Things have been rather quiet around the emerging power alliance BRICS in recent years. Its members were too busy with domestic concerns (Brazil, South Africa) or conflicts with each other (India – China). But in the geopolitical competition between the West and China, the BRICS alliance seems to become a new platform for Xi Jinping, analyzes Felix Lee. Together with the Western-shunned Vladimir Putin, Xi wants to strengthen the cooperation in the BRICS bloc.
The German government sees this development with concern and wants to prevent the formation of a new bloc. According to analysts, this could be almost impossible to avert. China tries far too hard to divide the world into factions. And not without reason: China would be the strongest player in any alliance that excludes the United States. The People’s Republic has left the other BRICS countries far behind economically, militarily, and power-politically.
Solar power from space – what may at first glance sound like the plan of a James Bond villain is under serious research by Chinese scientists. The first step is to send a test satellite into space to transmit solar power to a ground station via microwaves or lasers. By 2050, the capacity is to be gradually increased to two gigawatts – the output of two nuclear reactors. This is far too little for the energy transition and would also come too late. Our team in Beijing looked at the pros and cons of this technology. It could potentially be more suited for military purposes: To supply remote military bases with power.
The Western world stares at an eight-day marathon of events over the next few days, including the EU summit in Brussels, the G7 meeting in Elmau, and the NATO summit in Brussels. And as far as the war in Ukraine is concerned, the participating leaders agree, at least in principle: Russia is the aggressor in this conflict. The country is sanctioned, and Russian President Vladimir Putin is ostracized.
Some eight thousand kilometers to the east, China’s President Xi Jinping is presiding over an online meeting of politicians from BRICS countries, the association of the largest emerging economies Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. In this circle, Putin is no pariah.
On the contrary, Xi once again sharply criticized Western sanctions against Russia at the opening of the summit. “Facts once again have proven that sanctions are a double-edged sword.” Xi did not mention the United States or the NATO countries by name. And he also avoided formally declaring support for Russia. Apparently, Xi does not want to risk Western sanctions expanding to China. Nevertheless, his opening speech made it clear that he sees Moscow as an important partner against a common enemy: the United States.
Even before the virtual summit started, China’s president repeatedly emphasized that BRICS countries collectively account for about 40 percent of the global population, generate almost a quarter of the world’s gross domestic product, and dominate a fifth of global trade. And indeed, all five countries have not joined in the West’s sanctions against Russia. China and India even import more Russian oil and gas than ever before (China.Table reported). Russia has even become the largest oil supplier to China, surpassing Saudi Arabia. Xi used the unity among the emerging countries at the virtual BRICS meeting, not least to take a swing at the USA and the West.
In the face of so much unity in eastern Eurasia, it seems almost ominous that there will be far more discord between the Western allies at the G7 summit. And it will be precisely over the question of how to deal with China. At the beginning of the week, the German government announced that it would campaign for a rapprochement with the People’s Republic at the summit. It was important to prevent the formation of a bloc, with the West on one side and China and Russia on the other, according to German summit circles. The closer alliance among the BRICS countries is viewed with concern. The summit begins on Sunday in Elmau, Bavaria.
Above all, the United Kingdom and the United States will probably see things differently. At the last G7 summit in Cornwall, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson already advocated a clear position against China’s aggression. Germany blocked – for fear of consequences for economic relations, which are particularly deep between Germany and China. The US had already indicated in Cornwall that the Germans would have to decide which side they would be on in the future.
Political scientist Eberhard Sandschneider believes that the German government’s proposal, as host of this year’s G7, to focus less on confrontation with China is “the right thing to do”. Solutions at the global level, especially problems that know no borders, such as climate protection or trade regulations, can ultimately be better solved at the multilateral level, said the East Asia expert. This would be more cost-effective for all parties involved. But for the moment, the power-political signs are pointing in a different direction. “I don’t see that the German chancellor is strong enough to counter this trend at the moment,” he noted.
Other experts share a similar view. “The German government must look the new realities squarely in the eye,” says Mikko Huotari, Director of the Mercator Institute for China Studies (MERICS). Even if bloc formation is not in Europe’s interest, the bipolarity of the world intensifies – both in economic and security terms – all driven by the Chinese side, the Chinese expert said. “In Beijing, the world is increasingly seen through this lens – and the ideological rejection by the West.”
