The US has been doing the heavy lifting. Now EU is waking up.
At the EU summit at the end of March, a reorientation of industrial policy should be discussed, especially with regard to China. "Five years ago, the Member States were still divided and naive in relation to China," says Clément Beaune, European Adviser to French President Emmanuel Macron , "now is the time of naivety over."
ELMAT: The Chinese have been trying to drive an edge between US and the EU. Once both act decidedly the Chinese will discover they are up to a force they cannot win.
With a new strategy, the EU wants to hold its own against the great power of China
The hope for a change of the People's Republic to a free market economy has been shattered. The former partner becomes a rival for the EU states.
Ruth Berschens Moritz Koch Dana Heath Till Hoppe
25.02.2019 - 18:59 Comment
Berlin, Brussels Angela Merkel has discovered the topic of industrial policy . She requested in Brussels that EU leaders "hold a discussion on the industrial location of Europe," said the Chancellor recently.
At the EU summit at the end of March, a reorientation of industrial policy should be discussed, especially with regard to China. "Five years ago, the Member States were still divided and naive in relation to China," says Clément Beaune, European Adviser to French President Emmanuel Macron , "now is the time of naivety over."
The German economy also hopes that "it is very important for Europe to have something like an industrial strategy," emphasizes Allianz CEO Oliver Bäte in an interview with Handelsblatt . So far, Europe is acting "somewhat naïve" on this issue.
Other CEOs are worried that Europe may lose touch. "If the EU does not act together in a strategic way, Europe will be deposed," warned German bank chief Christian Sewing. The dependencies solidified, "one must come soon to results," warns Telekom boss Timotheus Höttges.
Politics has heard the wake up call of the economy. France and Germany set pace in EU competition law, Europe wants to find a common China strategy .
Because the future is at the other end of the world. Just as the twentieth century was an Atlantic one, shaped by US-Europe relations, the 21st century will be Pacific, with the US and China as key players. That is why Europeans are forced to reconsider the assumptions of their foreign policy.
Europe has been doing so for a long time. It was believed that democracy and the market economy would gradually spread all over the world and be yesterday's geopolitics. But now the Europeans realize that they were wrong. The present resembles a past believed past.
The "architecture of the world" has come under pressure through a "rivalry between great powers", Merkel said at the Munich Security Conference. From the dream of the end of history: Europe begins to face the transformation of world political reality.
China, the new great power in the Far East, is beginning to frighten the Europeans. Merkel formulated it in her Munich speech as follows: "We will be so diligent, no matter how great, nor be so great - with 80 million inhabitants, we will not come against it, if China decides that you have no good relations with Germany want."
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The days when China was above all a profitable sales market and supplier of cheap goods for the Europeans are over. Meanwhile, the People's Republic has become both economically and politically a serious competitor. It is becoming increasingly clear in European capitals that the EU must represent its interests vis-à-vis China more effectively than before - and together.
Germany and France are moving forward. Both have insisted on putting China on the agenda of the European Council in late March, Beaune said. For the first time ever, EU leaders would define a common "strategy towards China". Such a solidarity with the People's Republic has never been. It is true that Europe has been celebrating an EU-China summit every year for 20 years.
But the major EU states maintained their relations with China, especially on a bilateral level: German Chancellors and French presidents traveled to Beijing with a large delegation of business leaders to get the best jobs for their country.
The political turnaround in Sino-European relations is based on disillusioning experiences. The hope of the Europeans that the political system is liberalizing with the growing prosperity in China has not been fulfilled. At the same time, Europeans had to experience that China uses its economic engagement in the EU for political influence.
Example Greece: At the height of the euro debt crisis in 2009, Chinese investors took over the port of Piraeus. Six years later, Greece vetoed the EU by denouncing human rights violations in China and supporting a UN Declaration. The government in Beijing is behind it, according to Brussels.
Example New Silk Road: Within the framework of its gigantic infrastructure project, China is trying to bind 16 Eastern European states economically and politically. Each year, China's prime minister meets with Eastern European countries for a 16 plus one summit. EU countries such as Hungary, the Czech Republic and Bulgaria are also present. China gives them generous credit - for example for the construction of a super fast train between Budapest and Belgrade.
