Will China Rule The World? @ EIBF

Introducing authors Richard McGregor and Jonathan Watts, moderator Alan Little described them as having “China in their veins.” “And in our lungs”, added Watts, who equated his nine years in Beijing to living in an exhaust pipe.

Pollution was an enduring presence in a discussion that focused on a nation facing uncomfortable choices. Both authors identified the environment as a fundamental threat to China’s seemingly unstoppable growth. With 400,000 premature deaths a year due to air pollution, half the country’s water undrinkable and increasing droughts and floods, China was already hitting what Watts called its “ecological walls.”

McGregor agreed that China’s growth was unsustainable without turning the country into another Gobi Desert. But the Communist Party had an unspoken contract with the people: “We’ll keep the economy growing as long as you stay out of politics.”

Addressing the event’s theme – Will China rule the world? – McGregor forecast it would overtake the US economy by 2025. But internal pressures would divert it from projecting that power beyond its borders. Even so, failure to constrain consumption, said Watts, would inevitably have far-reaching consequences . For him, the bigger question was: Will China ruin the world? [James Carson]