The election results in Italy left many in shock: Giorgia Meloni’s right-wing nationalist party Fratelli d’Italia won the vote and, in all likelihood, will form the next government in Rome together with the right-wing populist Lega and the conservative Forza Italia. It is a dramatic shift to the right of a founding member of the European Union.
And Meloni’s election victory could also turn into a nightmare for China, as Marcel Grzanna analyzes. Meloni had already publicly discussed Italy’s withdrawal from the New Silk Road during her election campaign. But now not just the prestige project of China’s President Xi Jinping is at stake. Rather, Meloni has apparently chosen a new partner – and this alliance will likely enrage China’s leadership in Beijing.
Our second analysis also holds bad news for Beijing: For decades, the Chinese government tried to slow down population growth. But now China’s population faces a dramatic shift as early as this year: Aging, male overpopulation and the traditional degradation of girls pose a huge challenge to the Communist Party. Ning Wang shows how the leadership in Beijing is trying to counter this trend – but has so far set the wrong priorities.
With the election victory of the right-wing populists in Italy, China’s ambitions in the EU’s third-largest economy have been severely dampened. If the designated head of government, Giorgia Meloni, makes good on her announcements, cooperation between Rome and Beijing on the expansion of the New Silk Road could soon come to an end. Meloni threatened Italy’s potential withdrawal from China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) just days before her fraternity’s triumph.
In an interview last Friday with Taiwan’s CNA news agency, Meloni described the previous Italian government’s contractual agreement with the People’s Republic on the cooperation of the infrastructure project as a “big mistake.” She said she found it difficult to see the political framework necessary to “sign the memorandum tomorrow” to continue Italy’s integration into the project.
In 2019, Italy’s government at the time signed the BRI Protocol. Since then, however, many new realizations have emerged. China’s human rights crimes in Xinjiang, the curtailment of Hong Kong’s civil rights, and most recently China’s military threats against Taiwan, as well as Beijing’s position on Russia’s war of aggression on Ukraine.
However, what could be even worse perceived in Beijing than Italy’s exit from the New Silk Road is Meloni’s promise to Taiwan. The head of government-designate stressed that Taiwan is “an essential concern for Italy.” She said she has been following developments in recent months “closely with unease.” “This is unacceptable behavior on the part of Beijing, a behavior that we strongly condemn,” Meloni said.
At the end of July, the politician posted a photo of herself with Andrea Sing-Ying Lee, Taiwan’s representative in Italy, on Twitter. What was particularly striking about this was that Meloni herself referred to him as an “ambassador” – a term that is formally incorrect because Italy and Taiwan do not officially maintain diplomatic relations. The Italian journalist Giulia Pompili, who has closely followed China’s activities in her home country for years, interpreted this as a signal from Meloni to Beijing.
What the designation “essential” means specifically for Italy’s China policy is something Meloni left open and is presumably not her decision alone. Nevertheless, Beijing must prepare itself for a change in Italia’s position toward China. Especially since not only the BRI is at stake, but Chinese investments in general.
Francesca Ghiretti, an analyst at Merics, a Berlin-based China research institute, recently told China.Table that a right-wing election victory could lead to a “schizophrenic” China policy. The country already scrutinizes Chinese investments comparatively strictly by European standards. And in recent years, several Chinese projects have already been stopped.
The anti-migration sentiments of the right-wing alliance around the Brotherhood of Italy could also have social and economic consequences. Tens of thousands of Chinese form a veritable exclave of the People’s Republic in northern Italy, providing valuable supplies for Italy’s accessories and fashion industry. Cheap Chinese-made goods produced in Italy are also flooding the country’s souvenir stores. Whether a right-wing alliance will continue to allow the progressive Sinicization of parts of its industry seems questionable.
But Meloni’s statements do not yet mean a definitive rejection of the New Silk Road. For now, they only symbolize the determination to oppose the Chinese self-conception and not to accept investments from the People’s Republic at any price. However, Meloni deliberately left the backdoor open for renegotiations of the conditions for Italy’s cooperation.
