The German car manufacturer Audi is currently causing a sensation at the Guangzhou Motor Show in southern China. The body of the new E-concept car, which Audi has jointly developed with its Chinese partner SAIC, only bears the letters AUDI instead of the four rings, the manufacturer’s iconic logo.
In an attempt to build on past successes in the highly competitive Chinese market, the manufacturer is even sacrificing parts of its identity. But will that be enough? There are now more than 60 Chinese car brands, many of which offer impressive technology. Julia Fiedler, who is in Guangzhou and has analyzed why German car manufacturers have difficulty winning over young Chinese customers, says: “A firework display of models in all price ranges.”
Our second piece is dedicated to climate action. Although Taiwan is barred from attending the World Climate Change Conference in Azerbaijan – as with other international conferences, due to pressure from the Chinese government – it voluntarily abides by its guidelines. After all, the subtropical island state already feels the effects of climate change. David Demes has written down exactly what the Taiwanese government is planning and what role Germany plays in its plans.
British author Samir Puri does not believe there will be a new Cold War – if only because emerging economies such as India, South Africa and Indonesia have little desire to join clear geopolitical fronts. For him, “the real story of this century is not the conflict between the West and the autocracies of China and Russia. It is the even bigger story of the shift away from a world created by the West,” writes Puri in his new book ‘Westlessness.’ Leonardo Pape introduces the author and the book.
Have an inspiring read and a pleasant day,
The German car manufacturer Audi has made a highly exciting public debut at the Guangzhou Auto Show in southern China. Together with partner SAIC, the Ingolstadt-based company has unveiled the brand new Audi E Concept. But instead of the manufacturer’s iconic four rings, the car only bears four letters: AUDI.
The decision to bury its own logo divides the car world. Is the bold rebranding a surrender to the Chinese competition or a declaration of war? Apart from the new logo, the design of the pale purple concept car is modern, minimalistic and could – with a different logo – also be on display at many other trade fair booths. In other words: It looks very Chinese, visually the car has little to do with Audi.
This makes one thing clear: The new model shows Audi’s willingness to be truly disruptive. Behind it is the awareness that something really needs to change. And this realization could be the first step towards an urgently needed breakthrough. But the price is high. Everything is subordinated to success in China – even sacrificing part of its identity.
SAIC-Audi turns its booth into an experience in which visitors can immerse themselves. They can take selfies with cameras that appear in four large Audi rings. Virtual reality allows them to explore a digital car projected onto an empty platform. The Audi E Concept is prominently enthroned in the center of the booth. “The old Audi logo was classic and looked good. But the new one is more youthful,” says a young woman. Will that be enough? Chinese customers are mainly looking at the price. The new SAIC Audi model is expected to be available for around 300,000 yuan, which is just under 40,000 euros – not exactly a bargain.
The trade fair offers numerous special discounts to encourage customers to make a purchase amidst the difficult overall economic situation. The discount is particularly high for one Volkswagen model: the VW Viloran van. One version of the vehicle, which costs the equivalent of 53,000 euros, even offers a discount of around 13,000 euros on the top-of-the-line configuration.
Even outside the trade fair, German manufacturers only offer some vehicles at a discount. “The ID.3’s price is so low that people are considering buying the car even though they consider the technology to be backward, for example, because the screen doesn’t respond quickly enough,” says Mark Rainford from the Shanghai-based industry portal Inside China Auto.
He also attributes the low prices to a general trend: “Covid was the beginning of a new era where life is more about experiences. Young people go out more, they go camping, surfing, they want to have fun. It’s no longer so much about the brand emblazoned on the bag or the car. Young people realize they don’t have to spend so much money to have a truly good experience.”
Customers who place less value on status symbols are not good news for German car manufacturers, who make their living from precisely that. The glamour is fading, and with it, the willingness to spend a lot of money. The coming summer will show whether the Audi E concept can still win over Chinese customers.
“If Audi made better electric cars, I might switch to Audi,” says a visitor to the booth in Guangzhou. Better electric cars – by this, Chinese customers primarily mean better digital functions. This is where the cooperation with SAIC comes in. In collaboration with its partner, the Advanced Digitized Platform was developed exclusively for China; its four central computers are a hundred times more powerful than previous models.
