Wednesday, July 6, 2022

US seeks China's help to ease inflation in latest interaction

The US looks at reducing China tariffs amid soaring inflation in the country

US and China Discuss Trump-Era Tariffs Biden May Ease

Yang Jiechi (center), a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and director of the Office of the Central Leading Group for Foreign Affairs, criticizes human rights issues in the US at the opening session of US-China talks in Anchorage, Alaska on March 18, 2021. Photo: AFP

The US is seeking help from China to ease its economic pressure, hinting that it may ease tariffs on Chinese goods and engage in dialogue with senior Chinese officials more often. However, analysts said Beijing will approach Washington's overtures with caution, as it is still trying to use the tariffs as bargaining chips rather than sincerely correcting its mistakes that have harmed both sides.

Chinese Vice Premier Liu He, a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chief of the Chinese side of the China-US comprehensive economic dialogue, held a conversation via video link with US Secretary of Treasury Janet Yellen at the latter's request on Tuesday morning, according to the Xinhua News Agency.

As agreed by China and the US, Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi will meet with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken during the meeting of G20 foreign ministers, Chinese Foreign Ministry announced on Tuesday. In June, the defense chiefs of both sides met in Singapore on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue, and Yang Jiechi, member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and director of the Office of the Central Commission for Foreign Affairs, met with US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan in Luxembourg.

Such frequent communications between senior officials of the two sides show that China and the US are making efforts to manage the differences and competition to prevent escalation caused by miscalculations, while at the same time, the US is trying to seek China's help to ease the serious inflation the US is being confronted with, analysts said.

Chinese analysts said on Tuesday that although its economy is in disarray, the US is still being provocative in geopolitical issues to contain China. This means the US should not expect China to provide significant support for it to solve its domestic problems. The US tariffs have turned out to have a limited impact on the Chinese economy, and these are just part of the mistakes that the US must correct to bring bilateral ties back on track.

Heavy pressure

During the Liu-Yellen conversation on Tuesday, the two sides had a pragmatic and candid exchange of views on such topics as the macroeconomic situation and the stability of global industrial and supply chains. Their exchanges were constructive, the Xinhua reported on Tuesday.

The two sides agreed that as the world economy is facing severe challenges, it is of great significance to strengthen macro-policy communication and coordination between China and the US. Jointly maintaining the stability of global industrial and supply chains is in the interests of both countries and the whole world. The Chinese side expressed its concern about issues including the lifting of additional tariffs on China and sanctions by the US side, and fair treatment of Chinese enterprises, the Xinhua reported.

Lü Xiang, a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times on Tuesday that the US has been forced to engage with China because of its dreadful domestic economic situation.

"Joe Biden now is having a big headache as his approval rating is even lower than his predecessor Donald Trump at the same stage of presidency, which is a great humiliation. The pressure to win the midterms is heavy and serious, so he must find solutions to at least make some changes," Lü said.

Biden's approval rating was 39 percent as of June 30, according to an analysis by poll tracker FiveThirtyEight, while 56.2 percent of Americans disapproved of the way the president is handling his job, according to the Newsweek.

Trump's approval rating on July 1, 2018 was 41.8 percent, while 52.3 percent of Americans disapproved of him, figures from FiveThirtyEight show.

In 2018, Republicans suffered a major defeat in the midterm elections and lost 40 seats in the House of Representatives, handing control to the Democrats and allowing Nancy Pelosi to return as speaker.

Experts said the main factor that could influence the midterms later this year is the economy, so if the Biden administration cannot deliver some positive changes to ease inflation and gas prices and stop the economic decline, the Democrats are likely to repeat the failure of the Republicans in 2018.

Far from easing tension

According to Bloomberg on Tuesday, Biden may announce as soon as this week a rollback of some US tariffs on Chinese consumer goods - as well as a new probe into industrial subsidies that could lead to more duties in strategic areas like technology.

Although decreasing tariffs on Chinese goods has become an option for the US to solve some of its economic problems, it is still not clear what measures the US government will take next, experts said.

According to one estimate by the New York Federal Reserve, US tariffs imposed on Chinese goods through the middle of 2019 cost the American household an average of $831 per year.

"Decreasing tariffs on Chinese goods is a way to decrease inflation without the danger of hurting economic growth, but the US is not sure about the extent to which the tariff cuts would be effective in controlling price hikes. Therefore, the US government is still worrying about gains and losses and can't make up its mind," Gao Lingyun, a trade specialist with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing, told the Global Times on Tuesday.

