Green European politician Reinhard Bütikofer pleads in an interview for a new China policy - and calls for fewer solo efforts in the EU.
He thinks Merkel's approach is no longer appropriate.
Reinhard Bütikofer is chairman of the delegation for relations with the People's Republic of China in the EU Parliament.
Bütikofer advocates a pan-European approach in China policy.
Since March 2021, he has been on Beijing's sanctions list for his commitment to human rights.
This interview is available to IPPEN.MEDIA as part of a cooperation with the “
China.Table Professional Briefing
” - it was first published by China.Table on August 9, 2021.
Brussels / Berlin - Reinhard Bütikofer is one of the most prominent China politicians in the EU.
The former head of the Greens has been sitting in the EU Parliament * since 2009, where he helps shape European policy on China in the committees for foreign affairs and trade.
Bütikofer is also chairman of the delegation for relations with the People's Republic of China and a member of the German-Chinese dialogue forum.
His commitment sometimes causes him trouble: since March he has been on a list of people in China * who are not allowed to enter. The punitive measure was part of Beijing's response to European sanctions * for human rights violations in the Xinjiang region. Bütikofer had supported the sanctions. The 68-year-old's interest in China goes back a long way: in the 1970s he was already active in the Society for German-Chinese Friendship.
In an interview with IPPEN.MEDIA cooperation partner
China.Table
, Bütikofer criticizes the German government's China policy.
The "automobile foreign policy" is just as outdated as the idea of being able to achieve change in the People's Republic with patience.
Germany must overcome the illusion of its own helplessness and accept the challenge of the new rivalry with China.
Bütikofer: Merkel's China policy "strangely out of date"
Mr. Bütikofer, no other western industrial country has benefited as much from the rise of China as Germany. After 16 years as Chancellor Angela Merkel, what is your assessment?
You can't beat these 16 years of China policy.
Today it can hardly be remembered, but at the beginning of her chancellorship Angela Merkel * dared to receive the Dalai Lama, although she knew that it would meet with the utmost displeasure in Beijing.
A few years ago, a group of European China think tanks came to the conclusion in a study that Ms. Merkel was one of the few leaders in Europe who also spoke publicly about human rights in China *.
She managed to get the widow of the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Liu Xiaobo, Liu Xia, to travel to Germany after years of house arrest.
And yet today Merkel's China policy is strangely out of date in the landscape.
In what way?
She has recently made a name for herself as a reliable partner of Xi Jinping *, as a politician who is ready not only to reduce human rights issues again in favor of intensive cooperation with the Xi regime, but also to take German solo efforts, Europe's positions on China can only weaken. The close economic ties that led Mockers to say that Germany has no foreign policy at all towards China, but only an automobile foreign policy, does not explain that alone.
If you disregard large corporations like VW, the German economy has shown itself to be significantly more critical of China than the Federal Chancellery.
It seems to me that Merkel has a considerable amount of defeatism at play.
As if the Chancellor was convinced that China's propaganda of the unstoppable ascent was true and that in the end the only choice was whether to come to terms today or tomorrow under less favorable conditions.
I consider this to be a wrong and dangerous attitude that threatens to lead us into a position of helplessness in the face of an increasingly arrogant regime.
But Merkel is said to have a very good instinct for change in world politics.
The takeover of power by Xi Jinping in 2013 is to be equated with a fundamental roll-back in China and with an equally dramatic turn to open superpower presumption in external relations. At the beginning of his term in office, observers had hoped that Xi might turn out to be a reformer. It was an illusion. The human rights lawyers who bravely defended their clients in court ten years ago are now in custody themselves. Xi has brutally tightened the policy towards the national minorities.
In Xinjiang * there is the worst police state today, at best comparable to North Korea.
The Communist Party * is pushing its way back into every crack in people's everyday life and running the economy more and more.
Xi has used his campaign against corruption to concentrate all power in a kind of party empire - something that had been seen as a must-avoid error since the time of Deng Xiaoping.
For many years, Ms. Merkel's China policy followed the basic idea that one must drill thick boards with patience and passion.
But the Xi regime replaced the thick boards with steel plates.
Merkel can no longer do much with the wood drill.
Bütikofer: Decoupling from China is not a solution
The question is, what conclusions can be drawn from this? Should Germany decouple from China?
I have never considered the idea of general decoupling that President Trump promoted to be an intelligent perspective.
This is diametrically opposed to our basic European idea of multilateral cooperation.
We don't want to build walls.
But you have to take note of the fact that China started decoupling a long time ago.
It is still the case that European companies are not making cuts in the Chinese procurement markets, while our procurement markets are wide open to Chinese state-owned companies.
China relies on more and more self-sufficiency, operates decoupling in education, in the media sector, in the IT industry, in the field of rare earths.
Decoupling was a Trump ideology but is a Xi reality.
So decouple after all?
In a situation in which a partner is ready to turn economic entanglements into a political weapon, one cannot naively say: our openness knows no boundaries.
One example is the expansion of the 5G network, which will be the nervous system of our future communication, especially in the industrial sector.
I don't want a Chinese company to be part of the infrastructure expansion, which according to current Chinese law has to be unconditionally willing to comply with the security authorities there.
