Geopolitical Europe Pulse: zoom on the UK's China policy

18 October 2024

The UK’s Foreign Secretary David Lammy will pay an official visit to China on 18 and 19 October. The visit could give a glimpse into the UK’s China policy under the new Labour government, and also needs to be seen in the broader context of European approaches on China. This week’s edition of the Geopolitical Europe Pulse brings you a compilation of information on the visit, UK-China relations, and perspectives for the future.

Context of the visit: The visit to China is Lammy’s first one as a Foreign Secretary, and it is going to be a challenging one. While UK is expected to push for stronger economic ties, human rights — the topic at the core of increasing tensions over the last years — will most likely also be brought up in the discussions. The South China Morning Post has a preview of the visit.

Progressive realism on China? Lammy’s essay “The case for progressive realism”, published in Foreign Affairs in April, provides a general outline of foreign policy thinking of the Labour government. On China, the essay suggests that “The United Kingdom must instead adopt a more consistent strategy, one that simultaneously challenges, competes against, and cooperates with China as appropriate. Such an approach would recognize that Beijing poses a systemic challenge for British interests and that the Chinese Communist Party poses real security threats. But it would also recognize China’s importance to the British economy. It would accept that no grouping of states can address the global threats of the climate crisis, pandemics, and artificial intelligence unless it cooperates with Beijing. There is a crucial difference between “de-risking” and decoupling, and it is in everyone’s interest that China’s relationship with the West endure and evolve.” Read all of it here.

Auditing China: An “audit” of the relationship with China is among the foreign policy priorities of the new Labour government. This briefing by the House of Commons Library concludes provides an overview of the current state of UK-China relations, and concludes that “relations between the UK and China have deteriorated sharply”.

EU-UK synergies? Not really. Over a year ago, the Centre for European Reform and the Konrad-Adenauer Foundation (KAS) published a policy brief with a long list of recommendations for synergies between British and EU China policy… with arguably not many of them implemented. That’s precisely why it’s worth a read, again.