Joe Biden and Xi Jinping have talked together. Or more precisely – past each other.
AGREE: About disagreeing. US President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping. Photo: REUTERS / NTB view more
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Manager: This is an editorial from Dagbladet, and expresses the newspaper’s views. Dagbladet’s political editor is responsible for the editorial.
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This week talked the world’s two most powerful, US President Joe Biden, and Chinese President Xi Jinping, together. For a full three and a half hours, they talked via a video link between Washington and Beijing. This is good, because the increasingly open rivalry between the two global giants is what will shape the world’s geopolitics in the years to come. Therefore, it is good that the two assured each other of their good intentions. Biden went through his speeches on democracy, human rights, theft of technology and intellectual property, and China’s territorial expansion in the South China Sea. While Xi recalled China’s “red line” in relation to Taiwan.
ACCIDENTS: Joe Biden’s life has been marked by tragic family losses and professional success. Made by Marte Nyløkken Helseth / Dagbladet TV. view more
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Despite the United States and China at the climate summit in Glasgow recently surprised that they would so explicitly work together to achieve climate goals, there is still much more that separates the giants’ positions and perspectives, than that unites them. It did not diminish during the conversation, although the aggressive tone, which often otherwise characterizes the news picture, was toned down. Already in the hours after the conversation on Tuesday, one could see the results of the conversation, including that China began to issue press accreditations to American journalists who have been denied a work permit in China. It is fascinating to see how effective authoritarian bureaucracies can be.
And precisely efficiency is a key word for cooperation – or absence of cooperation – between the two countries. In a few weeks, Biden will gather for a “summit for democracy”, declared as perhaps the most important initiative during his presidency. It is intended to build an alliance of democracies, to ideologically, economically and geographically defend democracy against dictatorship and authoritarian rule.
It’s obvious who the other party is in this global battle. But it is not clear who will win from the American model or the Chinese one-party model. In January, we saw for the occasion the exceptionally dysfunctional American democracy exposed to the whole world with the storming of the Congress in Washington, while China, for its part, “restored order” and crushed the pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong. And in a year, we will have the by-elections for both houses of Congress, which according to opinion polls will be won by the Republicans, leaving behind an almost paralyzed political United States in a deeply divided country. While in China, Xi will just then cement his power as a dictator with greater power than anyone since Mao.
Biden and Xi can probably talk to each other, and that’s fine. But they do not speak the same language.