Meanwhile, Beijing has taken note of the threats and seems to be concerned about the election outcome. Especially since the China-critical rhetoric was part of the election campaign, and many voters apparently see no reason not to vote for the right-wing populists if they distance themselves from the People’s Republic.
China and Italy are “strategic global partners,” a Chinese Foreign Office spokesman said Monday, commenting on the outcome. He said the healthy and stable development of bilateral relations was in the interest of both sides. “We hope that the new Italian government will continue to adhere to a positive and pragmatic policy towards China, supporting the spirit of mutual respect and trust,” the spokesman said.
It was an unassuming announcement. The health department in Beijing announced in August that the country’s population had peaked and would begin to shrink between 2023 and 2025. “The turning point is right around the corner,” Yong Cai, a sociologist at the University of North Carolina, summed it up in a paper in the journal Nature. “I won’t be surprised if population decline is reported at the end of this year.” That it will happen seems almost inevitable.
But should the decline actually happen earlier than last calculated, it would have serious consequences for China’s economic development.
Birth rates in the People’s Republic have been falling rapidly, and not just since the start of the Covid pandemic. Last year, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, only ten million births were recorded – the last time so few children were born in the People’s Republic was in 1949 (China.Table reported). The declining birth rate has been observed for more than five years. Officially, only 1.3 children were born per woman last year. According to some demographers, the unofficial figure is as low as 1.15. The ensuing labor shortage is fatal to China’s desire for economic recovery.
Even though the Chinese government has made considerable efforts over the past decade to increase birth rates and create incentives, it has done too little to address the fears and concerns of young people.
They are afraid of the costs. To provide a child with a solid education and thus a reasonably secure future would cost an average of ¥485,000 (the equivalent of €69,700), according to estimates by the Yuwa Population Institute in Beijing. In the capital or in Shanghai, families would even have to spend more than twice that amount on their children’s education, at ¥969,000 and ¥1.026 million, respectively.
A look at other countries shows how great the burden is for parents in China: the cost of raising a child until the age of 18 is 3.64 times the GDP per capita in countries like Germany and 4.26 times in the US; in China, it is almost seven times.
Furthermore, Yuwa’s study shows that low- and middle-income families, in particular, have to expect an 8.6 percent drop in their income after the birth of their second child. Also, about one-fifth of women do not return to work after the birth of a second child. So far, neither improved maternity protection rights nor financial incentives have helped to counter this. Experts believe that this trend will continue. As a result, China’s population is getting older – and the pressure on Beijing is growing.
But it is not just financial constraints that create reluctance to have children among the younger population. For many young women, it simply seems impossible to have a child and a career at the same time.
Current measures including a survey to find out why young people no longer want to marry and have children, launched earlier this month in the province of Hunan by the top state planning bureau of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), not only come too late, they notably do not offer an alternative to the CP’s longstanding strategy of capping the population.
The fact that it was Beijing’s one-child policy between 1980 and 2016 that greatly manipulated China’s social development is often ignored. The authorities implemented the measures so radically that the population’s reproduction rate fell from 2.5 percent to 0.7 percent between the years 1970 and 2000.
The policy-motivated measures of that time have had other serious consequences: For example, China has a large female-to-male disparity in the age groups that fall within the period of the one-child policy (China.Table reported).
Yet despite all these problems, people’s perceptions have hardly changed so far. Unmarried women over 30 still frequently have the stigma of being “past their expiration date” attached to them. To this day, this damages relationships between mothers and daughters and leads to enormous psychological disorders that have not yet been scientifically examined. Furthermore, if they do not have children, they are quickly regarded as selfish, because they would place their own interests above the interests of the family. On top of that, girls face prejudice every single day.
And apparently non-economic factors also play a role in young women’s decisions to remain without children. Because so far, government support measures have not been able to change China’s declining population.