For Beijing, close cooperation with Russia is also a form of reassurance against the United States. Huotari recommends: “Germany, together with its European partners, must work to ensure that friendly states have a choice at all – without forcing them to make a choice.”
At the same time, the BRICS summit in particular, as a counter-event to the three Western summits, shows that polarization continues and is becoming more entrenched. China and Russia have a great interest in closer ties with as many countries as possible – including the other three BRICS countries – at least to the extent that they remain neutral. The bloc formation, which Germany wants to counter, is already in full swing.
In the search for new forms of energy generation, Chinese researchers have their sights set on Earth’s orbit for a spectacular experiment. As early as 2028 – and thus two years earlier than initially planned – the People’s Republic intends to launch its space solar power plant program. This was reported by the South China Morning Post with reference to a study published in the journal Chinese Space Science and Technology.
Such a project is controversial among experts. Many of them simply dismiss the idea of solar power plants in space as science fiction. However, there are arguments that speak for testing the new technology and collecting valuable experience. This is precisely what the Chinese scientists are likely to be interested in. After all, Japanese researchers have already successfully proven the viability of this technology.
Nowadays, solar power is considered one of the most important forms of renewable energy. However, as is well known, the technology only works when there are no clouds blocking the sun. Moreover, a significant portion of the incoming radiation is lost on its way through the Earth’s atmosphere due to effects such as reflection and absorption. Solar power plants in space, on the other hand, could absorb solar radiation around the clock and convert it into microwaves, which could subsequently be sent to corresponding ground stations and fed into the power grid from there.
In the first phase, according to the Chinese research report, a first satellite could be launched in six years to test the wireless transmission of energy from 400 kilometers above the ground. The module would convert solar energy into microwaves or lasers. These would then be sent to a ground station on Earth. This first space solar power plant would have an output of ten kilowatts. This would be a test at best; it is not yet a contribution to the power supply. Later, however, the technology could be “scaled up significantly,” Professor Dong Shiwei claims in his paper.
Some of the advantages that researchers attribute to the technology include:
The disadvantages mentioned are:
Professor Dong and his team do not hide the fact that this is a project with huge hurdles.
Emitting high-power microwaves over a long distance would require an antenna hundreds or even thousands of meters long in space. Any movement caused by solar winds or the station’s thrusters reduces its efficiency and accuracy. According to Dong, Chinese researchers have recently made significant progress at least in controlling and precisely pointing such an antenna.
China’s plans involve the construction of a complete space solar power plant in four stages. If the initial experiments succeed, another powerful satellite would be launched into space just two years after the first launch. A 10-megawatt power plant could then send power to some military and civilian end users by 2035. By 2050, the station’s power could then be expanded to two gigawatts. That is roughly equivalent to one nuclear power plant.
China is likely to be in a hurry with its plans, as energy problems are pressing. Other countries are also interested in the technology. The United Kingdom, for example, wants to build a similar power plant by 2035. In the United States, too, the United States Naval Research Laboratory has already tested solar power generation in space using a Boeing X-37 B space plane. Joern Petring/Gregor Koppenburg
China’s urban populations have been enduring some of the most intense infection-prevention measures of the COVID-19 pandemic. For 60 straight days, Shanghai’s 27 million residents were forced into a strict lockdown – and they were not alone. During the peak of the Omicron BA.2 wave in April and May, 45 cities with a total of 373 million people were under some sort of lockdown. That is more than the combined populations of the United States (329.5 million) and Canada (38 million), and 83% of the population of the European Union (447 million).
China’s “zero-COVID” strategy has wreaked havoc on its economy and its people. But the Omicron wave has also highlighted its elderly population’s continuing vulnerability to the virus. As of June 2, 40% of those over 60 – around 95 million people – had not received any doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, even though they are at higher risk of severe illness and death from the disease.
One reason for the low vaccination rate is that the Chinese population has simply grown accustomed to the low rates of COVID-19 infections over the past two years. Now that the Omicron wave has struck, the higher perceived risk of remaining unvaccinated should increase vaccination among the elderly somewhat.
