Source: Xinchaochensi (ID: xinchaochensi)
Author: Liu Menglong
Over the past three years, new changes have occurred every year, and now that 2023 is approaching halfway through, even dull people have sensed that the times are brewing some kind of explosion. This explosive trend must greatly change the world we are familiar with. Old experiences can no longer be simply applied, while the new future is slowly not clearly delineated. The decline of the old paradigm of the global order has converged with the nodes of China’s transformation cycle, and China is inevitably becoming the focus of the turning era.
In the past, political coldness and economic heat have always been a main theme between China, Japan, and South Korea, and the huge economic exchanges have been a foundation for how the three countries can maintain their political conflicts above the bottom line. However, at present, the economies of the three countries are also becoming increasingly tight with the turning space at the end of the old pattern. The situation has developed to today, and the once anticipated East Asian integration is being replaced by clear ideological barriers. Before the United States truly withdrew from the East Asian region, not only did the region lack a foundation for widespread integration, but the risk of conflicts erupting was increasing day by day.
With the separation of the three East Asian countries, what resonates most with each other is now only the label of high involution.
Involution, also known as’ involution ‘, should be translated rigorously as’ over densification’, which is a term commonly used to summarize the backwardness of East Asia in recent times. Before the Industrial Revolution, Asia, especially East Asia, was one of the most culturally advanced regions in the world. However, due to physical geography conditions, expansion is unrealistic. With the rapid expansion of population, the efficiency of seeking technological upgrading is better than relying on cheap labor. This forms the tone of what we call internalization, where a high degree of internal competition is used to compete for limited resources, becoming the norm in a society.
This situation was not alleviated until European and American powers used naval guns to break down their homes and forcibly bring East Asian countries into the global economic cycle. But this situation has not been fundamentally resolved, and even today, East Asian countries still face great pressure in terms of resource endowments. Any achievements and favorable conditions that this country has, once diluted by its population base, appear meager. In terms of global industrial structure, it is difficult to say that East Asian countries, as major producers, are the main beneficiaries.
The long-term overcrowding that lasted for 500 years during the Ming and Qing dynasties had a huge impact on the East Asian world, especially in shaping people. Europeans and Americans often label East Asians with several labels, such as antiquity, hard work, and obedience. Being hardworking and hardworking is naturally an advantage, but the hardships of farmers and landlords are clearly not the same. Gentle obedience is more like describing a good servant, which is the positioning given by the conquerors to the people of the East Asian Empire at that time. These labels carry the arrogance of conquerors, but they also reflect some issues.
In the 19th century, when European and American powers saw the low class Chinese people who were full of agricultural society and scattered, left and right indistinguishable, and the middle and upper class Chinese people who were arrogant and superstitious, it was difficult to imagine that they would become qualified workers, soldiers, and engineers. The big reason is probably because they happened to enter Asia at a climax of the Malthusian cycle, and what they saw was an abnormal scene that was not in line with daily life.
Where is the advantage of East Asia? I think it lies in its maturity and ability to withstand drastic social changes. This is a society that can withstand ups and downs, and in other regions of the world, it often disintegrates on its own. In this process of drastic changes, there is no fundamental change in the cultural core of East Asia.
The failure of the East Asian region to achieve modernization on its own may be more due to the objective environment rather than the issues of ethnic culture itself. At that time, outsiders believed that it had no room for upgrading, but it did have the potential for modernization. This is a valuable potential, and enduring drastic changes is also a cost of progress. However, change also means that many old experiences are not suitable, which has been the case for the past 100 years and is still the case now.
The ultimate result, or rather, after more than a hundred years of effort, is now that China has become increasingly mature and is about to occupy the pinnacle of contemporary human industrialization. There are some things that our generation, and even past generations, take for granted that need to be changed.
We are originally living in a transitional period, and this historical stage has a transitional nature. What caught us off guard was the profound social transformation of the Chinese people, firmly bound together with the global transformation that had not occurred in the past five hundred years since the rise of the West in the era of great navigation. The waves were turbulent, and the world was destined to be hot and cold.
There are two prominent problems in contemporary China. One is the legacy of long-term overcrowding, which is like a nightmare for five hundred years. The other is the illusion brought about by long-term high-speed growth, which is a beautiful dream for almost forty years. And a normal society will not be immersed in dreams for a long time, whether it is nightmares or beautiful dreams.
Over dense society will bring some typical thinking modes, such as always tending to find solutions internally. After all, an over dense society is often a society with obvious marginal utility. The same overcrowded society always strives to demand that its members save as much as possible to cope with the increasingly scarce distribution of resources. This is what people often say: everyone should eat less and save a little.
