DEFENDING GLOBALIZATION.docVIP

DEFENDING GLOBALIZATION 　　Xi Jinping is the first Chinese president to speak at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos， Switzerland. The visit attracted even greater international media attention than usual for a Chinese leader. As the Financial Times chief foreign affairs columnist Gideon Rachman put it， “The big star of this year’s forum is certain to be Xi Jinping.” 　　The reason for this is well understood. China’s unequivocal support for open economies and globalization now clearly contrasts with the protectionism embraced by newly inaugurated U.S. President Donald Trump and， on a smaller scale， the UK’s Brexit referendum. 　　In terms of a declared position on globalization， a definitive turning point has already been made. Every U.S. president since World War II（WWII） from Harry Truman to Barack Obama had at least verbally committed to free trade and globalization. Trump explicitly broke with this historical position， threatening to impose a 35-percent tariff on Mexico and a 45-percent tariff on China. He also pledged to impose a U.S. “border tax” and to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement （NAFTA） as well as pressurized U.S. companies not to invest in Mexico （despite it being a NAFTA member）. In parallel， while the Trans-Pacific Partnership （TPP） was not a move for freer trade―being in reality an anti-China bloc―its unilateral abandonment by Trump nevertheless made the United States appear as an unreliable negotiating partner. 　　Whatever happens in the future， there can never again be complete certainty in U.S. commitment to globalization. This fundamental pillar on which the post-WWII global order was built is no longer solid. It is widely understood that of the world’s two largest economies， only China remains unequivocally committed to globalization. 　　This has a direct and potent effect on other countries as well as on China―hence the widespread international interest in Xi’s Davos visit. Other countries understand， both fa