It is not a decoupling philosophy, but simply practical reason not to become completely dependent on a competitor who does not play fair.
How do you intend to explain this to a company like VW, which now makes half of its sales in China?
It is clear that a large corporation cannot turn back on sales and say that the Chinese market will be uninteresting from now on.
But I do believe that the strategists at corporate headquarters have also recognized that China's economic strategy does not rely on partnership with the West in the medium and long term.
It started with the “Made in China 2025” strategy six years ago.
This is now being continued in the 14th five-year plan * with the so-called "double circulation".
A place is only provided for international partners if they submit to the economic and political logic of China.
Instead of continuing to run into a dead end, we should look for new ways.
It won't be easy.
China: partner, competitor, system rival
Which China policy do you think is appropriate for this?
We have found a formula in the EU that accurately defines our relationship with China.
As one of competition, partnership and systemic rivalry.
The Biden administration has taken over this triad.
All three dimensions will exist in parallel for quite a while.
We do not master competition and systemic rivalry alone.
So I think it is appropriate that we team up with like-minded partners to stop Beijing's hegemonic drive.
In its rivalry with China, the USA is pursuing its own interests - but calling on Germany and Europe to decide which side they will be on in the future.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said several times that he is not asking US partners to do this. It would be unfortunate, however, if we wanted to pretend that this systemic conflict was not ours, but just one between the USA and China *. The system rivalry relates to fundamental values such as democracy, human rights, the rule of law, and multilateralism. In this regard, the EU is not a neuter, but is clearly a partner of countries such as the USA, Australia, Canada, Japan, India and others. Despite all openness to cooperation, it must also be clear: We do not make deals in which we exchange climate protection for our commitment to human rights.
No deals? The international community sacrificed Taiwan a while ago and cut all diplomatic ties because China wanted to. Now Taiwan’s status quo is more threatened than ever. Shouldn't a future federal government position itself more clearly?
Yes, it has to.
Incidentally, the European Parliament is playing a leading role in formulating a new policy on Taiwan.
In its basic concern, this policy is conservative: We do not want the status quo to be changed by unilateral measures by either of the two actors.
This excludes a military conquest of Taiwan * repeatedly threatened by Xi Jinping, as well as a possible Taiwanese declaration of independence.
But as Beijing continues to question the status quo, we need to make our support for Taiwan's democracy clearer.
That means: trying to involve Taiwan more closely in the World Health Organization or at world climate conferences;
negotiate an EU investment agreement with Taiwan;
promote political and cultural exchange more.
Bütikofer: Proposals for a more effective China policy
What would a Green Chancellor do differently in China policy?
When we rule, we rule in a coalition.
Nobody does foreign policy alone.
Nevertheless, I hope for changes in German China policy.
Firstly: We have to move more European and take less German solo efforts.
Germany behaved too selfishly.
Second, we must stop pretending that trade and foreign policy are separate.
We have to place our foreign trade interests in the geopolitical context.
Third: We want to focus more on climate foreign policy, also with regard to China.
Fourth: Germany and Europe must be a better partner to countries in the global south, for example through the EU connectivity strategy.
The Chinese Silk Road Initiative * fills a vacuum that we have left behind.
And right now: the EU has so far given away or sold fewer than 10 million vaccine doses to countries in the global south - a shameful state of affairs.
Green Chancellor candidate Annalena Baerbock * seems to have been holding back on foreign policy in the election campaign so far.
On the contrary.
It was very clear on European politics as well as on transatlantic relations and on dealing with authoritarian regimes.
“Dialogue and toughness” * is her formula for her relationship with the latter.
In doing so, it draws clearer borders towards China or Russia than Laschet or Scholz, who notice or scrub too much for my taste.
Angela Merkel and China
And Angela Merkel? It continues to enjoy a high reputation in China. What do you think, after her chancellorship, she might become a mediator in the difficult relationship with China, like Henry Kissinger or Helmut Schmidt once did?
Merkel's reputation in China is no longer as majestic as it used to be.
China sees that Merkel, despite all her commitment, cannot deliver the way Beijing would like.
For example, she really wanted to push through the investment agreement *, which is now in the freezer.
From the Chancellery she was able to shape China politics less and less, why should she want to continue to fail without an office?
Incidentally, I don't think she longs to become a Christian Democratic Helmut Schmidt or European Henry Kissinger.
And your future role? You have visited and worked on China regularly for decades. Now Beijing has personally put her on an undesirable list.
I will of course continue to get involved.
As long as I can't go to China, I might visit Taiwan more often.
After all, I will be 100 years old in 2053 and hope that before that there will be a change for the better in China and that I am welcome again.
The interview was conducted by Felix Lee.
Felix Lee
reported for many years as a China correspondent from Beijing for the
taz
, the Funke media group,
Die Presse
, the
Weser Kurier
and other German-language publications.
He has been writing for the
China.Table Professional Briefing
from Berlin since 2021
This article appeared on August 9th, 2021 in the “China.Table Professional Briefing” newsletter - as part of a cooperation, it is now also available to readers of the IPPEN.MEDIA portals. * Merkur.de is an offer from IPPEN.MEDIA.
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