Jeffrey Sachs 关于当今冲突解决方案的采访

April 4, 2024, Youtube video Jeffrey Sachs full Interview About Solution of today Conflicts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrpolp1aq3o&ab_Channel=financeCritics

Sachs says 

The good sign is that we have so much new good technology,  5G, lowcost renewable energy, robotics , many new approaches to problem solving, we really could make the energy transformation to safe energy at low cost.
This is the most important point use our knowledge and deploy it at scale; but the challenge is conflict division vested interests greed that impedes us from using these solutions at scale; so it's not even possible to predict the future with any insight; because we could have a good future with big solutions or we could have a very broken divided dangerous future; and we have to fight for the good one and that's why this is more of a question of effort than prediction.

杰弗里·萨克斯 (Jeffrey Sachs) 关于当今冲突解决方案的完整采访
金融评论家

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrpolp1aq3o&ab_Channel=financeCritics
2024 年 4 月 4 日

第二次世界大战的大萧条当然是毁灭性的，关键是到第二次世界大战结束时，英国基本上已经深陷债务之中，即使其自己的殖民地成为独立国家，因此英国再也没有完全摆脱债务国地位。 这是一个非常非常非常漫长的痛苦时期，世界中心英国向新的国际货币基金组织寻求紧急贷款； 我的意思是不可想象，但你知道美国你能想象向国际货币基金组织申请贷款吗？ 这并非不可能，这正是你所指的

主持人说
当然，我记得当时我在伦敦，当然，事情发生时我还记得财政大臣在机场折返，他不得不赶往华盛顿筹集资金，当然，我们拥有这种货币，它仍然是一种国际货币。 国际货币对英国国内经济造成了巨大损害，我认为人们不理解这一点，所以在某些方面它实际上可能对美国更好，我本想尽快解决它，而不是让它拖下去。 就像英国的情况一样，我并不是说这会发生，我也不是提出这些观点，但无论如何，这就是我想说的，如果这是一个漫长的过程； 这是一个漫长的痛苦，它不是基于英国的经验

萨克斯说
所以你知道，我们将用砖块进行非美元支付，这显然不仅是普京总统非常关心的问题，而且也是卢拉总统每天都在问的问题，他是今年 G20 的主席，也是金砖五国之一 成员，看在上帝的份上，我们为什么要用美元与俄罗斯打交道，他非常明智，非常合乎逻辑，我们将采取新的付款安排，他们会做得很好

主持人说

谢谢，这将是真正的教训，政治上的金钱腐败； 所以我会做出很多改变； 但我认为这个想法应该是可持续发展，这意味着一个经济体致力于共同利益，保护环境并提供任何人都需要的公共服务，无论是健康还是教育，这些都是公民权利的一部分 核心是政府有有效的手段来履行这一职责，而不会出现私人资金腐败的情况； 我认为正如你所说，今天的年轻人确实需要修复美国的体系，否则它只会继续下降，我认为目前美国的另一个问题是，它基本上是红色恐慌的数量，就像任何其他国家一样 ，就像针对中国的反宣传一样，中国对所有年轻人都不好，因此这给他们带来了一种非常不健康的心态，对中国产生了偏见，不愿意了解这些不同类型的政治制度，可能会有一些政策 可以在美国使用

萨克斯说

很好的一点，基本上美国政治上有很多关于很多事情的谎言； 因为如果你有一个基于特殊利益的系统； 这
特殊利益集团试图隐藏他们不言而喻的利益； 你看，我管理政府，所以我们有一系列谎言，实际上使清晰度保持距离； 所以这需要一些努力，但正如你所说，现在的反华宣传确实很重，而且非常激烈，而这些人对中国、它的历史、过去40年的经济成就、或者中国的辛勤工作一无所知。 人们

主持人说

正确的以及我们如何反击错误信息

萨克斯说

我想，呃，我们首先需要揭露任何谎言，所以我尝试每天通过文章、书籍和演讲来这样做； 但我认为年轻人进行直接接触并使用跨学校的数字连接也很重要，因此密歇根大学和chingua大学共同努力讨论等等以某种方式使这些项目既经济又文化商业技术，我认为这将是一个很大的帮助 ; 但正如你所说，我们政府的真正目的是吓唬人们，而不是真正教育他们。

主持人说

倒数第二个问题是，您认为世界经济在未来 10 年内要以可持续发展的方式实现什么目标

萨克斯说

好兆头是，我们拥有如此多的新技术、5G低成本可再生能源机器人、许多解决问题的新方法，我们确实可以以低成本将能源转变为安全能源。 这是最重要的一点，利用我们的知识并大规模部署它，但挑战是冲突、分裂、既得利益的贪婪，阻碍我们大规模使用这些解决方案； 所以甚至无法预测

未来有任何洞察力； 因为我们可以通过大的解决方案拥有一个美好的未来，或者我们可以拥有一个非常破碎、分裂的危险的未来，我们必须为美好的未来而奋斗，这就是为什么这更多的是一个努力问题而不是预测问题。

主持人说

最后，您想与所有渴望成为伟大经济学家和企业家的年轻观众分享的信息是什么

萨克斯说

我们会尽你所能，但在做的时候要服务于共同利益，不要忽视这样一个事实：我们身处一个相互联系的世界，我们需要解决全球问题，我们需要跨国友谊； 所有这些关于战争、冲突和分裂的谈论都是极其危险的，也是完全没有必要的，因此，要成为可持续发展的倡导者，使用新技术，成为伟大的企业家； 但总是以一种平和的方式进行
合作心态不这样做，因为我们必须击败对方，但因为这对世界有利，其后果的程度是可以看到的； 然后，史密斯在苏格兰启蒙运动中的精彩之处在于，他指出，虽然这对于统一世界来说通常是一个有益的事实，但对东印度群岛和西印度群岛的土著居民来说却是灾难性的，因为他说他们相对较弱 当时他不明白他们也把旧世界的病原体带到了美洲，消灭了人口，所以史密斯不可能明白这一点，但他确实了解征服，他
最后说了一些令人难以置信的人道的话，我认为这标志着他成为现代最伟大的思想家之一。
  他说，今后也许这些国家的人民可能会变得更强，或者欧洲的人民可能会变得更弱，而世界各地的居民可能会达到勇气和力量的平等，通过激发相互恐惧，可以独自克服不公正的事情。 独立国家之间相互尊重某种权利，但似乎没有什么比知识和各种知识的相互交流更有可能建立这种力量平等了。
从所有国家到所有国家的广泛商业自然地或者说必然地随之而来的改进，所以史密斯所说的是
未来将会出现平等，因为贸易将带来知识、技术进步和力量的不平等，基本上我们已经是史密斯写作之后的 250 年了，这个预测现在已经实现了，所以史密斯正处于 500 年前的 500e 时期的中间 亚洲在中东地区处于领先地位
9:29

Jeffrey Sachs full Interview About Solution of today Conflicts
Finance Critics

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrpolp1aq3o&ab_Channel=financeCritics
April 4, 2024

were the Great Depression World War II of course devastating and the point is by the end 

of World War II Britain had basically gone deeply into debt even with its own colonies 

which became independent countries and so Britain never quite got out of debtor status 

again, and it was a very very heavy long painful period Britain the center of the world 

going to the new international monetary fund for an emergency loan; I mean Unthinkable 

but you know the United States can you imagine going to the IMF for a loan; it's not 

impossible, this is exactly what you're referring to

Host say
absolutely, I remember it I was in London of course when it happened I can remember the 

chancell turning back at the airport he had to rush off to Washington to raise funds and 

of course the fact that we had this currency, which was still an inter International 

currency was doing immense damage to the British domestic economy, which I think people 

don't understand so in some ways it might actually be better for the United States, I 

would have thought to go through it quickly than have it you know drawn out in the way 

that it was with Britain, I'm not by the way saying that's going to happen, and I'm not 

making those points but anyway that's that's that's what I wanted to say if it it's a 

long process; it's a long Agony, it's not based on the British experience 

Sachs say
So you know we we will have non-dollar payments in the bricks that's clearly high on the 

mind not only of President Putin obviously uh but also president Lula who every day asks 

and he's the chair of the G20 this year as well as being a a brics member, why are we 

dealing with Russia in dollars For Heaven's Sake, and he's very sensible very logical and 

we will move to New payments arrangements, and they will do just fine

Host say

Thank you that will be the real lesson, corruption by the money in the politics; so I would make many changes; but I think the idea should be that sustainable development, that means an economy that works for the common good and that protects the environment and that provides the public services, that anyone needs whether it's health or education that, these are part of the citizens rights and responsibilities and that the government has the effective means to carry that out without the corruption of private money in
politics is Central; and I think as you say today's young people are going to really need to fix the US system because otherwise it's just going to continue to be in decline and I
think currently the another problem with the US is that it's basically Red Scare volume too like any, like the counter propaganda against China is like, China is bad to all the
young people, so that creates a really unhealthy into their mindset about a Prejudice 

about China, unwilling to learn about these different type of political systems, that might have some policies that could be used in the United States 

