Luxembourg’s Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn pointed out earlier this week that wars should not be waged during the Olympic Games. He referred to a United Nations resolution. “I believe that gives everyone time to think about war and peace and then make the right decision,” Asselborn said. A notion that also suits Xi Jinping at the moment. Nothing would be more inconvenient for him than a war in Eastern Europe overshadowing his Games. But will Vladimir Putin play along?
But Beijing is keeping a close eye on the Kremlin’s Ukraine tactics for a very different reason. The similarities between Ukraine’s symbolic importance to Russia and what China considers the breakaway province of Taiwan are obvious. Looking at Ukraine, Beijing is trying to figure out what reactions can be expected from US President Joe Biden and the West in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan, analyzes Christiane Kuehl.
Taiwan’s extremely successful chip industry is also in a bind. The high global demand is currently raking in record profits. At the same time, it could be crushed in the dispute between China and the USA, writes Frank Sieren in his analysis. Without Western know-how, even the best Taiwanese chip companies cannot remain competitive. And neither can they without the Chinese market.
I hope you enjoy today’s issue!
Did Xi or did he not? Earlier this week, Bloomberg reported that the Chinese leader had asked his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin at least not to invade Ukraine during the Winter Olympics. China’s foreign office spokesman Zhao Lijian immediately rejected the report on Monday as an attempt to divide Beijing and Moscow. An invasion that casts a shadow over the Winter Games “would not go down well in Beijing,” said Helena Legarda, a security expert at the China think tank Merics in Berlin. “But I can imagine that Putin would definitely consider it.” An invasion of Ukraine during the Games “could change relations with Russia completely.”
But China is likely concerned about more than just the spotlight from the Games. Because the obvious question is how Beijing would position itself in the event of a possible invasion. The more Russia allows the situation to escalate, the more difficult it will be for China to stay out of the Ukraine crisis. When Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, Beijing maintained its ironclad principle of “non-interference” in the affairs of other states.
So far, official Beijing has remained silent. Joe Webster noted in his blog on Russian-Chinese relations, that China’s military and diplomatic structures, as well as the state media, remain awfully quiet and without any opinion. The expert believes two reasons to be at play: “First, Beijing is uneasily balancing its security and economic interests. Second, […] ambiguity can be a useful tool.” It’s a tool Putin also likes to apply – especially when currently dealing with the West.
In fact, Beijing faces the difficult choice of either snubbing its partner Russia or potentially intensifying the conflict with the West. Both also entail economic risks for the People’s Republic. It is therefore likely that China will maintain a semi-neutral position for as long as possible – and, as usual, call for peace and dialogue. Direct support for Ukraine and NATO makes no sense for China, Legarda tells China.Table. “At the same time, Beijing will most likely not fully side with Russia either, because that also would not serve China’s interests.”
But an invasion would change the situation. “If Russia, hypothetically, invades Ukraine and a Western power gets involved militarily, it would be hard for China to stay out of it completely,” Legarda is convinced. While no one believes that soldiers of the People’s Liberation Army could be deployed to Europe, “China could offer Moscow more diplomatic support.”
But how far will this go? Webster regards the two states’ mutual aversion to a US-dominated world order as a uniting factor. “Both Moscow and Beijing continue to regard constitutional democracies as an obstacle to their geopolitical ambitions and, more importantly, a threat to their domestic political regimes,” he writes. Putin is increasingly willing to break rules and directly challenge the free world. “Beijing has operated more cautiously, but it has frequently – if only tacitly and quietly – supported Putin’s actions.”
Legarda also identifies mutual interests and concerns between the two partners. “But it’s not absolute. They don’t fully trust each other. For example, China is increasing its footprint in Russia’s former sphere of influence, such as Central Asia and the Arctic.” Russia sees that with suspicion. The balance is also increasingly shifting in China’s favor due to the economic rise of the People’s Republic. That could cause tensions in the future. Legarda does not yet consider the relationship a true alliance. “There are limits to what both would do for each other,” she says.