Overdensification is like this, where there is no longer an external outlet, and the total amount of internal resources is not large, so there is a tendency towards conservatism and internal consumption. But luck and misfortune are interdependent. The densification of the past millennium may have been a nightmare, but don’t forget its premise that East Asia in the classical era has reached its limit. In China, this means it has already occupied the best possible position and the largest population.
There has been a lot of discussion about population, and with the rapid modernization of Chinese society, China’s huge population has transformed from a burden to a precarious wealth. When a society lacks productivity, facing the Malthusian cycle and limited resources, an excessively large population is of course a burden. In an industrialized society that has undergone modernization and improved basic systems, the large industrial population is certainly not a burden. It means a stable and reliable internal market, with enough engineers, builders, educators, and a sustainable internal cycle that brings strong productivity and competitiveness. All these great changes have been experienced by our generation.
This is a hidden key issue, which is that it is very difficult for East Asia to support its social industrialization and modernization with its own resources, which is also an important reason for its failure to complete modernization. But correspondingly, once it enters the global resource system, an East Asian country that can seamlessly connect with modernization in terms of social structure will inevitably achieve rapid industrialization and have strong global competitiveness. Correspondingly, we must not forget that China’s dependence on the global market is actually no less than that of Americans. However, in the current system, many times China is still a producer, while the United States is already an end consumer.
The long and overly dense society has shaped China and the entire East Asian region. It is not a problem to rely solely on oneself, but it is impossible to rely solely on oneself. The greatness of contemporary China lies in bringing wealth and prosperity to such a large population, thus transitioning from quantitative change to qualitative change. But correspondingly, China’s industrial machinery is built for the world market, and its huge scale cannot be supported by a single country. It must have an external market that is no less than the current one. And this external dependence emerged earlier in Japan and South Korea, especially in canary countries like South Korea.
The second important legacy of overcrowding lies in the diligence and perseverance of the people, as society is difficult to maintain, let alone expand to its limits. The fact that the people are hardworking and the entire society is proficient in the complex system of industrialization is closely related to the fact that East Asian countries generally opened low and rose high in the 20th century. The people are easy to satisfy and diligent in their work, and the accumulation of the entire society will be high. The speed of development will also be fast, and even the social structure will be more stable, which will play an accelerating role. But this legacy is rapidly depleting, and its pace of extinction is the same as the pace of modernization.
Actually, we can already see its end. No mature industrialized society can retain the kind of hardship and perseverance left over by the agricultural society. Simply put, in a prosperous industrialized society, how can people make rapid progress without enjoying consumption? The productivity that has undergone a qualitative change must be met through sustained growth in consumption. But why do people want to consume and how can they encourage them to consume with peace of mind? This is much more meaningful than hoping to empty people’s wallets or expect people to work more with less wages.
Industrialization and modernization are not the same thing, although the two often complement each other. The speed of industrialization in a society can exceed the speed of modernization, which refers to the rapid growth of productivity, but institutional and human changes can be relatively lagging behind, and of course, only lagging behind rather than not coming. With the process of industrialization, it is natural that people’s material requirements continue to rise, as well as changes in their mental state and even the entire society’s views on work, life, and rights and obligations.
The drastic changes that are taking place in the social structure of China and the rapid shift in ideological trends are a very complex and grand issue, and I will further explore them with you in the future. The simplest point to discuss here is that the support for the high accumulation and development of the past will rapidly weaken the public base. The people’s endurance is actually about to decline.
Chinese society is bound to enter a historical stage that developed countries should go through. This includes further improvement of civil society, where people have higher demands for social governance and a stronger enthusiasm for participation. A more comprehensive social security system should enable a considerable number of people to have the right to leave their daily lives. The modern society centered around industry and finance has its own set of values and moral standards, distinct from the pastoral barriers of the old era.
In the eyes of the older generation, the behavior of neglecting one’s duties and being meticulous will become a natural thing. Dedication and sacrifice are no longer the norm, and correspondingly, there is a stronger sense of self-confidence and identification that those seniors do not have.
Many people do not realize that the past thirty years since the ceasefire in Vietnam in 1990 have been a complete miracle. In the past 200 years of history, the rise of major powers in the world has always been accompanied by iron and blood, which is the longest record of sustained peace and rapid development for a major power so far. (Excluding the revival of some defeated countries after the war, their situation is special) And this miracle is still continuously extending, China is a special case. While witnessing miracles, it is best not to forget that the biggest characteristic of miracles is that they are abnormal.
