Prediction China will lose the "cold war"

[BaobabScion]

But many 21st century challenges scale up with population size. More people means more mouths to feed, more water to source. I think China will eventually figure out ways to get out of those crises, but it will take a lot of resources. Resources that cannot be spent on fighting a cold war.

Many Western countries also have insufficient pension savings and looming challenges for mitigating and adapting to climate change. But they do have more wealth to draw on for facing these challenges.

If your logic is that - because of a demographic reshuffling towards a higher median age slated to occur over the next two decades - China will be unable to participate in global power play and politik, despite the fact that, over the same time span, China will maintain a youthful portion of its population that would be almost double the population of the entire United States, then - just to be able to keep coherence - you'd immediately need to reassess your claim that Western countries would be better able to face these challenges or you'd have to consider the possibility that their ability to force-project would decrease at a rate higher than that of China's.

Excluding the United States, whose lead is rapidly being lost, there is no Western country with a higher percentage of the world's wealth than China. The western runner-up, Germany, has only a quarter of China's wealth, and is likely to take a non-adversarial role due to their economic and energy resource-based links with Russia and China.

Differences in living standards may not be as extreme as they used to be, so migration flows can become gradually less one-sided. But we don't need everyone to come over, just enough to keep the engine going. I think for China this is more difficult, it's just not an easy country to migrate to and put your roots down (or is this a Western perspective, is it easier for non-Westerners to fit in there?). Japan struggles with this too, they could really benefit from some more (skilled) immigration but either don't want to or don't know how.

China doesn't need to make the process easier or increase the migratory flow. They're not like Japan, who really ought to have allowed more immigration but didn't due to cultural reclusiveness, xenophobia and a desire to preserve the Kawaii aesthetic. China has the propaganda apparatus, educational system, governmental focus, and good stock quality (as in, people quality) necessary to continuously cultivate productive and adept members of both leadership and STEM sectors.

Let's get a bit more abstract:
If a system requires exhaustible external energy in order to perpetuate itself, then it is unsustainable by definition. So, if I may use your analogy, if the US is a person transported in a Car OF FREEDOMTM powered by an engine that must be constantly fueled by gasoline sourced from outside the vehicle's own range and if that source could run out, then that vehicle is de-facto inferior to something like a tricycle because the tricycle is propelled by human work undergone by a body whose fuel could be sourced well within the range of the individual's athletic ability.

[PrometheusUnbound]

If your logic is that - because of a demographic reshuffling towards a higher median age slated to occur over the next two decades - China will be unable to participate in global power play and politik, despite the fact that, over the same time span, China will maintain a youthful portion of its population that would be almost double the population of the entire United States, then - just to be able to keep coherence - you'd immediately need to reassess your claim that Western countries would be better able to face these challenges or you'd have to consider the possibility that their ability to force-project would decrease at a rate higher than that of China's.

Excluding the United States, whose lead is rapidly being lost, there is no Western country with a higher percentage of the world's wealth than China. The western runner-up, Germany, has only a quarter of China's wealth, and is likely to take a non-adversarial role due to their economic and energy resource-based links with Russia and China.

I guess an important question is whether the ability to project power depends on total wealth or per capita wealth. China's total wealth is vast, and that makes it possible to fund big projects (military or otherwise). Its per capita wealth is a lot lower (currently 20 times lower than the US, source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_c ... per_capita). Per capita wealth says something about the kind of burden you can impose on your people before it gets too much. If I have to face water shortage and rising pension and healthcare costs, I would like to have high per capita wealth rather than high total wealth per se.

The coming decades most countries will have their hands full dealing with rising challenges like climate change and demographics. If you have a lot of resources per citizen, your hands will be a bit less full, so you'll have a bit more residual resources to undertake big projects like power projection, space race etc.

China doesn't need to make the process easier or increase the migratory flow. They're not like Japan, who really ought to have allowed more immigration but didn't due to cultural reclusiveness, xenophobia and a desire to preserve the Kawaii aesthetic. China has the propaganda apparatus, educational system, governmental focus, and good stock quality (as in, people quality) necessary to continuously cultivate productive and adept members of both leadership and STEM sectors.

Let's get a bit more abstract:
If a system requires exhaustible external energy in order to perpetuate itself, then it is unsustainable by definition. So, if I may use your analogy, if the US is a person transported in a Car OF FREEDOMTM powered by an engine that must be constantly fueled by gasoline sourced from outside the vehicle's own range and if that source could run out, then that vehicle is de-facto inferior to something like a tricycle because the tricycle is propelled by human work undergone by a body whose fuel could be sourced well within the range of the individual's athletic ability.

I like your system's perspective. True, if a continuing stream of talented migrants is needed to make an economy work, then that may be unsustainable. I don't know whether the source would run out, but eventually maybe it could. I do think that would be a slower process than Chinese population ageing, so at least temporarily (for a few decades?) it would not help China gain a stronger relative position vis à vis the US.

[funkervogt]

China is more likely to self-sabotage itself via its unstable economic and social systems rather than be defeated by external geopolitical enemies.

As a massive country that has nuclear weapons, I don't see how China could ever be "defeated."

The likeliest "bad outcome" for China would be economically stalling like Japan, but at a lower level of GDP. In other words, they would never get out of the "Middle Income Trap." The nature of their Communist government would prevent it from making the economic and political reforms needed to enter the league of the truly developed nations. Average Chinese people would be dissatisfied with their situation, but not powerful enough to overthrow the Communist party. (Kind of sounds like the marriage of inconvenience between American voters and the two dominant parties)

Another possibility is that China will finally launch its long-awaited invasion of Taiwan and lose, which would be hugely embarrassing and would cast into doubt the narrative that China's ascension to global leadership is inevitable and the West is doomed to decline. I often read about military affairs, and believe China's ability to project military power is weaker than most people think.

Let me resurrect this thread to update two points I made.

This analysis predicts that China will follow Japan by "stalling out," but at a lower level of GDP and living standards. It's mostly due to demographic decline.
https://www.lowyinstitute.org/publicati ... rise-china

The collapse of the American-installed government in Afghanistan and Russia's military problems in Ukraine show that even great powers can struggle to control smaller countries. With that in mind, there's reason to believe a Chinese invasion of Taiwan would fail.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/ukraine-wa ... 1646769700