The LIBEAC project is among the few elite projects selected by the Research Executive Agency (REA) of the European Commission inside the Seventh Framework Programmes for Research and Technological Development (FP7-PCRD). Inside the 2007-2013 50 billion euros FP7-PCRD, LIBEAC belongs to the category PEOPLE-IRSES project. This International Research Staff Exchange Scheme aims at improving international mobility of researchers among the world and especially between European countries and Third Countries partners in order to foster the emergence of multidisciplinary and multicultural research network. This 588,000.00 IRSES project called LIBEAC officially started the 1st January 2013 and will finish the 31th December 2016. Do not hesitate to contact us for further information.
Since their inception in 1998 in London to the most recent meeting in Brussels in October 2010, EU-China Summits demonstrate the importance of European and Chinese partnerships based on mutual understanding and joint efforts to overcome global problems ranging from ecological risks to economic crisis to social inequalities. Reflecting on the issues of EU-China relationships, the project “Liberalism In Between Europe And China” (LIBEAC) aims at developing a new understanding of liberalism in its economic, political and social dimensions. It involves a comparative analysis of the cultural differences in its interpretation and of the political discrepancies in its enforcement, in particular with respect to economic, social and environmental rights in China and Europe in Modern times. It is a multidisciplinary project based on a comparative study of European and Chinese political philosophy and political economy, legal practice and philosophy of right.
PROJECT RESEARCH BACKGROUND Liberalism has, since earlier than the Enlightenment, implied at least the following two components: a component of economics and one of politics. Economic liberalism (at least in some of its most representative brands) assumes that the less the economy is controlled by the state, the more efficient auto-regulated free markets can be in terms of production and distribution of goods. Political liberalism, again at least most generally, assumes that the more citizens are free from control by the state, the more creative, responsible and auto-disciplined those free individuals can be in terms of production and diffusion of ideas and innovation. Economic liberalism may therefore, under given circumstances, equate to “Capitalism”; Political Liberalism may, also under given circumstances,equate to “Democracy”. Inasmuch as some regard Liberalism as indeed being a Western Ideology, some structural correlation is often assumed between Economic Liberalism and Political Liberalism, as well as between Capitalism and Democracy: it goes at a par with the assumption that the more developed the economy in one country, the freer the persons living in this country. Now, does Liberalism truly work as a Western Ideology? And, in any case, is this correlation stable, in particular in the case of non-Western economies? Japan has been the first example, in the Meiji times, to face this dilemma. South Korea and Taiwan followed. And China is the most significant example in our times. If Liberalism works both at the level of expected economic welfare for the people and of political rights that it endows people with, shall we expect to observe such correlation in China as well? Is China an exception to the general “rule”, regarding its peculiar cultural background (notably its Confucian heritage) or is China a counter-example demonstrating that there is nothing as such a Rule, i.e. that the correlation between economic and social liberty purported by Liberalism is merely a matter of belief? That dual line of thought ends up equating Liberty to Creativity both in economic (scientific discoveries leading to technological innovations and leadership assumed by free entrepreneurs) and in political terms (the “rule of law” in an open society). Yet, a major economic, social and environmental issue emerges *in the face of the inequalities that Liberalism also seems to inevitably generate.* It may thus be possible and/or useful to distinguish between a Liberalism of expected welfare (on the economic side) and a Liberalism of civil and political liberties and rights on the political side. As we differentiate those, tension surfaces which is intrinsic to what some name the ‘Western Ideology of Liberalism’. This project tests this upon the course of past and present history in between Europe and China, as the European Union seeks to shape a new understanding of that relationship for the future. PROJECT TRENDS The project stands at the confluence of two major issues for the European Union, in terms of internal policies as well as external actions: the position and role of the European Union in the World and the present and future of Human Rights. The first issue, on liberal civil society and the various types of market-enhanced economies, brings concerns such as the World Trade Organization put forth recently when rebuking China’s application to be reckoned as a “market economy”. It relates to the new partnerships that the European Union is building with China in the globalized World and in the aftermath of the sovereign debt crisis. Our project is comparative as it focuses both on relationships between the European Union and China in particular, and accommodates viewpoints from China’s neighbor Japan. The second issue, involving the present enforcement and future potential implementation and/or revision of Human Rights concepts, is addressed by focusing principally on the political, legal and economic aspects of the concept of Liberalism, regarded as made of several traditions, from social liberalism to liberal theories of economics. The project thus aims at disclosing cultural and political differences in terms of interpretation and of enforcement of “Liberalism” in Europe and in China today. We discuss in detail theories called “liberal”, building conceptual tools and types of criterion useful for that comparison. Discussing those issues is all the more urgent that the recent global economic crisis has enhanced earlier temptations, on both sides of the Atlantic, to incriminate third parties. Globalization is often identified as the culprit for allowing competitive Asian companies to slow down European growth and for having created unemployment in Europe while Chinese counterparts affirm that European social benefits are responsible for European debt crisis and need a severe readjustment. Both the European Union and China will benefit from a better understanding of each other and from revising some of their mutual assumptions. New economic, political and juridical realities call for such an assessment, provided that the adequate evaluating criteria are presented.
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