Jeffrey Sachs on anti-China hysteria

Here’s Jeffrey Sachs in the FT:

Georgieva is receiving McCarthyite treatment of the kind for which Washington has been notorious in the past. President Joe Biden’s administration, counting votes in a closely divided Congress, looks on with wariness, not wanting to pick more fights with Republicans and anti-China Democrats. Those anti-China forces hope that by making enough noise, all will conclude that “for the good of the institution”, for peace and quiet, Georgieva must go. Pundits will add weighty nods of approval.

Such an outcome would be a dangerous and costly capitulation to anti-Beijing hysteria.

The American right in particular is overtly trying to undermine the multilateral system. In the minds of many in Washington, either the US runs a multilateral institution or should leave it. Under President Donald Trump, the US left the Paris climate agreement, the World Health Organization, Unesco and the UN Human Rights Council. For the unilateralists in Congress, and there are many, the US must control the World Bank and IMF.

Read the whole thing.


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10 Responses to “Jeffrey Sachs on anti-China hysteria”

  1. Gravatar of harry harry
    4. October 2021 at 10:05

    Criticizing China is not “anti-China”.

    Totalitarianism, killing Uyghurs, and threatening your neighbors with border incursions is not a role model for the rest of the world.

    And about “institutions”…

    When people’s liberties are being threatened by politicians who make laws thousands of kilometers away, the people have every right to be judge, jury, and executioner.

    Furthermore, the UN is very similar in structure to the old Catholic Church. Removing oneself from the precepts of a new religious dictator is absolutely critical to the preservation of liberty.

    The UN started with good intentions, but has since emerged as a totalitarian supranational hell bent on creating a new form of imperialism. Indeed, it has no problem condemning Duterte who has 80% support amongst his people, but refuses to condemn Biden, Bush and Obama – and other globalists – when they violate international law by killing people without due process.

    You speak of the “far right” without acknowledging that the far right almost always emerges as a counter weight to the apparatchiks of the “far left”. Institutions, so adorned and praised by the far left, will cause more needless wars. Wars that could be avoided if those institutions would stop “meddling” in local affairs.

  2. Gravatar of rinat rinat
    4. October 2021 at 10:20

    More partisan quackery.

    Look at the way he tries to shape the narrative.

    He says “republicans” as if all republicans think the same.
    And then he follows that by saying “and anti-china democrats”.

    Do you see the subtle quackery. In his Neanderthal mind he really means:

    republican = bad.
    some democrat = bad
    most democrat = good.
    vote democrat.

    No philosophy. No substance. No facts.

    Just more pandering to the globalist corporations who need cheap labor, and who don’t care about the concentration camps or threats towards India, Australia, Canada, U.S., Japan, Philippines, France, Vietnam, UK and Taiwan.

    China resembles Nazi Germany 2.0. The Chinese, like the Jewish, are not above the law. You can cry ‘antisemite” or “anti-china”, but people aren’t buying what your selling.

    The facts don’t lie.

  3. Gravatar of jayne jayne
    4. October 2021 at 10:38

    Why do people associate conservative values with hatred?

    I don’t see Texas ranchers burning down cities and looting stores. I haven’t seen Iowa farmers wearing black masks, talking like ignorant fools, and beating people over the head for protesting outside a spa. I haven’t seen anyone in Utah screaming and spitting at police officers, wearing Che Guevara t-shirts.

    Historically, the bigotry has been on the left. From the civil war, to Jim crow, to civil rights, it was always the republicans who stood up for liberty and the democrats who sought to restrain it.

    And most attacks on Chinese today are from blacks. Blacks commit 50% of all violent crimes in America, yet only constitute 14% of the U.S. population. Blacks also tend to vote democrat, especially if they are poor and ignorant. I’ve seen like thirty videos now of attacks on Asians, and at least 25 of them are black.

    Seems to me like the democrypts, are the more dangerous party.

  4. Gravatar of steve steve
    4. October 2021 at 11:46

    Well, there were the conservatives that deliberately ran cars into crowds to kill protestors. Part of the All Lives Splatter movement.

    Steve

  5. Gravatar of Carl Carl
    4. October 2021 at 12:27

    @rinat
    You wrote

    China resembles Nazi Germany 2.0. The Chinese, like the Jewish, are not above the law.

    Is your point that the Chinese are acting like Jews in Nazi Germany who tried to get around the law?

  6. Gravatar of postkey postkey
    5. October 2021 at 02:24

    Look, look, over here, it’s the ‘wicked’ Chinese.
    Don’t look over there at the plutocrats and the M.I.C., there is nothing to see.

  7. Gravatar of Anonymous Anonymous
    5. October 2021 at 09:36

    “the conservatives that deliberately ran cars into crowds to kill protestors”

    What?

  8. Gravatar of Michael S. Michael S.
    6. October 2021 at 07:25

    “If the US government, at the behest of congressional hotheads, brings down Georgieva, it would prove conclusively that the IMF is a US-directed institution with the mere trappings of multilateralism. China, Russia and others would increasingly go their own way. That would be devastating for global trust, financial stability and multilateralism. We would be back soon to the naked financial and monetary nationalism of the 1930s that deepened the Great Depression and set the world on the path to total war.”

    What?!

    The attacks against Georgieva may well be unjustified, but it’s the author who is hysterical

  9. Gravatar of John Thacker John Thacker
    8. October 2021 at 10:00

    Terrible, unconvincing article. China, in particular, is trying to undermine every multilateral institution in general, and democracy in particular.

    It is true that Trump was an isolationist and withdrew from UN organizations, but the US refusing to join the League of Nations did not make German, Italian, or Japanese foreign policy correct.

    The PRC is an imperialist power set on dominating and conquering its neighbors, and on undermining democracy everywhere.

  10. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    8. October 2021 at 16:01

    John, You said:

    “The PRC is an imperialist power set on dominating and conquering its neighbors,”

    Aren’t you confusing China with Russia? Isn’t Russia the one that invaded and conquered part of the Ukraine?

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