SUMMARY
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After the end of World War II, two powers reigned supreme, the US and the former USSR. By the end of the post-Cold War period, the world was under the US rule, engaging continually in wars. As George W Bush said: “You’re either with us, or against us.” Since its independence, the Philippines has always sided with the US.
However, global stability based on US financial domination is now being challenged.
Discontent, protests, power
We live in a world where world’s 80 richest individuals have the same wealth as the poorest 50%, which is composed of 3.5 billion individuals.
Economist Thomas Piketty explains that the rate of return of capital is greater than that of economic growth. Hence, the rich and inheritors of capital do not need to work, growing richer daily, while the toiling masses will never catch up, even with economic growth.
Education will not get you rich; capital and inherited capital will. The argument that 1% benefits from the current economic model is real.
Grassroots social movements and alternative political parties in the Philippines, Greece, Spain, Italy, and elsewhere oppose the mainstream from-right-to-left political parties’ dogmatic adherence to neoliberal economic austerity programs, which hurt the majority of the people. They struggle for a new, alternative, and just political economy which does not benefit the 1% only but the masses.
A new alternative international economic order is in the making.
China is part of a global movement that ushers in a new international political economy with emerging countries Brazil, Russia, India, and South Africa, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), and the New Silk Road.
Will the Philippines join?
China, alternatives
Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa (BRICS) create $100 billion reserve currencies pool to help member states be more independent of the international financial institutions and bypass global market instability.
Russia will help Greece if its economy collapses. China will lend Venezuela $10 billion dollars, should the US enforce its plan to wage an economic war with Caracas.
China is changing the global structure of political economy in 2015.
Together with the BRICS group, China led the establishment of the AIIB to which at least 57 economies have joined. AIIB (also known as the BRICS Bank) is an alternative to G7, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund, which are known to impose the “Washington Consensus” of trade liberalization, deregulation, and privatization as well as impose austerity measures. Economies that spearheaded the AIIB are frustrated with the Washington-controlled Bretton-Woods institutions.
In terms of international finance, China and Russia agree to transact business in renminbi, rubble, Hong Kong dollars, and other national currencies, at the expense of the US dollar. This move diminishes the supremacy of the US dollar. China and Russia plan to launch gold-backed global currency.
New Silk Road Economic Belt
An alternative to integration with the West is brewing. The Chinese-Russian arrangement has opened alternative routes to trade in the Greater Asian region. Eurasia will be much more connected with shared access by land through Mongolia and Central Asian countries and by water through sea lanes and seaports. All these mean leaving behind the U.S. as the center of global trade.
Going farther than the legendary Trans-Siberian Railway, the Yiwu–Madrid train route ships freight from Zhejiang, China to Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus, Poland, Germany, France, and end in Madrid, Spain, spanning 13,000 kilometers.
In addition, Russia plans to build the longest intercontinental highway on Earth, from the U.K. in the Atlantic to the U.S.A. in the Pacific, linking Moscow to North America through the Bering Strait.
New Maritime Silk Road
In the spirit of mutual benefit, China works with India, Sri Lanka, and the Maldives to link India’s “Spice Route” and “Mausam” projects to connect China with Europe and Africa by road, train, and ships. Trade across the Indian Ocean will increase exponentially with this multi-country megaproject.
Claiming that Southeast Asia is an important hub of the maritime Silk Road, China wants to have better maritime cooperation with the ASEAN.
The Philippines will remain close to the US, but the Philippines needs to join the new alternative political economy and choose progress over unending neocolonialism.
Eurasian integration
Composed of China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) consolidates the security, military, economic, and cultural cooperation among Eurasian countries.
While a new Cold War is trying to isolate Russia, we have to get used to a new Eurasian integration, where China cooperates with Eurasian, BRICS, and other countries that are opposed to the Washington Consensus, creating alternatives to international finances and international trade.
Welcome to the birth of a new international political economy.
From A and B to Silk
Along with several other economies discontented with the neoliberal economic model and austerity programs, China’s a-changing the world economy, from AIIB to BRICS and the new Silk Road.
But how different is AIIB from the World Bank and IMF? How will the vast majority of the people benefit from this new alternative international political economy? Will this be the demise of the rule of the few rich and the dawn of real grassroots democracy? Questions are raised. In time, answers will unravel.
Despite all these moves, the US will still be on top of the economic, political, and military totem pole. But like it or not, no power is forever, history reveals.
The Philippines must test the waters, explore alternative economic possibilities, and be an active part of the newly re-emerging Eurasian-centered international political economy. – Rappler.com
Rey Ty is a political observer, author, political theorist, comparativist, political risk and policy analyst, and lecturer. He received his doctorate from Northern Illinois University and Master’s degrees from the University of California at Berkeley and Northern Illinois University.
Money, calculator, notebook and pen image from Shutterstock
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