There are those who believe China's ongoing Party Congress will bode well for companies that do business in or with China. I am firmly convinced that the opposite is true and that it will used as yet another opportunity by China to show that it will not be cowered by the declining relations and sanctions/counter-sanctions between the United States / EU / Australia / Japan on the one hand, and China on the other. I see China using this Congress to let the world (domestic and external) know that it fully intends to fight back and fight back hard.
In other words, this Party Congress will lead to China's decoupling from much of the world accelerating, not slowing down.
1. 中美关系恶化不足为奇
早在2018年10月，我在《中国、美国与新常态》一文中就明确表达了对中国与西方关系改善可能性的悲观预期，并呼吁外国企业（尤其是向美国销售产品的公司）努力减少在华业务足迹。
2019年4月，《华尔街日报》在封面报道《仅靠贸易协议无法修复紧张的中美商业关系》中引用我的观点时，我再次公开表示确信中美关系正持续恶化且看不到转机：
“There is no way any deal between China and the U.S. will cause everyone on both sides to say, ‘We were just kidding,’” said Dan Harris, managing partner at Harris Sliwoski, a law firm that specializes in investment with China. “The tariffs and the arrests and the threats and the heightened risk have impacted companies and that will not go away.”
Then on May 4, 2019, I wrote The US-China Trade War: Winter is Coming on how the acceleration of this decoupling trend has been unleashed nothing is going to change that. I noted then (and I note again today) how "the US is cracking down hard on China deals with US companies on national security grounds. And China is doing what it can to stop its own companies from dealing with the United States.
于是我们便开始持续发文，敦促企业更深入地考察中国以外的国家。
2. 中国与西方将在几乎所有领域持续交锋
2019年5月8日，我深入探讨了中美关系，当时我这样说道：
基于最近几天的观察，我首先想到的是这场贸易战的核心本质，是中美两国争夺产品采购来源的控制权。显然我并非第一个提出这种观点的人，但必须承认直到昨天，当律所的西班牙律师不经意间提及类似观点时，我才真正领悟到这一点。特朗普总统和习近平主席都在运用各自的权力影响全球采购决策。 这样表述似乎显而易见，但若非听闻下文解释，我甚至不确定自己是否真能领会其中深意。不过嘛，若我的观点完全错误，请务必指正——正如俗语（大致）所言："这里没有坏主意"。
本周早些时候，我读到关于习近平如何掌控中国经济的报道。哎呀，这还用说吗？ 不，我是说真正掌控，几乎事无巨细。中国要报复加拿大——因其恪守国际法逮捕华为CFO孟晚舟。参见《华为起诉书成新常态》。中国采取的手段是：直接命令国内企业不得采购加拿大油菜籽油，结果——就这么简单——企业们果然不买了。 更甚者，中国已扣押两名加拿大公民，并突然决定将另一名原判15年监禁的加拿大公民改判死刑。换言之，习近平主席及中国政府高层只需轻弹指尖，就能重塑商业格局。
特朗普总统虽不具备如此近乎不受制约的权力，却渴望拥有同样的权力，因此他一直在利用关税来实质上达到相同的目的。 他先是对中国加征关税，接着与中国谈判，随后又威胁要加征关税，最终再次对华加征关税。与此同时，他不断施压美国各政府机构，要求其通过反倾销和反补贴税（AD/CVD）等非关税手段加大对华产品的压力。详见《又一份针对中国的国际贸易（AD/CVD）申诉：这次是金属文件柜》。
特朗普总统正竭尽全力说服美国企业——实际上是任何向美国销售产品的全球企业——停止与中国开展业务。CNN在《我们吓坏了：特朗普突然加征关税令美国企业措手不及》一文中，通过聚焦特朗普临时加征的关税将如何损害未作准备的美国企业，阐释了这一策略的运作机制。
I went into the long history above for two reasons. One, to show that I've been right all along. I want to show this not to brag (though I do like highlighting this to those who wrote me hate mail at the time saying I didn't have any clue what I was talking about), but to try to convince you that I know whereof I speak when I say that China's relations with the West will continue to decline. Two, because what is written above from 2018 and 2019, could just as easily be written today about the present and the future of China decoupling.
