As the U.S. attempts to reach a trade deal with China, it is important to remember that US negotiators are dealing with officials who believe they control the manner of succession of the Dalai Lama, the text of the Bible, and the consciences of upwards of one and half million Uyghurs languishing in “reeducation camps.”
If religions can be red-penciled to adhere to the whims of the Chinese Communist Party, then foreign businesses don’t stand a chance.
Tariff levels, market access, and enforcement are ancillary issues to the question of whether continued economic engagement with today’s China is possible without fatally compromising Western values.
From Hollywood, the world is treated to a glimpse of the future in which controversial events in the history of China will never be given an appropriate treatment. American actors and actresses clamber over each other to speak out against abuses for which they will be subject to no repercussions, but they don’t dare to question the CCP’s enforced disappearance of artists, filmmakers, authors, and human rights lawyers. We’ve already reached the stage at which production executives pre-clear and self-censor content relating to China. The combined impact of these decisions means that a generation will grow up in a Western popular culture that consistently portrays one of the world’s most repressive regimes as astute and altruistic.
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Yet while governments and international organizations are currently on notice of the CCP’s ideological excesses, they continue to embark on engagement that only emboldens the regime. One can be forgiven for thinking that the Beijing Olympics in 2008 — awarded in 2001 — could help bring about positive social change. But hosting of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing cannot be excused on similar grounds. Participant nations, voiceless on the CCP’s abuses from years of biting their own tongues, will be spoken for when the CCP uses the West’s participation to validate its bad acts.
Current U.S. efforts on trade also send the wrong message to democratic partners and U.S. businesses by putting values-based engagement on the back burner. Instead of spending time developing relations with Taiwan or the United Kingdom, contact is prioritized with a values-deficient regime. This is a lost opportunity to demonstrate preference for agreements with honest participants who operate under the rule of law.
Additionally, if the U.S. government can’t begin to verifiably resolve the CCP’s ongoing international transgressions, including the politically motivated detention of foreign citizens, no other entity will ever expose itself on these issues. U.S. businesses have already begun to decline cooperation with the U.S. government on investigations of CCP-led espionage so as not to trigger the CCP’s retaliation; a camera company that predicates its entire business on helping people to create iconic images must pretend that its use of the most iconic image from the student protests in Tiananmen Square was a mere error, never meant to be seen.
The CCP’s repression will also become more evident in the coming months as the party heightens security around the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests and the 70th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China, in addition the 100th anniversary of the May 4 movement. Those involved in any trade deal should be aware that reaching a near-term deal could cause the CCP to shed whatever inhibitions it might presently have to preemptively crack down on unrest. This de facto enabling of human rights violations is not something with which the U.S. or its negotiators should be associated.
A slow decoupling, already begun, is a safe course for the West and should be encouraged. As each day passes without resolution on trade, U.S. and other Western businesses will make conscious decisions to diversify their supply chains and investments. But the U.S. and other like-minded nations must also swiftly pursue deeper relationships in order resist the global creep of CCP-led economic servitude and the regime’s desire to Sinicize international organizations for its own benefit. Shelving China trade talks, while reengaging with partners of a shared moral legacy, would be a chance for the U.S. to return to nations the ability to speak uncompromisingly on matters of objective right and wrong. Everyone silenced by the fear of retribution, including the Chinese people, deserves this support.
Joseph Moschella is a media executive and attorney in Los Angeles. His views are his own.