Sachs say

Excellent point basically there are a lot of lies about a lot of things in in politics in 

the United States; because if you have a system that's based on special interests; the 

special interests try to hide they want their benefits without saying; you see I run the 

government so we have a set of falsehoods that keep Clarity at a distance actually; and 

so it takes some effort, but as you say the anti-china propaganda is really heavy
and very intense right now, by people who know nothing about China or its history or its 

economic successes in the last 40 years or the hard work of the people 

Host say

right and how do we counterd do misinformation 

Sachs say

I I think uh we have first any lies need to be called out, so I try to do that on a
daily basis, and through articles and books and speeches; but I think it's also important 

that young people make direct contacts and use the digital connections across schools so 

University of Michigan and chingua University working together discussing and so forth 

somehow making such projects both the economic cultural business technological, I think 

would be a big help; but our government is really aiming to as you say scare people 

rather than to really educate them.

Host says

the penultimate question is where do you see the economy the world economy in sustainable 

development ways to achieve in to 10 years 

Sachs says 

the good sign is that we have so much new good technology 5G lowcost renewable energy um 

robotics , many new approaches to problem solving, we really could make the
energy transformation to Safe energy at low cost. this is the most important Point use 

our knowledge uh and deploy it at scale but the challenge is conflict division vested 

interests greed that impedes us from using these Solutions at scale; so it's not even 

possible to predict the future with any insight; because we could have a good future with 

big Solutions or we could have a very broken divided dangerous future and we have to 

fight for the good one and that's why this is more of a question of effort than 

prediction.

Host says

so last of all so what is one message that you will want to share with all the young 

viewers, that are aspiring to be you know great economists and entrepreneurs 

Sachs says

Well go be the best you can, but serve the common good as you do it, don't lose sight of 

the fact that we are in an interconnected world, we need Global problem solving, we need 

friendships across Nations; all this talk of war and conflict and division is extremely
dangerous and completely unnecessary, and so go be champions of sustainable development 

use new technologies be great entrepreneurs; but always do it in a peaceful and 

Cooperative mindset not doing it, because we have to beat the other side, but because 

it's good for the world, extent of their consequences can have been seen; and then what's 

wonderful about Smith in the Scottish Enlightenment is he points out, that while this was 

generally a

beneficial fact to unite the world it was disastrous for the native inhabitants of the 

East and West Indies
7:58
he says because he says that they were relatively weak at the time he didn't
8:03
understand that they also brought pathogens of the old world to the Americas that wiped 

out the population
8:09
so Smith could not have understood that but he did understand conquest and he
8:14
said something incredibly Humane at the end which I think marks him as one of the great 

thinkers of modern times he
8:22
said Hereafter perhaps the natives of those countries May grow stronger or
8:27
those of Europe May grow weaker and the inhabitants of all the different quarters of the 

world may arrive at that
8:33
equality of courage and force which by inspiring Mutual Fear Can alone overw
8:40
the Injustice of independent nations into some sort of respect for the rights of one 

another but nothing seems more
8:46
likely to establish this equality of force than that Mutual communication of knowledge 

and of all sorts of
8:53
improvements which an extensive Commerce from all countries to all countries
8:58
naturally or rather necessarily carries along with it so what Smith is saying is
9:04
in the future there's going to come an equality because trade is going to carry
9:09
knowledge technological Improvement and inequality of force basically we are 250
9:16
years after Smith's writing and that prediction has come true now so Smith
9:22
was in the middle of a 500e period 500 years ago Asia in the lead in the Cent
9:29
of gravity and in the technological lead Europe becomes the Agent of
9:35
Change the steam engine a reflection of that not something that came out of the
9:40
blue but came out of Francis Bacon and Isaac Newton and Empire but it came out
9:46
of a Glasgow Workshop uh the condenser on James Watt steam engine and there
9:52
came a new European and North Atlantic Le world but as Adam Smith said
10:01
eventually trade will rebalance and that's the convergence that we're seeing
10:07
now so watt steam engine historians are right to say that
10:14
what was so fundamental about the steam engine is that it broke the organic barrier of 

the traditional economy
10:21
because basically all almost all energy of the primary energy of the pre James
10:30
economy was organic what you could feed to human beings for their labor and what
10:36
you could feed to the animals for animal traction plus a little bit of wind and a
10:42
little bit of water but basically an organic economy and we move to a fossil fuel economy 

and that let loose the
10:49
ability to do work of an unimaginable scale so everything changed
10:56
with the fossil fuel breakthrough in the last two and a half centuries and of course 

Europe got their first and
11:02
Britain got their first of the first and in the geopolitics we ended up with the British
11:10
world this is a map of a wonderful book the countries never invaded by Britain
11:15
those are the ones in white Britain went out and just beat the
11:23
out of everybody and really nasty by the way
11:28
nasty in 1839 showed up in China and saying
11:35
you have to import our opium no we don't want your opium you don't want our opium
11:40
we'll beat the hell out of you that was the first Opium War it was followed by the second 

Opium War no Scruples at
11:49
all sorry to say so that's power That's The Power of one-sided
11:56
industrialization and it conquered much of the world long story and I won't go into it
12:03
but the Baton was passed to the younger Anglo American kid brother uh in
12:11
1945 uh the great Anglo-Saxon handoff and the us became the next Empire and
12:18
the idea was that we would dot the world with 800 military bases around the world
12:24
and uh Henry loose made The Sweetest Love Song to American leaders tell them
12:29
this is the American Century that is always captivating it was captivating to chingas 

Khan it was captivating to Lord
12:36
Palmerston uh and it has been captivating to American leaders since then also to believe 

this is your
12:43
Century in the world it's over but we still have 800 military bases around the
12:49
world uh I believe the Ukraine war is likely to be America's tberg Forest uh
12:57
defeat tberg Forest was the uh loss by
13:02
Augustus Octavian in 89 when the Roman Empire tried to cross
13:09
the Rind to the east to take over Germania and was defeated it didn't end
13:14
the Roman Empire it just told them this is a limit and you're not going beyond that limit 

and the United States is
13:20
going to learn a limit that NATO doesn't just expand at us will there are limits
13:25
to that and that's the painful process that we're in right now um but it's a
13:31
secret don't tell anyone outside uh you're likely to be cancelled uh if if
13:36
you do um so the world changed fundamentally after
13:42
the second world war the United States aspired to be the world leader but something else 

happened to bring Adam
13:49
Smith's forecast to reality and that was the end of the Imperial age if there is
13:56
one dimension of Imperial ISM that I think needs to be understood it is that
14:02
Imperial powers do not educate the natives and if there's one dimension of
14:08
economic development that needs to be understood it is that education is the absolute 

Central feature of
14:15
development because without education nothing else can happen and so the
14:22
European Imperial Powers left the world illiterate left their colonies basically
14:28
illiterate at the end of the colonial rule the first thing that happened was mass 

education we're still not there yet
14:35
but this is the most fundamental breakthrough that happened after World War II the end of 

the colonial Imperial
14:42
era and the United States does its Empire in a different way through regime
14:48
change operations so it's not exactly the same as the occupation
14:54
imperialism but what countries got with their sovereignty was the ability to educ educate 

their people and this has
15:01
led to economic convergence just to show you the gaps the peak of North Atlantic
15:07
Power was 1950 compared to the rest of the world
15:13
56% of the literate World in 1950 roughly by my calculation was in the
15:19
North Atlantic region meaning Western Europe the United States and Canada now it's 133% 

of the literate World 60% of
15:28
world output was in the North Atlantic region now it's 33% at purchasing power prices 53%
15:36
of all Urban residents were in the North Atlantic World in 1950 now it's 14% the world's 

converged Urban literate
15:45
technologies have spread Adam Smith was right that trade was actually the
15:51
fundamental carrier of this it was when China opened up that the acceleration of
15:57
technological change came so fast to China it was Japan that invented this
16:04
process of Rapid infusion of technology in the mai Restoration in 1868 and then again 

