When China Rules the World

Another example will be provided by tourism. The United Nations World Tourism Organization predicts, rather conservatively, that there will be 100 million outward-bound Chinese tourists by 2019 (compared with almost 28 million in 2004), and an estimated global total of 1.6 billion in 2020. The World Travel and Tourism Council has predicted that by 2018 the value of Chinese tourism will almost be as great as that of the United States. The impact will be greatest in East Asia, especially South-East Asia, and Australia, where many destinations will seem as if they have been taken over by Chinese tourists, a phenomenon that hitherto has been almost exclusively Western, but which will happen on a far grander scale with the Chinese. [1254] The Chinese language, similarly, will assume global importance simply because it has so many native speakers; this will contrast with recent periods of history when the USSR and later Japan were riding high but which, partly because of their relatively small populations, had little linguistic impact, apart from on Eastern Europe in the case of the Soviet Union, outside their own borders. In terms of language, it is already possible to glimpse the future through those who use the internet. Though the proportion of China ’s population who are internet users is far smaller than that in the United States, by 2008 the number of Chinese internet users had already overtaken the number of American users. [1255]

Figure 44. Top ten internet languages, May 2008.

Figure 45. World internet users, March 2008.

THE CHINESE RACIAL ORDER

For the last two centuries Caucasians have enjoyed a privileged position at the top of the global racial hierarchy. During the period of European colonial empires their pre-eminent position was frequently explained in terms of racial theories designed to show the inherent superiority of the white race. Since the mid twentieth century, with the defeat of Nazism followed by colonial liberation, such explicitly racial theories have been in retreat in most regions of the world and now enjoy only minority appeal in the West. Nonetheless, if such racial theories are no longer regarded for the most part as acceptable, there remains an implicit and omnipresent global racial pecking order, with whites invariably at the top. Various factors helped to shape this hierarchy, including levels of development, skin colour, physical characteristics, history, religion, dress, customs and centuries-old racist beliefs and prejudices. Throughout the world, white people command respect and deference, often tinged with fear and resentment, an attitude which derives from a combination of having been globally dominant for so long, huge wealth and power, and genuine achievement. The rise of China to surpass the West will, over time, inevitably result in a gradual reordering of the global hierarchy of race. [1256]

Although possessed of an inner belief that they are superior to all others, the Chinese sense of confidence was shaken and in part undermined by the ‘century of humiliation’. This found expression during the 1980s in what Wang Xiaodong has described as ‘reverse racism’, or a desire to ape and copy the West, and denigrate things Chinese. [1257] That phase, however, is increasingly giving way to a growing sense of self-belief and a return to older attitudes. The idea that China must learn from the West is being joined by the proposition that the West needs to learn from the East. [1258] The fact that the Chinese sense of superiority survived more than a century of being hugely outperformed by the West is testament to its deeply ingrained nature. As China becomes a major global player, this feeling of superiority will be supported and reinforced by new rationales, arguments and evidence. Chinese racial discourse, furthermore, as we saw in Chapter 8, differs in important respects from that of Europe, primarily because its origins lie in China ’s existence as a civilization-state rather than as a nation-state.

In a few limited areas, such as football, athletics and popular music, the global predominance of Caucasians has come under significant challenge. But the ubiquity of the white role-model in so many spheres – business, law, accounting, academe, fashion, global political leadership – still overwhelmingly prevails. Figures like Barack Obama and Tiger Woods remain very much the exception, though the former’s election as American president is highly significant in this context. Nelson Mandela came to enjoy enormous moral authority throughout the world but enjoyed little substantive power. With the rise of China, white domination will come under serious challenge for the first time in many, if not most, areas of global activity.