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Alex Lo

Is the economic decline of Europe worse than the last decades of the Qing dynasty? That’s a question posed by Luis Vassy, director of Sciences Po, one of France’s premier universities. It has caused something of a stir in Europe and China.
“The European Union has seen its share of the world economy fall from 30 per cent to 17 per cent between 2008 and 2025, a span of 17 years,” he wrote in Le Grand Continent, a European current affairs publication, last week.
“China covered the same distance between 1820 and 1870. In relative terms, we are declining three times faster than the Qing dynasty.”
If this had been written by a Chinese person, far fewer people would have paid attention. But as pointed out by Lo Wing-hung, publisher of the online Chinese-language Bastille Post and former CEO of Sing Tao News Corporation, Vassy was a big cheese in the European diplomatic corps, having served as chief of staff for both the French ministers for Europe and foreign affairs, and as French ambassador to the Netherlands.
His historical comparison inevitably upsets some people in Europe but amuses others in China. Is he predicting a similar fate for the EU? As you can probably tell from the essay’s title – “Penser la puissance, un défi intellectuel de notre temps” (How to think about power: an intellectual challenge of our time) – it’s really a call to arms. That is, it’s time for the European Union to relearn power politics rather than rely on international law, bureaucratic rules and regulations, and equitable negotiations.
“These figures reveal the new condition in which we must think and act: understanding nothing of what is unfolding beyond our borders is both an intellectual shortcoming and an existential risk,” Vassy warned.

But that hasn’t stopped some Chinese commentators from claiming it is a prognostication. The influential commentary blog, Yi shi wei jian shuo (Let history be the guide), is especially insistent in citing three existential challenges: Brexit, energy decoupling and mass immigration.
Brexit not only crippled European integration, according to the blog, but more fatally, it shattered the political expectation of “European indivisibility,” causing widespread discontent across the continent.
The EU’s sanctions on Russian energy amount to shooting itself in the foot. Because of the war in Ukraine, European politicians are ignoring their natural energy routes and severing cheap fuel and gas supplies from the East. But energy is the lifeblood of industry, said the blog. Germany’s once-proud industry has rapidly declined, threatening mass unemployment and a decline in living standards.
Meanwhile, mass migration has caused widespread discontent across the continent, including a rise in racially motivated violence and antagonism, and a resurgence of the far-right not seen since the end of the second world war.
Writing in Foreign Affairs last month, political scientists David Shambaugh and Steven Jackson also observed that, “Europe today finds itself in the unprecedented position of being caught between three predatory powers – Russia, China, and the United States.”

All these challenges present existential risks, on top of the economic decline. However, it’s too early to write off Europe. Claudia Astarita, a lecturer at Sciences Po, said Vassy’s essay was “a call to action rather than a eulogy”.
“He is not saying Europe is toast, rather, sounding an alarm to prevent it from becoming so,” she told me.
“There’s a certain irony in borrowing China’s own historical trauma to warn Europe about Chinese pressure … The article’s core argument is that if Europe’s elites stop thinking about power, they are effectively consenting to let others exercise it over them. The statistics he uses – EU’s share of world GDP … declining ‘three times faster than the Qing dynasty’ – are not meant to depress but to shock people into urgency.”
Vassy believes new European leaders need to be skilled in “geopolitics, security and strategic thinking” to achieve “strategic autonomy”, she said. Hence the new training at her institution, which has been under reform since Vassy took up the reins.


Astarita, who received her doctorate in Asian studies from the University of Hong Kong, added that the economic comparison with the Qing dynasty might have been misunderstood in China. She described it as “rhetorically brilliant but analytically shaky”.
“The Qing lost wars, territory and formal sovereignty – Europe hasn’t, at least not yet!” she said. “And unlike the Qing, Europe has democratic institutions capable of self-correction and a solid technological base.”
Like Vassy, she believes Europe’s problem is not capability but political will and conceptual clarity.


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Is Europe declining faster than Qing China? A Chinese-French debate

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While a startling historical comparison made by a former French diplomat has caused a stir, it might be too soon to write off Europe


While a startling historical comparison made by a former French diplomat has caused a stir, it might be too soon to write off Europe.


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Is Europe declining faster than Qing China? A Chinese-French debate

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}While a startling historical comparison made by a former French diplomat has caused a stir, it might be too soon to write off Europe

While a startling historical comparison made by a former French diplomat has caused a stir, it might be too soon to write off Europe