The platform also has an innovative 800-volt architecture for fast charging: Just ten minutes are enough for a range of 370 kilometers. The batteries are supplied by CATL. With a 100 kWh battery, the Audi is expected to achieve a range of more than 700 kilometers; the total output of the two electric motors is 570 kW, with acceleration from 0 to 100 km/h in 3.6 seconds.
“I think that’s smart, because you need a two-pronged strategy – one for China and one for the rest of the world. Working with a Chinese brand helps to save the reputation of German brands, which are not seen as so progressive here. At the same time, Audi can preserve its heritage of building excellent, solid cars,” says Rainford. “The only question is whether it’s not too late. Because there are now over 60 brands in China, and many of them are high-tech.”
Guangzhou also shows what high-tech looks like. The auto show is among the three most important in the country, along with those in Beijing and Shanghai. It is primarily a domestic exhibition, with over 1,100 vehicles on display this year, almost half of which are electric. The queue at the booth of newcomer Xiaomi is probably the longest. Some visitors wait an hour or more to see the SU7 Ultra, the high-performance version of the smartphone manufacturer’s highly successful first car. The first SU7 model from Xiaomi sold so well that the annual sales target of 100,000 vehicles had already been reached by November.
The prototype of the SU7 Ultra has 1548 hp and will be launched in March. Other manufacturers have also brought along high-performance models. EV manufacturer Jiyue describes its Robo X as a super sports car that combines AI and autonomous driving. In other words, the car, which accelerates from 0 to 100 in 1.9 seconds, is designed to drive autonomously on the racetrack using Baidu’s Apollo system.
Of course, very few people can afford super sports cars. Still, they are an impressive display of the technical capabilities of China’s car manufacturers – a firework display of models in all price ranges, starting at the equivalent of 7,000 euros for a mini EV from Geely. The trade fair is mainly attended by the younger, lifestyle- and price-conscious generation, who are wooed with free drinks and dance shows. Influencers broadcast the car message to the country via livestream, some of them paid for by the manufacturers. A visit to the booths of the top brands requires skillful zigzagging to avoid collisions with smartphone tripods.
When the world’s heads of state and government negotiate the future of the planet in Azerbaijan these days, one of the largest economies will be excluded. Although Taiwan ranks 14th among the wealthiest countries in the world measured by average income per capita, Taiwan’s Environment Minister Peng Chi-ming and other government representatives have not been invited to the World Climate Summit. Only Taiwanese NGOs are allowed to attend the summit as observers.
Despite the exclusion, Taiwan follows the COP29 virtually. The Taiwanese Ministry of the Environment has set up a special “war room” where Minister Peng and his department heads follow the negotiations every evening. Interested citizens can watch the livestream on Facebook, while Taiwanese NGO representatives are connected directly from Baku and share the latest information.
As a trained meteorologist and entrepreneur, Peng has personally attended eleven COP summits. Table.Briefings met the minister last week in Taipei during a talk with international media. Peng is clearly aware of the urgency of the climate issue for Taiwan.
As a subtropical island, Taiwan is already severely affected by the effects of climate change. Peng expects temperatures of 40 degrees Celsius in summer to be the norm in just ten years. He stresses that Taiwan is increasingly characterized by extreme weather, with devastating typhoons on the one hand and periods of drought on the other. “In Taiwan, we have a love-hate relationship with typhoons. They bring important water resources, but they also claim lives every time,” he explains.
These effects already have an economic impact on every single citizen through so-called “green inflation.” “This is not necessarily triggered by the levying of CO2 charges; it also happens that a typhoon destroys our crops and causes prices to skyrocket.”
The spread of infectious diseases such as dengue fever illustrates Taiwan’s climate vulnerability. Once confined to the south, the mosquito-borne disease increasingly appears in northern Taiwan. “We expect dengue fever to spread further north from Southeast Asia in the future and possibly also reach Japan,” says Peng.
Although Taiwan is not a member of the United Nations, the country is voluntarily abiding by the guidelines of the World Climate Conference. “Taiwan will never be number one in climate action, but we want to catch up quickly,” emphasizes Peng. In 2015, Taiwan set itself the goal of cutting CO2 emissions by 50 percent until 2050. Last year, the parliament passed a law to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.
