[Biweekly Symposium] No. 577: Now or Never: The Crisis of Globalisation in the 21 st Century. 

Lecturer: QIN Hui

Host: SHENG Hong

Commentators: LI Yong, CHENG Xiaohe, ZHANG Lifan

Professor QIN Hui first argued that the global crisis of the 21st century is a problem he has been pondering upon for a long time, and the issues faced by China, considering the externality, is global rather than regional. He thought the Brexit and Trump’s ascendence to the presidency signaled the crisis of welfare state and the free market economy. A comprehensive set of problems have emerged, political, economic, cultural, and even diplomatic. He thinks that Thomas Piketty’s propositions were well-founded and the gap between the rich and the poor should not be stressed more. In the political arena, Professor QIN Hui thinks Fukuyama’s analysis of the state capacity stressed two things in essence, i.e., institution and money. 

Professor QIN Hui lastly emphasized that, the cultural dimension notwithstanding, globalization has in effect brought about convergence politically and economically. The gap between socialist economies and capitalist ones is closing. A middle way, or a status between pure capitalism and socialism is in play. However, he thought we should pay attention to the divergence process even though the choice of development paths has blurred the distinction between capitalism, socialism, welfare, and laissez-faire. 

Unirule Biweekly Symposium has been serving the Chinese public as an open platform for academic exchange.