And in many respects, it was written today, but by Dexter Roberts for the China Project. First a bit about Dexter Roberts, who I have considered to be one of the foremost experts on China since his days as Bloomberg Businessweek's China bureau chief. Roberts is. currently a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Asia Security Initiative and a fellow at the Maureen and Mike Mansfield Center, He is also the author of The Myth of Chinese Capitalism and writes the Trade War newsletter, both of which are superb most-reads.
3. China's COVID-Zero Policy is Here to Stay
Roberts -- like me -- believes that China's COVID-zero policy is going to continue and that Xi is bad for business and bad for China's relations with the West. And like me, he thinks those who believe otherwise are (like those who excoriated me for my negative predictions way back in 2018 are engaging in wishful thinking. I (like Roberts) believe that the motivations of some of those who claim to believe things will get good again after today's CCP Congress are doing so because their China related jobs/income depend on their companies or their investors/clients believing things will get better.
罗伯茨这样说：
经历了在中国经营的艰难岁月后，一些人似乎期待——或刻意期盼——二十大后经济政策的重置。
渴望投资的银行表示，重创中国经济的"清零政策"很可能在不久的将来解除。据领导层更迭的预测者称，即将卸任的总理李克强的继任者可能是位思想开放的改革者。 而习近平——几乎可以确定将在未来多年执掌大权——或许正是中国所需的强有力且高效的领导者，以应对诸多发展挑战，包括经济失衡、债务攀升及人口老龄化等问题。
Roberts emphatically states that "COVID zero isn’t going away . . . . [and] China won’t see its growth recover at all if it doesn’t end its stringent pandemic measures." He then notes how investment banks like "Nomura and Goldman Sachs, recently predicted officials will lift the tough restrictions in the spring, after the 20th Party Congress and next March’s National People’s Congress."
“Reopening appears the remaining meaningful tool to manage the economy,” wrote Morgan Stanley analysts in a recent note. (That banks are the ones making this bullish prediction is hardly surprising; they know well that their business will be badly hurt if a breakthrough doesn’t happen soon.)"
但罗伯茨和我一样（参见《新冠封锁期间在中国及与中国开展业务》），认为中国不会放弃清零政策，因为其拒绝进口更有效的mRNA疫苗的政策实在"令人费解"：
这或许正是《人民日报》——作为中共官方报纸——采取不同寻常举措的原因：短短一周内接连发表三篇社论（1,2,3），既大力捍卫"清零"政策，又抨击其他国家更为宽松的防疫措施。 新加坡国立大学李光耀公共政策学院教授吴文远向彭博社表示："这是习近平向全国宣告：这是我的政策，不容置疑，没有谈判余地。"
4. 中国共产党对商业不利，且未来仍将如此
Roberts also sees things getting even worse for companies that do business in or with China. He bases this on the fact that the new leadership will consist of economics professionals "with much less diverse experience, with much less international renown, and with much less collective voice in the making of economic policy." If “Xi is favoring loyalty over technocratic competence, this would be one of the strongest policy signals out of the congress — and one that would be interpreted negatively for China’s economic outlook over the next five years,” notes Logan Wright of Rhodium Group, a research firm.
Roberts then does a great job refuting "the old two-part and tired argument: that ultimately Xi is a pragmatist willing to take any path that helps makes China strong and prosperous and able to achieve its 'great rejuvenation' and that his heavy-handed consolidation of power allows him to overcome entrenched anti-reform interests before he loosens the reins over the economy and unleashes growth." He notes that you would "think people would have learned their lesson after watching Xi emerge as one of the most conservative, ideological leaders of China in decades" and then gives a long history of how those with these thoughts have consistently been proven wrong. My comment to clients who engage in this branch of wishful thinking is that for as long as I've been dealing with China it has always prioritized CCP control over the populace of economic growth. That has not changed one bit. All that has changed is the greater need to allow the economy to stagnate so as to allow CCP control to increase.
你看到外面有什么？