A paper published in the Chinese Social Science Journal quotes demographer Wei Chen of the prestigious Beijing Renmin University. Wei suggests that China’s population may have even peaked last year. “China may become the country with the fastest negative population growth and aging in the world,” the population researcher warns. His conclusion is not only a wake-up call for the Communist Party.
The Human Rights Committee of the German Parliament will vote on Wednesday on a possible invitation for Thomas Bach to the committee. Chair Renata Alt (Free Democratic Party) told China.Table that she had put a vote to that effect on the agenda. Alt would like to work through the awarding process of the Winter Olympics to the People’s Republic of China with the German president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
A delegation of the committee had visited the IOC headquarters in Lausanne roughly a week and a half ago, but had not met with Bach there. Instead, the German politicians, who had previously held numerous talks at the Human Rights Council in neighboring Geneva, were received by representatives of the communications department and the Commission for Human Rights at the IOC.
“The visit to the IOC was not satisfactory. I had the feeling that our questions were answered only evasively. The answers seemed mainly intended to justify the awarding of the Olympics to Beijing, even after the fact.” The IOC, on the other hand, assessed the visit positively. “There was a good atmosphere for talks, which gave us the chance for a constructive exchange,” said a spokesman. grz
China and North Korea have resumed their cross-border freight traffic. This was reported by the Chinese Foreign Ministry in Beijing on Monday. This marks the end of a five-month interruption. Due to the Covid pandemic, borders had been closed in April of this year.
Coordination will be made with authorities in North Korea to ensure safe and stable operation of the freight train, Foreign Office spokesman Wang Wenbin said at Monday’s regular press conference. Earlier, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported that a freight train from China’s Dandong had entered the North Korean city of Sinuiju.
The rail link between Dandong and Sinuiju is North Korea’s main connection to China, the country’s largest trading partner by far. Despite North Korea’s nuclear tests, China continues to maintain diplomatic ties with the regime led by Kim Jong-un (China.Table reported).
The train crossings between China and North Korea had been closed on April 29. At that time, a Covid outbreak occurred in Dandong. Shortly afterward, North Korea also reported its first Covid case. Last month, North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un announced his country’s triumph over Covid. rad
“There are 2300 different types of bread in Germany,” says Feng Yitong. “And I made it my goal to try them all.” Feng is 26 years old and a master’s degree student in illustration at the University of the Arts in Berlin. “Even during my bachelor’s degree in my hometown of Xi’an, I dreamed of traveling to Germany one day and living there for a few years.” After graduating from university in China, she took a year, learned German and drew every day to be accepted at the Berlin University of the Arts. With success.
Since she moved to Berlin, her drawings focus on two things: the German language and German bread. One of her illustrations, for example, is called “Varied German Breakfasts” and shows tongue-in-cheek drawings of different types of bread. Underneath each is the title: Bread.
In her drawings, she processes her impressions as a foreigner in Berlin and Germany. “Often it’s little things, like this obsession with baked goods, that Germans don’t even notice anymore.” In another drawing, Feng has transformed typical German surnames such as Schäfer, Neumann and Schneider into images. Currently, she is working on a piece on interesting street names in Berlin. In a way, she is exploring her new home on paper.
When asked what she hopes her drawings evoke in the observer, Feng is modest. “I want people to laugh when they see my illustrations,” she says, “that’s all.” But a laugh is actually worth a lot in a time of Covid fatigue and armed conflict all over the world.
Feng plans to graduate next year. “I always want to keep drawing and hope that my illustrations will eventually be seen by many people.” Her wish is to be able to live in Germany as a freelance illustrator – at least for a few years. “I already miss my Chinese homeland, but I have a deep connection to Berlin, even though I’ve only lived here for a year and a half.” In the capital, she particularly enjoys the many gardens and parks. “Berlin translates to ‘big forest’ in Chinese,” she says. “I find that poetic in itself.” Svenja Napp
The Golden Week in China begins at the end of the week on Saturday. Vacations at last. The leadership in Beijing also seems to be eagerly awaiting the start: Tiananmen Square is already festively decorated.