But there are isolated indications of growing geopolitical cooperation. Moscow has briefed Beijing on its negotiations with the US and NATO countries, Russia’s ambassador to China, Andrei Denisov, said on Tuesday. He also announced a possible “surprise gift” for bilateral relations during Putin’s visit. What that might be, he did not reveal. On Wednesday, diplomats from both countries decided to strengthen coordination of their Asia policy.
Economic relations have also increased. Shortly after Russia invaded Crimea, Beijing and Moscow signed off on the construction of the Power of Siberia gas pipeline in May 2014, which has since pumped natural gas to China. That pipeline has accelerated Russia’s “economic swing to China,” Webster writes. Between 2014 and 2020, Russian exports rose from about $42 billion to $57 billion – in part because of the expansion of oil pipelines along Russia’s Pacific coast.
China needs these Russian raw materials to fuel its economic growth. But as an export market, Russia is less important to the People’s Republic: “China exported almost as much to Mexico as to Russia in 2020. And China’s exports to Russia in 2020 represented only 0.3% of its 2020 GDP.” Conversely, it was four percent, according to Webster.
But the growing ties between the two states certainly have geopolitical consequences – especially when it comes to future sanctions against Russia. Since 2014, Chinese banks have largely complied with Western sanctions imposed in the wake of Russia’s incursions into Crimea and the Donbas region. That would be more difficult and costly for China today if those sanctions were tightened further, writes Chris Miller, Director of the Foreign Policy Research Institute’s Eurasia Program, in a newly-released study. “The decisions Beijing makes will either undermine sanctions or intensify their impact,” Miller writes. This, in turn, would affect how high Russia calculates the economic costs of a possible escalation.
If China decides to support Russia directly, it could transfer bilateral trade to other payment systems based on the Chinese currency, the renminbi. Beijing could also provide renminbi loans to Russia, which Russia could then use to source goods in China. “Such a move would be costly for China, as some of these loans might not get repaid,” Miller further writes. And it would significantly increase tensions between the US and China. But if successful, such renminbi payment systems could later become attractive to third countries that want to continue trading with Russia.
Such a scenario would be a severe blow to the efficacy of Western sanctions. But it is not out of the question. After all, according to Miller, China’s “alternative would be to tolerate major disruptions to China-Russia trade while watching the US demonstrate sanctions efficacy.” That sounds hardly appealing from Beijing’s perspective.
But that is not yet the case. First, Putin is flying to Beijing to attend the Olympic opening ceremony on February 4 to demonstrate friendship. Russian plans for a joint maneuver in Belarus rule out an attack before the end of the Games on February 20, according to Webster. From February 10-20, the two planned to hold maneuvers “to fine-tune the tasks of suppressing and repelling external aggression during a defensive operation,” according to official announcements. Putin has branded boycotts of the Games as “politicization of sport” in line with Beijing’s position. It is not known if he expects anything in return.
Helena Legarda believes that Ukraine will be a discussion point, even if neither of them explicitly urges it. “I think Putin and Xi will discuss their relations more broadly in the deteriorating geopolitical environment of 2022.” Webster expects they will both announce an agreement at the summit on a second gas pipeline called “Power of Siberia 2” – and perhaps an expansion of political or military cooperation. But would they also coordinate on a joint approach to the Ukraine crisis? Helena Legarda believes this to be unlikely.
China will probably hold its cards close to its vest and decide depending on the situation. But Legarda believes the conflict has a different dimension for the People’s Republic – one that has nothing to do with Russia. “In the event of a Russian invasion, China would observe the reaction of NATO and the West very closely. It will give Beijing information about a possible reaction of the West to a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan,” the expert says. Of course, the two cases can hardly be compared. But America’s reaction would tell China “whether there’s still an appetite in Washington to get involved in a conflict overseas – and to observe the level of coherence in the West.” Another reason why the West hopes that it won’t come to open aggression.
