In May 2024, the Saint Pierre International Security Center (SPCIS) initiated a series of interviews under the title European Security and China-Europe Relations. This initiative aims to provide a comprehensive analysis of the political, economic, and social dynamics of EU member states and other European countries, explore the evolving relationship between China and Europe. The series features leading experts from academia and industry, offering insightful analyses, diverse perspectives, and innovative ideas.
Laia Comerma is a postdoctoral researcher at the Centre for Security, Diplomacy and Strategy of the Brussels School of Governance (VUB) under the ERC project ‘Europe in US-China rivalry’ (SINATRA). She completed her PhD at the Pompeu Fabra University (UPF) and the Barcelona Institute for International Studies (IBEI). Her doctoral dissertation, “The influence of the EU–China economic relationship towards the reconfiguration of the economic regime of global governance”, analyses the norms, rules and institutions structuring the foreign policy relation between China and the EU, and how they are being reformed due to their interaction in the fields of investment, trade, and development infrastructure. Her research fields of interest are foreign policy analysis, Chinese and EU foreign policy, and EU–China relations. She holds a MSc in International relations from the London School of Economics (LSE) and a BA in Philosophy, Politics and Economics from UPF-UAM-UC3M. Her recent works including ‘European foreign investment policy towards China: Is there an EU net contribution?’ and ‘The normative influence of the Belt and Road Initiative in Europe’ have been published.
Trade & economy
SPCIS: How do you view the conflict of values between the EU and China in the context of global economic governance, particularly the struggle between multipolarity and unipolarity? How do these conflicts impact economic cooperation and foreign policies?
The struggle is not so much between multipolarity and unipolarity, as it is between different modes of global governance, as you hint in your question. While for many reasons I don’t believe that we are moving into a new ‘Cold War’-like type of world, as some people claim, it is definitely true that China does not fully align with the values that governed the Liberal International Order under which the current international system was created post-World War II. For instance, China challenges the notion of the universality of human rights and argues that social stability has pre-eminence over individual freedom, and while it liberalised significantly its economy towards its entry into the WTO, liberalisation has since then stifled in China and it has been brought to the WTO dispute settlement mechanism by the EU and other Western countries for issues regarding state subsidies, dumping and economic coercion, as it was the case with Lithuania since November 2021.
Therefore, China has only selectively accepted the norms, standards and values that govern the Liberal International Order, from which it has benefited greatly since the 1990s, in order to sustain its particular model of economic development. This has often resulted in problems for the economic cooperation between the European Union and China, and led to the re-design of the EU’s foreign policy towards China from one guided by economic opportunism towards its definition of China as a ‘partner, competitor and rival’ in 2019. In the particular case of economics, the fact that the EU must promote its core values – democracy, freedom, rule of law, human rights – in its foreign trade policy, as established by the Treaty of Lisbon, has often resulted in gridlock when dealing with China, who fundamentally challenges the universality and definition of those notions. This is clearly exemplified by the Comprehensive Agreement on Investment, approved by the Council in December 2020 but which has not been ratified by the European Parliament and thus is not in force and will not be in the foreseeable future.
SPCIS: As a follow up question, how does the EU balance economic interests with core values such as human rights in its strategy towards China? Should the EU consider delinking human rights issues from other topics to facilitate more economic cooperation in future EU-China relations? Can this "delinking" strategy bring long-term benefits for both sides?
As I was hinting to in my previous answer, the EU has not yet managed to reach such balance between its core values and its strategy towards China. I say this because a strategy would imply that those fundamental conflicts have been resolved and that the EU has found an actionable policy that reconciles its economic interest with its desire to protect and promote its core values vis-à-vis China. I would not advocate for ‘de-linking’ human rights and EU values from other issues such as the fight against climate change or terrorism, where China needs to be on board. This is because the European Union, since the first Trump presidency in 2016 but especially now in the context of a second Trump presidency from 2025 onwards, has become the main defender of those values, as the U.S. has turned inwards towards isolationism and abdicated from a principled policy, focusing instead on transactionalism and the promotion of its interests, as Trump sees international relations in a ‘cost-benefit analysis’ kind of way.