after World War II
16:12
in its rebuilding so we now see that Asia and the North Atlantic regions have
16:19
crossed paths again using Madison's data updated by IMF data uh the North
16:26
Atlantic was the dominant power into till uh this Gap started to close in
16:32
1950 and by around 2010 Asia is now larger than the North Atlantic region
16:39
this is the real change of the world we know that the bricks even before the
16:46
recent expansion to six more countries were already larger than the
16:51
G7 that's a transformed world and China of course overtook the US in GDP
16:58
measured at purchasing power parity around 2014 but China is still much
17:04
poorer per capita maybe a third but with more than four times the population so
17:10
this is the reason that China is a larger economy so I want to argue very
17:16
briefly that we're in a new age a new age which I call the age of sustainable
17:22
development were there in part because the scale of economic activity and a
17:28
population 10 times the size of when Thomas Robert malus wrote the principles
17:34
of population in 1798 which was then about 900 million
17:39
people and today 8 billion people now has put so much pressure on the physical
17:46
environment that we are in urgent need of global public response to climate
17:55
biodiversity destruction loss of ecosystem fun functions and so forth and the world
18:02
adopted goals addressed to this it's fitfully trying to achieve them today at
18:08
the UN this very day is the midpoint review of the sustainable development goals they're 

way off track nice
18:15
objectives not being achieved mainly because the United States and other rich
18:21
countries don't care at all about it uh and so the world governance is not organized to 

achieve these goals at this
18:29
point but these goals are the real Global goals and
18:34
needs so we have a very perilous moment because we have arrived at
18:40
multipolarity and as Adam Smith talked about that balance of awe and equality
18:46
of force to create Justice that's a delicate difficult
18:53
transformation and just to say there are several different theories of what's going on 

right now Robert Kagan whom you
19:01
may know is our chief neocon ideologue and the uh husband of our uh acting
19:09
deputy secretary of state Victoria nand uh believes uh that American hemony uh
19:16
must Rule and will continue to rule otherwise the jungle will grow back as
19:21
he says uh wow uh Henry Kissinger says that we
19:27
need a balanced of power Theory balance of power is okay except it becomes
19:35
imbalanced and it's extremely difficult to manage and when bismar was thrown out
19:42
by Kaiser vilhelm thei it was the end of Europe's balance of power and World War
19:49
I came in response when bismar genius at balancing was lost uh John mimer says we
19:58
are inevitably in tragedy that's just the nature of great power politics Mir
20:04
shimer is extremely uh intelligent predictive an extremely nice person but
20:10
it but tragic to read because he says that conflict is inevitable I don't buy
20:18
it uh now another theory of that I Read 50 years ago of a wonderful uh professor
20:26
of mine also Charles kindleberger uh said we need a hegemon so if it's not
20:32
the us or Britain it's got to be someone else like China I don't buy that either
20:38
but this is a brilliant book boy it led to lot of late night discussions over
20:43
the next 50 years um grahe Allison says as with Sparta and
20:50
Athens were prone for war not inevitable but uh the war trigger is very high
20:57
because of the rise of China and my little contribution is could we get our heads 

together and address Global public
21:04
goods and avoid Global public bad so I argue that we need a rational approach
21:11
not a tragic approach and that it is not Beyond us to reach the Cooperative
21:17
corner of the prisoners dilemma uh in other words we can understand the game
21:22
we can understand the risks of defection but we can understand the benefits of 

cooperation and so we should be able to
21:29
reach that Cooperative outcome so I would argue that we need a new geopolitics and a new 

ethics of
21:36
sustainable development I often refer to President Kennedy's inaugural address when he 

said
21:43
the world is very different now for man holds in his mortal hands the power to abolish 

all forms of human poverty and
21:51
all forms of human life so what hangs in the balance is something extraordinary
21:56
we could achieve sdg1 and poverty or we could blow up the
22:02
world and what is absolutely incredible is how this is in the hands of a very
22:09
few people that's what's incredible and by the way my take away
22:15
from Oppenheimer was what a bunch of geniuses that invented the bomb and what
22:21
a bunch of ads who use it or decide about using it this is our Paradox it
22:27
took the greatest Geniuses of the age to understand nuclear fishing and how this
22:33
could be created and then it fell into the hands of uh the everyday uh person
22:39
who might not have the imagination to keep us away from Global disaster that's technology
22:46
by the way technology is often created by Geniuses and used by all of us uh and
22:52
that is the real issue that uh Plato was wondering about already in the Republic
22:59
uh 2,350 years ago how do you make the rulers uh know what to do he said you
23:07
have to raise them from birth for that purpose so there are crucial public
23:13
goods at Regional and global scale this is something new Regional scale like the European
23:21
Union or Assan or African Union this is something new how important this scale
23:27
is and global scale is almost unprecedented in human
23:32
history we had global trade we had interconnectedness but Global public
23:38
goods not so much now we are with the center of
23:43
global public goods but institutions in the hands of nation states why
23:52
weird so I believe we need new kinds of global governance and
23:59
ethics and uh I think the universal Declaration of Human Rights is a good
24:04
place to start we're in the uh 75th Anniversary
24:09
this year and I believe that we can even find a common wisdom which I call the
24:15
ABCs uh of ancient wisdom Aristotle Buddha and confucious they all by the
24:21
way were virtue ethicists they basically said cultivate your soul as decent
24:27
people it said it in somewhat different ways but they said it's virtue that
24:32
gives us the capacity to reach the Cooperative solution whether it's civic
24:37
virtue friendship virtue or the other Virtues Of sociality
24:44
and Aristotle said it's possible because we are zoan politicon we are Political Animals 

we can be sociable and so I
24:52
think finding this commonality of east and west is crucial now because there
24:59
actually is a strong commonality of the underlying cultures this was already pointed out 

in
25:06
the observations of the axial age uh uh
25:12
that these philosophies arose roughly the same time and with roughly the same
25:18
philosophical underpinnings and I'll just end with the President Kennedy's
25:23
remark 60 years ago we're at the 60th anniversary of Kennedy's remarkable
25:29
initiative to make peace at the height of the Cold War and to NE negotiate the
25:35
partial nuclear testan treaty which was ratified just these days 60 years ago
25:41
Kennedy May well have been killed for it because Rogue elements of the US government 

hated him for his peace
25:48
initiatives and uh I believe that this is probably what did him in uh but he
25:55
made wonderful observations about peace and uh I'll just end with his uh most
26:01
beautiful words so let us not be blind to our differences but let us also direct 

attention to our common interests
26:08
and to the means by which those differences can be resolved and if we cannot and now our 

differences at least
26:15
we can help make the world safe for diversity for in the final analysis our
26:20
most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet we all breathe
26:26
the same air we all cherish our children's future and we are all Mortal
26:31
thank you very much we are in need of this dialogue
26:39
for two basic reasons that I'd like to elaborate just briefly one is uh we are
26:47
in a in a new world in these years and
26:52
we're trying to navigate A New World by that I mean the world that
27:01
we have thought uh we knew in some
27:06
places a rather naive idea was a western Le world and that was an idea that
27:15
predominated uh from roughly uh
27:21
1820 to I would say uh the middle of the 20th century but the notion of
27:31
Western Le World continued at least until the end of the
27:36
20th century that world is finished but we don't know it yet and it's uh that
27:46
ignorance of the end of the western Le World which is at the heart of the very
27:53
very serious tensions between the United States and China for example because the
28:00
Western Le world has finished the United States doesn't know it and this means
28:07
that we have a very deep misunderstanding about the nature of our
28:12
current Global reality the second reason why we are
28:18
here is that all together we are wrecking the world the natural
28:24
environment so this is a feature of common uh Humanity for a common Global Commons
28:34
which is the title of our meeting I'd like to say just a few words
28:41
about how we got here to give you my perspective for most of
28:48
known history of the last two Millennia there was no question that
28:55
Asia was the center of the world economy because it was well over half of the
29:02
world population the nature of Life pretty much across
29:08
the world did not vary so widely so what we would call per capita incomes were
29:16
similar people were small farmers in villages and this was true whether was
29:22
in Western Europe whether it was Native Americans whether it was uh in Chinese
29:28
Villages whether it was in African villages the population of the world was
29:35
from 1 AD onward uh enormous in the Indian
29:43
subcontinent and in China and this meant that Asia was the center of gravity if
29:50
you would make that calculation of the world economy as well as of the world
29:57
demography more than that China was the dynamic country of the world
30:04
technology and many civilizational inventions especially
30:11
during the Song Dynasty uh from 960 till
30:17
1279 till the Mongol conquest the Song Dynasty was a remarkable period of
30:26
technological the country of economic gain of multiple fundamental
30:33
inventions from the use of the compass for navigation paper currency public
30:40
administration uh ocean navigation uh movable type printing and
30:47
countless other inventions that um changed the world fundamentally So Not
30:55
only was China populist but China was was really dominant and
31:02
throughout much of Asia and especially East Asia uh it was China that set the
31:09
civilizational patterns for uh what is today's countries of Southeast Asia and
31:19
Japan and Korea and this civilization which was a neoc Confucian
31:26
civilization was a remarkable achievement at this time we had the high
31:33
medieval period in Western Europe and um some breakthroughs were starting a lot
31:40
of Wars by the way and uh but Europe would have looked to any Observer at the
31:46
time as a taker of Technology a receiver of Technology not as a maker or Giver of
31:54
technology and the technology came from the east in many Direction ctions from the Arab 