IOC President Thomas Bach had actually scheduled a lunch meeting with Chinese tennis player Peng Shuai in Beijing in January. The sports world is deeply concerned about the whereabouts of the world-class athlete after she accused a top Communist Party cadre of sexual assault and has since only appeared in public under mysterious circumstances. So far, however, the meeting has not happened.
Now the IOC has told China.Table that the appointment still stands and will take place during the Games. Since the first video phone call between Peng and Bach on November 21 last year, “the IOC team has kept in touch with her.” There have been several online meetings during which they “got to know each other better.”
According to the IOC, Peng expressed that she was very much looking forward to the Olympic Games and intended to follow the competitions and the performance of the Chinese team very closely. She is also looking forward to meeting Thomas Bach, to which the chair of the IOC Athletes’ Commission, Emma Terho, has also been invited. “In arranging the different conversations, the Chinese Olympic Committee has always been very supportive and will also ensure that the meeting can take place under very strict COVID-19 measures (…).”
The president of the International Olympic Committee has been in Beijing, the host city of the Winter Olympics that begin February 4, since last Saturday. State and party leader Xi Jinping has already met Bach for a face-to-face meeting. The IOC chief took the opportunity to express his admiration for the sports venues and the “efficiency, determination, and vigor” of the organizers. Whether it was also about Peng Shuai – nothing about this leaked to the public. According to the IOC, Bach and Xi spoke about the “strong support of the international community for the Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022.”
This assessment is astonishing. After all, it is already clear that numerous nations such as the United States, Australia, Japan, the UK, Denmark, and Canada will boycott the Games diplomatically because of China’s massive human rights violations. The German government is avoiding an official boycott, yet no German government representative has announced a trip to the People’s Republic. In addition, athletes and officials are increasingly criticizing China’s zero-covid strategy and even suspecting a possible manipulation of the Games.
Most recently, German five-time World Cup medalist Felix Neureuther expressed these suspicions in an interview with RTL/ntv. “It’s easy to manipulate these Games. And that’s where I think you have to take a very close look. Otherwise, the Games become an absolute farce,” said the former ski racer.
Neureuther believes that the host country could cheat its way to sports victories. He is certain that China would try to be successful in sports “by any means necessary.” “And what easier way is there to eliminate competition than with a positive Covid test? No one checks how the tests are controlled,” Neureuther told the TV station. German Alpine Head Coach Wolfgang Meier and the President of the German Snowboard Association, Michael Hoelz, also do not rule out potential manipulations of Covid test results.
The distrust against the Chinese organizers is the result of the authoritarian state leadership and the sheer endless list of human rights violations in China, which makes many Olympic participants sick to their stomachs. Three-time Olympic luge champion Felix Loch told ARD television before leaving for Beijing that the Games should never have been awarded to Beijing in the first place. “Nothing has changed” about the issues of human rights and freedom of the media.
At long last, Claudia Barkowsky can finally travel from China to Germany again. She has not been back to her home state of Brandenburg since the outbreak of the Covid pandemic two years ago. She is now visiting friends and family during the Chinese New Year – and is accepting a three-week quarantine in China to do so. ” Hopefully, you can work properly in the quarantine hotel,” she says.
The 45-year-old sinologist has lived in the Chinese capital for 17 years. Barkowsky has headed the China office of the German Engineering Federation (VDMA) since 2016. It is the largest foreign office of the VDMA: 850 of its approximately 3,400 member companies have invested in China.
The Covid pandemic and its effects have been the major challenge of the past two years, not only for her private life but also for her work. Barkowsky describes this period as “busy”: supply chain problems, travel restrictions, price developments, the trade disputes with the US – the turbulences of the past few years have directly affected VDMA companies in China. Added to this were unforeseen difficulties, such as acute power shortages last fall.
“All this has led us to be less optimistic overall about the Chinese market,” says Barkowsky. On the other hand, there is no pessimism, but rather increased caution: People are keeping a closer eye. Accordingly, the interest of managers at German company headquarters in China has risen sharply. “Now even management is reading the Five-Year Plan closely.”
