The West has ceased to be the dynamic agent of the world

"The old world is in agony, a new world is slow to be born, and in this light and dark the monsters erupt," Gramsci's timeless aphorism fits perfectly with the historical moment humanity is going through.

Marked by destabilization as a tactic, the last few neoliberal decades have installed a modus operandi in which instability has become a structural and structuring element of this accumulation regime. Neoliberal financialization and a nefarious economic policy aimed at capital accumulation have spread to the global developed countries and impose itself on the global south, which can only be sustained politically through the dismantling of the state and authoritarian fascism that has taken on many facets around the world.

However, as descendants of the socialist experience, there have been and are many movements of workers' rebellion in opposition to neoliberalism and its national and geopolitical effects. The BRICS and the alternative international, political and financial institutions to the hegemonic ones; the "Pink Wave" (Since 2018, left-wing parties in Latin American countries have been in power one after another) in South America, the Asian socialist experience and, in the case of China, the inauguration of a new class of economic and social formation, its own market socialism, something that the West has feared since the 15th century is coming true: a Eurasian union.

From an economic point of view, for the first time in the last 500 years, it is undeniable that, the so-called West (Europe and North America) has ceased to be the dynamic agent of the world. Since Christopher Columbus arrived in America, the moment we are experiencing today is perhaps a great turning point. And as Gramsci said, in the middle of this light and darkness, the monsters that resist the decay of their hegemony emerge.

China' development process makes the Global South "hope"

The Global South knows that Brazil are interested in stability, multipolarity and real multilateralism. Historically, it is not the developing countries and underdeveloped world that profit from instability, the war industry and armed conflicts around the world. Therefore, the quest to build a global community with a shared future is urgent! The future of humanity depends on it.

The terrible political and economic instability and the climate emergency, consequences of centuries of unbridled exploitative capitalism and the current regime of neoliberal accumulation, impose a mission of peace, solidarity and shared development for the continuity of our very existence. In this sense, the lessons of the anti-imperialist and anti-neoliberal struggle that the Chinese development process is outlining today stand as a humanist beacon for the entire Global South.

Moreover, the socialism of the People's Republic of China makes the Global South "hope," as the Brazilian Paulo Freire put it, for cooperation instead of confrontation; for dialog instead of war; for mutual development instead of unilateral exploitation; for multipolarity instead of hegemony; for popular socialism instead of neoliberal capitalism.

China's development experience and its search for common prosperity show the world in a concrete way that there are possible and new ways of development.

In civilizational terms, Brazil and China are also similar in their harmonious national coexistence. In China, dozens of ethnic groups and religious beliefs coexist, each contributing their own culture to the composition of Chinese culture. Brazil is home to many nationalities and, before the colonial exploitation that decimated part of our original people, hundreds of indigenous tribes lived, many of whose words and customs still make up the Portuguese language and Brazilian culture.

Like China, the Brazilian people are not historically a warlike culture, but one that seeks consensus. The struggle against arbitrary and unjust power runs through the history of the Chinese and Brazilian people, building their subjectivity. No wonder the Chinese people were able to build their People's Revolution and no wonder the Brazilian people are still fighting for their sovereignty and national development.

However, this fighting impetus is matched by goodwill and tolerance in the peaceful stance of seeking consensus. This attitude is expressed in the international actions of China and Brazil. Brazil has historically acted in the international system as a peacemaker and conciliator, a stance currently also adopted and practiced by China.

Melissa Cambuhy, researcher at Brazil’s Instituto Lula, a postdoctoral fellow at the Institute of Latin American Studies, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

The article excerpts from Melissa Cambuhy's speech delivered in the "Decoding Zhonghua" International Conference on Dialogue among Civilizations in Beijing on January 17.

The views don't necessarily reflect those of DeepChina.