world from the Indian
32:02
subcontinent from China there are some notable
32:08
dates the worst Economic Policy mistake in human history was made by China in
32:17
1434 when the uh Ming Dynasty decided to end ocean navigation and to scrap the
32:26
fleet of Admiral Juna because China would have discovered the new world it would have 

discovered the
32:32
Americas it would have created a world economy but uh China was concerned the
32:40
the court was concerned about the incursions from the north uh not from the gains of 

ocean navigation and the
32:49
great uh Fleet of Admiral Jung was ended
32:54
and those were the end of the ocean navigations the the oceans were given over to the 

Europeans actually this was
33:01
really one of the most decisive own goals of human history I have to say uh
33:09
now the next date that's important is 1492 because uh as China vacated the
33:15
oceans uh Portugal and Spain filled the oceans using Chinese technology by the
33:22
way uh the ocean navigation uh and the gunpowder which all had come from China
33:29
to begin uh an age of navigation still without the fortuitous
33:37
fact that heading west from Europe landed a continent that was not known to
33:43
the Europeans history would not have changed all that fundamentally but the Americas 

became a uh resource base for
33:52
Europe's development for the next four centuries which fundamentally changed the world
33:58
and Adam Smith writing in 1776 said that the two most significant events in the
34:04
history of mankind were the discovery of the Americas by Columbus in 1492 and the
34:11
discovery of the path around the Cape of Good Hope by Bosco de Gama in 1498 so that was a 

turning point still
34:19
Asia was dominant but this little Peninsula on the far west of Eurasia
34:24
began to explore and ironically conquered the Americas and
34:33
that was by virtue of pathogens rather than any dominance because the Europeans
34:40
brought small poox yellow fever malaria and many other diseases and wiped out
34:46
the Native American populations by around 95% and were able to conquer therefore a
34:53
two continents of massive resource base so his began to change the next date
35:00
that I would suggest is fundamental is 1776 that's a very interesting year four
35:08
things happened that year uh you know some of them the most
35:15
important uh was James Watt patented the steam engine in that year uh a second uh
35:26
decisive uh event was that Adam Smith published The Wealth of
35:32
Nations the third uh decisive event was that Gibbon published The Decline and
35:38
fall of the Roman Empire and then there was something a declaration of independence of 

some country also all
35:44
happened in that year but the invention of the steam engine was a turning point as 

significant as
35:54
1434 and 1492 because though the steam engine had been
36:00
invented by China it had not been utilized by any scale in China China had
36:08
invented the steam engine about 700 years earlier wat improved the steam
36:14
engine with a condenser and Britain became the first
36:20
industrial Country and this was very significant
36:25
because in 18 39 my next date Britain invaded China uh in the first Opium
36:34
War uh the war fought to make the world safe for opium uh addiction uh really uh
36:44
a sorted act but just an illustration of what had changed fundamentally in power
36:51
from China's dominance now China was uh in uh defeat
36:58
by the British by a British expeditionary force from not quite
37:03
halfway around the world but was able to uh defeat the Chinese Ming uh or Ching
37:11
sorry Ching uh uh
37:17
Empire of course I won't go into long history but the defeats in the two Opium
37:24
Wars was followed by the taiping Rebellion and and I probably the wor
37:30
well the worst Civil War perhaps in human history in terms of the human toll in the 

typing rebellion and China went
37:38
from being an absolute great power to being a subjected country and one that faced
37:47
extreme poverty and hardship later in Invasion by many Imperial Powers along
37:55
the coast and then the invasion by Japan starting in uh 7 in 1894 95 and then in
38:03
the 20th century for me the uh next
38:09
turning point is 1947 and 1949 the independence of India and the
38:16
independence of China I think there's one key point in history which is a
38:22
colonized or imperialized country cannot achieve e Economic Development or
38:28
success because it is not in the interest of the Imperial power to have
38:34
success in its colonies the interest of an imperial power is extraction and so
38:40
until Independence came after this terrible hundred years China and India
38:48
were left behind far behind Economic Development so the next turning point in
38:54
history was the middle of the 20th century when Asia began to recover and
38:59
if you look statistically Asia had been around 60% of world output for 1,800
39:07
years roughly from as much as one can measure this from 1 AD to roughly 1800
39:14
ad and then by 1950 it had declined to
39:20
15% or perhaps 20% of world output though the population was still
39:26
60% so the per capita income had collapsed what we are experiencing now
39:33
is the recovery of normality not something uh outside of
39:40
human experience but actually the recovery of normality because what was
39:45
abnormal was that a small part of the world the North Atlantic region would so
39:52
dominate the whole world and that was by virtue of the technological
39:59
advances starting with steam engine and then the militarization of those
40:05
Technologies which led to a century of Imperial Domination by Western
40:11
countries this would have lasted longer but the West fought
40:17
two disastrous bloody Civil Wars World War I and World War II and by the end of
40:24
that period uh it was of course morally politically
40:29
economically financially militarily incapable of Empire and with some
40:35
lagging battles the countries found their way to
40:41
Independence so Asia began to recover dramatically
40:46
fast and by around 2010 China was larger than the US
40:52
economy in absolute size measured in purchasing power terms
40:58
but not surprising because China is more than four times the US population or was
41:03
then now it's about four times the US population and so naturally it would
41:08
become a bigger country two implications and I'll stop
41:13
here one is that now that the whole world has is
41:19
industrializing and we're going to have development everywhere uh India was
41:25
behind China by about 15 or 20 years but now India is growing faster than China
41:32
is likely to continue to do so Africa is going to grow faster than both India and
41:38
China in the next 40 years because it's going to be catching up from farther back and by 

the way Africa right now has
41:46
the same siiz population as China and India all are 1.4 billion but Africa
41:51
will be the biggest by mid-century by far so if there's an African Union the African 

Union will be the most populous
41:59
part of the World by 2050 by far and it will be a dynamic part of the world
42:06
economy also so we're going to have lots of mindset changes uh in the years ahead
42:12
but there are two significant conclusions from this one is mainly the
42:19
United States has been shocked at China's rise and I have to say to my
42:25
Chinese friends you didn't ask permission you know the US is supposed to be in
42:30
charge and now without us permission you became so big and powerful and that is a
42:38
bit unforgivable in the American mentality the Americans cannot figure it
42:44
out because they know no what happened to Western values
42:51
because it's a very uh interesting and important and strange story in a way and
42:59
it's worth reflecting on the values that we heard about uh both Buddhist and
43:07
Confucian thought clearly find some resonance in
43:13
Christian thought uh especially in gospel teachings uh of Jesus and also in
43:22
Greek thought I because if you look at uh Aristotle's philosophy as was seen
43:32
you would find some connections that are quite important actually and I want to draw them 

out but then Western
43:40
philosophy took an odd turn or Western thinking took an odd turn and it's
43:46
important to understand that change of values that took place starting around
43:53
1500 to uh today because there really was a change of the uh Western
44:01
philosophical approach and a Divergence that uh is I think quite harmful uh in
44:09
many ways so if you look at uh Aristotle Buddha and confucious if I
44:16
might just very briefly they're all in
44:21
deep ways not the same ways but deep ways
44:30
uh variance of what can be called virtue ethics the idea of virtue ethics is that
44:39
human beings have the potential to do good not the inevitability of doing good
44:46
and that virtues need to be cultivated to bring out the best in human beings and this is 