Conversely, the Chinese management of VDMA companies is currently unsure whether and how the change of government in Germany will affect German-Chinese relations. “I am not too concerned, however, that the German government will make a change in direction here.”
Claudia Barkowsy has spent her entire career in China so far. The country made her independent at a very early stage. Even as a young newcomer, she was given a lot of trust and a lot of leeway, which gave her additional motivation. “I started from scratch here, both in my professional and private life,” she says. You can certainly go far in China with English. “But for me, mastering the Chinese language has always been the key to integration.”
She first traveled to China in 1999 while studying sinology at the University of Goettingen. She spent one academic year in Beijing. Although she had already studied Mandarin for three years by that time, her first contact with the locals was “very bumpy and frustrating.” “Hardly anyone understood my school Chinese.” That didn’t discourage her; rather, she was drawn to the challenge of exploring a foreign culture. This foreign Asia had already fascinated her as a child; the TV show “Revenge of the Samurai” was one of her favorite shows.
After studying sinology, Barkowsky returned to Beijing for an internship at the German Chamber of Foreign Trade – and got her first job there right away. She then worked for several years in expat management at Daimler. She deliberately left the expat bubble some time ago, she says, to give China even more room.
Even though she does not want to spend her retirement there, Beijing is still the center of her life. Even today, she likes to drink a coffee in the Forbidden City or visit the Great Wall. “It reminds me of my fascination with Chinese history and culture,” she says. This is something she is determined to hold on to. Adrian Meyer
Claudia Barkowsky is the representative of the German Engineering Federation (VDMA) in China.
Is everything already decorated for the Year of the Tiger? There are still a lot of red and gold trinkets left in Bangkok’s Chinatown for the Chinese New Year, which begins on February 1st. Large celebrations, as is usually the case around the Chinese holidays in the Thai capital, have been canceled due to the pandemic.
Luxembourg’s Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn pointed out earlier this week that wars should not be waged during the Olympic Games. He referred to a United Nations resolution. “I believe that gives everyone time to think about war and peace and then make the right decision,” Asselborn said. A notion that also suits Xi Jinping at the moment. Nothing would be more inconvenient for him than a war in Eastern Europe overshadowing his Games. But will Vladimir Putin play along?
But Beijing is keeping a close eye on the Kremlin’s Ukraine tactics for a very different reason. The similarities between Ukraine’s symbolic importance to Russia and what China considers the breakaway province of Taiwan are obvious. Looking at Ukraine, Beijing is trying to figure out what reactions can be expected from US President Joe Biden and the West in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan, analyzes Christiane Kuehl.
Taiwan’s extremely successful chip industry is also in a bind. The high global demand is currently raking in record profits. At the same time, it could be crushed in the dispute between China and the USA, writes Frank Sieren in his analysis. Without Western know-how, even the best Taiwanese chip companies cannot remain competitive. And neither can they without the Chinese market.
I hope you enjoy today’s issue!
Did Xi or did he not? Earlier this week, Bloomberg reported that the Chinese leader had asked his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin at least not to invade Ukraine during the Winter Olympics. China’s foreign office spokesman Zhao Lijian immediately rejected the report on Monday as an attempt to divide Beijing and Moscow. An invasion that casts a shadow over the Winter Games “would not go down well in Beijing,” said Helena Legarda, a security expert at the China think tank Merics in Berlin. “But I can imagine that Putin would definitely consider it.” An invasion of Ukraine during the Games “could change relations with Russia completely.”
But China is likely concerned about more than just the spotlight from the Games. Because the obvious question is how Beijing would position itself in the event of a possible invasion. The more Russia allows the situation to escalate, the more difficult it will be for China to stay out of the Ukraine crisis. When Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, Beijing maintained its ironclad principle of “non-interference” in the affairs of other states.
