• 298: The Dangerous Decade: A Foreign Policy for a World in Crisis, submitted on 2022-09-06 22:48:07+08:00.
• 299: The Weakness of Xi Jinping: How Hubris and Paranoia Threaten China’s Future, submitted on 2022-09-07 22:45:18+08:00.
• 300: The Weakness of Xi Jinping: How Hubris and Paranoia Threaten China’s Future, submitted on 2022-09-07 23:10:09+08:00.
• 301: Ukraine Holds the Future: The War Between Democracy and Nihilism, submitted on 2022-09-09 02:30:47+08:00.

298: The Dangerous Decade: A Foreign Policy for a World in Crisis, submitted on 2022-09-06 22:48:07+08:00.

—– 298.1 —–2022-09-06 22:53:33+08:00:

[SS from the essay by Richard Haass, President of the Council on Foreign Relations]

On the one hand, the world is witnessing the revival of some of the worst aspects of traditional geopolitics: great-power competition, imperial ambitions, fights over resources. Today, Russia is headed by a tyrant, President Vladimir Putin, who longs to re-create a Russian sphere of influence and perhaps even a Russian empire. Putin is willing to do almost anything to achieve that goal, and he is able to act as he pleases because internal constraints on his regime have mostly disappeared. Meanwhile, under President Xi Jinping, China has embarked on a quest for regional and potentially global primacy, putting itself on a trajectory that will lead to increased competition or even confrontation with the United States.

But that is not all—not by a long shot. These geopolitical risks are colliding with complex new challenges central to the contemporary era, such as climate change, pandemics, and nuclear proliferation. And not surprisingly, the diplomatic fallout from growing rivalries has made it nearly impossible for great powers to work together on regional and international challenges, even when it is in their interest to do so.

Further complicating the picture is the reality that American democracy and political cohesion are at risk to a degree not seen since the middle of the nineteenth century. This matters because the United States is not just one country among many: U.S. leadership has underpinned what order there has been in the world for the past 75 years and remains no less central today. A United States riven internally, however, will become ever less willing and able to lead on the international stage.

299: The Weakness of Xi Jinping: How Hubris and Paranoia Threaten China’s Future, submitted on 2022-09-07 22:45:18+08:00.

—– 299.1 —–2022-09-07 22:48:19+08:00:

[SS from the essay by Cai Xia, a Professor at the Central Party School of the Chinese Communist Party from 1998 to 2012.]

I have long had a front-row seat to the CCP’s court intrigue. For 15 years, I was a professor in the Central Party School, where I helped train thousands of high-ranking CCP cadres who staff China’s bureaucracy. During my tenure at the school, I advised the CCP’s top leadership on building the party, and I continued to do so after retiring in 2012. In 2020, after I criticized Xi, I was expelled from the party, stripped of my retirement benefits, and warned that my safety was in danger. I now live in exile in the United States, but I stay in touch with many of my contacts in China.

At the CCP’s 20th National Party Congress this fall, Xi expects that he will be given a third five-year term. And even if the growing irritation among some party elites means that his bid will not go entirely uncontested, he will probably succeed. But that success will bring more turbulence down the road. Emboldened by the unprecedented additional term, Xi will likely tighten his grip even further domestically and raise his ambitions internationally. As Xi’s rule becomes more extreme, the infighting and resentment he has already triggered will only grow stronger. The competition between various factions within the party will get more intense, complicated, and brutal than ever before.

At that point, China may experience a vicious cycle in which Xi reacts to the perceived sense of threat by taking ever bolder actions that generate even more pushback. Trapped in an echo chamber and desperately seeking redemption, he may even do something catastrophically ill advised, such as attack Taiwan. Xi may well ruin something China has earned over the course of four decades: a reputation for steady, competent leadership. In fact, he already has.

300: The Weakness of Xi Jinping: How Hubris and Paranoia Threaten China’s Future, submitted on 2022-09-07 23:10:09+08:00.

—– 300.1 —–2022-09-07 23:11:22+08:00:

[SS from the essay by Cai Xia, Professor at the Central Party School of the Chinese Communist Party from 1998 to 2012.]

At the CCP’s 20th National Party Congress this fall, Xi expects that he will be given a third five-year term. And even if the growing irritation among some party elites means that his bid will not go entirely uncontested, he will probably succeed. But that success will bring more turbulence down the road. Emboldened by the unprecedented additional term, Xi will likely tighten his grip even further domestically and raise his ambitions internationally. As Xi’s rule becomes more extreme, the infighting and resentment he has already triggered will only grow stronger. The competition between various factions within the party will get more intense, complicated, and brutal than ever before.
At that point, China may experience a vicious cycle in which Xi reacts to the perceived sense of threat by taking ever bolder actions that generate even more pushback. Trapped in an echo chamber and desperately seeking redemption, he may even do something catastrophically ill advised, such as attack Taiwan. Xi may well ruin something China has earned over the course of four decades: a reputation for steady, competent leadership. In fact, he already has.

301: Ukraine Holds the Future: The War Between Democracy and Nihilism, submitted on 2022-09-09 02:30:47+08:00.

—– 301.1 —–2022-09-09 02:44:35+08:00:

[SS from the essay by Timothy Snyder, Richard C. Levin Professor of History and Global Affairs at Yale University and the author of Bloodlands and On Tyranny.]

For 30 years, too many Americans took for granted that democracy was something that someone else did—or rather, that something else did: history by ending, alternatives by disappearing, capitalism by some inexplicable magic. (Russia and China are capitalist, after all.) That era ended when Zelensky emerged one night in February to film himself saying, “The president is here.” If a leader believes that democracy is just a result of larger factors, then he will flee when those larger factors seem to be against him. The issue of responsibility will never arise. But democracy demands “earnest struggle,” as the American abolitionist Frederick Douglass said. Ukrainian resistance to what appeared to be overwhelming force reminded the world that democracy is not about accepting the apparent verdict of history. It is about making history; striving toward human values despite the weight of empire, oligarchy, and propaganda; and, in so doing, revealing previously unseen possibilities.