Bai Ming, deputy director of the international market research institute at the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, told the Global Times on Tuesday that "under the US' general strategy of containing China's rise, which is unlikely to change in the short term, the US might adjust some of the punitive tariffs on Chinese consumer goods, but at the same time intensify pressure on China, such as increasing sanctions on Chinese tech firms."

Lü said that judging from the US' failed COVID-19 pandemic response, Afghanistan withdrawal, inflation and the Ukraine crisis, we found "the US system of command is problematic, and the coordination between White House staff and cabinet officials is desperately wanting. Therefore, in the future, we have to be prepared for many uncertainties and even some overnight contingencies." He added that it is caused by the problematic decision-making system of the US side.

What should China do?

Gao said that China should insist on an reciprocal tariff policy with the US, meaning cutting the same amount of tariffs on US goods if the US reduces tariffs on Chinese products. China should also insist that tariff reductions should bring benefits to both countries, he said.

Bai noted that China should stick to its dual circulation policy, especially focusing on internal circulation so external policies would not affect China's economy to a great extent.

Chen Jia, a research fellow at the International Monetary Institute of the Renmin University of China, said that market data show that the US economy is deeply bogged down in stagflation, while recessionary risks are increasing, which means the US is still far from reaching a turning point to stop its economic situation from worsening.

On the other hand, the US is not making even small concessions in global strategies, rather it is showing an inclination to toughen the strategic encirclement of China, such as the recent Partnership for Global Infrastructure to target the China-proposed Belt and Road Initiative.

"If the US is willing to seize the opportunity to restart China-US high-level communication on the basis of economic cooperation, and move to repair the damage it has caused in the past, China would of course welcome and support those moves. But if the US continues to treat its global partners arrogantly, then it won't get any help from developing countries including China," Chen told the Global Times.

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Monday, July 4, 2022

Whither the international rules-based order?

US’ so-called rule-based order means international gangsterism

The United States’ so-called rule-based order is gangsterism while its sanctions on other countries are illegal, a renowned Canadian lawyer has said a recent interview. Christopher Black, a veteran Canadian lawyer who has been involved in a number of high-profile cases, including defending former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, strongly condemned actions from the U.S. and the U.S.-led North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which have repeatedly accused other countries of destroying postwar international orders, portraying themselves defenders of international order. The lawyer believes that U.S. sanctions on other countries are illegal and are a ploy to defend its economic wars against other countries.

China's challenge to the rules-based order

Top priority: The moral principle that we all should live peacefully on one planet should over-ride sovereign nations fighting over power and ego from turf to space, when humanity could be burned by climate warming or nuclear war. — AFP

EVERYDAY, we are told we must defend the rules-based order. But whose order? What rules? Why should we defend an order if we did not have a say in shaping?

All this is in the realm of politics and geo-politics. The biggest thinker who shaped the current neoliberal order was Austrian philosopher Friedrich Hayek (1899-1992), whose ideas of classical liberalism of freedom, democracy and self-order of markets dominated global relations.

Neoliberalism was put into practice in the 1980s, when US President Ronald Reagan and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher pushed through the free market philosophy that swept away Keynesian state intervention of the 1950-1970s.

The deeper thinker on the whole question of constitutional law, politics and international order was German jurist Carl Schmitt (1888-1985), whose influence on conservative political circles in almost all the Big Powers has been growing.

I only became aware of Schmitt’s work when Noema magazine wrote an editorial on Schmitt’s Nomos of the Earth (1950).

Schmitt is controversial, because he essentially wrote the legal basis for Nazism in the 1920s, which accounts for his ostracisation (in today’s language “cancelled”) from academic circles for decades.

Main priority: A demonstration calling on the German government not to intervene in the ongoing conflict in the Ukraine, in Berlin. The moral principle that we all should live peacefully on one planet should over-ride sovereign nations fighting over power and ego from turf to space, when humanity could be burned by climate warming or nuclear war. — AFP

Schmitt was a brutally realist thinker who explored the legal foundations of European political theory. Schmitt argues that no order can function without a sovereign authority. A state is legally constituted when the politics distinguishes between friend and enemy and when the citizens are willing to fight and die for its identity. The state alone is given the power of violence (and enforcement) by the citizens to enforce the law.

Schmitt is considered an authoritarian supporter, because he saw sovereign power resting ultimately in the Executive (rather than the Legislature or Judiciary) because the sovereign (i.e. the President) decides on the exceptional situation, where he/she must suspend the law because of war or assume emergency powers in order to restore order.

Decisions by the Executive are either bound by law or bounded by his or her moral bearings.

