Review of the year 2023 and prospects for the year 2024 in China and Europe

The correspondents’ club is interested in the events that marked the year 2023 and the issues that will occupy the year 2024 in Beijing and Brussels.

At the end of 2023, the time for taking stock is approaching. We are going to China and Europe to find out what characterized the year that is ending and to find out what will be at the center of concerns in 2024. While China is in a complicated economic situation despite the end of the zero policy covid, the future of the European Union (the EU), is more geopolitical and plays out around the Ukrainian question.

China: youth unemployment is growing

The Chinese are finally freed from the zero covid policy, even if the start of 2023 is marked by an impressive surge in cases after the definitive lifting of health restrictions. China is coming back to life, train stations and airports are filling up again during major national holidays, but covid has left its mark. The Chinese economy is struggling to recover. The lack of confidence of the Chinese prevents the revival of domestic consumption, the main engine of growth.

A new phenomenon is also starting to gain momentum: youth unemployment. Graduates from Chinese universities are finding it increasingly difficult to find employment. There are also public finances which are faltering. The provinces and municipalities that have borne the burden of zero covid are heavily in debt. Quite unusual, the highest leaders of the Communist Party recognized a few days ago that China was still encountering difficulties in reviving its economy. And the subject is ultra-sensitive. Users of the social network Weibo, the equivalent of X in China, received messages warning them against publishing pessimistic views on the Chinese economy.

The year 2024 will begin with an election that is expected to determine the future of relations between China and Taiwan. On January 13 there will be the presidential election in Taiwan and the result is eagerly awaited. Depending on the new president who will be elected in Taipei, tensions in the Taiwan Strait could take a new turn. The two opposition parties considered to be rather favorable to a rapprochement with China ultimately failed in their union. They will leave divided, which gives a serious chance of victory to the DPP, the party of the outgoing president which defends the principle of a Taiwanese nation against China. A result which could therefore reignite tensions with Beijing.

EU: a reform to welcome new countries?

After a year marked in the European Union by very diverse subjects, from Ukraine to glyphosate via the aftermath of Qatargate, the directive on digital services or the agreement with Tunisia, the European institutions are ready to turn the page. The European elections will take place from June 6 to 9, 2024 and the European institutions will be renewed: the Parliament, then the Commission and the presidency of the European Council.

In 2023, the European Union’s biggest geopolitical success, aid to Ukraine, has been overshadowed by the Union’s inability to achieve strong and effective action in the Middle East. Ukraine was the Europeans’ revenge for their deadly divisions at the outbreak of the war in Yugoslavia and now this political support is fractured. The fault lies with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán who is playing Vladimir Putin’s Trojan horse, but the Europeans will have to rebuild their unity at 27 if they want to present themselves to the voters with an honorable record for the EU.

It is in Ukraine or around the Ukrainian question that the future of the European Union is being played out this year. First of all, we have a give-and-take coming back to the table between enlargement and internal reform. It’s an old sea serpent of the EU: should we enlarge the Union or deepen it first? We had the accession of ten new countries in 2004 but the French and the Dutch rejected the European constitutional treaty in 2005.

In 2024, it is no longer called deepening but reform. The 27 intend to talk about it at all summits: how to reform the EU from within in order to be ready to welcome new countries with Ukraine but also Moldova in mind. And then we will have to agree on the common budget, not only for aid to Ukraine but also to finance the asylum and migration pact. The prospect of musical chairs at the top of institutions at the end of June is still very distant.