Implementing the Spirit of the Fifth Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee and Marching Toward China’s Second Centenary Goal

Wang Jiacheng

The 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China clearly put forward China's "two centenary goals": to build a moderately prosperous society in an all-round way by the centenary of the Communist Party of China; to fully build a modern socialist country by the centenary of the People’s Republic of China. The 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China has made a strategic arrangement to realize the second centenary goal in two stages: to basically realize socialist modernization by 2035, and to develop into a great modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced, harmonious, and beautiful in the middle of the 21st century.

I. An Important Meeting at the Historical Intersection of the Two Centenary Goals——To Embark on a New Journey for Building a Socialist Modern Power in an All-round Way

The Fifth Plenary Session of the 19th CPC Central Committee (October 26-29, 2020) is an important meeting held at the historical intersection of realizing the "two centenary goals". The plenary session spoke highly of the decisive achievements in building a moderately prosperous society in an all-round way. The plenary session deliberated and adopted the proposal on formulating the 14th Five-Year Plan and the Long-Range Goals for 2035, pointing out the direction and drawing the blueprint for starting a new journey of building a socialist modern country in an all-round way.

II. The Fifth Plenary Session Spoke Highly of the Decisive Achievements in Fully Establishing a Moderately Prosperous Society——China is on Course to Realize its First Centenary Goal. 

During the 13th Five Year Plan period, China held high the great banner of socialism with Chinese characteristics, insisted that development is the first priority, adhered to the leadership of the party, adhered to the dominant position of the people, the rule of law, and took both domestic needs and the international context into account. As scheduled, China achieved the goals of "maintaining medium and high-speed economic growth", "generally improving people's living standards and quality", "improving national quality and social culture". China have entered the stage of high-quality development and become one of the innovative countries. China’s basic people's livelihood has been strongly guaranteed. China’s industrial development has moved to the medium and high-end level. China have promoted the formation of a new pattern of comprehensive opening-up and contributed China’s experiences and China’s wisdom to global governance.

III. The Fifth Plenary Session deliberated and adopted the proposal on the formulation of the 14th five year plan and the Long-Range Goals for 2035 -- the Guidance for Marching Towards the Second Centenary Goal

The year 2021 marks the centenary of the Communist Party of China. On the basis of building a moderately prosperous society in an all-round way, China will embark on a new journey toward building a modern socialist country. Standing at the intersection of the "two centenary goals" and celebrating the centenary of the Communist Party of China with outstanding achievements, in the face of complex changes in domestic and foreign situations, China must base itself on the basic national conditions of the primary stage of socialism, coordinate development and security, and put the two major events of "high-quality economic development" and "ensuring and improving people's livelihood" in a more prominent position Guided by Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, China must  uphold the underlying principle of pursuing progress while ensuring stability and remain committed to the new development philosophy, focus on building a new development paradigm, pursuing a people-centered approach to development and practice in the development to ensure and improve people's livelihood; Adhere to the overall leadership of the Communist Party of China, consolidate and improve the system of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and promote the modernization of the national governance system and governance capacity; comprehensively deepen the reform and opening up, accelerate the integration of China's economy with the world economy, promote higher quality, more efficient, more equitable, more sustainable and safer development, and promote the all-round development of human beings and the whole society. China will make a good start in building a modern socialist country in an all-round way.

Outlook for China-U.S. Relations as Biden Takes Office

Yu Sui

Fed up with Trump’s craziness, people naturally hope that Biden can bring some kind of moderate return on relations with China. It can be seen that some people shout loudly not to have a fantasy about Biden. It is an illusion that Biden is to abandon the hegemony of the United States. It is an illusion that Biden does not want to curb the pace of China's development. And it is undoubtedly an illusion that Biden will establish a comprehensive strategic partnership with China like the relations between China and Russia.

The United States should also cast away illusions on China. It is impossible to let China abandon the socialist road with Chinese characteristics, which was established in accordance with its national conditions and supported by 1.4 billion people sincerely. It is impossible to drive a wedge between the Chinese people and the Communist Party of China, whose flesh-and-blood ties were bonded in the revolutionary war and peace building period. Third, It is impossible to stop China from moving towards a glorious process of peaceful development.

China-US relations will not follow any illusions. Cooperation is inevitable, competition is not terrible, but cooperation should be honest and competition should abide by rules. Biden, after winning the presidential election, called on the American people to "stop using opponents as enemies.". This claim should also be applied to the US relations with China.