Another reason for the low vaccination rate among the elderly, however, is that many fear the side effects. To counter this, the Chinese government recently introduced a COVID-19 vaccine insurance package for individuals over 60. Vaccine recipients who fall genuinely ill stand to receive $75,000 – more than four times the country’s average annual income ($15,950). This is a clever idea. But it will not suffice, because the bigger obstacle is the lack of trust between the Chinese public and the medical establishment.
To be sure, all countries have faced difficulties in convincing concerned populations that the benefits of vaccines outweigh the risks. In the US, 15% of people remain unvaccinated against COVID-19, and 42% of this group say they don’t trust the vaccines. Still, this is a tremendous improvement from September 2020, when 49% of American adults said they would not take a vaccine if one were available. Within that cohort, 76% of survey respondents cited concerns about side effects.
The Chinese and American vaccine-resistant populations thus share a fear of side effects. But the Chinese and US medical establishments have responded to these concerns in very different ways.
In the US, the medical establishment has tried to build trust by conducting independent and transparent medical trials, the results of which are reported in uncensored publications and subject to open deliberation at all levels – by experts, journalists, politicians, and the public. This approach builds on two well-known maxims of public health: trust in the medical establishment will increase the uptake of treatments; and such trust is built through transparency and open deliberation.
In contrast, China’s approach has been almost completely opaque. The government has released very limited data on vaccine trials, and it has censored all discussion of side effects – even common minor ones such as soreness from the injection. Chinese authorities have followed the maxim that information about controversial topics should be withheld to prevent the airing of views that might run counter to government objectives.
This strategy has proved counterproductive, because it creates an information vacuum that can be filled only by rumor, speculation, and conspiracy theories. The current failure contrasts sharply with China’s own past success with deliberative decision-making on matters of health policy. After the 2002-04 SARS outbreak, China permitted a constructive debate about problems in its health system. As many noted, over 80% of rural residents, and 40% of urban dwellers, had no health insurance of any kind at the time.
In response, the government announced in 2009 that it would invest ¥850 billion ($127 billion at today’s exchange rate) to provide health coverage for 90% of the population. The next two years featured intensive discussions among and between national and regional policymakers, health experts, community leaders, journalists, and the public. The deliberations led to many amendments in the proposed policy. Though the final product was not perfect, it proved popular and led to widespread adoption of health insurance. By 2021, 95% of Chinese had some form of coverage.
Of course, deliberation about COVID-19 vaccines will need to be faster and will not be cost-free. The Chinese vaccines would draw criticism, and some people would still be turned off by common side effects (such as fevers) or rarer risks (such as allergic reactions). Others would criticize the government’s handling of the pandemic, if given the chance.
But these short-run costs are worth the long-term benefits of building trust in public-health authorities and increasing vaccination rates over time. As other countries have found, disclosing negative information about vaccines might increase public reluctance in the short run, but it helps to sustain trust and stymie conspiracy theories.
Battling COVID-19 effectively requires accounting for the long run, given the high likelihood of future waves and the need for additional rounds of vaccinations. For China, even more than for other countries, building trust is critical, because it is a necessary step in moving away from the zero-COVID strategy. That shift will naturally lead to more infections and deaths. But open deliberations about the vaccines can increase their uptake, help to moderate the spread of the disease, and counter the negative impact on public trust.
China urgently needs to embrace transparency on this issue. The longer it waits, the more difficult it will be to abandon its economically destructive zero-COVID policy.
Nancy Qian, Professor of Managerial Economics and Decision Sciences at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, is Founding Director of China Econ Lab and Northwestern’s China Lab and leads the Kellogg development economics initiative.
Copyright: Project Syndicate 2022.
www.project-syndicate.org
Like a torch, the “Long March” booster rocket illuminates a misty mountainous landscape in the province of Sichuan. With its help, a series of reconnaissance and earth observation satellites were launched into orbit from the Xichang Spaceport on Thursday morning. The Yaogan-35 satellites will be used, among other things, to prevent disasters such as floods and forest fires.
