The Sinocism China Newsletter – March 24, 2015

THE ESSENTIAL EIGHT

1. In Lee Kuan Yew, China Saw a Leader to Emulate – NYTimes In the last decade of his life, Mr. Lee gave advice to the Bush and Obama administrations on how to handle a rising China, and frequently they did not like his blunt assessments. When Graham T. Allison and Robert D. Blackwill, both at Harvard University, asked Mr. Lee whether China’s goal was to become the predominant power in Asia and then the world, he responded: “Of course. Why not? They have transformed a poor society by an economic miracle to become now the second-largest economy in the world,” he said. “Unlike other emergent countries, China wants to be China and accepted as such, not as an honorary member of the West. The Chinese will want to share this century as coequals with the United States.”

Related: In China and West, contrasting views on legacy of Singapore’s patriarch – The Washington Post “Neither slander from the foreign media, nor criticism from the West, has ever shaken Lee Kuan Yew’s governing ideals and values,” China’s Xinhua News Agency wrote. “He thought the U.S. and Europe would not succeed in imposing their so-called human rights and democratic standards onto the world. It is exactly thanks to his firm belief and long implementation of Asian values that he could establish an Asian ‘micro power’ with good order, a prosperous economy and a rich culture.” But China’s reading of Lee’s legacy has largely been selective, and his personal attitude toward China was almost always more complicated than Xi and Xinhua said.

Related: SIM CHI YIN: As all reporters who travelled with Mr Lee Kuan… In my earlier years as a Singapore-based journalist active in civil society, particularly on migrant labour rights, my friends and I had run-ins — ideological and real-life — with his state, its apparatus and its all-permeating mindset. Many of us still cringe or flinch at parts of the state’s meta-narrative, its decisions, how things are, and debate the paths not taken, paths quashed. Conflicted as many of my generation are about Mr Lee, his decisions and legacy, and what Singapore has become, warts and all, I think many of us are, at base, respectful of and grateful for the stability and opportunity the country afforded us as we were growing up and finding our way and purpose in life. Thank you and rest in peace, Mr Lee.

2. China eyes innovation in face of economic “new normal” – Xinhua A document, co-published by the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and the State Council, China’s cabinet, on Monday underscored the role of innovation-driven development amid the economic “new normal” of slower growth. A government work report, delivered by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on March 5, highlighted the “twin engines” that would drive development, namely popular entrepreneurship and mass innovation paired with increased supplies of public goods and services.

Related: 中共中央 国务院 关于深化体制机制改革 加快实施创新驱动发展战略的若干意见_新闻频道_央视网(cctv.com) 中共中央、国务院23日印发《关于深化体制机制改革 加快实施创新驱动发展战略的若干意见》。《意见》共有九项三十条。 《意见》指出，创新是推动一个国家和民族向前发展的重要力量，也是推动整个人类社会向前发展的重要力量。面对全球新一轮科技革命与产业变革的重大机遇和挑战，面对经济发展新常态下的趋势变化和特点，面对实现“两个一百年”奋斗目标的历史任务和要求，必须深化体制机制改革，加快实施创新驱动发展战略，现提出如下意见。

Related: China is getting ahead. Can the rest of the world keep up? – The Washington Post I’m not trying to alarm anyone. But we need to rethink the idea that the West is ahead of everybody else. Yes, we have more companies, but China is catching up — and doing it with less capital.–Linda Bernardi is the chief innovation officer at IBM focused on cloud and the Internet of things

3. U.S. Looks to Work With China-Led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank – WSJ Has Treasury been driving the bus (off the road) on the US response to the AIIB?  //  “The U.S. would welcome new multilateral institutions that strengthen the international financial architecture,” said Nathan Sheets, U.S. Treasury Under Secretary for International Affairs. “Co-financing projects with existing institutions like the World Bank or the Asian Development Bank will help ensure that high quality, time-tested standards are maintained.” Mr. Sheets argues that co-financed projects would ensure the bank complements rather than competes with existing institutions. If the new bank were to adopt the same governance and operational standards, he said, it could both bolster the international financial system and help meet major infrastructure-investment gaps.

Related: Beijing cedes veto power on new bank-Wall Street Journal China offered to forgo veto power at a new Beijing-led development bank in a proposal that helped attract major European countries despite US concerns.  Chinese negotiators presented the no-veto position to some of the US’s staunchest allies in Europe in the past few weeks, according to individuals involved in setting up the bank.  The offer proved critical in getting first the UK and then France, Germany and Italy to break with Washington and line up as founding members of Beijing’s Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, these people said.

