Features

Sinophobia vs. China’s development model: Part 2

Published

5 years ago

2021/05/25

By Shiran Illanperuma and Dr. Vagisha Gunasekara

The first part of our series introduced the concept of “Sinophobia Inc.” and the information industrial complex surrounding it. We argued that funding from Western state and corporate sources has sought to flood media with anti-Chinese sentiment, while alternative perspectives rarely get wider coverage. Especially in Sri Lanka, the Anglicized liberal comprador elites lap up the vitriol and use it to shape public opinion.

To be specific, Sinophobia in Sri Lanka is fuelled by several elements on the political stage that may not always have converging political agendas, but rally together when it comes to the ‘China issue’. This constellation consists of Western embassies such as the US, the NGOs funded by these same governments, the pro-imperialist rightwing parties, sections of the ultranationalists, and sectarian/utopian ‘Left’ parties and intellectuals who invoke Marx only in name.

Previously, we discussed their allegations of income inequality in China, the rural-urban divide, and differing provincial outcomes in New China’s 70-year development story. This part shifts focus to criticisms surrounding the ecological and climate impact of China’s swift industrial development, which no doubt came at great environmental cost.

Total emissions: a Malthusian trap

China is now the largest CO2 emitter in the world in absolute terms. China’s coal consumption sky-rocketed with rapid industrialization post-revolution. In 2012, China consumed almost the same volume of coal as the rest of the world combined. Air pollution rose, leading to infamous stories of smog-covered cities. This certainly puts some onus on China to consider its global environmental impact, which, as we shall show below, it is doing.

Yet, the focus on China’s total emissions conveniently ignores the country’s per-capita emissions (6.4 metric tonnes), dwarfed by advanced economies like the United States (17.6mt), Australia (14.9mt), and Germany (10.4mt). The US military alone emits some 59mt of CO2, more than Sweden – and this is not even for the sake of production and consumption, but for destruction!

We can push beyond even per-capita emissions to examine China’s emissions in historical perspective by looking at cumulative global emissions. Data shows that from 1750-1950, the industrializing and colonizing West was by far the sole ecological culprit. Even to the present day, the underdeveloped countries, home to the vast majority of the world’s population, are responsible for less than 40% of historical emissions.

The world’s manufacturer/dumping ground

Trendy liberal environmentalism, popularized by corporations and I/NGOs, tends to focus on pollution caused by consumption. Less examined is the role of production. In a world of globalized value chains, where production has been decentralized to break organized labor and preserve capitalist profits, attributing emissions to any single country is tricky.

After China’s Reform and Opening-up from 1978, large numbers of Western firms relocated their manufacturing to China’s Special Economic Zones (SEZs). By 2019, China contributed around 28.7% – over a quarter – of the world’s manufacturing output. Though we may have dismissed cheaper Chinese manufactures as “Cheena badu” in the past – an attitude still prevalent with regard to COVID-19 vaccines – it was this process that created the abundance of affordable commodities we all enjoy today.

From China’s perspective, this was a historical compromise to attain the technology and market share required for rapid development. But, for consumers in the developed world, it meant they could enjoy goods manufactured cheaply in China, while not having to directly deal with the environmental impacts of the production process.

Right to development

China occupies a unique position as the world’s largest CO2 emitter, while also being a developing country. Industrialization inevitably leads to higher emissions, given the required buildup of infrastructure and heavy industry, unless there’s access to new technologies that can make the process more environmentally sustainable.

After industrialization at the expense of their colonies, Western countries now hypocritically lecture us about environmental standards. Yet, until recently, they ‘conveniently’ held sole access to the technology to achieve these standards. Therefore calls to accede to such standards were partly to open up our markets for their monopolies.

China’s solution was to develop its own green technologies at its own pace, and at a more-affordable price level for underdeveloped countries. Today, China has the largest market share in every stage of solar-panel production. Meanwhile, it produces around half the world’s electric cars. China’s heavy investment in railways, both locally and internationally, should also be lauded for being a greener alternative to transport by road and air.

People-led policy

Before the last decade, China’s environmental policy could be described as ‘pollute first, clean up later’. Soon, air quality became a serious cause for concern, especially for a newly emerging educated middle class.

Protests in Sichuan, Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces over pollution led China to publish a comprehensive plan that would significantly bring down smog levels by 2017. These triggered changes in China’s environmental management policies, highlighting problems in local governments not wanting to compromise economic growth and tax revenue.

China’s vision to ‘go green’ meant changes for ordinary citizens. In the mining town of Datong, workers found new jobs in solar-power plants built on old mine sites. In 2017, millions of households had to be weaned off depending on coal, replaced with natural gas. Rural households struggled to heat homes, and some commentators challenged whether ‘it’s fair for low-income rural families to shiver so Beijing can enjoy bluer skies?’