The past forty years, dating back to the past seventy years, should be a period of progress in Chinese history. Thoroughly shattered the nightmare of over densification, almost stepping into another beautiful dream overnight, especially in the past forty years. Forty years is enough time for a generation to form deeply rooted beliefs, such as about peace, about progress, about everything will be better, and about living beyond our means.
Over the past century, the desire for progress in the entire East Asian region has been unparalleled, and this is also the driving force behind progress. Just as we are accustomed to describing evolution theory as evolution theory, in fact, many people have simply understood the eternal movement in philosophy as progress, and improvement and progress have become the beliefs of many people, regardless of the actual situation. This expectation is actually forming some kind of huge pressure, even running cannot always be at high speed.
This can’t help but raise concerns, is the overall society’s ability to withstand difficulties and heavy burdens decreasing? As the material strength of the entire country becomes stronger, the appetite of the entire society is also growing, but it is far from keeping up in terms of spiritual and social endurance.
Catching up must have an end, which is a serious problem. The rapid progress of China in the past was largely a pursuit, and the more forward this pursuit is, the greater the difficulty it naturally becomes, and the speed will inevitably decrease, eventually reaching a peak. As Japan and South Korea, which entered the moderately developed countries earlier than us, both entered a certain social stagnation after a period of rapid growth. I don’t think China will repeat this path. Japan and South Korea have come to a standstill because the old system can barely provide their position, and they also have to limit themselves to the limited space they can provide. Overall, that plate is limited.
But placing China’s size in their position is not realistic. Just like China entering the $10000 per capita GDP threshold, if we follow the experience of Japan and South Korea and at least double it within 20 years, it means that the weight of GDP needs to reach almost three Americans. But can the world withstand four Americans? When the strength develops to this stage, it is inevitable to face fierce suppression, contradictions and conflicts are inevitable, and precisely because they are inevitable, it is necessary to demonstrate sufficient toughness in order to avoid unnecessary conflicts to the greatest extent possible.
On the one hand, we have to realize that rapid development has its end, and the entire society is likely to enter a period of patient adjustment. On the other hand, we should also be aware that this adjustment is to continue moving forward and not to pursue a price that is sufficient to surrender. In the past forty years, we have indeed gone through a period of concealment, but compromise is to exchange time for progress, and compromise at the cost of progress and development is meaningless. It is just drinking poison to quench thirst. This is bound to lead to a difficult situation, with both enormous external pressure and difficult internal adjustments. The long journey to the west is difficult and dangerous, and there are always people who can’t wait to rely on surrender to return to the beautiful times of Gaolaozhuang.
Although I have repeatedly mentioned patience, it is not a regression or stagnation, but rather a redistribution of internal resources, a compromise of various internal forces, and a form of social progress. This is essentially the only way for a mature society to modernize. China cannot accept stagnation until it achieves the goal of enabling the masses to live a better modern life. Premature stagnation means the beginning of self disintegration.
In order to achieve sustained breakthroughs under unprecedented pressure, more unity and progress are needed. Internal improvement is necessary, and external pressure cannot be relied on to solve everything. That would only double the problem of tomorrow and push it to erupt the day after tomorrow. High growth can mask many problems, and when growth is no longer high, it is like a ebb tide, and many problems need to be exposed.
What is more painful for social managers is probably the past feasible practices that will soon become infeasible. The needs of the people increase with the progress of productivity, and this demand also includes the continuous pursuit of attitude, strength, and speed in social governance. But in the final analysis, we should not suffer from scarcity but from inequality. Difficulties can be overcome together, and the benefits of progress should naturally be shared together. The good times of the little bosses indulging in extravagance and drinking may have come to an end, but it doesn’t mean that they should let the people go back to gnaw on their food. On the contrary, the people do not intend to stop at being able to eat pork belly.
At present, many people in China are dissatisfied in one way or another, and internal contradictions and problems always emerge with development. However, if we look at external issues, anyone who is not fundamentally based on a colonial mentality will surely recognize such a problem. In the international environment, especially in the past three years of the epidemic, China has suffered such great malice from the Western world. Is the reason why China has done something wrong? Is it wrong to persist in independence and not surrender or kneel down?
The mistake is not really China, but this old paradigm of order, and the post Cold War era is coming to an end. As the largest and most prosperous emerging market in the world after the Cold War, China’s market is actually no longer able to feed its own industrial behemoth, and the corresponding growth rate of other markets after the Cold War can no longer keep up with the consumption rate of developed countries. And the malice of the West will obviously not only stop at the Chinese government, whether it is sanctions against various Chinese enterprises, agitation for de industrialization, or military encirclement of China, this malice will inevitably fall on every Chinese person in the end.