The pros and cons of Biden coming to power for China in this paper is in comparison with Trump's actions.

Firstly, Biden will adjust its approach to China from the interests of the United States after he takes power. It is even normal to resume dialogue. The United States will continue to pursue the traditional policy of containment and engagement. It is not surprising that the US should strengthen containment from time to time, and continue to put pressure on China in the economic, technological, human rights and international fields. The key is to do ourselves well first. China and the United States will still be top priority in the future. Subjectively, the United States is not willing to tolerate the rise of China , but objectively, it has to bear with a limit. After Biden came to power, there will be twists and turns in its development of China-US relations.

Secondly, China-US relations is not dependent on the personality of American leaders, the role of which, however, should not be underestimated. Since there are differences between Biden, a politician, and Trump, a businessman, we should take it differently to strive for the best result. Of course, this does not mean that there is no end to compromise and surrender.

Thirdly, China's skillful multilateral diplomacy will weaken or even break down the effectiveness of Biden's joint allies to curb China. Especially in recent years, the contradiction and rift of the transatlantic alliance have been deepened due to trump's implementation of the "America first" and policies of quitting international organizations. It is very important that China should keep working hard with several Western European allies, especially Germany, France and Japan in the East.

The Evolving Global Landscape and Major Power Relations in the Midst of China-U.S. Strategic Competition

Zou Zhibo

It is the inevitable result of the transformation of international strategic landscape that China-US relations enter into the stage of competition and confrontation. With the rise of China, the world hegemony of the United States will be greatly impacted, the world order will be fundamentally changed, and the international order also needs to be greatly adjusted.

I. Centennial Changes and Future World Landscape

1. The world landscape is in the process of reconstruction

Under the influence of a series of internal and external factors, the strength and strategic advantage of the United States began to decline, and the picture of one superpower and multi-polarized powers is weakening. The trump administration's policy of "America First" is a sign that its strength has declined and it is unable to do what it wants. Today, the landscape of one superpower and multi-polarized powers is gradually dissolving, and the world order is evolving into a new one.

2. Future World Landscape

Only the United States and China have the conditions and elements to become a powerful country; In the future, the United States and China will both become superpowers, while Russia, Europe, Japan and India will become multi-polarized great powers, thus forming a world landscape of "two superpowers and multi-polarized great powers".

II. Prospects of China-US relations

With the major adjustment of the US policy towards China and the comprehensive upgrading of the US strategic suppression on China, China-US relations have undergone a qualitative change and entered a stage of competition and confrontation. After Biden takes office, the US foreign policy will be greatly adjusted, but the nature of competition and confrontation in China-US relations will not change, what changed will be the strategy and tactics.

The reasons why the United States changed its China policy and launched a comprehensive strategic attack on China are as follows: first, to prevent China from rising and threatening the global status of the United States. Second, the disillusionment of the preset goal of China's development and rise. Third, the United States attributes its decline to China.

From the perspective of Biden and his cabinet and advisers’ ideas, the US strategy and means towards China will be adjusted as follows: first, from going it alone to forming cliques. The second is to regulate China. Third, to collaborate in limited international affairs.

In Trump’s administration, although China faced a lot of unilateral pressure from the United States, the multilateral pressure was relatively small. In terms of long-term competition between China and the United States, the overall situation was favorable to China; however, after Biden came to power, China faced a decline in unilateral pressure from the United States, but a sharp increase in multilateral pressure, and the overall competitive situation was relatively unfavorable to China.

III. The Strategic Game between China and the United States and Great Power Relations

According to the needs of their own interests and the changes in the world picture, European, Russian, Japanese and Indian parliaments have made trade-offs and adjustments in their policies towards China and the United States, thus forming a great power relationship with intertwined interests and division.

1. Europe

Europe's China policy reflects a complex situation in which interests and contradictions interweave, and consensus and differences coexist: in strategy, Europe does not have the idea of containing China's rise, but is wary of China's rise; in politics, there are fundamental ideological differences between Europe and China, but they will not go too far to curb China's development; in diplomacy, both China and Europe adhere to multilateralism and free trade, but with differences on some specific issues; in terms of geography, there are no interest conflicts and contradictions between China and Europe, but the EU is worried about the European division might caused by the cooperation between China and some European countries; in terms of economy and trade, China and Europe are willing and have great potential to cooperate, though there are still some interest conflicts and disputes (such as industrial policies, intellectual property rights, etc.); in terms of humanities, the two civilizations learn from each other with a broad prospect of mutual learning, which, however takes both sides to reach a consensus. After Biden comes to power, Europe will take advantage from the recovery of EU-US relations and benefit from US pressure on China.