a
44:54
common idea of of Aristotle Buddha and
45:00
confucious in the teachings in
45:06
Buddha's eight-fold Noble Path uh there is the idea of the right view
45:15
the right action the right speech the right livelihood and so on uh as ways to
45:24
cultivate the underlying virtu Aristotle was very very clear
45:32
that happiness depends on virtue but virtue must be cultivated
45:40
it cannot be taken for granted and the main virtues in the Greek thought were
45:48
Virtues Of what's called practical wisdom or fris which was the ability to choose the
45:55
good over for the enticing Temperance which is
46:01
moderation uh which is a common virtue across all of these
46:06
philosophies uh bravery which means the ability to defend the good and Justice
46:17
the uh ability to discern the
46:22
right allocation for each person and and so those became the cardinal virtues in
46:29
Western thought but what was key for Aristotle was the idea that being
46:35
virtuous is a potential of human beings not a inevitability because we are all
46:42
bound by our bodily temptations by our animal instincts but also by our reason
46:48
so in Western Greek thought reason was the predominant notion this is not the
46:57
same as in eastern thought but it comes to some similar points and Aristotle
47:03
said one must develop the habits of virtue in fact virtue or ethics comes
47:11
from the word habit in Greek that you practice just as we heard uh that you
47:18
become altruistic by practicing uh altruistic acts and Aristotle believed
47:26
in mentorship in education in practice in life experience
47:33
as being vital so here is a common basis that merges
47:41
East and West virtue Traditions at a quite deep level
47:48
and Christian thought especially the teachings of Jesus
47:54
himself as in the go gospels are not the same basis uh it's not exactly virtue
48:02
ethics but it is of course the virtues that are proposed and especially also uh
48:10
the confusion Golden Rule is also Jesus's Golden Rule although Jesus
48:18
States it positively do to others what you would have them do to you and love
48:23
thy neighbor as uh you love yourself and that led in the early centuries of
48:33
Christianity to a tremendous institutional focus of the
48:38
Bishops and the monasteries to care for the poor and that was a real point
48:45
because the Christian communities the Emperors took care of their business and
48:51
the Bishops took care of the poor in a division of responsibility that started
48:57
around the 4th Century ad in the
49:05
west skipping ahead A Thousand Years things philosophy
49:11
changed uh starting around 1500 in a rather deep way and while Aristotle
49:20
taught for example that politics is a field of ethics and Aristotle's book the
49:29
politics which is the first book of Western political thought no let me say it's the 

first
49:36
book of Western political science is the better way to say it because Plato had written 

the Republic a generation
49:44
earlier but it's the first book of political science it is paired with his
49:50
ethics nicomaki and ethics as two joined
49:55
volumes because for ER Aristotle ethics and politics were the
50:00
same of course in 15 14 I think it
50:09
is makavelli wrote a very different political science he wrote a handbook
50:15
for the prince which was about how to maintain
50:20
power and political science in the west began to be the science of maintaining
50:26
or managing power not the science of producing the good and in fact makavelli was 

teaching
50:36
the prince he was actually making a job application back to the medes because he had been 

dismissed from the medes
50:43
wanting a job back that he was advising the medes how to hold power in
50:50
Florence later in The Next Century one of the most influential texts in West
50:56
Western cultural history was written by Thomas Hobbs the
51:02
Leviathan and this was written in 1640 as Western science was taking shape and
51:10
Hobbs wanted a scientific theory of human beings but modeled as individual atoms
51:19
that collide with each other because for Hobbs there was no longer a cultivation
51:24
of virtue but rather each individual with insatiable
51:29
desires so hobbs' model of human nature is that it is simply unbounded
51:37
desire it can't be taught to moderate desire it can't be cultivated for virtue
51:45
it is individualistic and it is insatiable and so hob said unless there
51:52
is an overarching power people will kill each other other and so we need a leviathan he 

said
52:01
to stop human nature from committing nonstop violence it was
52:09
a very pessimistic view of human nature but notice the main point is no longer
52:15
was there any idea of developing virtue that was deemed to be impossible instead
52:21
one needed institutions to reflect harsh re
52:26
realityy this is the flip of philosophy it's no longer about cultivating the
52:33
good it is about controlling the bad then
52:41
interestingly and importantly this was
52:47
Amplified at the beginning of the 18th century first by a very uh
52:55
influential public intellectual Bernard mandaville who
53:01
wrote an essay in London called the Fable of the bees and in the Fable of the bees the
53:08
most aggressive bees win but they make the hive powerful and
53:17
great and if you try to control the avarice or the vice or the aggression of
53:25
the bee The Hive actually dies so this was now a philosophy of
53:33
Empire that power seeking was good because it would make the society
53:39
powerful and wealthy and able to dominate over the other bees so it was
53:46
taking Hobs and adding another element one beehive taking dominance over others and
53:53
clearly this was a philosophy that appealed to the emerging British
53:59
Empire then came Adam Smith six decades later in
54:08
1776 and he said in agreement with Hobbs and an agreement with
54:14
mandaville that human nature is individualistic tastes are
54:22
unbounded desire is a great motivator but Market forces will tame
54:28
all of that because Market forces will force a kind of competition that will
54:35
lead to a socially beneficent
54:41
outcome the point is the anglosaxon philosophy Broke Free of more than 1800
54:50
years of Western tradition the Western tradition from Aristotle
54:56
and Christianity was an tradition of the common good
55:02
virtue and care for the poor by the with the rise of the British
55:10
Empire the philosophy came became the benefits of power as a
55:20
philosophy and then even the idea that this would lead to quote the common good
55:27
but there are two more steps that are important to State the poor became an
55:34
enemy because now they were a drag on society so John Lock one of our most
55:40
esteemed philosophers wanted very harsh treatment for the poor so that they
55:45
would not be burdens on society and then came
55:52
malus Thomas malus wrote after after Adam Smith one generation later in
56:03
1798 and he proposed something even darker which is that those hives those
56:09
different societies are actually in competition for survival with each
56:14
other because there are more people produced than can be supported and so life is a 

battle for
56:23
survival and trying to help the poor is inevitably to fail because there will
56:29
just be more poor people that was his iron law of
56:35
population and it's that led in The Next
56:41
Step Darwin took that idea brilliantly from a scientific point of view to
56:48
understand natural selection but the later 19th century philosophers took that idea
56:56
as a struggle across Nations and that now Nations or peoples
57:03
or races were in the struggle for survival and this became known as social
57:12
Darwinism and the idea was not only should there be no beneficence if you
57:17
help your own poor you will weaken your Society compared to others and indeed
57:24
you're in a struggle for Sur survival and this gave rise to the worst
57:31
crimes of History because Nazism actually is a
57:36
philosophy which it was was based on social
57:42
darwinist pseudo science and this idea the German people
57:48
will survive or the Slavic people will survive and so this is a war even to
57:55
extermination now this kind of idea led to the worst
58:01
cruelties but we are still in a mindset in the western world where it is
58:09
competition and struggle that is the absolute
58:16
underpinning of society when I studied economics I was
58:21
taught about perfect competition I was never taught even one minute about
58:28
perfect cooperation the idea doesn't even exist in
58:33
economics it's not even developed in one paper that I know of because the idea of 