The election results in Italy left many in shock: Giorgia Meloni’s right-wing nationalist party Fratelli d’Italia won the vote and, in all likelihood, will form the next government in Rome together with the right-wing populist Lega and the conservative Forza Italia. It is a dramatic shift to the right of a founding member of the European Union.
And Meloni’s election victory could also turn into a nightmare for China, as Marcel Grzanna analyzes. Meloni had already publicly discussed Italy’s withdrawal from the New Silk Road during her election campaign. But now not just the prestige project of China’s President Xi Jinping is at stake. Rather, Meloni has apparently chosen a new partner – and this alliance will likely enrage China’s leadership in Beijing.
Our second analysis also holds bad news for Beijing: For decades, the Chinese government tried to slow down population growth. But now China’s population faces a dramatic shift as early as this year: Aging, male overpopulation and the traditional degradation of girls pose a huge challenge to the Communist Party. Ning Wang shows how the leadership in Beijing is trying to counter this trend – but has so far set the wrong priorities.
With the election victory of the right-wing populists in Italy, China’s ambitions in the EU’s third-largest economy have been severely dampened. If the designated head of government, Giorgia Meloni, makes good on her announcements, cooperation between Rome and Beijing on the expansion of the New Silk Road could soon come to an end. Meloni threatened Italy’s potential withdrawal from China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) just days before her fraternity’s triumph.
In an interview last Friday with Taiwan’s CNA news agency, Meloni described the previous Italian government’s contractual agreement with the People’s Republic on the cooperation of the infrastructure project as a “big mistake.” She said she found it difficult to see the political framework necessary to “sign the memorandum tomorrow” to continue Italy’s integration into the project.
In 2019, Italy’s government at the time signed the BRI Protocol. Since then, however, many new realizations have emerged. China’s human rights crimes in Xinjiang, the curtailment of Hong Kong’s civil rights, and most recently China’s military threats against Taiwan, as well as Beijing’s position on Russia’s war of aggression on Ukraine.
However, what could be even worse perceived in Beijing than Italy’s exit from the New Silk Road is Meloni’s promise to Taiwan. The head of government-designate stressed that Taiwan is “an essential concern for Italy.” She said she has been following developments in recent months “closely with unease.” “This is unacceptable behavior on the part of Beijing, a behavior that we strongly condemn,” Meloni said.
At the end of July, the politician posted a photo of herself with Andrea Sing-Ying Lee, Taiwan’s representative in Italy, on Twitter. What was particularly striking about this was that Meloni herself referred to him as an “ambassador” – a term that is formally incorrect because Italy and Taiwan do not officially maintain diplomatic relations. The Italian journalist Giulia Pompili, who has closely followed China’s activities in her home country for years, interpreted this as a signal from Meloni to Beijing.
What the designation “essential” means specifically for Italy’s China policy is something Meloni left open and is presumably not her decision alone. Nevertheless, Beijing must prepare itself for a change in Italia’s position toward China. Especially since not only the BRI is at stake, but Chinese investments in general.
Francesca Ghiretti, an analyst at Merics, a Berlin-based China research institute, recently told China.Table that a right-wing election victory could lead to a “schizophrenic” China policy. The country already scrutinizes Chinese investments comparatively strictly by European standards. And in recent years, several Chinese projects have already been stopped.
The anti-migration sentiments of the right-wing alliance around the Brotherhood of Italy could also have social and economic consequences. Tens of thousands of Chinese form a veritable exclave of the People’s Republic in northern Italy, providing valuable supplies for Italy’s accessories and fashion industry. Cheap Chinese-made goods produced in Italy are also flooding the country’s souvenir stores. Whether a right-wing alliance will continue to allow the progressive Sinicization of parts of its industry seems questionable.
But Meloni’s statements do not yet mean a definitive rejection of the New Silk Road. For now, they only symbolize the determination to oppose the Chinese self-conception and not to accept investments from the People’s Republic at any price. However, Meloni deliberately left the backdoor open for renegotiations of the conditions for Italy’s cooperation.