Things have been rather quiet around the emerging power alliance BRICS in recent years. Its members were too busy with domestic concerns (Brazil, South Africa) or conflicts with each other (India – China). But in the geopolitical competition between the West and China, the BRICS alliance seems to become a new platform for Xi Jinping, analyzes Felix Lee. Together with the Western-shunned Vladimir Putin, Xi wants to strengthen the cooperation in the BRICS bloc.
The German government sees this development with concern and wants to prevent the formation of a new bloc. According to analysts, this could be almost impossible to avert. China tries far too hard to divide the world into factions. And not without reason: China would be the strongest player in any alliance that excludes the United States. The People’s Republic has left the other BRICS countries far behind economically, militarily, and power-politically.
Solar power from space – what may at first glance sound like the plan of a James Bond villain is under serious research by Chinese scientists. The first step is to send a test satellite into space to transmit solar power to a ground station via microwaves or lasers. By 2050, the capacity is to be gradually increased to two gigawatts – the output of two nuclear reactors. This is far too little for the energy transition and would also come too late. Our team in Beijing looked at the pros and cons of this technology. It could potentially be more suited for military purposes: To supply remote military bases with power.
The Western world stares at an eight-day marathon of events over the next few days, including the EU summit in Brussels, the G7 meeting in Elmau, and the NATO summit in Brussels. And as far as the war in Ukraine is concerned, the participating leaders agree, at least in principle: Russia is the aggressor in this conflict. The country is sanctioned, and Russian President Vladimir Putin is ostracized.
Some eight thousand kilometers to the east, China’s President Xi Jinping is presiding over an online meeting of politicians from BRICS countries, the association of the largest emerging economies Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. In this circle, Putin is no pariah.
On the contrary, Xi once again sharply criticized Western sanctions against Russia at the opening of the summit. “Facts once again have proven that sanctions are a double-edged sword.” Xi did not mention the United States or the NATO countries by name. And he also avoided formally declaring support for Russia. Apparently, Xi does not want to risk Western sanctions expanding to China. Nevertheless, his opening speech made it clear that he sees Moscow as an important partner against a common enemy: the United States.
Even before the virtual summit started, China’s president repeatedly emphasized that BRICS countries collectively account for about 40 percent of the global population, generate almost a quarter of the world’s gross domestic product, and dominate a fifth of global trade. And indeed, all five countries have not joined in the West’s sanctions against Russia. China and India even import more Russian oil and gas than ever before (China.Table reported). Russia has even become the largest oil supplier to China, surpassing Saudi Arabia. Xi used the unity among the emerging countries at the virtual BRICS meeting, not least to take a swing at the USA and the West.
In the face of so much unity in eastern Eurasia, it seems almost ominous that there will be far more discord between the Western allies at the G7 summit. And it will be precisely over the question of how to deal with China. At the beginning of the week, the German government announced that it would campaign for a rapprochement with the People’s Republic at the summit. It was important to prevent the formation of a bloc, with the West on one side and China and Russia on the other, according to German summit circles. The closer alliance among the BRICS countries is viewed with concern. The summit begins on Sunday in Elmau, Bavaria.
Above all, the United Kingdom and the United States will probably see things differently. At the last G7 summit in Cornwall, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson already advocated a clear position against China’s aggression. Germany blocked – for fear of consequences for economic relations, which are particularly deep between Germany and China. The US had already indicated in Cornwall that the Germans would have to decide which side they would be on in the future.
Political scientist Eberhard Sandschneider believes that the German government’s proposal, as host of this year’s G7, to focus less on confrontation with China is “the right thing to do”. Solutions at the global level, especially problems that know no borders, such as climate protection or trade regulations, can ultimately be better solved at the multilateral level, said the East Asia expert. This would be more cost-effective for all parties involved. But for the moment, the power-political signs are pointing in a different direction. “I don’t see that the German chancellor is strong enough to counter this trend at the moment,” he noted.
Other experts share a similar view. “The German government must look the new realities squarely in the eye,” says Mikko Huotari, Director of the Mercator Institute for China Studies (MERICS). Even if bloc formation is not in Europe’s interest, the bipolarity of the world intensifies – both in economic and security terms – all driven by the Chinese side, the Chinese expert said. “In Beijing, the world is increasingly seen through this lens – and the ideological rejection by the West.”
