LA TRIBUNE SUNDAY – The French presidency has made major economic imbalances the priority theme of this G7. Do you think, like it, that they threaten global stability?
GILLES GRESSANI – On this subject, we must remember the last conversation between Xi Jinping and Barack Obama, when the latter was at the end of his mandate. The Chinese president said he was very surprised to see a person as astonishing as Donald Trump be elected to the White House. Obama responded very simply: “…This is…the result of what you have done to our economy….»
In other words, the economic asymmetry that China has implemented has caused the dislocation of American industry and made it more difficult for the middle class to maintain its standard of living. This is what produced this symptom of which Donald Trump is the expression. But above all, Xi saw that the election of Trump would change the way in which this asymmetry could be perceived.
ALSO READ
At the G7, Trump will impose his mood and his timetable
C’est-à -dire ?
Every day, the American president embodies and dramatizes the dislocation of the international order even though it was caused by a much broader economic configuration. In telling the story of our world, we only look at the United States. It is a global spectacle that captivates billions of people. But this prevents us from seeing a much deeper transformation. We fall into this trap of ignoring almost everything about China.
Why this indifference?
We think of the world, particularly in Western Europe, as that of the 2000s while we are closer to 2050. We have not entered the 21st century if we do not appreciate the role that China is playing. This is why we launched the so-called “  testof the three Chinese » : « Tell me three living Chinese people whose names you know. » Few succeed, and it’s a democratic problem.