Meanwhile, Beijing has taken note of the threats and seems to be concerned about the election outcome. Especially since the China-critical rhetoric was part of the election campaign, and many voters apparently see no reason not to vote for the right-wing populists if they distance themselves from the People’s Republic.
China and Italy are “strategic global partners,” a Chinese Foreign Office spokesman said Monday, commenting on the outcome. He said the healthy and stable development of bilateral relations was in the interest of both sides. “We hope that the new Italian government will continue to adhere to a positive and pragmatic policy towards China, supporting the spirit of mutual respect and trust,” the spokesman said.
It was an unassuming announcement. The health department in Beijing announced in August that the country’s population had peaked and would begin to shrink between 2023 and 2025. “The turning point is right around the corner,” Yong Cai, a sociologist at the University of North Carolina, summed it up in a paper in the journal Nature. “I won’t be surprised if population decline is reported at the end of this year.” That it will happen seems almost inevitable.
But should the decline actually happen earlier than last calculated, it would have serious consequences for China’s economic development.
Birth rates in the People’s Republic have been falling rapidly, and not just since the start of the Covid pandemic. Last year, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics, only ten million births were recorded – the last time so few children were born in the People’s Republic was in 1949 (China.Table reported). The declining birth rate has been observed for more than five years. Officially, only 1.3 children were born per woman last year. According to some demographers, the unofficial figure is as low as 1.15. The ensuing labor shortage is fatal to China’s desire for economic recovery.
Even though the Chinese government has made considerable efforts over the past decade to increase birth rates and create incentives, it has done too little to address the fears and concerns of young people.
They are afraid of the costs. To provide a child with a solid education and thus a reasonably secure future would cost an average of ¥485,000 (the equivalent of €69,700), according to estimates by the Yuwa Population Institute in Beijing. In the capital or in Shanghai, families would even have to spend more than twice that amount on their children’s education, at ¥969,000 and ¥1.026 million, respectively.
A look at other countries shows how great the burden is for parents in China: the cost of raising a child until the age of 18 is 3.64 times the GDP per capita in countries like Germany and 4.26 times in the US; in China, it is almost seven times.
Furthermore, Yuwa’s study shows that low- and middle-income families, in particular, have to expect an 8.6 percent drop in their income after the birth of their second child. Also, about one-fifth of women do not return to work after the birth of a second child. So far, neither improved maternity protection rights nor financial incentives have helped to counter this. Experts believe that this trend will continue. As a result, China’s population is getting older – and the pressure on Beijing is growing.
But it is not just financial constraints that create reluctance to have children among the younger population. For many young women, it simply seems impossible to have a child and a career at the same time.
Current measures including a survey to find out why young people no longer want to marry and have children, launched earlier this month in the province of Hunan by the top state planning bureau of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), not only come too late, they notably do not offer an alternative to the CP’s longstanding strategy of capping the population.
The fact that it was Beijing’s one-child policy between 1980 and 2016 that greatly manipulated China’s social development is often ignored. The authorities implemented the measures so radically that the population’s reproduction rate fell from 2.5 percent to 0.7 percent between the years 1970 and 2000.
The policy-motivated measures of that time have had other serious consequences: For example, China has a large female-to-male disparity in the age groups that fall within the period of the one-child policy (China.Table reported).
Yet despite all these problems, people’s perceptions have hardly changed so far. Unmarried women over 30 still frequently have the stigma of being “past their expiration date” attached to them. To this day, this damages relationships between mothers and daughters and leads to enormous psychological disorders that have not yet been scientifically examined. Furthermore, if they do not have children, they are quickly regarded as selfish, because they would place their own interests above the interests of the family. On top of that, girls face prejudice every single day.
And apparently non-economic factors also play a role in young women’s decisions to remain without children. Because so far, government support measures have not been able to change China’s declining population.