Instead, I believe that the EU should find a way to link and order its priorities in a value/interest scale where one particular value or interest would take priority, and the other would take a secondary, conditional role. This means that such value would still be promoted through the conditionality, but it would not be a give-or-take situation, and this would allow the EU to reconcile its principled policy with its relations with authoritarian powers. This would be a way to enact its policy of ‘principled pragmatism’ proposed by the EEAS in 2016, where its interests are promoted in its foreign policy guided by its principles and values. This would also give China the freedom to implement and consider those values in a way that it sees fit in its own territory, while the EU would not abdicate in the eyes of its constituents its promotion of liberal values and its defence of the liberal system of global governance.
Policy design
SPCIS: How do domestic political and security issues in EU Member States influence their policy-making towards China? What role do these domestic factors play in EU-China dialogues?
Foreign policy is a Member States’ competence, while trade and investment are largely an EU competence. Thus, the fusion of those two creates complex dynamics that give both the EU and its Member States the power to influence their respective policies vis-à-vis China in the fields of foreign trade with China. In the case of Member States specifically, they hold the power within and through the Council of the EU where in many cases there needs to be unanimity if certain declarations, communiqués or treaties are to be published or approved. Member states can even block a certain item that they do not wish to be discussed form even being included in the Council meeting’s agenda, as those are usually incorporated by consensus. In other cases, the need for a qualified majority also gives coalitions of Member States the possibility to block a certain policy initiative that goes against their interests, also in the case of their policy towards China.
Therefore, their political and economic interests towards China in the domestic level greatly influence their behaviour in the Council and, potentially, the outcome of the EU’s policy on China. This could be either because they have important economic relations with China, as is the case of Germany or Spain, because of the political influence of China in those countries, like Hungary, or because of certain ideological issues, like Cyprus and Greece. Of course, those are fluid interests and the coalitions and interests of the Member States on issues related to China are not static, which is why the EU has been able to make tangible progress in its ‘China policy’ towards achieving unity among the Member States and what it calls a ‘single voice’. In the case of dialogues, since their outcomes are not mandatory or enforceable in any way, the interests from Member States are more diluted, and mostly permeate at the level of agenda-setting and the drafting of the final communiqué, where it is equally important what is said and how it is said, as what is left out.
SPCIS: How does the interaction between domestic politics and international affairs influence China's foreign policy in the context of EU-China cooperation? Has this interaction, in turn, influenced the EU’s policy-making towards China?
China’s domestic politics are of course an important influence in its policy towards the European Union, especially in the case of trade and investment. I will give you two examples to clearly illustrate this point: first, the overcapacity in the Chinese domestic market, which means that Chinese industries are producing more than the domestic Chinese market can consume, in the context of low domestic consumption, the crisis of its construction sector and its crackdown on fast-growing sectors such as private-tutoring companies, big tech and platform companies, and videogames. On the contrary, China’s electric vehicle (EV) market is booming and it has put China in a dominant position in the global EV industry, with its revenue from EV sales projected to reach US$376.4bn in 2024. Yet, EV companies suffer from oversupply domestically, and fuelled by government subsidies, they rely on selling their vehicles abroad and are able to do so at a fraction of a price compared to Western companies such as Tesla.
This has influenced the EU’s policy-making towards China because China’s subsidisation of its companies and the dumping of its products on European markets have increased the pre-existing conception that their economic relations were unfair, and has been one of the contributing factors of the EU’s strategic autonomy and economic security strategies, and the instruments that have been defined and enacted thereof. For instance, the International Procurement Instrument and the Foreign Subsidies Instrument, whose first investigations uniformly targeted Chinese companies and investments, or the FDI screening mechanism, which has raised suspicion among Chinese companies around the openness of EU markets and future of their investments and trade with China. The sanctions on EVs from China, instead, have led China to increase its greenfield investment in Europe, committing to build EV factories in Hungary, Poland and Spain, for instance, as a backdoor to avoid the import tariffs.