For Beijing, close cooperation with Russia is also a form of reassurance against the United States. Huotari recommends: “Germany, together with its European partners, must work to ensure that friendly states have a choice at all – without forcing them to make a choice.”
At the same time, the BRICS summit in particular, as a counter-event to the three Western summits, shows that polarization continues and is becoming more entrenched. China and Russia have a great interest in closer ties with as many countries as possible – including the other three BRICS countries – at least to the extent that they remain neutral. The bloc formation, which Germany wants to counter, is already in full swing.
In the search for new forms of energy generation, Chinese researchers have their sights set on Earth’s orbit for a spectacular experiment. As early as 2028 – and thus two years earlier than initially planned – the People’s Republic intends to launch its space solar power plant program. This was reported by the South China Morning Post with reference to a study published in the journal Chinese Space Science and Technology.
Such a project is controversial among experts. Many of them simply dismiss the idea of solar power plants in space as science fiction. However, there are arguments that speak for testing the new technology and collecting valuable experience. This is precisely what the Chinese scientists are likely to be interested in. After all, Japanese researchers have already successfully proven the viability of this technology.
Nowadays, solar power is considered one of the most important forms of renewable energy. However, as is well known, the technology only works when there are no clouds blocking the sun. Moreover, a significant portion of the incoming radiation is lost on its way through the Earth’s atmosphere due to effects such as reflection and absorption. Solar power plants in space, on the other hand, could absorb solar radiation around the clock and convert it into microwaves, which could subsequently be sent to corresponding ground stations and fed into the power grid from there.
In the first phase, according to the Chinese research report, a first satellite could be launched in six years to test the wireless transmission of energy from 400 kilometers above the ground. The module would convert solar energy into microwaves or lasers. These would then be sent to a ground station on Earth. This first space solar power plant would have an output of ten kilowatts. This would be a test at best; it is not yet a contribution to the power supply. Later, however, the technology could be “scaled up significantly,” Professor Dong Shiwei claims in his paper.
Some of the advantages that researchers attribute to the technology include:
The disadvantages mentioned are:
Professor Dong and his team do not hide the fact that this is a project with huge hurdles.
Emitting high-power microwaves over a long distance would require an antenna hundreds or even thousands of meters long in space. Any movement caused by solar winds or the station’s thrusters reduces its efficiency and accuracy. According to Dong, Chinese researchers have recently made significant progress at least in controlling and precisely pointing such an antenna.
China’s plans involve the construction of a complete space solar power plant in four stages. If the initial experiments succeed, another powerful satellite would be launched into space just two years after the first launch. A 10-megawatt power plant could then send power to some military and civilian end users by 2035. By 2050, the station’s power could then be expanded to two gigawatts. That is roughly equivalent to one nuclear power plant.
China is likely to be in a hurry with its plans, as energy problems are pressing. Other countries are also interested in the technology. The United Kingdom, for example, wants to build a similar power plant by 2035. In the United States, too, the United States Naval Research Laboratory has already tested solar power generation in space using a Boeing X-37 B space plane. Joern Petring/Gregor Koppenburg
China’s urban populations have been enduring some of the most intense infection-prevention measures of the COVID-19 pandemic. For 60 straight days, Shanghai’s 27 million residents were forced into a strict lockdown – and they were not alone. During the peak of the Omicron BA.2 wave in April and May, 45 cities with a total of 373 million people were under some sort of lockdown. That is more than the combined populations of the United States (329.5 million) and Canada (38 million), and 83% of the population of the European Union (447 million).
China’s “zero-COVID” strategy has wreaked havoc on its economy and its people. But the Omicron wave has also highlighted its elderly population’s continuing vulnerability to the virus. As of June 2, 40% of those over 60 – around 95 million people – had not received any doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, even though they are at higher risk of severe illness and death from the disease.
One reason for the low vaccination rate is that the Chinese population has simply grown accustomed to the low rates of COVID-19 infections over the past two years. Now that the Omicron wave has struck, the higher perceived risk of remaining unvaccinated should increase vaccination among the elderly somewhat.