So far, official Beijing has remained silent. Joe Webster noted in his blog on Russian-Chinese relations, that China’s military and diplomatic structures, as well as the state media, remain awfully quiet and without any opinion. The expert believes two reasons to be at play: “First, Beijing is uneasily balancing its security and economic interests. Second, […] ambiguity can be a useful tool.” It’s a tool Putin also likes to apply – especially when currently dealing with the West.
In fact, Beijing faces the difficult choice of either snubbing its partner Russia or potentially intensifying the conflict with the West. Both also entail economic risks for the People’s Republic. It is therefore likely that China will maintain a semi-neutral position for as long as possible – and, as usual, call for peace and dialogue. Direct support for Ukraine and NATO makes no sense for China, Legarda tells China.Table. “At the same time, Beijing will most likely not fully side with Russia either, because that also would not serve China’s interests.”
But an invasion would change the situation. “If Russia, hypothetically, invades Ukraine and a Western power gets involved militarily, it would be hard for China to stay out of it completely,” Legarda is convinced. While no one believes that soldiers of the People’s Liberation Army could be deployed to Europe, “China could offer Moscow more diplomatic support.”
But how far will this go? Webster regards the two states’ mutual aversion to a US-dominated world order as a uniting factor. “Both Moscow and Beijing continue to regard constitutional democracies as an obstacle to their geopolitical ambitions and, more importantly, a threat to their domestic political regimes,” he writes. Putin is increasingly willing to break rules and directly challenge the free world. “Beijing has operated more cautiously, but it has frequently – if only tacitly and quietly – supported Putin’s actions.”
Legarda also identifies mutual interests and concerns between the two partners. “But it’s not absolute. They don’t fully trust each other. For example, China is increasing its footprint in Russia’s former sphere of influence, such as Central Asia and the Arctic.” Russia sees that with suspicion. The balance is also increasingly shifting in China’s favor due to the economic rise of the People’s Republic. That could cause tensions in the future. Legarda does not yet consider the relationship a true alliance. “There are limits to what both would do for each other,” she says.
But there are isolated indications of growing geopolitical cooperation. Moscow has briefed Beijing on its negotiations with the US and NATO countries, Russia’s ambassador to China, Andrei Denisov, said on Tuesday. He also announced a possible “surprise gift” for bilateral relations during Putin’s visit. What that might be, he did not reveal. On Wednesday, diplomats from both countries decided to strengthen coordination of their Asia policy.
Economic relations have also increased. Shortly after Russia invaded Crimea, Beijing and Moscow signed off on the construction of the Power of Siberia gas pipeline in May 2014, which has since pumped natural gas to China. That pipeline has accelerated Russia’s “economic swing to China,” Webster writes. Between 2014 and 2020, Russian exports rose from about $42 billion to $57 billion – in part because of the expansion of oil pipelines along Russia’s Pacific coast.
China needs these Russian raw materials to fuel its economic growth. But as an export market, Russia is less important to the People’s Republic: “China exported almost as much to Mexico as to Russia in 2020. And China’s exports to Russia in 2020 represented only 0.3% of its 2020 GDP.” Conversely, it was four percent, according to Webster.
But the growing ties between the two states certainly have geopolitical consequences – especially when it comes to future sanctions against Russia. Since 2014, Chinese banks have largely complied with Western sanctions imposed in the wake of Russia’s incursions into Crimea and the Donbas region. That would be more difficult and costly for China today if those sanctions were tightened further, writes Chris Miller, Director of the Foreign Policy Research Institute’s Eurasia Program, in a newly-released study. “The decisions Beijing makes will either undermine sanctions or intensify their impact,” Miller writes. This, in turn, would affect how high Russia calculates the economic costs of a possible escalation.
If China decides to support Russia directly, it could transfer bilateral trade to other payment systems based on the Chinese currency, the renminbi. Beijing could also provide renminbi loans to Russia, which Russia could then use to source goods in China. “Such a move would be costly for China, as some of these loans might not get repaid,” Miller further writes. And it would significantly increase tensions between the US and China. But if successful, such renminbi payment systems could later become attractive to third countries that want to continue trading with Russia.