An important step in this direction is the introduction of the “Taiwan Carbon Solution Exchange,” a platform for trading emissions credits, launched last month. From 2026, a CO2 levy of 300 Taiwan dollars per ton will also apply to companies emitting more than 25,000 tons of CO2 annually. That is the equivalent of 8.75 euros. The calculation is based on the previous year’s emissions.
In this context, Minister Peng expressed his gratitude for the good cooperation with the Federal Republic of Germany. “Over the past seven years, Germany has supported Taiwan in many ways, for example, by training colleagues in the field of emissions trading. Germany has helped us considerably here,” Peng told Table.Briefings. The minister had visited Germany as recently as September last year. “I hope to lead a delegation to Germany again next year, as the emissions trading scheme will be an indispensable part of Taiwan’s environmental policy,” he added.
Last week, Udo Philipp, State Secretary at the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action, was also a guest in Taipei. Philipp and Peng had already met in Germany last year. The State Secretary attended two German-Taiwanese economic cooperation and trade policy conferences and visited the semiconductor manufacturer TSMC in Hsinchu.
Germany welcomes the new TSMC plant in Dresden but also has some reservations, for example, regarding water and electricity consumption and environmental standards, explains Peng. “As Environment Minister, I have explained our position on TSMC. It reassured the Germans to hear first-hand that TSMC’s environmental standards are high.” He added that the exchange with Germany was extremely close.
Another government focus is the creation of a green growth fund worth 100 billion Taiwan dollars (around three billion euros). This fund is intended to support companies active in net zero emissions, the circular economy and other environmentally related projects.
Despite all efforts in emissions trading and green growth, Taiwan’s energy mix remains dominated by fossil fuels; coal and LNG accounted for almost 82 percent of electricity production last year. By 2030, the country aims to obtain 30 percent of its electricity from renewable sources, compared to currently just 9.5 percent. The expansion of wind energy is progressing slowly.
For the future, Peng envisions connecting Taiwan to international power grids. He points to Singapore, which plans to import green electricity from Australia, Indonesia and Malaysia via new undersea cables over the next few years, as it lacks land for solar and wind energy.
As an island that has to import 96.7 percent of its energy sources (including fuel), Taiwan is particularly vulnerable to geopolitical risks, such as a possible blockade by China. While Taiwan’s last nuclear reactor will be decommissioned in May next year, the public debate on nuclear power is still ongoing. Prime Minister Cho Jung-tai recently emphasized that Taiwan is open to using new nuclear technologies to meet the growing energy needs of the semiconductor and AI industries. David Demes
When Samir Puri accepted an invitation from the German business community to attend the Asia-Pacific Conference (APC) in New Delhi in October, he was not only amazed at the acute shortage of beer at the evening reception. Even more remarkable for him were the geopolitical and economic implications of the meeting between Germany and the host country. The representatives of the world’s third-largest economy were faced with an India whose Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, has openly stated his goal of soon moving up to this very position and who met Germany on an equal footing.
It was a memorable sight for Puri: “Such a conference would not have been possible 20 years ago, the economic balance of power was too different.” His impression fitted seamlessly into his geopolitical perception. “The real story of the century will not involve the West’s stand-off with the autocracies of China and Russia; it is the even bigger story of rebalancing away from the world crafted by the West,” writes Puri in his book Westlessness, published in July this year.
Samir Puri uses the term, borrowed from debates at the Munich Security Conference, to counter those observers who believe the world is entering a new era of the Cold War. In the already dawning “Westless” era, he writes, the West is losing some of its power to steer the world economically and politically. A Cold War like the one waged between the US and the Soviet Union is no longer possible, if only because there are no longer any actors of comparable dominance – and because major emerging economies such as India, South Africa or Indonesia and many other non-Western actors have little inclination to join clear geopolitical fronts.
Puri in no way questions the value of democratic ideals and the threat of autocratic powers. After studying at King’s College London and Cambridge, one of his professional stations as a civil servant in the British Foreign Office took him to the Donbas, as an observer during the Russian invasion from 2014. In an earlier book, Puri dealt with Russia’s expansionist ambitions and is currently researching how China is threatening Taiwan. He unhesitatingly refers to himself as a “Westerner”.