Chinese companies are building rail tracks with Chinese workers. EU rules on public procurement were ignored, prompting the EU's competition authority. The fact that China later transforms its investments in infrastructure projects into political influence has alarmed the governments in Berlin and Paris.
It was a mistake to sell the port of Athens or even a quarter of the Portuguese power grid to Chinese companies during the euro debt crisis, a high-ranking EU diplomat admits. The EU now wants to review investments by third countries in terms of security policy. This "investment screening" has just been approved by the European Parliament by an overwhelming majority. France wanted to make it even worse.
"China's attitude to Europe is ambivalent," says Volker Perthes, director of the Berlin Foundation for Science and Politics. "On the one hand, Beijing likes to present itself as a friend and supporter of European integration. This is correct in that it values ??and wants to preserve the EU as an economic partner with a strong single market and a stable common currency. However, a politically united Europe is not in the Chinese interest. "
Orientation debate plannedThat is why the new strategy for dealing with China in Brussels should become a top priority. In the coming weeks, the 28 EU Commissioners will first discuss the issue in an orientation debate, then the Foreign Ministers of the EU member states, and at their summit on 21 and 22 March, the heads of state and government. Europe can not continue as it has done so far, says a senior EU official.
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However, it should not rely on curbing China, as the US government is currently trying. Experts think this is correct: "Europe must be careful not to be crushed between the two power blocs USA and China," says Frank Pieke, head of the Berlin China think tank Merics. From an EU point of view, there are policies in which China is a partner with which Europe can cooperate.
Climate protection, for example. "But we see in China as a communist one-party system also a systemic rival, here we must draw on some issues clear red lines," said an EU representative. "What we need is much more realism and a sober defense of EU interests." The previous strategy of dialogue has not produced the desired results. The speeches of the Chinese sound good, it says in Brussels, but it does not follow.
The significance that the German government attaches to a European policy on China is also apparent elsewhere: According to diplomats, Berlin wants to hold a summit during the German EU Council Presidency in the second half of 2020, during which President Xi Jinping will address the heads of government of the 27 EU member states for the first time to meet. So far, Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker and Council President Donald Tusk have represented the Union at the EU-China Summits.
Even the German economy, which has established close relations with China, is increasingly critical of the great power in the Far East. From the idea that China is developing into a free market economy, the companies have now adopted. They are now banking on the political commitment of Germany and the EU in the fight for open markets.
Hubert Lienhard, outgoing head of the Asia-Pacific Committee of the German Economy (APA) , welcomed in an interview with the Handelsblatt the initiative of Minister of Economics Peter Altmaier for an industrial policy strategy, but warns: "If we say that we are in the competition of systems, On the one hand, a free market economy and, on the other hand, a controlled market economy in China, it is important to find the right balance with us and not to stifle companies with too much regulation. "
At the beginning of the month, Altmaier had presented his "National Industrial Strategy 2030". In it, he calls for a better framework for companies, a reform of competition law to facilitate the formation of "European champions" - a demand that had also set up the BDI in a position paper in early January.
On Tuesday, Lienhard passes the APA's presidency to Joe Kaeser . The Siemens boss is considered more China-friendly, he once called the project of the "New Silk Road" a "new WTO". Meanwhile, even Kaeser has moved away from his euphoric attitude to the initiative.
The new severity of the German economy is also reflected in the debate over the involvement of Chinese network equipment suppliers Huawei and ZTE in the development of the new 5G mobile communications standard. "There is no question that at 5G we have a network of data and physical infrastructure that has never existed before," warns Lienhard. "If someone can extract data there, then that would be absolutely critical for the German economy." He pleads for excluding Huawei in the doubt of the 5G-development.
China's leadership has recognized that Europe is taking a new course. In Berlin government circles is talk of a charm offensive of the Chinese. Beijing is worried that Germany is too heavily on the side of Washington in the trade dispute. When Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier visited China in December, China's President Xi Jinping campaigned for Europe's neutrality.
The Europeans need a concept for the Pacific Century, that's for sure. Also, because the conflict between China and the US otherwise moved into the EU. "Europe will be one of the poles of the multipolar international system or itself polarized," warns political scientist Perthes. |
