Here's an interesting exchange in blogosphere about the Chinese diaspora and global finance underpined by on component, i.e. U.S.-China relations involving China's "Sovereign Wealth Funds" invested in the U.S. -West financial sectors in Wall Street and European bourses, and whether or not China's "money men" should shift their strategy from the U.S. -West hegemonistic control of global finance into into a more "Asian-centered" or "non-West" investment strategy, given the recent turmoil in Wall Street. There are "brainiacs" out there among Global Chinese learning and improving on their plays.
The conversation in blogosphere is between two Chinese expats David Chiang "DC" ( an ethnic Chinese Diasporic Chinese from Malaysia) and Joseph Wang "Twofish" (Wall Street apologist/astrophysicist from Austin, Texas- a Chinese-American)
DC: The Beijing government is better suited to represent the interests of the 80 million Chinese diasporia in Southeast Asia than the US Treasury controlled IMF, don't you think?
Twofish: That's not clear. If the interests of the Chinese diaspora conflict with the interests of homeland Chinese, then Beijing will listen to homeland Chinese first. In particular, I don't think it is good for the PRC either for itself or for overseas Chinese to present itself as the protector of overseas Chinese since this could cause a backlash.Anyway it is *NOT* a good idea from my self-interest for present *ANY* economic issue as US versus Chinese, because if I do that, someone is going to think of me as a traitor.
DC: China will never attempt to establish global hegemony like the US, but China will certainly regain its historic role as the dominant Asian economic power.
Twofish: I don't think it ever will be the dominant Asian economic power. China is going to have to share power with India, Japan, Russia, and United States. Also it has to behave in a way that does not alarm Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand and the other ASEAN states.This is an example of how the interests of homeland Chinese and diaspora Chinese outside of China, among huarens, may conflict. Beijing really has no interest in asserting any sort of political or economic influence over Malaysia for exmaple, and has no interest in displacing the United States or India as a power in Southeast Asia. This may conflict with the wishes of ethnic in Chinese in southeast Asia who want China to take a much more active role.Also the interests in diaspora Chinese conflict with each other. I personally would be in *DEEP* trouble if the US and China got into any sort of economic or political conflict, and so I'm going to do everything that I can to keep that from happening, and I think that view is shared by most Chinese-Americans. Also since I live in the United States and have US citizenship, I'm hardly in a position where I can argue that the US should be less powerful. Wiser in the use of its power, yes. But less powerful, no. Also, having lived in the US, I have a sense of how powerful the US really us, and how very, very, very stupid it would be to fight it. People that think that the US is going to collapse in the next 10 or the next 50 years are really kidding themselves. Yes you can point to the 100 stupid things that the US is doing, but the point is that the US can do 100 stupid things and still be a superpower whereas if China does two stupid things, it's finished.
This means that I get into constant internet arguments with ethnic Chinese from Malaysia who have different goals and want China to have a more Asia-centered policy, and I think sharply underestimate how powerful the US is.This does have an impact on "homeland politics" since the finance and commerce ministries of the PRC are staffed with returnees from Wall Street, and I don't think that a lot of the anti-globalist sentiments that I've found among Malaysian Chinese really hold that much currency among them.
Written by Twofish on 2008-04-23 16:58:21
