China need not fear the challenge of a racist, crumbling West

Unless the West goes back to the racial tribalism of the last century, a unified Western strategy against China is not morally and practically sustainable

China should continue to control its hubris as there is no reason to panic, either from a democratic alliance or an ‘Asian Nato’ meant to strangle China

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Lanxin Xiang

Lanxin Xiang is Ngee Ann Kongsi Professor in International Relations at S.

Published: 1:00am, 16 Jan 2021Updated: 2:58am, 16 Jan 2021

Oswald Spengler, the prophet of the decline of the West, left a terrible question for the West more than a century ago. If the decline of the West is caused by its own doing, then it has no one to blame. But if the rise of non-white people causes the West to decline, should the West eliminate them?

The crisis in the West is racial war by nature. The Western angst about China echoes the “Yellow Peril” sentiment as well. We are again living in a Spenglerian world.

The Yellow Peril theme was popularised by the German Kaiser Wilhelm II at the end of the 19th century. As the saying famously attributed to Karl Marx goes, history repeats itself, the first time is tragedy, the second time farce. It is farcical that China should be chosen by the West as a lead scapegoat for its own crisis.

This time, the Yellow Peril theme is concealed in a “democratic alliance” for a common fight against China. But this alliance is fragile, as the conclusion of the China-EU Investment Treaty testifies.