World future

Rana Mitter and Elsbeth Johnson August 23, 2021 Many people have wrongly assumed that political freedom would follow new economic freedoms in China and that its economic growth would have to be built on the same foundations as in the West. The authors suggest that those assumptions are rooted in three essentially false beliefs about modern China: (1) Economics and democracy are two sides of the same coin; (2) authoritarian political systems can’t be legitimate; and (3) the Chinese live, work, and invest like Westerners. But at every point since 1949 the Chinese Communist Party—central to the institutions, society, and daily experiences that shape all Chinese people—has stressed the importance of Chinese history and of Marxist-Leninist doctrine. Until Western companies and politicians understand this and revise their views, they will continue to get China wrong. Originally appeared in the May-June 2021 Harvard Business Review here When we first traveled to China, in the early...

Gordon Hahn on Guadalajara Geopolitics Institute August 10, 2021  Professor Gordon Hahn is interviewed by Hrvoje Morić of Geopolitics & Empire Gordon Hahn discusses what he calls the New East-West Cold War or Russia-West Tinderbox, which can potentially escalate into a WWIII scenario. He examines the key drivers between the Russia-West divide which is primarily EU/NATO expansion (e.g. Belarus, Ukraine, Donbass), a situation that will continue to fester and could explode at any moment unless it is resolved. He comments on China’s rise as a global hegemon and believes Russia and China will make Afghan inroads as the U.S. withdraws and the Taliban likely come to power. Finally, he looks at the “authoritarian-ization” or “Putin-ization” of America, where neo-liberals, leftists, and big tech have melded with the military-industrial-complex and oligarchic globalists who are pushing the U.S. toward a one-party state. Beyond that, these forces are pushing for some form of...

American economist Professor, Jeffrey Sachs exposes how America, its Western allies, the CIA and the defence industry have rigged the system to keep Africa from being prosperous. It is a stunning expose and rebuke to the present world order and why it must change. Jeffrey David Sachs is an American economist, academic, public policy analyst and former director of The Earth Institute at Columbia University, where he holds the title of University Professor. He is also a renowned leader in sustainable development, a senior UN advisor and a bestselling author. TFF’s work with global structural change, abolition of militarism and our long-term engagement with Somalia and Burundi has always emphasised one or more of the dimensions Sachs highlights so brilliantly – with both knowledge, eloquence and passion. Please share widely!

© Jan Oberg, “Capitol Hill, January 6, 2021” By Global Times August 7, 2021 Editor’s Note: “No alternative to the CPC in terms of people or a party with a program and a vision is known of inside or outside China,” said Carsten Boyer Thøgersen, a former diplomat with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark and the European Commission. How to objectively evaluate the CPC’s role in China’s social progress? Why cannot some Western media outlets and some Western forces separate the CPC from the Chinese people? How will the West’s prejudice of the CPC affect their China policies? Thøgersen shared his views with Global Times (GT) reporters Yu Jincui and Lu Yuanzhi.  Originally published at Globaltimes.cn GT: You have witnessed China’s reform and opening-up. It was reported that on November 20, 1976, a farmer in Hu county, Shaanxi Province drew a sketch of you, do you still remember...

William H. Overhalt July 20, 2021 President Biden’s foreign policy team says China is the priority, but the team lacks China expertise. Other than trade experience at the Office of the United States Trade Representative, Biden’s Cabinet has no China expertise. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has worked on issues involving Europe, Canada and the Middle East. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has a distinguished career as a general in Iraq and as leader of U.S. forces in the Middle East. National security adviser Jake Sullivan’s biography highlights work on Libya, Syria, Iran and Myanmar.  Originally posted by The Hill on July 7th, 2021 Biden’s lead candidate for ambassador to Beijing continues the pattern. Nicholas Burns has served in the Middle East and Europe. An Indiaphile and Sinophobe, he lacks China experience and disdains China experts with more complex views.  I’m a lifelong Democrat who criticized George W. Bush’s foreign policies. But Bush had outstanding success...

John Scales Avery TFF Associate July 14, 2021 I would like to announce the publication of a book which discusses the reasons why the institution of war continues to threaten human civilization and the biosphere, and the steps that might be taken to rid the world of war. The book may be downloaded and circulated free of charge from the following link: A new freely downloadable book Albert Einstein’s letter to Sigmund Freud “Why War?” – the title of this book, was also the title of a famous letter written to Sigmund Freud by Albert Einstein. In 1931, the International Institute for Intellectual Cooperation invited Albert Einstein to enter correspondence with a prominent person of his own choosing on a subject of importance to society. The Institute planned to publish a collection of such dialogues. Einstein accepted at once, and decided to write to Sigmund Freud to ask his opinion about...