Samir Puri grew up in the UK. His parents had emigrated from East Africa, and both had roots in India: “My family has lived on three different continents in three generations: Asia, Africa, and Europe.” In 2020, Puri moved to Singapore, where he worked for three years on the organizing team of the Shangri-La Dialogue, Asia’s most important conference for security policy. He now works as an analyst at the think tank Chatham House from his new adopted home of Singapore.
He sees Singapore as a symbolic place of the “westernized” world – with a colonial past and a deep imprint of global capitalism, but with a pronounced cultural self-confidence – and without liberal democracy.
All of these characteristics can be found in different shades in many places in the non-Western world, including China, which, in Puri’s eyes, continues to stand for “the greatest economic success story outside the West in our lifetime.” However, very few countries follow China’s political model. Instead, many non-Western countries pursue a kind of “managed democracy” with more or less free elections and political discourse.
Samir Puri sees the world on the way to an age of multipolarity. He considers the recently enlarged BRICS+ group of states a striking expression of this development. Its aim is by no means to create a comprehensive alliance like the EU or NATO. However, precisely because of its non-binding nature, the bloc offers its members a platform to network with each other and cooperate flexibly: “Many observers see the lack of institutionalization of BRICS as a weakness, but it is actually a strength.”
Beyond geopolitics and global economic flows, Puri explores Indian films and Chinese video games, as well as the intricacies of hybrid cuisines and migration stories. In the best-case scenario, as his book suggests, the “Westless” world holds the promise of peaceful and equal encounters between diverse living environments. One may see this as a loss of one’s own supremacy – or a gain for all. Leonardo Pape
Why travel far away when one’s own country has so much to offer? With a good dose of campfire romance, RV manufacturers want to make traveling with a hotel room on four wheels appealing to potential customers in the People’s Republic, like here at the auto show in Guangzhou. Incidentally, the campfire in the picture is just the electrical illusion of a campfire. The mock-up probably symbolizes the future electrification of the motorhome fleet on the market.
The German car manufacturer Audi is currently causing a sensation at the Guangzhou Motor Show in southern China. The body of the new E-concept car, which Audi has jointly developed with its Chinese partner SAIC, only bears the letters AUDI instead of the four rings, the manufacturer’s iconic logo.
In an attempt to build on past successes in the highly competitive Chinese market, the manufacturer is even sacrificing parts of its identity. But will that be enough? There are now more than 60 Chinese car brands, many of which offer impressive technology. Julia Fiedler, who is in Guangzhou and has analyzed why German car manufacturers have difficulty winning over young Chinese customers, says: “A firework display of models in all price ranges.”
Our second piece is dedicated to climate action. Although Taiwan is barred from attending the World Climate Change Conference in Azerbaijan – as with other international conferences, due to pressure from the Chinese government – it voluntarily abides by its guidelines. After all, the subtropical island state already feels the effects of climate change. David Demes has written down exactly what the Taiwanese government is planning and what role Germany plays in its plans.
British author Samir Puri does not believe there will be a new Cold War – if only because emerging economies such as India, South Africa and Indonesia have little desire to join clear geopolitical fronts. For him, “the real story of this century is not the conflict between the West and the autocracies of China and Russia. It is the even bigger story of the shift away from a world created by the West,” writes Puri in his new book ‘Westlessness.’ Leonardo Pape introduces the author and the book.
Have an inspiring read and a pleasant day,
The German car manufacturer Audi has made a highly exciting public debut at the Guangzhou Auto Show in southern China. Together with partner SAIC, the Ingolstadt-based company has unveiled the brand new Audi E Concept. But instead of the manufacturer’s iconic four rings, the car only bears four letters: AUDI.
The decision to bury its own logo divides the car world. Is the bold rebranding a surrender to the Chinese competition or a declaration of war? Apart from the new logo, the design of the pale purple concept car is modern, minimalistic and could – with a different logo – also be on display at many other trade fair booths. In other words: It looks very Chinese, visually the car has little to do with Audi.
