?Chinese state is a spiritual institution?

When Top Gear went to China, a meaner than usual Jeremy Clarkson smirked, ?I am speaking to you from behind a pair of fake Ray-Bans, wearing a fake Armani jacket, carrying a fake Louis Vuitton bag, in which we find a fake iPad and a fake iPhone. And if we consult my fake Omega, we see that it?s 2.35. Probably. Which means it?s time to pop into the fake Starbucks over there for a cup of fake coffee. It seems the expression copyright infringement doesn?t translate terribly well into Mandarin.? Next, Chinese cars are reviewed. It?s declared that while they are pale imitations of globally patented counterparts, they have come a long way in the last decade, and will overwhelm British roads within the next one. Then, Stig?s local cousin kicks James May ?in the plums?. The closing bombshell? Chinese presenters take over the show.

The Chinese economy is now projected to overtake the US within a decade. It is already the chief trading partner of India, Pakistan, Japan, Brazil, South Africa, the US, etc., and this list is fast-expanding. So, when Martin Jacques published When China rules the world: The end of the Western world and the birth of a new global order in 2008, when the financial crisis really put the spotlight on the Dragon, the book serendipitously climbed to the top of assorted best-seller lists. Penguin has just brought an updated and expanded edition to India. It has been accompanied by Jacques animatedly marketing the idea that while China is not only transforming itself but also the world today, the world is too blinkered by Western glasses to understand this transformation. He tells us, ?If China is going to be a template for the world, then we have to understand what China is as opposed to what we think China is.?

Jacques subscribes to Paul Kennedy?s claim, in The rise and fall of the great powers, that economic power is a precondition for political and cultural power. The economic phase of China?s rise isn?t complete, so it is difficult to SEE the shape of Chinese hegemony. Plus, Jacques says, ?We have grown up with 200 years of Western furniture being our furniture. Not just for our generation, but for our parents? generation, our grandparents?, great grandparents?… So, it?s extremely difficult to imagine an alternative.? Yet, Jacques insists that Chinese modernity will be different, and that China will transform the world more fundamentally than any other power in the last two centuries!

The problem is that Brand China remains so sub-optimal. It?s in imitative thrall to Ray-Ban, Armani, Louis Vuitton, Apple, Omega, Starbucks, Mini Cooper, BMW and the like. As for the US, When China itself admits that the country used its wealth and dynamism to set the benchmark of modernity in so many areas, like the rise of the car, suburbia, shopping malls, space exploration, the PC, skyscrapers, affordable air travel, the internet, Facebook, fast food, Ivy League universities, jeans and Hollywood. In India, we may celebrate Diwali with crackers made in China but there is no sign that we will embrace Lunar Year celebrations with the same enthusiasm we have show towards Valentine?s Day. Our cultural knowledge of China is mediated by the likes of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Kung Fu Panda or even Top Gear.

To Jacques, such discussions of popular culture seem banal. One, he directs us to instead attend to the Beijing-Lhasa railway, the Three Gorges Dam and the Bird?s Nest stadium. Yes, but how does any of this direct us towards Chinese cultural hegemony? Two, he says China has a civilisational consciousness that comes from managing to remain united through 2,000 years, with more than 90% of the population proclaiming itself Han. All of which he takes to mean that the Chinese state enjoys more legitimacy in the eyes of its citizens than any Western state! To see the state as the Achilles heel of China, to see it as problematic, or less competent and impressive than any Western state, is to suffer from Western bias. Because the Chinese see the state as almost a spiritual institution, an intimate, a member of the family, indeed the head of the family. This is thanks to Confucianism.

We grant Jacques the strategic capability of the Chinese state. But as much as he homogenises the last century?s world history as Western hegemony, Jacques oversimplifies the Chinese state of affairs. With a caveat here or there, too much is predetermined in his picture of tomorrow?s world. If, as he insists, China is crammed with debate (while the West is merely recycling old ideas), how can the state-citizenry relationship be static, and without discontinuity with 2,000 years of history to boot?

As for the immediate future, Jacques sees another government stimulus package coming to keep growth buoyant. Some years down the line, this will mean that the extent to which China is postponing necessary structural changes, their cost will be that much more, growth rate will fall that much more. But the political situation is in control. Leadership transition is progressing smoothly, the Bo Xilai conflict has been contained in a way that was not initially clear (much like Tiananmen?).

For India, Jacques?s advice is to consult a psychologist. ?China is rapidly becoming the biggest player in the world. If you are constantly upset by China, it will constantly eat away at you. You need to get over it, and seek a rapprochement. There is an alienation between the two cultures, for which the Chinese are more responsible. But if your need is greater, get on with it. Don?t wait for the Chinese to do it.? Getting on with it means learning from China. Like the Japanese did during the Meiji restoration, by sending many delegations to study how Europeans organised their economy, railways, universities, etc. Jacques complains that he never sees any Indian faces at Chinese universities. Indian tourism to China needs to expand on a grand scale. So far, so good.

But everything has a 1962 hangover. So resolve the border question, first. Be pragmatic. ?All we are talking about is a bit of the Himalayas with hardly any people in it.? Huh? Basically all of China?s neighbours should just kneel over and say hello, kick me. Guess this is the logical corollary of a world view in which only one country is credited with a civilisational consciousness.