Another reason for the low vaccination rate among the elderly, however, is that many fear the side effects. To counter this, the Chinese government recently introduced a COVID-19 vaccine insurance package for individuals over 60. Vaccine recipients who fall genuinely ill stand to receive $75,000 – more than four times the country’s average annual income ($15,950). This is a clever idea. But it will not suffice, because the bigger obstacle is the lack of trust between the Chinese public and the medical establishment.
To be sure, all countries have faced difficulties in convincing concerned populations that the benefits of vaccines outweigh the risks. In the US, 15% of people remain unvaccinated against COVID-19, and 42% of this group say they don’t trust the vaccines. Still, this is a tremendous improvement from September 2020, when 49% of American adults said they would not take a vaccine if one were available. Within that cohort, 76% of survey respondents cited concerns about side effects.
The Chinese and American vaccine-resistant populations thus share a fear of side effects. But the Chinese and US medical establishments have responded to these concerns in very different ways.
In the US, the medical establishment has tried to build trust by conducting independent and transparent medical trials, the results of which are reported in uncensored publications and subject to open deliberation at all levels – by experts, journalists, politicians, and the public. This approach builds on two well-known maxims of public health: trust in the medical establishment will increase the uptake of treatments; and such trust is built through transparency and open deliberation.
In contrast, China’s approach has been almost completely opaque. The government has released very limited data on vaccine trials, and it has censored all discussion of side effects – even common minor ones such as soreness from the injection. Chinese authorities have followed the maxim that information about controversial topics should be withheld to prevent the airing of views that might run counter to government objectives.
This strategy has proved counterproductive, because it creates an information vacuum that can be filled only by rumor, speculation, and conspiracy theories. The current failure contrasts sharply with China’s own past success with deliberative decision-making on matters of health policy. After the 2002-04 SARS outbreak, China permitted a constructive debate about problems in its health system. As many noted, over 80% of rural residents, and 40% of urban dwellers, had no health insurance of any kind at the time.
In response, the government announced in 2009 that it would invest ¥850 billion ($127 billion at today’s exchange rate) to provide health coverage for 90% of the population. The next two years featured intensive discussions among and between national and regional policymakers, health experts, community leaders, journalists, and the public. The deliberations led to many amendments in the proposed policy. Though the final product was not perfect, it proved popular and led to widespread adoption of health insurance. By 2021, 95% of Chinese had some form of coverage.
Of course, deliberation about COVID-19 vaccines will need to be faster and will not be cost-free. The Chinese vaccines would draw criticism, and some people would still be turned off by common side effects (such as fevers) or rarer risks (such as allergic reactions). Others would criticize the government’s handling of the pandemic, if given the chance.
But these short-run costs are worth the long-term benefits of building trust in public-health authorities and increasing vaccination rates over time. As other countries have found, disclosing negative information about vaccines might increase public reluctance in the short run, but it helps to sustain trust and stymie conspiracy theories.
Battling COVID-19 effectively requires accounting for the long run, given the high likelihood of future waves and the need for additional rounds of vaccinations. For China, even more than for other countries, building trust is critical, because it is a necessary step in moving away from the zero-COVID strategy. That shift will naturally lead to more infections and deaths. But open deliberations about the vaccines can increase their uptake, help to moderate the spread of the disease, and counter the negative impact on public trust.
China urgently needs to embrace transparency on this issue. The longer it waits, the more difficult it will be to abandon its economically destructive zero-COVID policy.
Nancy Qian, Professor of Managerial Economics and Decision Sciences at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, is Founding Director of China Econ Lab and Northwestern’s China Lab and leads the Kellogg development economics initiative.
Copyright: Project Syndicate 2022.
www.project-syndicate.org
Like a torch, the “Long March” booster rocket illuminates a misty mountainous landscape in the province of Sichuan. With its help, a series of reconnaissance and earth observation satellites were launched into orbit from the Xichang Spaceport on Thursday morning. The Yaogan-35 satellites will be used, among other things, to prevent disasters such as floods and forest fires.