cooperation as a
58:41
norm doesn't exist it
58:47
happened this notion of letting greed motivate action
58:57
perhaps did generate the spirit of innovation to
59:04
some extent but the way that it was
59:09
championed and taught of course led to the worst
59:15
excesses so the world became rich and those who were Rich became devoid
59:24
of benevolence and compassion and a terrible writer in the
59:31
United States who became quite popular a and
59:37
Rand a kind of uh popular
59:44
philosopher among young people and among many politicians wrote a famous essay about
59:52
the virtues of selfishness so selfishness became the
59:58
virtue actually that's the literal title of an essay it's unbelievable and she is
1:00:05
championed by many still these novels are unbearable to read but they are part
1:00:12
of our philosophy so I went on too long I know because the sign told me to stop
1:00:18
five minutes ago but so that's not very benevolent of me but let me say the
1:00:25
following I believe we've had a deviation from the
1:00:30
right path in western civilization there are roots of Western
1:00:37
culture that we can really use to find a path of
1:00:43
virtue and politics that is ethical but the anglosaxon
1:00:51
version deeply lost this tradition and there are many fascinating
1:00:58
reasons for this but it was mainly the rise of power of the British
1:01:04
Empire which was in many ways an extremely nasty
1:01:09
Empire and the United States learned everything it knows from the British
1:01:15
Empire because it aims to be the continuation of the British Empire after
1:01:21
World War II and this is what needs to end a world
1:01:28
that can return to the common ethical principles of
1:01:33
virtue now let me just conclude by saying I am hopeful that this can
1:01:39
actually happen and I think you at the table need to help lead
1:01:45
that and we need to help explain these
1:01:50
things and when President Xi Jinping launched last last year the global
1:01:58
civilizations initiative I think that this is actually an important opening
1:02:04
that is very positive because China has said we should go back
1:02:10
to our roots of culture to find a way forward which I very much subscribe to
1:02:17
and the GCI or Global civilizations initiative is an invitation across
1:02:24
civilizational wisdom and I hosted a meeting in Athens
1:02:31
last month co-hosted with the Academy of Athens a Aristotle confucious Symposium
1:02:39
on Ancient wisdom for modern challenges that brought together Chinese and
1:02:45
Western philosophers we didn't have Buddha properly at the table except one very
1:02:52
distinguished Buddhist thinker from Cambodia but we need more of that at the end of
1:02:59
this meeting we agreed that we would have a second Symposium this time I hope it is the
1:03:07
Aristotle Buddha confucious Symposium in shuu uh in Shandong province in July I
1:03:16
hope we could participate together in that uh we will be back for that many
1:03:23
philosophers are interested in that I will be in shuu in next month for the
1:03:31
Nishan uh Forum which is uh also a
1:03:36
philosophical form but the Shandong government has asked to host the
1:03:42
follow-up meeting of the Aristotle Buddha confucious uh Symposium and I
1:03:49
believe that this idea of east and west
1:03:56
deep philosophical traditions finding the Deep Humanity that is common across
1:04:03
them is extremely important and powerful and can really
1:04:09
contribute to an understanding which right now doesn't
1:04:15
exist and I think the failings of this understanding are overwhelmingly on the
1:04:22
western side if I may say so because we are steep de in a philosophy of
1:04:27
competition and even war and this mindset is taken as given but it is
1:04:35
actually a recent phenomenon it is an imperial phenomenon and it needs to be
1:04:41
put aside so I I believe that this actually can be
1:04:47
done can I have two more
1:04:54
minutes because I want to talk about Net Zero by
1:04:59
2050 and first to say how much I admire what Dr Shaw proposed and I I is the
1:05:08
book in English also or in Chinese
1:05:13
English okay we're going to have to get me an English translation somehow uh if
1:05:19
we can but I'm very eager also to read your forthcoming paper let me add a
1:05:26
couple of things that I think are Central but I think they're already exactly in your uh 

climate Club
1:05:36
idea it is not possible to reach net zero one country at a time
1:05:45
least of all for an island we need an interconnected Energy
1:05:54
System region by by region because if you are tapping renewable energy it's
1:06:00
intermittent so it's sunny here or windy here this needs
1:06:06
interconnection and East Asia should be interconnected in a common
1:06:13
grid there is a mainland China program called guide
1:06:23
code cooperation organization that is the China State
1:06:28
grid Engineers who are doing analytical work on
1:06:35
interconnecting Regional grids for Africa for South America for North
1:06:40
America for Europe and for Asia this is
1:06:46
very important work Taiwan should be connected to the
1:06:52
mainland in a power grid and Mainland should be connected with Mongolia and it
1:06:58
should be connected with the Assan countries
1:07:12
and with sub
1:07:20
system it would [Music] be
1:07:26
region the economic Powerhouse of the
1:07:31
world rather than a Battleground because this region has
1:07:38
everything if it works together and it could lose everything if
1:07:44
it views the region as a Battleground I think everyone in this
1:07:51
region can understand this the only one that does not is my
1:07:57
country actually but the US needs to be told let
1:08:03
us solve our problems we know how to
1:08:08
discuss don't meddle because you will make a
1:08:14
mess this is actually the truth this is true about Japan
1:08:24
it's
1:08:37
of zero carbon energy and all the cooperation that goat
1:08:54
would
1:09:07
the regional cooperation the regional structure
1:09:19
andos and
1:09:24
probably road maps that show the physical
1:09:29
interconnectedness what technologies
1:09:35
where as I've been
1:09:42
saying opposite of a plan it's 80% fossil fuel what plan is that
1:09:54
nothing please don't encourage
1:10:00
them so
1:10:09
shastic or work I was Sonia and I were just in
1:10:16
Beijing with them a couple of days ago we'll come back for a meeting that they're hosting 

on September 26th uh for
1:10:24
a world worldwide meeting on energy interconnections I think that this is really uh uh 

absolutely at the core so I
1:10:35
agree with everything that you said and I think that it's absolutely the way
1:10:41
forward and in that polycentric world there's a concept which I find very
1:10:50
useful it's a concept adopted by the European Union
1:10:55
but a concept that actually started with the Roman Catholic church and that is
1:11:01
the concept of subsidiarity which is that we need governance at all
1:11:07
levels so we need Global governance Regional governance National governance
1:11:13
local governance you put each problem at the
1:11:19
lowest level possible closest to the people where it can be solved but not
1:11:26
below the level at which it can be solved so the power grid cannot be
1:11:31
solved at the national level it must be solved at the regional level the targets for 

decarbonization
1:11:39
must be solved at the global level and so forth and the idea of subsidiarity is
1:11:45
that we have this multiple levels we have Global governance we have a global
1:11:52
government that can do certain things and and not other things we have Regional 

government we have national
1:12:00
government we have
1:12:06
local um is there any hope that the US and and Ukraine are going to be trying
1:12:13
to negotiate for some sort of peace agreement with Russia this is uh Kim not unlike the
1:12:20
virus story in that the government lies relentlessly about why we are in this War what's 

happening in the war and
1:12:28
therefore uh what is going to happen the
1:12:34
two the the biggest lie is where this war came from and uh I have a view that
1:12:43
is deeply founded I'm going to say because I know a lot about this over the past 30 years 

this is a war in my view
1:12:51
that arose because the US right rather pigheaded in other words relentlessly
1:12:58
stubbornly insisted on pushing NATO farther to the east every step of
1:13:06
the way and the Russians kept saying don't expand NATO towards us don't do
1:13:13
that don't do that don't do that don't do that to Ukraine we don't want your
1:13:20
military on our border do you get it and the United States said what we don't
1:13:25
hear you no don't worry we're peaceloving we we love you we want to
1:13:30
destroy you we want to decolonize you we want to break you up we want to do all sorts but 

we love you and we never go to
1:13:37
war except in in bombing Belgrade for uh seven straight weeks oh yeah and
1:13:45
Afghanistan we occupied for 15 years as NATO and uh and the Iraq War was
1:13:50
unprovoked and yeah we tried to overthrow your ally Assad with the CIA
1:13:56
regime change operation and oh yeah NATO took out Gaddafi and yeah yeah we are
1:14:01
placing missiles nearby you in Poland and Romania because we
1:14:06
unilaterally abandoned the anti-ballistic missile treaty but we're we're peaceloving and 

of course we're
1:14:13
going to move NATO right up to your 2,300 kilometer border and not just in
1:14:19
Ukraine but we're going to do it in Georgia fascinating by the way people
1:14:24
please take out a map and look up Georgia not the one uh uh in uh next to
1:14:30
Florida but Georgia in the Black Sea on the eastern boundary of the Black Sea
1:14:37
because that country is not a North Atlantic country so why would it ever be
1:14:44
in NATO and yet the United States wants to
1:14:49
push NATO to Georgia and if you look at a map I can explain in 30 seconds why
1:14:56
that is because the intention of the United States is to surround Russia in
1:15:01
the Black Sea Ukraine Romania Bulgaria turkey and
1:15:09
Georgia creates an encirclement and Russia's naval fleet
1:15:15
the Black Sea warm waterer naval fleet is in saastal Crimea and it's been there
1:15:22
by the way since 1783 and there was already one major war in
1:15:29
the 19th century between 1853 and 1856 where the British had the idea get rid
1:15:36
of that naval fleet and in the late 20th centuries big
1:15:41
new binski had the same idea surround Russia uh by getting Ukraine into the
1:15:48
Western camp and actually into NATO and then Russia ceases to be a major power
1:15:53
is their Theory well to make a long story short this is
1:15:59
uh the major reason for this war and we've never been told the truth about it
1:16:05
and that is really devastating
1:16:10
second closely related issue is that in February 2014 the US uh conspired to
1:16:18
overthrow the government of Ukraine and it did so that's not a good move if
1:16:24
you're trying to to push NATO and there's a president named Victor yanukovich who wanted
1:16:31
neutrality and you get together with forces inside the country and you uh
1:16:36
support the overthrow of yanukovich the violent overthrow not a good look that's
1:16:42
when this war started in February 2014 and then if you look at the real
1:16:49
sequence of events not the not not the uh uh mind
1:16:56
deadening uh repeated Mantra of the US government and the New York Times and
1:17:02
blah blah blah that this is an unprovoked attack that started in February
1:17:09
2021 uh which 20122 excuse me which is a nonsense this isn't an unprovoked attack
1:17:16
and it didn't start then it started in 2014 but in 2019 onward the US poured
1:17:23
in armaments to build up a very very powerful Army and when Biden came in he
1:17:31
doubled down on this whole thing because Biden and his team Sullivan blinkin
1:17:37
newand have been part of this story since
1:17:43
2014 and really before because Biden's always been a an advocate of NATO
1:17:49
enlargement Biden's got some dark side still to be explained about Ukraine as
1:17:54
well because of Hunter's involvement we don't know what that is yet but there's something 