A paper published in the Chinese Social Science Journal quotes demographer Wei Chen of the prestigious Beijing Renmin University. Wei suggests that China’s population may have even peaked last year. “China may become the country with the fastest negative population growth and aging in the world,” the population researcher warns. His conclusion is not only a wake-up call for the Communist Party.
The Human Rights Committee of the German Parliament will vote on Wednesday on a possible invitation for Thomas Bach to the committee. Chair Renata Alt (Free Democratic Party) told China.Table that she had put a vote to that effect on the agenda. Alt would like to work through the awarding process of the Winter Olympics to the People’s Republic of China with the German president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
A delegation of the committee had visited the IOC headquarters in Lausanne roughly a week and a half ago, but had not met with Bach there. Instead, the German politicians, who had previously held numerous talks at the Human Rights Council in neighboring Geneva, were received by representatives of the communications department and the Commission for Human Rights at the IOC.
“The visit to the IOC was not satisfactory. I had the feeling that our questions were answered only evasively. The answers seemed mainly intended to justify the awarding of the Olympics to Beijing, even after the fact.” The IOC, on the other hand, assessed the visit positively. “There was a good atmosphere for talks, which gave us the chance for a constructive exchange,” said a spokesman. grz
China and North Korea have resumed their cross-border freight traffic. This was reported by the Chinese Foreign Ministry in Beijing on Monday. This marks the end of a five-month interruption. Due to the Covid pandemic, borders had been closed in April of this year.
Coordination will be made with authorities in North Korea to ensure safe and stable operation of the freight train, Foreign Office spokesman Wang Wenbin said at Monday’s regular press conference. Earlier, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency reported that a freight train from China’s Dandong had entered the North Korean city of Sinuiju.
The rail link between Dandong and Sinuiju is North Korea’s main connection to China, the country’s largest trading partner by far. Despite North Korea’s nuclear tests, China continues to maintain diplomatic ties with the regime led by Kim Jong-un (China.Table reported).
The train crossings between China and North Korea had been closed on April 29. At that time, a Covid outbreak occurred in Dandong. Shortly afterward, North Korea also reported its first Covid case. Last month, North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un announced his country’s triumph over Covid. rad
“There are 2300 different types of bread in Germany,” says Feng Yitong. “And I made it my goal to try them all.” Feng is 26 years old and a master’s degree student in illustration at the University of the Arts in Berlin. “Even during my bachelor’s degree in my hometown of Xi’an, I dreamed of traveling to Germany one day and living there for a few years.” After graduating from university in China, she took a year, learned German and drew every day to be accepted at the Berlin University of the Arts. With success.
Since she moved to Berlin, her drawings focus on two things: the German language and German bread. One of her illustrations, for example, is called “Varied German Breakfasts” and shows tongue-in-cheek drawings of different types of bread. Underneath each is the title: Bread.
In her drawings, she processes her impressions as a foreigner in Berlin and Germany. “Often it’s little things, like this obsession with baked goods, that Germans don’t even notice anymore.” In another drawing, Feng has transformed typical German surnames such as Schäfer, Neumann and Schneider into images. Currently, she is working on a piece on interesting street names in Berlin. In a way, she is exploring her new home on paper.
When asked what she hopes her drawings evoke in the observer, Feng is modest. “I want people to laugh when they see my illustrations,” she says, “that’s all.” But a laugh is actually worth a lot in a time of Covid fatigue and armed conflict all over the world.
Feng plans to graduate next year. “I always want to keep drawing and hope that my illustrations will eventually be seen by many people.” Her wish is to be able to live in Germany as a freelance illustrator – at least for a few years. “I already miss my Chinese homeland, but I have a deep connection to Berlin, even though I’ve only lived here for a year and a half.” In the capital, she particularly enjoys the many gardens and parks. “Berlin translates to ‘big forest’ in Chinese,” she says. “I find that poetic in itself.” Svenja Napp
The Golden Week in China begins at the end of the week on Saturday. Vacations at last. The leadership in Beijing also seems to be eagerly awaiting the start: Tiananmen Square is already festively decorated.