Such a scenario would be a severe blow to the efficacy of Western sanctions. But it is not out of the question. After all, according to Miller, China’s “alternative would be to tolerate major disruptions to China-Russia trade while watching the US demonstrate sanctions efficacy.” That sounds hardly appealing from Beijing’s perspective.
But that is not yet the case. First, Putin is flying to Beijing to attend the Olympic opening ceremony on February 4 to demonstrate friendship. Russian plans for a joint maneuver in Belarus rule out an attack before the end of the Games on February 20, according to Webster. From February 10-20, the two planned to hold maneuvers “to fine-tune the tasks of suppressing and repelling external aggression during a defensive operation,” according to official announcements. Putin has branded boycotts of the Games as “politicization of sport” in line with Beijing’s position. It is not known if he expects anything in return.
Helena Legarda believes that Ukraine will be a discussion point, even if neither of them explicitly urges it. “I think Putin and Xi will discuss their relations more broadly in the deteriorating geopolitical environment of 2022.” Webster expects they will both announce an agreement at the summit on a second gas pipeline called “Power of Siberia 2” – and perhaps an expansion of political or military cooperation. But would they also coordinate on a joint approach to the Ukraine crisis? Helena Legarda believes this to be unlikely.
China will probably hold its cards close to its vest and decide depending on the situation. But Legarda believes the conflict has a different dimension for the People’s Republic – one that has nothing to do with Russia. “In the event of a Russian invasion, China would observe the reaction of NATO and the West very closely. It will give Beijing information about a possible reaction of the West to a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan,” the expert says. Of course, the two cases can hardly be compared. But America’s reaction would tell China “whether there’s still an appetite in Washington to get involved in a conflict overseas – and to observe the level of coherence in the West.” Another reason why the West hopes that it won’t come to open aggression.
IOC President Thomas Bach had actually scheduled a lunch meeting with Chinese tennis player Peng Shuai in Beijing in January. The sports world is deeply concerned about the whereabouts of the world-class athlete after she accused a top Communist Party cadre of sexual assault and has since only appeared in public under mysterious circumstances. So far, however, the meeting has not happened.
Now the IOC has told China.Table that the appointment still stands and will take place during the Games. Since the first video phone call between Peng and Bach on November 21 last year, “the IOC team has kept in touch with her.” There have been several online meetings during which they “got to know each other better.”
According to the IOC, Peng expressed that she was very much looking forward to the Olympic Games and intended to follow the competitions and the performance of the Chinese team very closely. She is also looking forward to meeting Thomas Bach, to which the chair of the IOC Athletes’ Commission, Emma Terho, has also been invited. “In arranging the different conversations, the Chinese Olympic Committee has always been very supportive and will also ensure that the meeting can take place under very strict COVID-19 measures (…).”
The president of the International Olympic Committee has been in Beijing, the host city of the Winter Olympics that begin February 4, since last Saturday. State and party leader Xi Jinping has already met Bach for a face-to-face meeting. The IOC chief took the opportunity to express his admiration for the sports venues and the “efficiency, determination, and vigor” of the organizers. Whether it was also about Peng Shuai – nothing about this leaked to the public. According to the IOC, Bach and Xi spoke about the “strong support of the international community for the Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022.”
This assessment is astonishing. After all, it is already clear that numerous nations such as the United States, Australia, Japan, the UK, Denmark, and Canada will boycott the Games diplomatically because of China’s massive human rights violations. The German government is avoiding an official boycott, yet no German government representative has announced a trip to the People’s Republic. In addition, athletes and officials are increasingly criticizing China’s zero-covid strategy and even suspecting a possible manipulation of the Games.
Most recently, German five-time World Cup medalist Felix Neureuther expressed these suspicions in an interview with RTL/ntv. “It’s easy to manipulate these Games. And that’s where I think you have to take a very close look. Otherwise, the Games become an absolute farce,” said the former ski racer.
