Charles Parton
Introduction
Clarity on the question of whether the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is a threat is vital. 1 Firstly, the obvious needs restating: ‘China’ means the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). As Xi Jinping, General Secretary of the CCP, likes to say, ‘South, north, east and west, the communist party leads everything.’ 2 Secondly, the current world order is under threat – the system of global governance, laws and values established after the Second World War by the victors. Western powers were buttressed by the institutions and norms established. The CCP wishes to change current global governance and is prepared to fight hard and outside the hitherto accepted rules of competition.
The CCP puts out two types of narrative. The first it terms ‘foreign propaganda’ [外宣], the language of ‘win-win’, ‘community of shared destiny for mankind’, and the Global Development, Global Security, and Global Civilisation initiatives. The second narrative is what it puts out to party members for guidance and reassurance. It is this which better represents its true intentions and therefore to which foreign governments should pay attention
The CCP declares its ‘Second Centennial Goal’ as being, by 2049, to establish a PRC which is a ‘modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced and harmonious’. Behind this reassuring language lies a more muscular intention: to ensure that the PRC replaces the United States (US) as the leading superpower, and to reorder global governance better to suit CCP interests and values.
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