not good at all about that but
1:18:03
I think newand has been on this case of NATO enlargement she was actually the
1:18:08
Ambassador under Bush Jr in 2008 to where to
1:18:14
Nato in the 2008 meeting when the US
1:18:19
pushed the proposition and forced everyone to agree that Ukraine would
1:18:26
become a member of NATO so Nan's been part of this story from way back when
1:18:31
from The Cheney Bush days uh and uh she continued through the Obama
1:18:38
Administration days as the point person for the overthrow of yanukovich in the
1:18:43
US government and for the NATO enlargement issues and then we started
1:18:49
arming Ukraine heavily especially in the late uh 2010
1:18:55
and then Biden really doubled down when he became president and repeated uh
1:19:01
repeated actually in several highlevel processes that Ukraine will become a
1:19:08
member of NATO and to bring us to today and just to conclude on December
1:19:17
17th 2021 President Putin tabled a Russia
1:19:22
NATO security agreement in a draft based on no more NATO enlargement and I happen
1:19:30
to call the White House after that said avoid a war negotiate it's not even a
1:19:35
concession why do we want nato in Ukraine it's going to provoke disaster
1:19:40
and I was told oh don't worry about it Professor saxs but we'll never negotiate over NATO 

enlargement it's none of
1:19:47
Russia's business and I said none of Russia's business are you kidding it's their border 

2,300 kilometers how can it
1:19:55
not be their business where the American military
1:20:00
alliances but we are so arrogant that uh we treated it as if
1:20:09
don't have to talk to rush about it then as soon as this uh special military
1:20:16
operation was launched in February 2022 zalinski said okay okay I could we
1:20:23
could be neutral and they actually exchanged documents drafts and negotiated a peace
1:20:31
Arrangement a year and a half ago in March
1:20:36
2022 and I talked to the negotiators by the way I talk to the mediators the
1:20:41
Turkish government in detail and you know what happened the United States came in and 

told zinsky no you don't
1:20:48
agree to neutrality you fight on we have your back you're going to win you defeat
1:20:54
Russia okay now there are hundreds of thousands of ukrainians dead this counter offensive 

of June July
1:21:03
August and September is a killing field Ukraine doesn't have the weapons
1:21:10
the Manpower the training the air cover the artillery to do this even if it were
1:21:17
desirable to do they don't have it so they're getting smashed and Biden doesn't have the 

gum
1:21:25
to say you know this was a terrible blunder we need to agree that NATO won't
1:21:32
enlarge and save Ukraine but rather oh we're all with you for as long as it
1:21:37
takes meaning how many more hundreds of thousands of ukrainians dead as long as it takes 

oh come on I'm 68 years old I
1:21:46
know what it means as long as it takes it means some moment the US leaves that's what it 

means as long as it takes
1:21:53
with a lot of dead in Ukraine in a country that has been absolutely pummeled by artillery 

non-stop basically
1:22:01
on both sides since February 2024 uh 2022 but with a lot of
1:22:08
shooting and killing that took place since February uh 2014 this is terrible this
1:22:15
is destroying Ukraine this isn't protecting Ukraine and so this is the real story but 

again the government lies
1:22:23
to us we don't don't get to debate it and if you say it you know you're a
1:22:29
you're a Putin propagandist you're called but I have written an oped in the
1:22:35
last couple of days that I've put online where the Secretary General of NATO
1:22:41
himself someone I know quite well for a long time Yen stoltenberg said when he
1:22:46
was speaking in the European Parliament that Putin went to war to stop NATO
1:22:53
enlargement but we don't have to negotiate with him well great favor to
1:23:00
Ukraine it's interesting I'm just looking at this map from what you're saying and yeah uh 

NATO has successfully
1:23:09
nearly successfully completely cut Russia off from various bodies of water I mean you've 

got the Black Sea what
1:23:16
you're mentioning and if they could get Georgia uh and the rest of ukra and you
1:23:21
know they then they'll have every other area around Black Sea the Baltic Sea as well them 

off from the Baltic Sea got
1:23:29
with Finland these These are choke points yeah right what what why do you
1:23:35
think they're trying to do that what is the why cut them off from the the Black Sea or 

the Baltic Sea I'm curious if the
1:23:40
Caspian C is next I mean is that what you think they're going to go after that one as 

well look I don't know if you
1:23:49
have used to play Risk do you know that board game uh it was a board game of my
1:23:55
youth the the idea was to have your peace on every uh part of the world map
1:24:01
then you had taken over the world well that that's uh that's the neocon uh
1:24:07
Vision they're playing risk uh playing risk at the expense of uh of vast
1:24:13
numbers of deaths in many parts of the world they want to have the US military or 

subservient governments or supplicant
1:24:21
governments or pliant governments everywhere on the map of the world and uh this is 

pretty Relentless uh and it's
1:24:29
a it's kind of manifest destiny RIT at the global scale it used to be at the
1:24:34
Continental scale nothing could stop us we take over all of North America uh
1:24:40
Native Americans notwithstanding and so forth uh this is a manifest destiny at
1:24:47
the global level the only problem is others don't quite share this idea and
1:24:52
uh we are getting into an awful a lot of wars and they're very dangerous very dangerous 

this is a war with a nuclear
1:25:00
superpower and obviously a very powerful military and Russia has 6,000 nuclear
1:25:09
warheads and they're gunning after China at least a lot of politicians in
1:25:14
Washington I think in the last few weeks Biden is trying to pull back a
1:25:20
little bit I think from the brink uh but scared always of his right flank that
1:25:26
he'll be attacked for being soft on China and so forth but there are a lot of hardliners 

on China that seem really
1:25:34
to be preparing for war can you imagine anything more Reckless stupid
1:25:41
unnecessary potentially uh Armageddon than that I can't so all of this is
1:25:48
mindboggling to me but the basic answer to your question is no rational reason
1:25:54
other than that they think they're playing Global hegemon and they need their peace on 

every part of the map
1:26:01
well let me just say the kinds of things that should be done in my opinion are
1:26:06
things like the belt and Road initiative of China because the Chinese government
1:26:13
recognized that for China's own well-being but also the well-being of its neighbors 

Cambodia La Vietnam
1:26:22
Indonesia Thailand and so forth and countries even farther a field I all
1:26:29
economies need modern infrastructure and modern infrastructure means uh access to
1:26:37
high quality electricity especially zero carbon energy now uh to fast rail uh to
1:26:45
fiber 5G networks and so forth and the belon road initiative which is in its
1:26:51
10th year uses speci especially Finance from China from the China Development
1:26:57
Bank and other institutions to help Finance the spread of
1:27:02
infrastructure across Eurasia and across the sea routes also
1:27:08
connecting Africa uh and South America and East Asia so that's a very good
1:27:16
example it's pragmatic it's investment oriented it doesn't just talk to talk it
1:27:22
it actually provides the in uh and uh provides the technology I wish the rich
1:27:29
countries in the west were doing this they are the former Colonial Powers they
1:27:37
behaved badly when they were the colonial powers and they're not behaving very well as 

the postcolonial powers
1:27:44
they're not really stepping up to their responsibility right because because I because I 

was just in China like for two
1:27:50
months and I think it really strength of carbon peaking by 2030 and uh carbon
1:27:57
neutralization by 2050 but I feel like the United States haven't done enough of
1:28:02
you know promoting this ideology of you know Carbon neutrality so how as Citizens 

ourselves can you know push for
1:28:10
those changes it's interesting in the United States most people know that
1:28:16
climate change is a very serious crisis and we just had the devastating fires in
1:28:22
Hawaii to show how tragic this climate change is we're in the hottest period in
1:28:31
not only recorded uh history but in human history for the last 125,000 years
1:28:39
the month of July was probably the single hottest month ever uh that Humanity has 

experienced certainly
1:28:47
that's true During the period of recorded temperatures so we should be doing much more 

and the American people
1:28:55
know this and certain things are happening of course there's investment in green energy 