EU-China relations
SPCIS: In the current global context, particularly with the US-China trade dispute and China's rise, how should the EU redefine its strategy towards China to safeguard multilateralism and the stability of the global governance system?
As I mentioned before, after the U.S.’s retreat towards isolationism, the European Union is now the main defender of multilateralism and the values that have governed the global governance system since the end of the second World War, through what has been named in academia as the EU’s ‘normative power’ or ‘ideational power’. Through its trade war with China and with the European Union during the Trump presidency, even the United States abdicated from the free trade standard, and this legitimised China’s non-market practices, which Western democracies had until then forcefully criticised. In this context, the European Union should re-define its ‘China strategy’ in a way that avoids a further division of the international system, promoting the engagement with China on global issues, and to promote regional stability in the Indo-Pacific region.
To achieve this, the EU should work with its like-minded partners in the region to ensure multilateral cooperation aimed at ensuring a global coalition that favour and protects global liberal norms and standards, aimed at counter-balancing any counter-regime initiative or the attempts by the China-Russia coalition to amend and re-define those standards both at international institutions and platforms, and through challenging existing ones, as China is doing in the South China Sea. This is also crucial if the EU wants to contribute to the deterrence of China from any attack against Taiwan. On top of these initiative at international organisations and fora, the EU should reconcile the Indo-Pacific strategy that it published in 2021 with the re-definition of its China policy and consider how it will engage with China, whom it considers as a partner in the region, towards promoting the stability in areas such as maritime security, cybersecurity and trade.
SPCIS: Is the "Prisoner's Dilemma" more prominent in specific areas of cooperation such as climate change, high-tech development and digitalization between the EU and China? How can communication mechanisms help overcome decision-making dilemmas in these areas?
I don’t believe there is any ‘prisoner’s dilemma’ between the EU and China in the areas you mention; in any case, I would see it more present in the areas of military development (including nuclear issues) and security, and it could even be present somehow in some specific areas of trade. This is because of lack of transparency in those issues, which increases the potential for mistrust and misunderstanding, while in some other areas – such as climate change – China’s commitments and intentions are much more clear, especially if it aims to raise as a global leader once Trump becomes the president of the United States once again. This is closely linked with a key issue that hinders the relations between the European Union and China in many instances, which is a fundamental lack of knowledge about China – what it is, what it wants, what it means when it says this or that, its language, etc. – in many capitals of Europe, whereas China has spent much more time studying the West and its political system, even though its knowledge of America is arguably more significant than that of Europe. This ignorance raises the suspicion around China in Europe, portraying it as a ‘hostile other’ and it has been the main reason for the popularisation of the so-called ‘China threat’ narrative.
In this context, and especially as relations between the US and China become more heated and the perceptions of China in Europe become more negative, communication becomes key. The mechanisms for communication between the EU and China are there, there is a wide array of dialogues, high-level meetings, etc. that have been put in place during the many years of diplomatic relations between them, but they were highly affected by the COVID-19 pandemic and they have not recovered yet. For instance, the EU-China dialogue on human rights was only reinstated after Council President Charles Michel’s visit to China on the 1st of December 2022. Therefore, the EU should continue this path of engagement and dialogue, while making an effort to assert its power and clearly communicate its red lines, but this needs greater unity among Member States so that the EU can develop its hard power, which will be key if it wants to become an actor in global security and a security partner to its allies around the world.
China’s image in Europe
SPCIS: Do you think China's "soft power" strategy has been successful within the EU? As China rises on the global stage, how is the EU responding to the challenges posed by China's values and governance model?