In the last few years, Chinese government policies have enhanced environmental awareness among the people. Waste-sorting has been introduced as a “social contract” between the government and the people. There’s also a push to reduce food wastage in restaurants.

Ecological civilization

Contrary to the image of a polluting behemoth portrayed by corporate media, China today is a global leader in developing greener technologies and policies. Few outside China know of the government’s 40-year efforts in the Gobi desert to plant forests the size of Germany. China’s forest cover has increased from 12% in 1978 to 22%. A study by NASA showed that, while global green-leaf area grew by 5% since 2000, at least 25% of this growth came from China.

In 2014, Chinese President Xi Jinping and then US President Barack Obama issued a joint statement on climate change, and China made its first international commitment to curb carbon emissions, carving out the path to the 2015 Paris Agreement and a climate governance model based on nationally determined contributions.

In 2018, the concept of “ecological civilization” was added to the Chinese Constitution. The Ministries of Ecology and Environment and of Natural Resources were established. In 2020, Xi Jinping announced, China would reach peak emissions in 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality by 2060. Coal would be completely phased out in the next 40 years, and wind and solar dominate, supplemented by hydro, gas and nuclear energy.

Given the massive head-start of former colonial powers in the West, these rich countries should be miles ahead in development of green technologies and implementation of green policies. Instead, it is testament to China’s marketized socialist system how it managed to turn an underdeveloped country into a global leader in green technology and policy in just over 70 years.

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Features

The challenge of keeping value-based politics alive

Published

12 hours ago

2026/05/28

Sahan Weerasooriya

Anti-migrant protests in Durban, South Africa. BBC

The current outbreak of anti-immigrant protests in Durban, South Africa is bound to have taken many a subscriber to value-based politics or political idealism quite by surprise. After all, this is evidence that despite the historic accomplishments of nation-builders of the stature of the late President Nelson Mandela it cannot be taken for granted that identity politics, including racism in its worst forms, is no more in South Africa.

At the time of this writing details are scarce on the substantive root causes of the protests but it could very well be that economic grievances, particularly on the part of the majority community in South Africa, are contributing considerably to the disaffection. Shrinking employment and material prospects are likely to figure majorly among the factors igniting the unrest.

Fortunately, the local authorities in Durban are losing no time in calling for peaceful co-existence among the relevant communities and are pointing to the vital importance of stepping-up national integration processes. Apparently, immigrants in sizable numbers from neighbouring countries are present in Durban. However, international TV footage of the protests quoted some local authorities as saying that the majority of the immigrants in some centres that housed them were not illegal migrants and had the documents that entitle them to be in Durban.

In the Durban protests the world has fresh proof of the socially divisive consequences of the gathering globe-wide economic disaffection, touched off particularly by the continuing crisis in West Asia. Going ahead, the world would need to brace for increasing identity-based unrest of the kind it is just witnessing in South Africa.

Considering that the material lot of ordinary people everywhere could only aggravate progressively, with the US and Iran showing no signs of negotiating an end to their confrontation any time soon, it will be left to the more democratic and progressive sections of the world community to initiate positive measures collectively to bring a measure of relief to the discontented.

The swiftness with which such relief will be provided would depend crucially on the importance those sections taking up these undertakings attach to value-based politics as opposed to Realpolitik of power politics.

Going by these yardsticks, Italy could be considered to be moving in the right direction. Recently Italy came to the fore in initiating the collective named, ‘Rome Coalition for Food Security and Access to Fertilizer’, which has as one of its aims the swift provision of fertilizer to economically weak African countries.

In a recent statement Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Antonio Tajani, said that a principal aim of the project was to ensure that the farmers of Africa gained easy access to fertilizer, considering that food security is a growing concern among some of Africa’s economically vulnerable countries.

The statement went on to mention that some 30 countries hailing from the Mediterranean region, the Middle East, the Balkans as well as the FAO had been invited to join the coalition. The venture is far-seeing in that food security is main among the reasons for social discontent which in turn could degenerate into endemic political turmoil and bloodshed. Separatist violence and geographical fragmentation of countries wouldn’t be too far behind these developments, as Africa itself has often proved.

It is hoped that more G7 countries would take the cue from Italy and do what they could to ease the hardships of economically distressed countries, particularly of the global South. In these efforts they would need to break rank with the US, which is today brutally indifferent to the consequences of its policy of making ‘America First’, come what may.

Going by current developments, the Trump administration seems to be blithely oblivious to the wider, deleterious effects of its policy course in West Asia. Besides rendering Iran militarily and otherwise impotent nothing else seems to matter to Washington, as regards West Asia. This is policy short-sightedness of an extreme kind. After all, right now West Asia could be said to be sitting on the proverbial powder keg.

