China is on there hands about their power among the world. China's efforts to join the World Trade Organisation (WTO) dragged on for 15 years, long enough to “turn black hair white”, as Zhu Rongji, China’s former prime minister, put it. (His own hair remained Politburo-black throughout.)
Yet the bet paid off for China. It has blossomed into the world’s greatest exporter and second-biggest importer. The marriage of foreign know-how, Chinese labour and the open, global market has succeeded beyond anyone’s predictions.
It is instead China’s trading partners who now contemplate its WTO membership with furrowed brows.
Too big to be a bystander—or to be kept out
But China’s sins should be put into perspective. In terms of global trade consumers everywhere have gained from cheap Chinese goods. Chinese growth has created a huge market for other countries’ exports. And China’s remaining barriers are often exaggerated. It is more open to imports than Japan was at the same stage of development, more open to foreign direct investment than South Korea was until the 1990s. Its tariffs are capped at 10% on average; Brazil’s at over 30%. And in China, unlike India, you can shop at Walmart, most of the time.
As for the hurdles foreign firms face in China, they are disgraceful—but sadly no worse than in other developing countries. So celebrate China’s ten years in the WTO: we are all richer because of it. But, when it comes to trade, China’s rulers now badly need to grow up. Their cheating is harming their own consumers and stoking up protectionism abroad. That could prove to be economic self-harm on an epic scale.
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