China and the West: Partners on Equal Terms? (Wolfgang Müller)

Between 1978, the beginning of Deng Xiaoping's reform policy, and Xi Jinping's assumption of office in 2013, China's gross domestic product has increased more than 64 times. More than 800 million people have been lifted out of poverty. However, global ambitions are tempered by domestic political realities, as China is still far from being a wealthy industrial nation with a developed social system. Given the massive social and political contradictions, the "common prosperity" sought by the Chinese government remains a distant goal. According to state and party leader Xi Jinping, the country aims to leave behind the "century of humiliation" by Western colonial powers and to engage with the world "on equal terms" through "common prosperity" at home. How will we respond to this? Speaker: Wolfgang Müller has spent many years in IG Metall Bavaria overseeing the Siemens Group and the automotive and supplier industry. Previously, he was a software developer at US computer companies. He lived in Beijing for several years.