Neureuther believes that the host country could cheat its way to sports victories. He is certain that China would try to be successful in sports “by any means necessary.” “And what easier way is there to eliminate competition than with a positive Covid test? No one checks how the tests are controlled,” Neureuther told the TV station. German Alpine Head Coach Wolfgang Meier and the President of the German Snowboard Association, Michael Hoelz, also do not rule out potential manipulations of Covid test results.
The distrust against the Chinese organizers is the result of the authoritarian state leadership and the sheer endless list of human rights violations in China, which makes many Olympic participants sick to their stomachs. Three-time Olympic luge champion Felix Loch told ARD television before leaving for Beijing that the Games should never have been awarded to Beijing in the first place. “Nothing has changed” about the issues of human rights and freedom of the media.
At long last, Claudia Barkowsky can finally travel from China to Germany again. She has not been back to her home state of Brandenburg since the outbreak of the Covid pandemic two years ago. She is now visiting friends and family during the Chinese New Year – and is accepting a three-week quarantine in China to do so. ” Hopefully, you can work properly in the quarantine hotel,” she says.
The 45-year-old sinologist has lived in the Chinese capital for 17 years. Barkowsky has headed the China office of the German Engineering Federation (VDMA) since 2016. It is the largest foreign office of the VDMA: 850 of its approximately 3,400 member companies have invested in China.
The Covid pandemic and its effects have been the major challenge of the past two years, not only for her private life but also for her work. Barkowsky describes this period as “busy”: supply chain problems, travel restrictions, price developments, the trade disputes with the US – the turbulences of the past few years have directly affected VDMA companies in China. Added to this were unforeseen difficulties, such as acute power shortages last fall.
“All this has led us to be less optimistic overall about the Chinese market,” says Barkowsky. On the other hand, there is no pessimism, but rather increased caution: People are keeping a closer eye. Accordingly, the interest of managers at German company headquarters in China has risen sharply. “Now even management is reading the Five-Year Plan closely.”
Conversely, the Chinese management of VDMA companies is currently unsure whether and how the change of government in Germany will affect German-Chinese relations. “I am not too concerned, however, that the German government will make a change in direction here.”
Claudia Barkowsy has spent her entire career in China so far. The country made her independent at a very early stage. Even as a young newcomer, she was given a lot of trust and a lot of leeway, which gave her additional motivation. “I started from scratch here, both in my professional and private life,” she says. You can certainly go far in China with English. “But for me, mastering the Chinese language has always been the key to integration.”
She first traveled to China in 1999 while studying sinology at the University of Goettingen. She spent one academic year in Beijing. Although she had already studied Mandarin for three years by that time, her first contact with the locals was “very bumpy and frustrating.” “Hardly anyone understood my school Chinese.” That didn’t discourage her; rather, she was drawn to the challenge of exploring a foreign culture. This foreign Asia had already fascinated her as a child; the TV show “Revenge of the Samurai” was one of her favorite shows.
After studying sinology, Barkowsky returned to Beijing for an internship at the German Chamber of Foreign Trade – and got her first job there right away. She then worked for several years in expat management at Daimler. She deliberately left the expat bubble some time ago, she says, to give China even more room.
Even though she does not want to spend her retirement there, Beijing is still the center of her life. Even today, she likes to drink a coffee in the Forbidden City or visit the Great Wall. “It reminds me of my fascination with Chinese history and culture,” she says. This is something she is determined to hold on to. Adrian Meyer
Claudia Barkowsky is the representative of the German Engineering Federation (VDMA) in China.
Is everything already decorated for the Year of the Tiger? There are still a lot of red and gold trinkets left in Bangkok’s Chinatown for the Chinese New Year, which begins on February 1st. Large celebrations, as is usually the case around the Chinese holidays in the Thai capital, have been canceled due to the pandemic.
