Britain's changed relationship with China
- By John Ross
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E-mail China.org.cn, December 5, 2014
It is also worth adding that the U.K. Parliament's discussion was particularly ridiculous, since the 2017 Hong Kong election will be considerably more democratic than anything Britain ever allowed in Hong Kong. During the more than 150 years that Hong Kong was a British colony, the U.K. never permitted any form of election to select the governor general, who was the chief executive of the colony's administration.
Furthermore, the MPs who would potentially be involved in such a trip to Hong Kong have not taken a neutral stance on the events in the area, but have supported those opposing China's laws and disrupting Hong Kong's economic life.
The world has moved on. As Britain's empire has vanished, Britain's parliament no longer has gunships with which to attempt to interfere in China's internal affairs, but merely words. The blunt demonstration of this situation should induce Britain to reflect on what its relations with China should look like. Perhaps in China, this incident will induce the country to reflect on what it may or may not wish to receive from Britain.
Britain's specific position in the world is derived from the fact that the British Empire was the largest empire ruled by any single country in history. Britain was the world's most powerful state for several centuries. For that reason, its history has created many contradictions that directly affect China.
On the one hand, the British Empire was responsible for some of history's greatest crimes. It was the main organizer of the transatlantic slave trade that transported over 10 million enslaved Africans to the Americas, it was responsible for millions of deaths in India, it seized Hong Kong and carried out numerous military interventions in China. The British Empire's power and aggression was so great that it attacked almost 90 percent of the world's states - only 22 countries escaped British attack in their history. Cumulatively, over its long history, the British Empire was responsible for more deaths than Nazi Germany or Japan in its assault on and occupation of China.
On the other hand, the U.K. was one of the world's greatest centers of the arts and science. Shakespeare is universally recognized as one of the world's greatest writers, and Britain has numerous others of scarcely lesser rank - Jane Austen and Charles Dickens to name only two. Newton and Darwin produced revolutions in science. Britain has also produced some of the most well-known and popular figures in world literature, from Sherlock Holmes to Harry Potter.
Economically, it is now China, not Britain, that is the great industrial "workshop of the world" and which has the greater military power. But the U.K. still has real abilities from which China can benefit in finance, life sciences and fields such as marketing and branding.
The overall context of the new post-colonial relationship between Britain and China is that China's "national revival" is vital not only for China, but also for the world. China therefore has not only the right but the obligation to prevent other nations from interfering in its internal affairs. China has lifted 630 million people out of internationally-defined poverty, while, regrettably, there has been no fall at all in the total number of people living in internationally-defined poverty outside of China. China has brought social security protection to 820 million people, more than the population of the EU or the entire continent of Latin America, and health care to over a billion.