Related: Premier Li reaffirms AIIB cooperative stance – Xinhua Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Monday reaffirmed cooperation between the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and existing financial institutions. The AIIB will take an open and inclusive attitude and be complementary to existing development banks, said Li at a meeting with the president of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) Takehiko Nakao . The AIIB will strengthen the region’s communication, social and economic development, Li said. Nakao said the ADB was ready to cooperate with the AIIB.

4.郭正钢寓所抄出7百万现金 其妻曾5年半攫取15亿_新闻_腾讯网 more details on the corruption of Guo Zhenggang (Guo Boxiong’s son) and his second wife Wu Fangfang. 7 million RMB cash found in his house, claims his wife made 1.5 Billion RMB in 5 years (that’s it?), says Wu had their child two months after they were married… //  [摘要]杭州女商人吴芳芳租用土地建设两家商贸城，凭借丈夫、少将郭正钢关系获取四季青市场经营权，5年半攫取15亿资金。据她本人透露，郭正钢被带走后，办案人员从两人杭州的寓所抄出700万现金。

Related: 【独家】郭正钢火箭式升迁路，曾称反腐”搞搞就得了” The media destruction of the Guo family is well underway, I will bet there will be a Guo Boxiong detention announcement by June 1. I wonder how Wendi Deng feels about this comparison of Wu Fangfang to her-the “Wendi Deng of Tonglu”// 吴芳芳就是‘桐庐的邓文迪  //  环球人物杂志记者深入调查发现，郭正钢案的相关情况，要从浙江省军区门口响起的“还钱”声说起。

5. The “cancer” of all things Western – China Media Project There are many textbook examples of oddly “take-ist” (Marxist) critiques on “take-ism”, but one of the best and most recent is a piece on economics education in China written by Qiu Haiping (邱海平), a professor at Renmin University of China. The piece, published in the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences Journal, bemoans the fact that the teaching of “political economy,” which in this case refers narrowly to Party-approved Marxist theory, has fallen by the wayside in China. Qiu, himself an expert on Marx’ Das Kapital, paints a portrait of the progressive infiltration of Western economics and Western-trained economists in China’s universities. This has brought a shift and displacement of the “mainstream” in economics teaching, he says. That is important in particular because the word “mainstream,” in the context of the People’s Republic of China, refers generally to the ideas espoused by the Party and Party-controlled vehicles of media and culture. Qiu’s piece is supremely dogmatic in its approach to economics education and its political goals. And yet one of chief reasons he gives for the need to control the trend of “severe Westernisation” is the risk of “dogmatism and atrophy” in economics education.

6. Kissinger: China, U.S. Must ‘Lead in Cooperation’ – Caixin “I’m very confident President Xi, when he comes to the United States, will present a picture of what is going on in China that will be very significant,” he said. Kissinger said China is bound to rise despite some down periods, and its influence will make the United States feel uneasy in certain regards. However, it is very important that the world’s two biggest powers “lead in cooperation,” as they did in a recent agreement on climate change, he said. The United States’ former top diplomat also said both countries should “remember that whatever their differences, their common interests are greater.” He also talked about a wide range of other issues, including Russia and the crisis in Ukraine, landscape-changing events occurring in the Middle East, and how diplomacy should work in an age where it is harder to keep secrets.

7. Beijing to Shut All Major Coal Power Plants to Cut Pollution – Bloomberg Business The capital city will shutter China Huaneng Group Corp.’s 845-megawatt power plant in 2016, after last week closing plants owned by Guohua Electric Power Corp. and Beijing Energy Investment Holding Co., according to a statement Monday on the website of the city’s economic planning agency. A fourth major power plant, owned by China Datang Corp., was shut last year. The facilities will be replaced by four gas-fired stations with capacity to supply 2.6 times more electricity than the coal plants. Once complete, the city’s power and its central heating will be entirely generated by clean energy, according to the Municipal Commission of Development and Reform.

8. 【棱镜】郭文贵与他的神秘“盘古会”_综合_产经频道首页_财经网 – CAIJING.COM.CN long Caijing story on Gui Wengui, the man behind Pangu Plaza and involved in the Founder Group case and apparently the downfall of MSS Vice Minister Ma Jian  //  郭文贵，因为方正与政泉一场“恶斗”被更大范围地知晓。他曾扳倒过原北京市副市长刘志华，建成了地标建筑盘古大观。在这里，他搭建了一个被称为“盘古会”的政商网络，已落马的原国安副部长马建等赫然在列。他不断地与曾经的合作伙伴“反目成仇”，在残酷的政商斗争中，他选择信奉了“丛林法则”，有人说他是孤独的，因为他成为了一个“没有真正的朋友的人”。

You can read the rest of today’s newsletter here.