Andrew Bacevich July 1, 2021 Has a new Cold War, this one pitting the United States against the People’s Republic of China, commenced? Rhetoric coming out of Washington, amplified by hawkish media commentary, appears to take a Second Cold War as a given, something perhaps even to be welcomed. Originally posted by Los Angeles Times on April 18th, 2021 If Cold War II looms, how will it compare with its predecessor? Does the term “Cold War” aptly describe the contest now being joined? Or might the revival of the term itself represent a potentially fatal misstep? The first Cold War, dating from 1947, centered on geopolitical competition with an overlay of ideology. The so-called free world, led by the United States, stood in opposition to the Soviet-led Communist bloc. Whatever the passing allure of Marxism-Leninism, that competition was never a contest between equals. Although the outcome may not have been...

Photo: Pankaj Mishra By Radmila Nakarada and Jelena Vidojević June 29, 2021 This conversation with the Indian-born essayist, novelist and historian Pankaj Mishra, took place before the US elections. Q: In your major writings you deal with the Western model of modernisation and in the suffering involved in its evolution, expansion and emulation. You have emerged as a prominent critic of the empire and its links to liberal ideas. Reviewers often depict you as the voice of the marginalised and excluded, humiliated, the victims. How would you define yourself today?  A: I think I was fortunate to write for mainstream publications in the United States and Britain from the late 1990s onwards, when the illusions of Americanising the world were at their strongest. Britain and America were being held as models for the rest of the world to imitate and no attention was being paid to their long past of slavery and...

Jan Oberg June 22, 2021 Empires come and go. Innovation, vision and power lead to their establishment. If they have good carrying capacity they spread, grow and mature. Their relative power begins to increase, ascendance in more than one field, then consolidation on top–a very dangerous moment when you are second to none–extension and peak and, sooner or later with over-extension–begins the decline, ’fatigue’, lack of innovation, vision and leadership, dissolution and unavoidable fall. All empires decline and fall none have lasted forever. The next – and last – empire to fall is God’s own exceptionalist country, the United States of America. The indicators are pretty obvious in all sectors including the Military-Industrial-Media-Academic Complex, MIMAC: Economic decline with uniquely high debts, muddling through with no vision (not an unclear vision but no vision) and trying to solve problems by just injecting money into a manifestly malfunctioning system instead of investing...

Cyrus Janssen May 19, 2021 Many Americans view China in a completely wrong way. They only view it from the eyes of an American. But how does a Chinese person view China? Is China a threat to the USA? Is China going to overtake the US? In today’s video I break down my thoughts on the America’s foreign policy towards China and reveal the truth about China. This video was posted at Cyrus Janssens Youtube Channel, May 14. 2021 About the author: Cyrus Janssen is an American Expat that has lived in Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Vancouver over the past 14 years. He is passionate about showing a true insight into China and loves sharing about his travels around the world. Here is his amazing YouTube Channel with 137 000 subscribers. A great example of citizens’ media/reporting – much better informed and free than many Western mainstream media reporters. Please...

Or – it isn’t every day you address several hundred million people The TFF report “The Xinjiang Genocide Determination As Agenda” has reached more people in more countries than virtually anything else we have produced the last few years. That is, outside the West, in Asia in general and in China in particular. All leading Chinese media have paid substantial attention to it in both their Chinese and English editions. It is as if there was a need for a substantial – not political – scholarly examination of the empirical basis of the accusation, or “determination,” that Western governments have issued spearheaded, of course, by the Trump and Biden Administrations. In the report we reveal that the documentation is very weak, the scholarly work biased and bordering on the anti-academic and that those who have brought the documentation are anything but independent. Instead, many of those who have provided the...

Photo taken on April 17, 2021 shows the Boao Forum for Asia International Conference Center in Boao Town, South China’s Hainan province. [Photo/Xinhua] Tom Fowdy April 28, 2021 At the Boao Forum for Asia, a regional summit for government, business and academia typically hosted in Hainan province, China said that it does not seek hegemony and that it does not strive to displace the United States, only seeking fairness and justice in the international system. This came amid the Western mainstream media repeatedly framing Washington and Beijing as being in a competition for global dominance. Unfortunately, this view is shared by many politicians in the United States increasingly depicting China as a threat and a strategic competitor – espousing the language of the Cold War. Originally published at china.org.cn What is hegemony? In international relations, a hegemon is a state that wields so much undisputed power that has almost complete...