This makes one thing clear: The new model shows Audi’s willingness to be truly disruptive. Behind it is the awareness that something really needs to change. And this realization could be the first step towards an urgently needed breakthrough. But the price is high. Everything is subordinated to success in China – even sacrificing part of its identity.
SAIC-Audi turns its booth into an experience in which visitors can immerse themselves. They can take selfies with cameras that appear in four large Audi rings. Virtual reality allows them to explore a digital car projected onto an empty platform. The Audi E Concept is prominently enthroned in the center of the booth. “The old Audi logo was classic and looked good. But the new one is more youthful,” says a young woman. Will that be enough? Chinese customers are mainly looking at the price. The new SAIC Audi model is expected to be available for around 300,000 yuan, which is just under 40,000 euros – not exactly a bargain.
The trade fair offers numerous special discounts to encourage customers to make a purchase amidst the difficult overall economic situation. The discount is particularly high for one Volkswagen model: the VW Viloran van. One version of the vehicle, which costs the equivalent of 53,000 euros, even offers a discount of around 13,000 euros on the top-of-the-line configuration.
Even outside the trade fair, German manufacturers only offer some vehicles at a discount. “The ID.3’s price is so low that people are considering buying the car even though they consider the technology to be backward, for example, because the screen doesn’t respond quickly enough,” says Mark Rainford from the Shanghai-based industry portal Inside China Auto.
He also attributes the low prices to a general trend: “Covid was the beginning of a new era where life is more about experiences. Young people go out more, they go camping, surfing, they want to have fun. It’s no longer so much about the brand emblazoned on the bag or the car. Young people realize they don’t have to spend so much money to have a truly good experience.”
Customers who place less value on status symbols are not good news for German car manufacturers, who make their living from precisely that. The glamour is fading, and with it, the willingness to spend a lot of money. The coming summer will show whether the Audi E concept can still win over Chinese customers.
“If Audi made better electric cars, I might switch to Audi,” says a visitor to the booth in Guangzhou. Better electric cars – by this, Chinese customers primarily mean better digital functions. This is where the cooperation with SAIC comes in. In collaboration with its partner, the Advanced Digitized Platform was developed exclusively for China; its four central computers are a hundred times more powerful than previous models.
The platform also has an innovative 800-volt architecture for fast charging: Just ten minutes are enough for a range of 370 kilometers. The batteries are supplied by CATL. With a 100 kWh battery, the Audi is expected to achieve a range of more than 700 kilometers; the total output of the two electric motors is 570 kW, with acceleration from 0 to 100 km/h in 3.6 seconds.
“I think that’s smart, because you need a two-pronged strategy – one for China and one for the rest of the world. Working with a Chinese brand helps to save the reputation of German brands, which are not seen as so progressive here. At the same time, Audi can preserve its heritage of building excellent, solid cars,” says Rainford. “The only question is whether it’s not too late. Because there are now over 60 brands in China, and many of them are high-tech.”
Guangzhou also shows what high-tech looks like. The auto show is among the three most important in the country, along with those in Beijing and Shanghai. It is primarily a domestic exhibition, with over 1,100 vehicles on display this year, almost half of which are electric. The queue at the booth of newcomer Xiaomi is probably the longest. Some visitors wait an hour or more to see the SU7 Ultra, the high-performance version of the smartphone manufacturer’s highly successful first car. The first SU7 model from Xiaomi sold so well that the annual sales target of 100,000 vehicles had already been reached by November.
The prototype of the SU7 Ultra has 1548 hp and will be launched in March. Other manufacturers have also brought along high-performance models. EV manufacturer Jiyue describes its Robo X as a super sports car that combines AI and autonomous driving. In other words, the car, which accelerates from 0 to 100 in 1.9 seconds, is designed to drive autonomously on the racetrack using Baidu’s Apollo system.
Of course, very few people can afford super sports cars. Still, they are an impressive display of the technical capabilities of China’s car manufacturers – a firework display of models in all price ranges, starting at the equivalent of 7,000 euros for a mini EV from Geely. The trade fair is mainly attended by the younger, lifestyle- and price-conscious generation, who are wooed with free drinks and dance shows. Influencers broadcast the car message to the country via livestream, some of them paid for by the manufacturers. A visit to the booths of the top brands requires skillful zigzagging to avoid collisions with smartphone tripods.
