Dawn of the Empathic Civilization
- By Kyle Calandra
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E-mail China.org.cn, November 6, 2015
Speaking directly about the current political and social realities in China, Rifkin admits he's cautiously optimistic. However, he is eager to relate the brave vision of the future currently shared by Chinese policymakers. "The Chinese leadership has put together a few things: China Digital Plus, the Belt and Road Initiative (B&R), and the Ecological Civilization," said Rifkin, maintaining that "these are the bellwether of the new 13th Five Year Plan, and they're very interesting."
China is developing what it calls "Digital Plus." Already a feature of European innovation, the concept revolves around Rifkin's conceptualizations of "a new era of technology," and is centered on a plan to combine the three internets of communication, energy and transportation into what is currently being called "Internet Plus" and ground this on an "Internet of Things" platform. Essentially, China's concept of "Digital Plus" is an intimate integration of the internet and traditional industries which aims to drastically increase economic efficiency and productivity.
As China develops this concept of "Digital Plus," the EU continues to similarly pioneer a vision of "Digital Europe." Taking a closer look at the two regions' digital development in consideration of the China proposed B&R, a larger context begins to emerge. "Europe is China's largest trading partner, China is Europe's second largest and the two share a landmass and 1,000 years of history," says Rifkin. With the announcement of B&R, "it became clear that China is talking about a collaborative initiative with Europe stretching from Ireland to Shanghai."
Rifkin added that the collaboration could "help lay out an infrastructure for all of the developing Asian countries and create an integrated, digital Eurasia." Acknowledging the difficulties associated with the level of commitment and administrative execution necessary to achieve this goal, Rifkin reiterated that it's "an exciting new vision," and not yet an "‘end of history' scenario."
Another concept China is beginning to envision is the creation of an "Ecological Civilization." "China has passed an amendment to the country's constitution, which requires all future economic development to harmonize with nature," Rifkin says, asserting that the amendment is an acknowledgement of China's further commitment to encourage a fledgling biosphere consciousness. "It's a way for the country to develop a new and sustainable society with a sensibility that extends beyond geopolitics."
Recognizing the core of Confucianism, perhaps China's most influential traditional philosophy, as "a mission to empathize in ways that allow us to continue to harmonize our relationships with the natural world," Rifkin speculates that "philosophically, the Confucian Tradition positions China to move the world quickly toward biosphere consciousness. The cultural DNA is there."
With the current economic and political realities in China, "The Empathic Civilization" provides a philosophical framework that is an almost perfect complement to China's current and future developmental outline. Only recently released in the Chinese language, Rifkin's book offers a compelling vision which seems to fall directly in line with the greater aspirations of China's current national orientation. However, Rifkin's book also describes several challenges that may ultimately eclipse the star of these rising aspirations.
"In the context of China, the impediments are obvious," says Rifkin, commenting on the country's overpopulation, rampant pollution, the ongoing debate concerning how to reform state run enterprises and the outdated education system. However, he again remains optimistic, preferring to discuss "the plus side," saying, "Frankly, I think the challenges in China are no more challenging than those in Europe or America."
After more than a century of relative slumber, China has awoken, steadily positioning itself at the center of a world that seems somehow on the brink of both catastrophic collapse and a new dawn of civilization. At the moment, the country is permeated with a feeling of momentum and determination. Even in daily life, everything seems to carry the weight of a larger significance.
Walking along Beijing's seemingly infinite back alleys, looking past the superficial veneer of constant, almost cursory construction and pausing to consider deeply the lives of everyday people, comes a profound understanding of China's present and future circumstance manifest in the Chinese Dream. For centuries, the Chinese have referred to their country as "Tian Xia," literally "under heaven," more loosely translated as "our land."
It exposes a fundamental, philosophical principle of Chinese civilization that the vision of the future is one of shared destiny. The Chinese Dream, riding the back of China's economic dragon, embodies in its phrasing a similar sense of destiny. As the fallout from the political, economic, and industrial revolutions of the previous century finds human civilization at a critical crossroads, China's more aspiring vision of the future has begun to radically shape their development, and manifest the spirit of a shared global consciousness.
"I'm quite bullish about China, but guardedly hopeful," says Rifkin, "we are talking about a major shift in geopolitics, and getting there is going to be really, really difficult. However, we are witnessing the dawn of a new global paradigm shift for human civilization."
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