On the contrary, I believe that China’s ‘soft power’ strategy has been largely unsuccessful, especially after the COVID-19 pandemic. While it enjoyed a period of allurement after the Eurozone crisis, when it was seen as an economic opportunity that resulted in multiple EU Member States joining the Belt and Road Initiative and pursuing a greater economic relationship with China, even joining China-sponsored fora like the 16+1 (now 14+1) summit, those expectations were not materialised except in sporadic cases like the Piraeus port in Greece. As China’s soft power relied on its image as an economic opportunity and the material incentives it offered, the BRI’s underperformance, the lack of greenfield investment coming from China and the decrease in FDI more broadly since China’s economy began to undergo some difficulties, its image in Europe also suffered, especially among the policymaking community. Among the EU public more broadly, China’s image was considerably affected by the obscurity with which it dealt with the origins of the virus, and with its draconian response at the domestic level, together with its economic coercion towards Lithuania and Australia during the same period, albeit for different reasons. Moreover, during those years the term “wolf warrior diplomacy” was popularised in Europe, as Chinese diplomats began to behave more assertively in order to protect China’s image and, following CCP rhetoric, “tell China’s story well”.
When it comes to the EU’s response, its main strategy is to work with its allies in existing international relations and through new platforms and fora to protect the norms and standards of the Liberal International Order where they exist, such as in the area of free trade through the WTO, the ILO, etc. and to make an effort to define them in a consensual manner in the cases where they do not, as is the case with new technologies like 5G, AI or space exploration. Considering that China is a global leader in many of these new technologies, it is key for the EU and its democratic allies that the standards governing their application follow democratic and liberal norms, if they are to avoid a split of the digital world along political lines, which would be highly impractical, especially as recent laws enacted by the Government of China, much as the Cybersecurity Law of 2017 and the Data Security Law of 2021 have raised suspicion in the EU. In this case, the EU must show, together with its allies, that it is in the benefit of Chinese companies to abide to democratic regulatory standards, if they do not want to risk being shut out from their digital ecosystems, as it happened with Huawei in 2019.
SPCIS: As a conclusion, how could China improve its image in Europe, if possible?
First of all, we need to be realistic. It is clear and even natural that China will be guided by its national interests in its foreign policy and will aim to further them in international organisations. Yet, it can take clear steps to improve its image in Europe. First, while it often speaks in favour of the UN Charter and the UN as the core of the multilateral system, its relationship with Russia since the invasion of Ukraine began have put that claim in serious jeopardy in the eyes of Europeans. China has been accused of providing a life-line to Russia by which it is able to sustain its attack against Ukraine. While it might not be in China’s interests the domestic collapse of Russia, China should become an advocate of peace and work together with Europeans and the U.S. towards a peaceful settlement of the war that is guided by the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity. If it chooses to do so, the 12 points it published on February 2024 are a non-starter. In order to really be a player for peace, Xi should talk with Zelensky, which he has not done since February 2022 before the invasion, and actually understand which are his red lines and where there is room for concession.
Second, while the perspectives on Chinese investment and trade have changed since 2019, China should take the opportunity that a new Trump presidency offers to expand its trade and investment relationship with Europe, which is in its domestic interest considering the state of its economy. Yet, for this, it needs to increase its transparency and make clear that it will abide by EU regulations at least when it comes to the EU market, and commit to the protection of privacy and personal data of European consumers on everything related to new technologies, which expands from EVs to 5G networks. Finally, China has often proven that it does not wish to become an hegemon and that it does not wish to shoulder the responsibilities that the United States has since the end of World War II. Yet, if it proves to be a reliable and committed partner to the EU on issues that the US will potentially withdraw from in the next 4 years at least, such as climate change, this would contribute towards a more positive image of Europe and would add substance to China’s slogan of ‘peaceful rise’ and ‘peaceful development’. Overall, both the EU and China need to work on improving their mutual communication and their understanding of each other, as otherwise their dialogues will often end up ‘lost in translation’ and their cooperation in gridlock or, at least, not realising the full extent of their potential.
Comments