EU?

Recent examples are illustrative of how European disunity and improvidence are hastening a handover of global leadership to China. In July 2019, UN ambassadors of 22 Western countries, including 15 EU members, signed a joint statement urging China to end human rights violations against Muslims in Xinjiang. While the sponsors may have commended themselves for achieving this unprecedented joint action, it may be more illuminating for present purposes to look at the result from the outside in, and assess it in terms of what it was not. For one, it was not a sign of EU solidarity, given that almost half of the total membership refused to sign (in previous instances in 2016 and 2017 as many as 21 member states had rejected joint action). Second, it was not an example of rank-breaking among those countries outside the EU, be it developing or developed states, that tend to side with China on sensitive international issues. On the contrary, Beijing was able to muster 37 UN member states for a counter-statement in support of its policies in Xinjiang, thereby highlighting the mounting international isolation of the small group of advanced Western countries and stepping up its own leadership role in the rest of the world. Lastly, the verbal rebuke was not backed by any concrete action, for example, of the type that the US took by imposing visa restrictions on Chinese officials and adopting legislation that enabling further sanctions.

This is not to argue that the EU and the member states should not at times make a stand. But without a solid strategic approach and firm action, being more “vocal” serves no real purpose other than self-deception, and ultimately self-defeat. Instead, the EU should pick its battles more strategically, expand areas where it can present a (near) united front and commit beyond mere words, and engage perceptively and realistically with other groupings, including those developing nations united in the Group of 77, so as to encourage them to reconsider their default pro-China positions.

This requires more than “raising awareness” or “explaining” European views and values in other places of the world; what is needed is a preparedness both on the part of the EU and the member states to compromise and adapt. Without the support of developing countries and non-like-minded states, as the AIV also observes, not only will change be virtually impossible, but European criticisms will easily be construed as neocolonial expressions of the type of “the West against the rest.”

New Times, Old Questions

Can democracies act strategically? Do democratic processes produce effective foreign policies? These are old dilemmas, debated over the past centuries by such great thinkers as Locke and De Tocqueville, and still waiting to be resolved. In theory, there is no reason why democratic participation must forestall effective policy-making, even if voters are poorly informed. In practice, however, the picture is more complicated. The Dutch China paper serves as a case in point. Despite constitutionally-mandated deliberations being conducted by the book between government and parliament, resulting in the legislative power correcting the executive on several points, much of the debate was completely beside the point. With government eschewing the really hard questions, parliamentarians were quick to resort to their familiar repertoire of easy-to-score political points and demands for doubling down on policies that have previously proven ineffective, divisive, and self-damaging.

The potential added value of a national policy paper on China is that it may improve a member state’s contribution to the EU decision-making process – and therefore its outcomes – both in practical terms (such as information sharing, agenda-setting, proposals) and by infusing it with democratic legitimacy. After all, EU policies can only be effective if there is a minimal degree of acceptance in the member states. This requires public awareness and debate in the individual member states, which is exactly what a national policy paper can help to raise.

But all this, of course, requires that national politicians genuinely and intelligently consider prevailing realities in Europe and the world, and that they dare to confront the vital questions even where these are unpopular with their constituencies, such as those involving the EU’s powers and the inevitability of compromise in global politics. EU policy-making is not usually praised for its strong democratic basis. If member states provide ineffective input into an undemocratic system, chances are that the output will be faulty on multiple counts.

This may all sound overly harsh and pessimistic. Perhaps it is. But the importance of the argument can hardly be overstated. If Europe is to become more realistic and strategic in its relations with China, and secure a better balance, as it has set out to achieve, this will require more thoughtful approaches from national parliamentarians and policy makers. As I and others have argued elsewhere, the starting point of an effective and realistic EU strategy for China does not lie in seeking change in Beijing or Brussels, but in domestic politicians – in the executive and the legislature – facing up to the challenges.

While China’s ongoing rise lays bare Europe’s vulnerabilities, these weaknesses are not of China’s making. They are the result of inherent flaws and discordant incentives that expose the EU and its members to a range of “threats.” Rather than conceiving China’s current engagement with the world as an anomalous threat that that simply requires a China paper or a more “vocal” attitude toward Beijing, policymakers in Europe should treat it as a wake-up call for candid reflection on Europe’s changed place and needs in an altered geostrategic environment.

What is needed is not a new strategy on China, but a deeper shift in strategic thinking that can inform a viable, long-term strategy that will help Europe to operate and prosper in an environment in which its influence is constrained and contested and in which it finds itself defending a set of values that are in the minority internationally and under serious challenge even from within. To acknowledge this is a sign of lucidity, not of weakness, and of a genuine, not merely professed, strategic awakening. To ignore it is to eschew strategy and endanger self-survival.

In 1795, the Dutch emissaries Isaac Titsingh and Andreas van Braam Houckgeest were the last Western envoys ever to kowtow at the Chinese court – thereby upsetting the other European powers, who had denounced the submissive practice two years earlier following Earl Macartney’s famous precedent. If we are to avoid a pendulum swing back to those bygone days and practices, our national politicians must dare to face the uneasy truths and hard questions. This alone can inform a truly strategic, forward-looking approach.