2. Russia

In the historical context of China-US strategic game, while strengthening the strategic cooperation with China to deal with the security threats and pressures from the United States and Europe, on the one hand, Russia will also make full use of the opportunity of China-US confrontation to serve its great power rejuvenation strategy. On the other hand, in today's world strategic picture, only by carrying out strategic cooperation and mutual support with China can Russia cope with the strategic pressure of the west, which is the basis of China-Russian relations and the trend of world landscape.

At the same time, Russia is a country with great power ambition, and its national attribute is neither the West nor the East. It must be a strategic choice for Russia to restore its former position as a great power in both ways. In this way, in the long run, Russia will not choose the "one-sided" policy between the East and the west, but will make use of the contradictions between the East and the West and the gap between big powers to make trade-offs and adjustments on specific issues according to the development and changes of the world landscape and situation, so as to serve its strategic goal of big powers.

3. Japan

Japan faces a difficult choice between China and the United States. Based on the current situation and future of the international landscape, Japan's choices may be as follows: first, Japan will still regard US-Japan alliance as the basic axis of Japan's security and diplomacy. Second, Japan will not choose sides between China and the United States. Japan's stand on America's containment of China is strategic disobedience and tactical cooperation; third, it pursues autonomy and great power status. In the long run, Japan is likely to evolve from the political and diplomatic thinking with the US-Japan alliance as the main body to a more balanced direction of returning to Asia.

4. India

The development of China-Indian relations is constrained by the structural contradictions between China and India: first, the China-Indian border disputes. Second, Pakistan. There are also contemporary practical problems: first, India’s Threat Perception of China. Second, India's regional hegemony ideology is serious. Third, homogeneous competition. In the Sino US strategic game, India's choice may be as follows: First, India will not chose side. Second, India will participate in the action of containing China in US strategic crackdown on China. Third, profit from the game between China and the United States.

The U.S. Economy Under an Out-of-Control Pandemic

Zhou Shijian

In September 2019, the Federal Reserve and the world's major economic institutions predicted that the U.S. economy will enter the downward channel from 2019 to 2020.

I. Trump pressured the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates and expand the table to save the U.S. economy from downturn

As the Federal Reserve has cut interest rates five times, expanded its balance sheet substantially, abused US dollar bills and the Treasury's excessive issuance of treasury bonds, the capital market has become active, greatly stimulating the stock market and bond market. As we all know, the stock market has already formed a huge bubble. Once it is broken, it will cause great harm to the financial market in the United States and even the world. In the United States, 10% of the rich own 92% of the shares. The abnormal prosperity of the stock market has led to serious polarization of society and even more social antagonism. The unlimited quantitative easing monetary policy of the Federal Reserve led to the depreciation of the US dollar and the decline of the US dollar exchange rate. According to the principle of economics, the result of a country printing money indiscriminately will cause inflation. The reason why the United States has not yet inflated is that it gain some advantage from the dollar as an international currency. But this kind of overprint will lead to higher inflation sooner or later.

II. The epidemic in the US is out of control and is seriously damaging the US economy.

In the 2020 US presidential election, it is not Biden who wins, but trump who loses. The major mistake is in the prevention and control of COVID-19, which has seriously affected the US economy, especially for the third industry, and caused a large number of workers to lose their jobs for long-term, have no money to pay rent and money to spend. The impact of the epidemic on the US economy and industrial structure is long and far-reaching, but the economic impact is not without any benefit. It has stimulated the development of medical rescue equipment, pharmaceutical industry and information industry, and the number of tablet computers, notebook computers, mobile phones and home color TV sets has increased greatly. Real estate sales are hot in some countries in the world, and the United States is no exception.

III. Trump's fiscal deficit has brought great pressure on the economy

Tax reduction policy has always cut both ways. The first is to stimulate economic growth, and the second is to reduce government revenue. After trump took office, he was eager for quick success and instant benefit. He only focused on the immediate situation, and did not consider sustainable development at all. Under the guidance of this idea, the federal government's fiscal deficit increased sharply. At the same time, the national debt increased sharply. Trump's debt will reach US $8 trillion in this term, which will soon catch up with the total debt of the Obama administration in eight years. The rapid growth of national debt has increased the burden of national debt service. Trump is using his great grandson's money to serve his re-election campaign.