On the other hand, Iran is not giving the world the impression that it is doing anything constructive to get out of the policy straitjacket that it wove for itself decades ago. Rather than enter into a policy of ‘live and let live’ in relation to Israel in particular and initiate a process of reconciliation with the latter, it has chosen to operate within policy parameters that continue to damn Israel. This has put Israel always on the ‘defensive’ so to speak and prevented the opening up of space for meaningful dialogue.

That said, Israel is obliged to explore the possibilities of entering into a negotiatory process with the Arab-Islamic world that could lead to a de-escalation of tensions and bloodshed. It cannot continue to look at its neighbours through lenses that distort them as archetypal enemies who should be ‘wiped off completely from the face of the earth.’

In other words, the need is urgent for Realpolitik to give way to value-based politicks. Italy is beginning to prove that the latter approach could be pursued with some success. May be the EU and the UK could throw their weight behind these initiatives as well and establish that international politics could be refashioned on the basis of humane, civilized norms. The UN would need to be fully supportive of these moves and prove an organizational nucleus of the operations that follow.

In fact the time is ripe for people of conscience to collectively stand up on the side of peace and say ‘No’ to war and violence. Organizations such as the ICRC, the WHO and Medicines Sans Frontiers have already taken up this call. Referring to the widespread destruction of health facilities and their dehumanizing results these organizations have said, among other things, that ‘This is not a failure of the law. It is a failure of political will.’

True, ‘failure of political will’ among those powers that matter accounts for the runaway, uncontrollable nature of war and destruction in contemporary times, but more fundamentally it is a failure of the human conscience. It could very well be that the phenomenal levels to which violence and war have been unleashed today have had the effect of deadening consciences. This is a matter for urgent study and wide discussion.

Features

Vesak celebrations … with Cuteefly

Published

12 hours ago

2026/05/28

Sahan Weerasooriya

Perfect for celebrations, gifts, and meaningful occasions // Gift pack

I would describe Indunil Kaushalya Dissanayaka as innovative and creative, and she operates under the name of Cuteefly.

Indunil always comes up with something novel to celebrate special occasions, and she does it with candles … and that’s her profession.

She was in the spotlight when she created a happening scene, with candles, for Christmas, Sinhala and Tamil New Year, and Valentine’s Day.

As lanterns light up Sri Lanka for Vesak, the Colombo-based candle maker is quietly turning wax and wick into little pieces of the festival.

Candles reflecting Vesak themes

Her candles reflect Vesak themes – light, peace, remembrance, giving, etc., to enable you to fill your Vesak celebration with devotion and beauty.

Among her Vesak creations is a lotus-shaped soy candle, scented with sandalwood, lavender, etc., meant to burn during this Vesak Poya Day.

Indunil Kaushalya Dissanayaka: Customers
praise her for her creativity

These handcrafted Vesak candles are perfect for offering at the temple, she says.

What makes her creations so novel is that they come in different shapes, scents, themes, and all are handmade.

What’s more, her customers have heaped praise on her for her creativity.

According to Indunil, her creations are perfect as a thoughtful gift … to bring beauty, unity, and light into every moment.

Says Indunil: “Our beautifully handcrafted Unity candles are designed with premium detail and love, making them perfect for celebrations, gifts, and meaningful occasions.”

Cuteefly, says Indunil, is available online.

Readers could contact Indunil on 0778506066 for more details.

He Facebook Page is: Cuteefly.

Handmade with love

Features

Dark Spots …

Published

12 hours ago

2026/05/28

Sahan Weerasooriya

Yes, dark spots do crop up on the skin, especially with sun exposure and, of course, as the skin ages.

However, these tips should be of immense benefit to those who are faced with dark spots.

* Lemon and Honey Glow Mask:

You will need 01 teaspoon lemon juice and 01 teaspoon honey.

Mix the lemon juice and honey well and then apply this mixture, only on the dark spots.

Leave for 10–15 minutes and then rinse with cool water.

Benefits:

Lemon helps brighten pigmentation.

Honey moisturises and heals skin.

Gives a natural glow.

* Aloe Vera Gel Treatment:

All you need is fresh aloe vera gel.

Apply the gel apply on dark spots, before going to bed.

Leave overnight and wash in the morning.

Benefits:

Reduces acne marks and pigmentation.

Soothes irritated skin.

Helps skin repair naturally.

* Turmeric and Yoghurt Paste:

You will need 01 teaspoon yoghurt and a pinch of turmeric

Mix the yoghurt and turmeric into a smooth paste and apply on affected areas.

Leave for 15 minutes and then wash gently with lukewarm water.

Benefits:

Turmeric brightens skin naturally.

Yoghurt removes dead skin cells.

Helps fade dark spots gradually.

Use these packs 02-03 times a week as results are generally seen over time.

You can also try this out: Mix a ripe papaya into a smooth paste and apply to the face, or directly on to the dark spots. Leave for 15-20 minutes and then wash with lukewarm water.