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US-China relations
OpinionComment
Zhou Xiaoming
Zhou Xiaoming

Opinion | The West’s fight against China’s ‘economic coercion’ is misguided and misleading

  • The G7’s latest move to take trade disputes into its own hands only weakens the WTO and suggests selfish geopolitical aims
  • China has been a victim of Western sanctions for decades and it is time for the world to demand an end to the misguided fight against economic coercion

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Illustration: Craig Stephens
Zhou Xiaoming

Economic coercion is not as new as some of us might think. Surfing the web for material for this commentary, I came across a United Nations document.

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A 1991 resolution by the UN General Assembly “calls upon developed countries to refrain from making use of their predominant position in the international economy to exercise political or economic coercion through the application of economic instruments with the purpose of inducing changes in the economic, political, commercial and social policies of other countries”.

It seems developed countries’ use of economic coercion was already widespread. Bad habits die hard. Thirty-odd years on, developed countries have not changed tack. Rather, they have continued to deploy coercive economic measures with increased scope and magnitude. Between 2000 and 2021, the number of sanctions Washington slapped on other countries jumped over ninefold to more than 9,400.

Under Donald Trump alone, the US imposed nearly 4,000 sanctions, averaging three a day. Over the decades, US sanctions have hit nearly 40 countries, affecting almost half of the world’s population. Over 30 countries remain on its sanctions list.

What is new is that those who perpetuate economic coercion have decided to turn on their victims with false countercharges. The Group of Seven (G7) leaders, meeting in Hiroshima, Japan, last month, blasted what they see as a “disturbing rise” of the “weaponisation of economic vulnerabilities”. To counter it, they have launched a “coordination platform” and vowed to develop new tools while continuing to use existing ones.
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Although the language on economic coercion in the G7 communique did not name China, it was obviously the group’s main target. Both US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen have claimed that China economically coerced countries such as Australia and Lithuania.
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