IV. The uncertainty of Trump's policy leads to a sharp decline in attracting foreign investment

According to the statistics of the US Rhodium Group, China's investment in the US was US $45.5 billion in 2017, which dropped to US $5 billion in 2019, showing a precipitous decline. The United States is the largest economy in the world. Its development needs large-scale world funds to support and consolidate the international monetary status of the US dollar. Trump's insistence on opposing the perverse practice of economic globalization has resulted in a sharp decline in foreign investment in the United States for four consecutive years, which is a heavy blow to the American economy and has left irreparable future troubles.

V. Trump’s trade war madness hindered the development of US economy

Trump is on fire for trade wars, and his best skill was to impose high tariffs on foreign imports. On October 8, 2020, Robert Zoellick, former deputy secretary of state, former U.S. trade representative and former president of the World Bank, issued an article Trump will lose the new cold war against China, "Trump's China policy has always focused on putting on a successful posture, but it has completely failed. When Trump took office, he announced that he would eliminate the US trade deficit with China. But the deficit of $346 billion in 2019 is about the same as that in 2016.

Top 10 World News of 2020

 Chengxu/Sun Haichao

1. The COVID-19 epidemic has taken the whole world by surprise.

2. China has made a decisive contribution to the world's anti epidemic and become the only major economy to achieve positive growth, which plays a more significant role in driving the world economy.

3. The most bizarre presidential election in the history of the United States affects the nerves of the world, and the sequelae of political polarization and popular split will exist for a long time.

4. The signing of the regional comprehensive economic partnership agreement has injected vitality into the world economy, which is of great practical significance and exemplary role.

5. The situation in the Middle East is more turbulent, Trump is constantly stirring up trouble to transfer domestic contradictions, and religious and civilization conflicts between the United States and Europe and the Islamic world are looming.

6. Strategic conflicts between the United States and Russia continue unabated, and military confrontation, including nuclear deterrence, continues to escalate. There is no hope for the improvement of US-Russian relations.

7. The relationship between the United States and Europe has entered the most gloomy period since the establishment of the strategic relationship, and the two sides have reached the situation of no exchanges.

8. China's technology development has attracted worldwide attention. The Chang'e five moon "digging" and HUAWEI 5G's advanced nature mutually confirmed.

9. The G20 has become the most active and promising international organization, and China's leading role is increasingly obvious.

10. The American police's rough enforcement of the law has exposed the social injustice and serious racial discrimination in the United States to the world once again. "Black people's life matters" reverberates in every corner of the world.

A Follow-up of the Latest Development of Global Terrorism and Anti-Terrorism in the Post-Islamic State Era

Yuan Ze

In August 2014, in view of the major security threats posed by international terrorist forces to peace and security, economic development and social stability in Africa, the French government launched a counter-terrorism operation named "the crescent-shaped sand dunes" (also known as France's Operation Barkhane), sent troops to West Africa and eliminated the terror. This round of counter-terrorism operations, such as pouring ants' nest in soup, has a great effect on suppressing the momentum of violence and terror. But it has not been able to root out the fear of Africa. In view of this, it is generally accepted by the academic circles at home and abroad that in the face of the increasingly complex and gang terrorist threat, fighting alone is not possible, and superstitious force is not possible; only by using all resources and various means as a whole, and taking both specimens and governing, is the only way to build a "safe Africa". (To be continued)

China's National Security Outlook in the Middle East

Sun Degang

Since the establishment of the special envoy for the Middle East by the Chinese government in 2002, the concept of security governance with Chinese characteristics has gradually formed, reflecting the characteristics of fairness, balance, steadiness, practicality and comprehensiveness. Guided by the "new security concept", China has changed from passive response to active planning, advocated the settlement of disputes through political channels, and pursued "partnership and nonalignment". In this process, China advocates military, political, economic and social governance - actively participating in UN peacekeeping operations in the Middle East, carrying out hot spot diplomacy, promoting "development for peace", and attaching importance to dialogue among civilizations and exchange of experience in "de radicalization". In the future, in the security governance of the Middle East, China will actively seek momentum, from "crisis management" to "conflict resolution", from focusing on "normalization problems" to "sudden problems", from focusing on "exogenous problems" to "endogenous problems", from focusing on "traditional security issues" to focusing on "comprehensive security issues", and from dealing with "military security" to dealing with "economic security", from enjoying "peace dividend" to providing "security dividend". The new initiatives and propositions put forward by China are the safe public goods provided by China to the Middle East.