When the world’s heads of state and government negotiate the future of the planet in Azerbaijan these days, one of the largest economies will be excluded. Although Taiwan ranks 14th among the wealthiest countries in the world measured by average income per capita, Taiwan’s Environment Minister Peng Chi-ming and other government representatives have not been invited to the World Climate Summit. Only Taiwanese NGOs are allowed to attend the summit as observers.
Despite the exclusion, Taiwan follows the COP29 virtually. The Taiwanese Ministry of the Environment has set up a special “war room” where Minister Peng and his department heads follow the negotiations every evening. Interested citizens can watch the livestream on Facebook, while Taiwanese NGO representatives are connected directly from Baku and share the latest information.
As a trained meteorologist and entrepreneur, Peng has personally attended eleven COP summits. Table.Briefings met the minister last week in Taipei during a talk with international media. Peng is clearly aware of the urgency of the climate issue for Taiwan.
As a subtropical island, Taiwan is already severely affected by the effects of climate change. Peng expects temperatures of 40 degrees Celsius in summer to be the norm in just ten years. He stresses that Taiwan is increasingly characterized by extreme weather, with devastating typhoons on the one hand and periods of drought on the other. “In Taiwan, we have a love-hate relationship with typhoons. They bring important water resources, but they also claim lives every time,” he explains.
These effects already have an economic impact on every single citizen through so-called “green inflation.” “This is not necessarily triggered by the levying of CO2 charges; it also happens that a typhoon destroys our crops and causes prices to skyrocket.”
The spread of infectious diseases such as dengue fever illustrates Taiwan’s climate vulnerability. Once confined to the south, the mosquito-borne disease increasingly appears in northern Taiwan. “We expect dengue fever to spread further north from Southeast Asia in the future and possibly also reach Japan,” says Peng.
Although Taiwan is not a member of the United Nations, the country is voluntarily abiding by the guidelines of the World Climate Conference. “Taiwan will never be number one in climate action, but we want to catch up quickly,” emphasizes Peng. In 2015, Taiwan set itself the goal of cutting CO2 emissions by 50 percent until 2050. Last year, the parliament passed a law to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.
An important step in this direction is the introduction of the “Taiwan Carbon Solution Exchange,” a platform for trading emissions credits, launched last month. From 2026, a CO2 levy of 300 Taiwan dollars per ton will also apply to companies emitting more than 25,000 tons of CO2 annually. That is the equivalent of 8.75 euros. The calculation is based on the previous year’s emissions.
In this context, Minister Peng expressed his gratitude for the good cooperation with the Federal Republic of Germany. “Over the past seven years, Germany has supported Taiwan in many ways, for example, by training colleagues in the field of emissions trading. Germany has helped us considerably here,” Peng told Table.Briefings. The minister had visited Germany as recently as September last year. “I hope to lead a delegation to Germany again next year, as the emissions trading scheme will be an indispensable part of Taiwan’s environmental policy,” he added.
Last week, Udo Philipp, State Secretary at the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action, was also a guest in Taipei. Philipp and Peng had already met in Germany last year. The State Secretary attended two German-Taiwanese economic cooperation and trade policy conferences and visited the semiconductor manufacturer TSMC in Hsinchu.
Germany welcomes the new TSMC plant in Dresden but also has some reservations, for example, regarding water and electricity consumption and environmental standards, explains Peng. “As Environment Minister, I have explained our position on TSMC. It reassured the Germans to hear first-hand that TSMC’s environmental standards are high.” He added that the exchange with Germany was extremely close.
Another government focus is the creation of a green growth fund worth 100 billion Taiwan dollars (around three billion euros). This fund is intended to support companies active in net zero emissions, the circular economy and other environmentally related projects.
Despite all efforts in emissions trading and green growth, Taiwan’s energy mix remains dominated by fossil fuels; coal and LNG accounted for almost 82 percent of electricity production last year. By 2030, the country aims to obtain 30 percent of its electricity from renewable sources, compared to currently just 9.5 percent. The expansion of wind energy is progressing slowly.
