If China has peaked, can the West breathe easy?

H

as China peaked? A few years ago, when the country consistently posted eye-watering growth figures and middle-class western parents rushed to enrol their children in Mandarin classes, such a query would have seemed eccentric to most people. But a slowing economy, combined with seemingly insoluble problems such as an ageing population and a collapsing housing sector, have led to increasing speculation that the Chinese economic miracle, now entering its fifth decade, may be over.

And China’s malaise is not merely economic. When Xi Jinping took over China, he vowed to give his country “major country diplomacy” befitting its international status. A decade on, China has managed to alienate once-friendly countries, while alliances designed to counter its global ambitions are forming in Asia and elsewhere. In

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