World needs to tackle problems amid process of economic globalization
By Zhong Sheng
“Economic
confrontations” and “domestic political polarization” are considered the top
risks this year by the Global Risks Report 2020
recently issued by the World Economic Forum (WEF). The
report holds that 2020 is going to be a year that sees severer polarization and
slower economic growth.
This
once again reminds the world of the risks of economic polarization and
confrontation, even though the global economy has entered in-depth integrated
development. Therefore, the world sees an urgent need to make practical
solutions to solve the issues happening in the process of economic
globalization.
Instabilities
and uncertainties have haunted the world in recent years, and the insufficient
inclusiveness of economic development to a large extent facilitated the happening
of "black swans", as a result of which the
benefits of economic globalization are hardly able to be shared by all
countries, classes and groups.
Economic
globalization was once hailed as the "power of nature", as people
believed to reject it is to reject the sunrise. However, economic globalization
is seeing a countercurrent in today's world where many have started discussing
how to reverse the process.
Hence, to have an objective understanding of economic globalization
comes before everything. This economic process is neither Ali Baba's cave nor
Pandora's box. The world is bothered by a number of problems, so it's not right
to put all the blame on economic globalization.
At the WEF held in Davos, Switzerland 3 years ago, Chinese President
Xi Jinping shared his views on how the world can have a dialectical
understanding of economic globalization and how it should tackle the problems
in a targeted manner, dismissing the clouds that shadowed the world economy.
"It is true that economic globalization has
created new problems, but this is no justification to write economic
globalization off completely. Rather, we should adapt to and guide economic
globalization, cushion its negative impact and deliver its benefits to all
countries and all nations," said the Chinese President.
Problems are acceptable, but the fear of
facing them and the incapability of finding solutions are not. To tackle the
problems during economic globalization, the primary task is to make the cake of
global development bigger. When global economy is facing downward pressure,
it's not easy to expand the cake, and it might even shrink. Therefore
contradictions would appear sharper, and both developing and developed
countries are expected to shoulder pressure and impacts.
Faced with contradictions and problems, global countries should adopt
an opener mind and make joint efforts to enhance global governance, expand
global market, better share the benefits with each other and revitalize global
cooperation. Only by doing so, can economic globalization enjoy stronger
dynamics, and can development dividend benefit more countries and regions.
To tackle the problems during economic
globalization, how to slice the cake of development is also important. Many
countries, especially certain developed ones, are seeing severe class rigidity
and widening wealth gap, which generates serious domestic issues. However, this
is caused by their domestic governance, rather than economic globalization. To
blame other countries for domestic governance failure and turn to isolation out
of the so-called fear for economic globalization will only lead to a dead end. Only
by constant reforms that are able to solve the contradictions between growth
and distribution, capital and labor, and efficiency and equality, can a
workable path be found.
While WTO members enjoyed an average export increase of 14 percent
between 1980 and 2016, the wealth and exports of non-members were on a fall,
according to statistics released by Germany's Bertelsmann Foundation. Such
comparison proves that to integrate into and promote economic globalization is
a right choice that conforms to the needs of each country to develop and the
interests of the people.
Speaking of the prospects of economic globalization, former WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy noted that he
still believes there's a long way ahead for globalization, and its negative
impacts can be eliminated, and dividends can be shared.
He took China as an example, saying the country benefited from
globalization and contributed to it at the same time. The secret for China is
that it upholds a people-centered development concept while expanding
opening-up and embracing globalization and its development achievements are shared
by all Chinese people.
International observers took President Xi's speech at the WEF as a
"Chinese declaration" that defends economic globalization and leads
the world economy to walk out of shadow. They also drew inspiration from the
initiative proposed in the same year by Klaus Schwab, founder of
the WEF who said that "We need a new narrative for
globalization".
Chinese ideas and actions aim at joining hands with global partners to
write new narratives of economic globalization. As more such narratives are
created, the new type of economic globalization will be made more open,
inclusive, balanced and beneficial to all. These narratives will also help
build an open world economy, promote global peace and stability, and achieve
common development and prosperity.
(Zhong Sheng is a pen name often used by People's Daily to express its
views on foreign policy.)
World needs to tackle problems amid process of economic globalization
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