in a lot of places
1:29:03
there's investment in the conversion of the Auto industry to electric vehicles
1:29:08
which is part of the solution but at and at the national level there was a piece
1:29:14
of legislation the uh inflation reduction act which is was a very
1:29:19
strange name for legislation which is mainly centered on the energy
1:29:26
transformation and it gives tax breaks for green energy but it what it doesn't
1:29:32
do is make a national plan there is no National plan right it doesn't make a
1:29:37
national plan because in American politics uh the power of the fossil fuel
1:29:43
Lobby big oil and big coal is so strong that politicians don't tell the truth to
1:29:52
their own constituents and they act on behalf of their lobbies who pay for
1:29:59
their campaigns rather than on behalf of the American people in the United States
1:30:05
Senate in the Senate energy and natural resources committee uh the chairman
1:30:12
Senator Joe Mansion of West Virginia is notorious for being the front for the
1:30:18
Big Oil Lobby and he himself has family wealth tied up into two coal companies
1:30:25
so I regard that as corruption but in the American system it's legal
1:30:30
corruption or seems to be legal but it's corruption not nonetheless uh if you're
1:30:37
told that in a country uh that hasn't taken a clear plan for decarbonization
1:30:45
has senior officials who own coal companies you'd say well of course
1:30:50
that's just political corruption but unfortunately that's the United States works so the 

American people are saying
1:30:58
more and more we're disgusted with the political system it's all about money
1:31:03
it's all about the reelection uh of these corrupt politicians and I think
1:31:09
that the more we clarify how broken this is the farther we're going to get but of
1:31:15
course at substantive levels we need a plan of action to decarbonize by 2050
1:31:22
that is not only at the state level because many states have such plans
1:31:27
taking shape but at the federal level uh and one of the main lessons of what's
1:31:33
happening right now is that there are more projects in oil I'm sorry more
1:31:38
projects in wind and solar y then can be put onto the grid because the real
1:31:46
breakdown is the transmission system but that's where Federal investment and a
1:31:52
federal plan is needed and we don't have that because of all the political problems that 

I talked
1:31:57
about and I think that America's structure is so like money based money
1:32:04
focused that it comes before the mutual benefits the mutual benefits that all
1:32:09
the human can get it's always that's exactly right yeah yeah it's not based
1:32:15
on the common good it's based based on the special interest right it's always money money 

money and then I want to
1:32:21
touch on this is that we all know that Japanese is going to have a nuclear Wastewater 

dumps so what are some
1:32:28
actions that United Nations would do to counter this type of behavior well on on
1:32:34
the specifics on Japan I can't really uh comment because I haven't studied the
1:32:40
scientific arguments on both sides and in General on technical arguments I tend
1:32:48
to listen to the range of experts and ask their opinion so I would would think
1:32:54
at a minimum what the UN should be doing and maybe it is and I'm just not uh in
1:33:01
involved at all in it is uh looking at through the international atomic energy
1:33:08
agency which is based in Vienna at this question of the Wastewater from
1:33:14
Fukushima and what should be done about it because that's a technical issue that
1:33:20
should not be any individual governments that Authority the UN should weigh in
1:33:26
especially at the technical level but in general we have some pretty clear needs
1:33:33
that are Urgent whether it's the decarbonization or protecting the ecosystems from 

pollution or from overh
1:33:41
harvesting or from waste and we need technical plans of action but that
1:33:48
planning mechanism is hard work uh and it's hard work for the political reason
1:33:56
of keeping it free from corruption and it's hard work at the technical level
1:34:02
because a lot of technical issues are raised and so countries need effective
1:34:07
planning Ministries China has the national development and Reform Commission ndrc which 

does a lot of the
1:34:14
technical planning and the United States doesn't have a planning Ministry so we
1:34:20
we don't make plans uh because we don't have a uh Ministry of planning or a Ministry
1:34:27
of economy or a planning agency in the US lexicon planning is a bad idea but
1:34:35
you know for certain things I I am happy that planning is done within private
1:34:42
businesses but for other things I want the planning to be done by government and in every 

sphere of the economy
1:34:50
planning is essential it's just that sometimes it's a government function sometimes it's 

a private sector function
1:34:57
yeah and like like you mentioned the United States government needs to go through a 

really big structural change
1:35:04
and in that I think the driving forces are the Gen Z and gen Alpha uh people
1:35:09
coming up but right now I think we like we lack guidance so what are some advices that 

you would guide like some
1:35:16
advices that you give us to start with well that's a really very interesting
1:35:21
and deep question because let me just say that our constitution was drafted in
1:35:29
1787 of course it's had some Amendment since then but basically it's the same structure 

that was decided in
1:35:36
1787 and it's out of date uh it doesn't have the substantive principles that are
1:35:43
needed for the modern period and it does not uh enable uh the strong planning or
1:35:52
Environmental Protection or Assurance of economic rights for the
1:35:57
people so it's really an out ofd structure in many many ways it at the
1:36:04
same time it has been uh deeply damaged by uh corruption uh by the money in the
1:36:13
politics so I would make many changes but I think uh the idea should be that
1:36:21
sustainable development that means an economy that works for the common
1:36:26
good and that protects the environment and that uh provides the public services
1:36:33
that anyone needs whether it's health or education uh that these are part of the
1:36:39
citizens rights and responsibilities and that the government has the effective means to 

carry that out uh without the
1:36:47
corruption of uh private money in politics is is Central and I think you
1:36:53
say today's young people are going to really need to fix the US system because
1:36:59
otherwise it's just going to continue to be in declined and yeah I think currently the 

problem another problem
1:37:05
with the US is that it's basically Red Scare volume too like any like the counter 

propaganda against China is like
1:37:13
oh China is bad to all the young people so that creates a really unhealthy into their 

mindset about a Prejudice about
1:37:20
China and unwilling to learn about these different type of political systems that might 

have some policies that could be
1:37:26
used in the United States excellent point basically there are a lot of lies
1:37:33
about a lot of things in in politics in the United States because if you have a
1:37:39
system that's based on special interests the special interests try to hide uh
1:37:45
they want their benefits without the saying you see I run the government so
1:37:50
we have a a uh set of falsehoods uh that
1:37:56
keep uh Clarity at a distance actually yeah and
1:38:02
so it takes some effort but as you say the anti-china propaganda is is really heavy
1:38:10
uh and uh very intense right now by people who know nothing about China or
1:38:16
its history uh or its economic successes in the last 40 years or the hard work of
1:38:23
the people right and how do we counterd do misinformation I I think uh we have uh
1:38:32
first uh any any uh lies need to be called out so I try to do that on a
1:38:38
daily basis uh and uh through articles and books and speeches but I think it's
1:38:45
also important that young people make direct contacts uh and use the digital
1:38:51
connections across schools so University of Michigan and chingua University
1:38:57
working together discussing uh and so forth somehow making such projects uh
1:39:04
both the economic cultural business technological I think would be a big
1:39:10
help uh but our government is really aiming to
1:39:16
uh as you say scare people rather than to really educate them yeah and the
1:39:23
question is where do you see the economy the world economy in sustainable development 

ways to achieve
1:39:30
in five to 10 years the the good sign is that we have
1:39:36
so much new good technology 5G uh lowcost renewable
1:39:42
energy um robotics uh many uh new approaches to problem solving uh we
1:39:50
really could make the energy transformation to Safe energy at low
1:39:56
cost and this is the most important Point use our knowledge uh and deploy it
1:40:03
at scale but the challenge is uh
1:40:09
conflict division vested interests uh
1:40:14
greed uh that impedes us from using these Solutions at scale so it's it's
1:40:20
not even possible to to predict the future with any insight because we could
1:40:27
have a good future with big Solutions or we could have a very broken divided
1:40:34
dangerous future and we have to fight for the good one and and that's why this is more of 

a question of effort than
1:40:41
prediction yeah so last of all so what is one message that you will want to
1:40:47
share with all the young viewers that are aspiring to be you know great e uh
1:40:52
economists and entrepreneurs well go be the best you can but serve
1:41:01
the common good as you do it uh don't lose sight of the fact that we are in an
1:41:07
interconnected world we need Global problem solving we need friendships
1:41:13
across Nations all this talk of war and conflict and division is extremely
1:41:20
dangerous and completely unnecessary and so go be champions of sustainable
1:41:27
development use new technologies be great entrepreneurs but always do it in
1:41:33
a peaceful and Cooperative mindset not doing it because we have to beat the
1:41:40
other side but because it's good for the
1:41:46
world