The world is today watching on TV whether former President Trump is morally culpable for causing the Jan 6, 2021 riots, or legally culpable.

The Ukraine war is being supported by the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation or Nato on a matter of moral principle for a non-member, but if the war escalates to nuclear global destruction that kills all, how do we trade off the individual rights with the collective right of everyone else to survive?

Schmitt dissected the European constitutional laws and international order, dividing them into three phases: pre-1500, 1648 to 1919 (World War I) and thereafter.

Before the discovery of America, European powers fought each other under a religious cloak, since the Pope decided on disputes of rights on moral grounds.

Indeed, it was the Papal Bulls of 1455 and 1493 that authorised the Portuguese and Spaniards to conquer all lands and seize and enslave Saracens and non-Christians in the Americas, Africa and Asia.

The religious rationales comprised the Domination Code whereby Christians can rule over non-Christians and possess their property, as well as the Discovery Code, whereby land owned by non-believers are treated as terra nullius (empty land), meaning non-Christian indigenous peoples do not have rights.

But when the Dutch and English started fighting with the Portuguese and Spaniards over overseas territories, what was the legal justification?

Dutch jurist Grotius (1583-1645) provided the secular rationalisation that discovery alone is not enough, but since there was freedom in the seas, occupation by a sovereign state confirms rights seized through war.

Schmitt argued that Jus Publicum Europaeum (European Public Law) emerged after the 1648 Treaty of Westphalia to allow sovereign countries to have the right to go to war based on their own judgement of justice and necessity without interference in each other’s domestic affairs.

This changed after the end of the First World War, when the 1919 Treaty of Versailles treated the losing side as criminals, with their rights cancelled or confiscated.

While the Europeans were busily fighting each other, the United States rose in global power and imposed its 1823 Monroe Doctrine that asserted that it has its own sphere of influence, with the right to intervene in Central and South American states.

That sphere of influence would spatially cover cultural, economic, military, political and today technology exclusivity beyond legal sovereign borders.

Schmitt was prescient in seeing that where war is fought on the basis of “good versus evil”, in which all rights of the other side are “cancelled” (like the foreign exchange assets of Afghanistan and Russia are frozen or seized), the situation may be an unstable equilibrium.

The unstable European security architecture was settled decisively by the United States in two World Wars because of her overwhelming military, economic and industrial power.

But in today’s multipolar situation, who decides on the rules of the international order? If both sides accuse the other side as evil and illegitimate, who decides other than the use of arms?

To cut a complex story short, the Nato military alliance, comprising nearly one billion people and 47.3% of the world’s gross domestic product or GDP (2020) assumes its status quo role as the final arbiter of the “rules-based order”.

The problem is that BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), plus Indonesia have 3.5 billion population with one quarter of world GDP in market terms (25.6%).

However, on GDP PPP terms, they are near parity with Nato and therefore may have their own views on the international order. What if the larger non-Western countries want their own version of the Monroe Doctrine?

The moral principle that we all should live peacefully on one planet should over-ride sovereign nations fighting over power and ego from turf to space, when humanity could be burned by climate warming or nuclear war.

For Nomos (or order) of the Planet, rather than the Earth, we should all rationally cooperate. If we truly believe in democracy, can the eight billion people in the world vote on the rules-based order, or do we still leave it to G-7?

No order is stable without true legitimacy on democratic principles. How to achieve that order remains a truly open question.

Andrew Sheng writes on global issues from an Asian perspective. The views expressed here are the writer’s own.

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Saturday, July 2, 2022

A matter of Cost: Stretching their ringgit further

Janet Chia, 48, watering the lettuce plants at her house compound in Seri Kembangan, Selangor. Chia and her husband have planted several vegetables in their garden for their own consumption.

Rise in prices pushes Ipoh folk to think of alternative ways to live within means

The hike in prices of essential items such as chicken, eggs, flour and vegetables has compelled ordinary folk in Perak to plant their own greens and herbs. Some are trimming their grocery bill or dining out less frequently by cooking simpler meals at home to better manage their household expenses. LIKE the rest of the nation, consumers in Ipoh, Perak, are feeling the pinch from the rise in the prices of goods, especially essential items.

The increase in prices is taking a toll on the people, leaving those in the low and middle-income groups struggling to cope.

Retiree Joginder Kaur Jessy, 67, said she had started to grow some vegetables in her house compound to help cut cost of buying greens.

She said eating out had always been expensive but cooking at home was no longer cheap either.

Expressing dismay at the rise in the prices of oil, vegetables, fish, chicken and eggs, she felt it necessary to cut back on some items as she was a pensioner.