On the one hand, there is an imbalance in development, on the other hand, there is a relative surplus of production capacity, and perhaps more importantly, the pace of development is gradually slowing down. This is what I have repeatedly mentioned. In the past thirty years, there has been almost no decisive technological progress. The progress is mainly focused on the improvement of management systems and the efficiency of resource redistribution.
Living in China may not be obvious, as China has a relatively low starting point, and the rapid development of life often gives people the illusion that the world is progressing at a high speed. And in the developed world, this stagnation will become increasingly apparent. The fruits of technology that are easy to break through and low hanging have already been harvested, and new breakthroughs rely on greater resource investment. The threshold for major countries is much higher than before, and no one dares to think much about the fate of those who are eliminated.
As always, the East Asian countries have maintained disunity among monsters, especially in the face of China. After all, this is a world dominated by China for nearly two thousand years, and East Asian countries have concerns to some extent about being dominated by the Chinese order. This has resulted in the world’s largest market, the most powerful industrial belt, never being able to integrate, if not for each other’s attempts to dismantle each other. But China’s advantages are indeed constantly evident. The future of the coexistence of China, Japan, and South Korea requires us to work together on an equal basis to contribute to the development of the world. However, this process itself is indeed a process of repairing the global status that Japan and South Korea have gained under the shadow of the US hegemonic order over the past few decades. We can only hope for a positive development in the process.
Correspondingly, China’s own problems are becoming increasingly apparent. Capital has its own flow law. financial capital occupies the top of the capital world, with the best talents and the most resources. But it also makes capital go global, and makes Europe and America, the birthplace of capitalism, go industrial hollowing. During this process, China, as a rising industrial country among Western powers, was indeed in a prime time. However, it goes without saying that China cannot escape its ultimate law of mobility.
At the same time as China undergoes changes, the world is also undergoing changes. Another turbulence in the capitalist world may be imminent, and how this turbulence is manifested is also worth our attention. From lower class white people in the rust belt of the United States who cannot find jobs to ordinary people in Europe who cannot afford to pay color television taxes and switch back to black and white television, it is not normal for China to stand out and hope to remain so in the midst of intense internal conflicts among major powers.
The post Cold War era is coming to an end. As the largest and most prosperous emerging market in the world after the Cold War, China’s market has actually become an industrial behemoth that cannot feed itself. The corresponding growth rate of other markets after the Cold War has not kept up with the consumption rate of developed countries. Nowadays, the global economic crisis is the most intuitive manifestation.
During this period, China can continue to make progress in high-tech fields represented by new energy, and seizing cities and territories on a global scale is naturally a confidence. But with the irreversible decline of Western economic and technological advantages, the economy cannot be separated from the interference of national politics and ideology. How long can this normal and peaceful economic competition continue? It is worth worrying about.
Nowadays, the East Asian countries have become one of the most tense regions in the world, and a crisis is imminent. Under unprecedented external pressure, China’s own internal problems are becoming increasingly apparent. Integration is the theme of the contemporary world. How to maximize the integration of one’s own internal resources and the team that one can win before the outbreak of a crisis, in order to gain the greatest advantage in the fierce global changes, is a common issue facing all countries. In fact, after the outbreak of the Russo Ukrainian War, this side selection has become increasingly apparent. Many countries, including Japan and South Korea, have already rolled the dice.
In such a historical process, of course, we should keep our sights on the distance, just like promoting reconciliation in the Middle East and promoting the global benchmark monetization of the RMB. These measures are like cutting off the arms of the Xiongnu and opening up the arms of China, which is naturally crucial. But we should also see that the support for all of this ultimately comes from the strength of the Chinese people, and from within the country. A broken house cannot withstand wind and rain.
We don’t have much time left. The large industrialized population in Chinese society has brought about a high-speed process, which also means a huge burden on the elderly care of the entire society in the future. As this generation ages and aging approaches, the pace of competitiveness decline is also accelerating. China is actually racing against time, taking advantage of the elite soldiers left over from the old era and the contradictions of social transformation that have not yet erupted, to do everything possible to open up a path for the new world.
Almost simultaneously, the West faces its own decline and will never sit idly by while the East rises. Even compared to us, the situation faced by the West is even more severe, which means that the West cannot allow us to solve internal problems from tolerance and then turn to the outside.
We cannot sit back and see the superposition of these dual issues, which will be the most dangerous moment. And the solution to these two problems always complements each other. Without good internal unity, one cannot win external suppression, and the ultimate goal of breaking external suppression is to establish a more mature and progressive society internally. The solution to both is indispensable.