An Analysis of the Cause and Effect of America’s Changing Demographic

Li Changjiu

The United States is an immigrant country, and now Indians are the main aborigines accounting for only 2% of the total population of the United States. The trend of population composition in the United States is that the proportion of white people is shrinking, and the proportion of Hispanic, Asian and African Americans is expanding.

Since the first European immigrants stepped on the North American continent, "white supremacy" (or "white priority") has been existed from the North American colonies to American society. Among the colored races, Hispanic accounts for a high proportion, because from 1846 to 1848, the American people won the current Arizona, California, Nevada, New Mexico and parts of Colorado and Wyoming, covering an area of 1.2 million square miles,. Not only are two thirds of the U.S. oil capital concentrated in these areas, but also a large number of Mexicans are transferred to the United States to become second-class citizens. So far, Mexican population still accounts for 62.3% of the total Hispanic population in the United States. As Latin American countries are closer to the United States and have convenient transportation, immigration from Latin America to the United States is increasing. The demographic changes in the United States are also related to the age and fertility of the various ethnic groups.

For the United States, harmful divisions are becoming normal. If Trump continues to support "white supremacists" to create ethnic conflicts and political and social unrest, if Republicans and Democrats continue to fight, and if the American political society continues to tear apart, then the future of the United States will be difficult to be great again and will accelerate its decline.

The Role of Sectarian Issues in Shaping Saudi Arabia's Foreign Policy

Liu Zhongmin/Zhao Yuechen

This paper find that Saudi Arabia provides legitimacy for its tough foreign policy by shaping a set of sectarian contradictory discourse, but it also has a serious negative impact on itself. This paper focus on the object, process, effect and essence of the security of sectarian issues.

First, the object and process of securing sectarian issues. It is the inherent requirement and inevitable result of Saudi regime to shape sectarian contradiction and strengthen sectarian divergence, which has become the object of securing sectarian issues. Since the Middle East changes, Saudi Arabia's foreign policy has mainly mobilized Iran and its Shiite as enemies and threats by weaving "Shiite threat", and then interpreted and responded to the opposition protests in Saudi Arabia, and confront Iran’s influence by supporting its agents, even through direct military intervention.

Secondly, the limit and paradox of securing sectarian issues. As mentioned earlier, sectarian factors have become an important force for Saudi Arabia to mobilize domestic and regional forces against Iran and its allies. However, securing sectarian issues is only the expedient and ideological strategy of Saudi Arabia to deal with regional changes and domestic crises, not a long way, but also a lack of moral basis. The long-term measures to strengthen sectarian contradictions will only lead to an infinite vicious circle of regional international relations, which will seriously consume the material power accumulated by Saudi Arabia for a long time, and will not benefit its national image, and in turn aggravate the national security dilemma. What's more, Saudi regime has long allowed the development of sectarian opposition, which will not only aggravate the sectarian conflict and sectarian conflict, lead to the sectarian identity erode the national identity, hinder the economic diversification and religious moderation reform that Saudi Arabia is currently promoting, but also create conditions for the development and growth of extremism, and seriously threaten national security and regional security.

Challenges and Opportunities for Taiwan's Entrepreneurs Doing Business and Investing in Chinese Mainland

Wang Jianmin

The rise of US unilateralism and economic nationalism, the establishment of a comprehensive containment strategy against China and the global spread and influence of COVID-19 have brought the international economic and political order and the global industrial chain and supply chain into a new reconstruction period. The great changes in the situation of cross strait relations have a profound impact on the development of cross strait economic and trade relations, especially on the investment layout of Taiwan entrepreneurs. Taiwan entrepreneurs face many new challenges when investing in mainland. The mainland's economic recovery and sustained and stable economic development, huge market and great potential for development in the western region, and the continuous economic strategy of continuous opening up and economic development are also rare historical opportunities for Taiwan businessmen. If Taiwan entrepreneurs can seize this opportunity and make the right investment choice, it will create a new miracle of development.