For the future, Peng envisions connecting Taiwan to international power grids. He points to Singapore, which plans to import green electricity from Australia, Indonesia and Malaysia via new undersea cables over the next few years, as it lacks land for solar and wind energy.
As an island that has to import 96.7 percent of its energy sources (including fuel), Taiwan is particularly vulnerable to geopolitical risks, such as a possible blockade by China. While Taiwan’s last nuclear reactor will be decommissioned in May next year, the public debate on nuclear power is still ongoing. Prime Minister Cho Jung-tai recently emphasized that Taiwan is open to using new nuclear technologies to meet the growing energy needs of the semiconductor and AI industries. David Demes
When Samir Puri accepted an invitation from the German business community to attend the Asia-Pacific Conference (APC) in New Delhi in October, he was not only amazed at the acute shortage of beer at the evening reception. Even more remarkable for him were the geopolitical and economic implications of the meeting between Germany and the host country. The representatives of the world’s third-largest economy were faced with an India whose Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, has openly stated his goal of soon moving up to this very position and who met Germany on an equal footing.
It was a memorable sight for Puri: “Such a conference would not have been possible 20 years ago, the economic balance of power was too different.” His impression fitted seamlessly into his geopolitical perception. “The real story of the century will not involve the West’s stand-off with the autocracies of China and Russia; it is the even bigger story of rebalancing away from the world crafted by the West,” writes Puri in his book Westlessness, published in July this year.
Samir Puri uses the term, borrowed from debates at the Munich Security Conference, to counter those observers who believe the world is entering a new era of the Cold War. In the already dawning “Westless” era, he writes, the West is losing some of its power to steer the world economically and politically. A Cold War like the one waged between the US and the Soviet Union is no longer possible, if only because there are no longer any actors of comparable dominance – and because major emerging economies such as India, South Africa or Indonesia and many other non-Western actors have little inclination to join clear geopolitical fronts.
Puri in no way questions the value of democratic ideals and the threat of autocratic powers. After studying at King’s College London and Cambridge, one of his professional stations as a civil servant in the British Foreign Office took him to the Donbas, as an observer during the Russian invasion from 2014. In an earlier book, Puri dealt with Russia’s expansionist ambitions and is currently researching how China is threatening Taiwan. He unhesitatingly refers to himself as a “Westerner”.
Samir Puri grew up in the UK. His parents had emigrated from East Africa, and both had roots in India: “My family has lived on three different continents in three generations: Asia, Africa, and Europe.” In 2020, Puri moved to Singapore, where he worked for three years on the organizing team of the Shangri-La Dialogue, Asia’s most important conference for security policy. He now works as an analyst at the think tank Chatham House from his new adopted home of Singapore.
He sees Singapore as a symbolic place of the “westernized” world – with a colonial past and a deep imprint of global capitalism, but with a pronounced cultural self-confidence – and without liberal democracy.
All of these characteristics can be found in different shades in many places in the non-Western world, including China, which, in Puri’s eyes, continues to stand for “the greatest economic success story outside the West in our lifetime.” However, very few countries follow China’s political model. Instead, many non-Western countries pursue a kind of “managed democracy” with more or less free elections and political discourse.
Samir Puri sees the world on the way to an age of multipolarity. He considers the recently enlarged BRICS+ group of states a striking expression of this development. Its aim is by no means to create a comprehensive alliance like the EU or NATO. However, precisely because of its non-binding nature, the bloc offers its members a platform to network with each other and cooperate flexibly: “Many observers see the lack of institutionalization of BRICS as a weakness, but it is actually a strength.”
Beyond geopolitics and global economic flows, Puri explores Indian films and Chinese video games, as well as the intricacies of hybrid cuisines and migration stories. In the best-case scenario, as his book suggests, the “Westless” world holds the promise of peaceful and equal encounters between diverse living environments. One may see this as a loss of one’s own supremacy – or a gain for all. Leonardo Pape
Why travel far away when one’s own country has so much to offer? With a good dose of campfire romance, RV manufacturers want to make traveling with a hotel room on four wheels appealing to potential customers in the People’s Republic, like here at the auto show in Guangzhou. Incidentally, the campfire in the picture is just the electrical illusion of a campfire. The mock-up probably symbolizes the future electrification of the motorhome fleet on the market.