“I have to be more prudent now and use less ingredients when cooking.

“I will probably have to look for a cheaper type of fish, eat less chicken, try to cook smaller portions, avoid wastage and make leftover food stretch over a few days,” she said.

Among the vegetables and fruits that Joginder has planted are chillies, okra, brinjal, lemon, mint, banana and papaya.

“Most of the prices of vegetables, fish and other seafood have tripled.

“Some fishmongers and vegetable and fruit sellers have taken this opportunity to raise the prices even further,” she added.

Holly Lai, 60, a marketing manager, said that at times cooking at home was more expensive than eating out.

Lai, who is single, said she used to cook at home, but after the increase in prices, she discovered it was not worth the effort.

Preferring fish and eggs in her diet, she noted that the prices of these items were not affordable.

“For me to cook a meal consisting of fish, rice and a vegetable, it will easily cost about RM15, not including the spices and other ingredients.

“In comparison, I can get a meal consisting of three dishes and rice for between RM5 and RM7 from a stall.

“During these trying times, I must choose wisely and cannot simply eat at expensive restaurants,” she added.

Teacher Ambiga Pillay, 60, said the government should step in to counter the increase in prices.

Ambiga says she cuts down on daily costs by cooking more often at home.

Many including herself, she said, were saving on daily living costs by cooking more often as well as cutting back on luxury expenditures and travel.

“I always cook at home although it is a challenge as I work full-time.

“People think that grocery prices are lower in Ipoh compared to Kuala Lumpur, but it is not true.

“Prices here are higher because there is less variety compared to other places,” she said, adding that some also looked for cheaper alternatives to save money.

“I plan my finances based on priority as well,” said Ambiga.

Family Wellness Club president P. Mangaleswary also noted that people had been complaining about the rising prices of essential items.

She said some members of the non-governmental organisation (NGO) complained about how prices of vegetables had gone up in wet markets.

Members were saying that 1kg of tomatoes now cost RM9 when it used to be about RM5 before, she told StarMetro.

“Just last weekend at a get-together, some said they were feeling the burden of rising food prices as other expenses such as transport and house rental were also going up.

“The government’s cash aid for the B40 group is hardly enough for them to cover the rising costs.

“The government needs to look into some concrete measures to increase the supply of food such as vegetables and chicken,” said Mangaleswary.

Mangaleswary suggests that the government give food suppliers some form of subsidy.

She said it was important to have control on prices of essential food items such as rice, sugar, flour, vegetables, fruits and chicken. To keep the supply chain going, she suggested that the government give suppliers some form of subsidy to help them overcome difficulties such as rise in price of chicken feed and transport cost.

“Of course, people must be reminded to be prudent and not to waste food,” she stressed.

Dr Richard Ng, president of NGO Ipoh City Watch, said although the country was transitioning into the Covid-19 endemic phase, the B40 folk in particular had little to cheer about.

Ng says government assistance must reach the target group on a more consistent basis.

He said those who had been jobless might have heaved a huge sigh of relief as they would be able to earn a basic living.

He highlighted that a chain reaction had been triggered with the implementation of the minimum wage, the war between Russia and Ukraine taking a toll on the world’s economy, and the government’s announcement on the removal of subsidy on cooking oil and other essential items.

“These events have caused the prices of petrol, gas, cooking oil and essential food items to go up by at least 30%.

“This diminishing purchasing power not only impacts the B40 group, but also those in the M40.

“Each time such a crisis happens, the government can ask the people to tighten their belt, take less sugar, grow their own vegetables, provide one-off monetary assistance and groceries.

“But in reality, these efforts cannot really address the hard times faced by the people,” said Ng.

Instead, he said political leaders should set an example by going down to the ground and checking if the efforts made by them were effective.

He said government assistance must reach the target group on a more consistent basis, instead of just providing one-off aid.

“One way to solve this is to ensure some sort of prepaid card is given for the poor to buy groceries and other essential items from authorised outlets selling goods at lower prices.

“Of course, the mechanism must be monitored strictly to ensure there is no abuse and products sold must be of a certain minimum standard,” Ng added.

StarMetro By MANJIT KAUR manjit@thestar.com.my

Stretching their ringgit further

Like the rest of the nation, consumers in Ipoh, Perak, are feeling the pinch from the rise in the prices of goods, especially essential items.

The increase in prices is taking a toll on the people, leaving those in the low and middle-income groups struggling to cope.

Joginder showing the brinjal growing in her garden.

Joginder showing the brinjal growing in her garden.Joginder showing the brinjal growing in her garden.