Renewed "Sinophobia" in Post-Covid Era

Last couple of months have been unprecedentedly harsh on nearly the entire world population. Travel restrictions, home quarantines and closed marketplaces have become the new normal and the resulting halt of economic activity from Covid-19 pandemic has already taken an unimaginable toll on livelihoods across the globe. And it’s apparently getting worse by each passing day with no clue of ‘End of the tunnel’ light as of now.

One sure shot outcome of this is the global volcano of rage (of never-seen-before proportions) against the Chinese deep state as already evident from the exchange by many prominent leaders of the west and public outrage on social media in general, world-over. The reactions at this point appear only rational with calls to ascertain accountability for criminal negligence and cover-up of humongous scale by the Chinese communist party.

Sinophobia may not be an entirely new phenomenon before the impact of Covid began. It has a long history to it going back to opium wars and the deep suspicion stemming from the lack of insight into the mystical Chinese culture for centuries. Even in much more peaceful contemporary times, the fast-growing empire of China is compared to the elephant in the elevator, which is inadvertently suffocating others even if it has politer intentions then everyone tends to agree upon. It always has been that unsolved riddle on the world foreign policy stage where everyone seems to be trying to make sense of it while avoiding direct confrontation with the dragon.

As the more transactional and less principled era of Trump took shape with 3 am bold letter tweets lamenting the 2^nd largest world economy, the hostility became overt and palpable with horn-locking in a long drawn trade war and over secondary irritants like North Korea and South China Sea. But today, even the Trump style rhetoric appears mild compared to the global anger building up in the wake of credible reports about China deliberately suppressing crucial information flow for weeks (if not months) which could’ve saved thousands of lives and the resulting economic and human costs. Now it is a test of the global apparatus to prove that it’s not mere surface level pomposity. It will take realpolitik capital and willpower to look “dollar-intoxicated” China into the eye and force it to make amends to avert any future catastrophe.

The liberal democratic section of the world would still want to be cognizant of the fact that Chinese public at large is equal if not greater victim themselves to the secretive totalitarian regime. Xenophobic targeting of citizens and migrants with vengeful mindset is no less immoral and doesn’t help resolve the problem. Also, there is unease within China itself even amid elite party circles about the serious mismanagement of the pandemic at party level and how it exposes the rotten hierarchical and sycophantic work environment where the local administration has all the incentives to hide the death toll and severity of the spread of contagion and be in the good books of the top brass.

To quote Elbert Einstein, In the midst of every crisis lies great opportunity. It’s probably the dragon’s less worse chance to shun the hubris and do the world a favor by doing introspection and taking corrective actions.

Ashish Kumar