Just over a year ago, the term common prosperity began to gain more traction when it was firmly set as a goal to which China aspires. The phrase is not new, nor is its meaning. According to the news agency Reuters, Mao Zedong, a pivotal figure in the People’s Republic of China and its head of state from 1949 to 1959, had spoken of it in the 1950s. Later, in the 1980s, leader Deng Xiaoping, who was a powerhouse from the late 70s to 1989, had also referred to common prosperity. Last week, President Xi Jinping, who reintroduced the concept in 2020, defended it publicly during the virtual annual meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF).
It is not known whether a question on the subject was put to President Xi, although one doubts this was the case. Perhaps he felt the need to explain that common prosperity is not a volte face, but rather a continuation of the Chinese Communist Party’s goal that China will become a “fully-developed, rich, and powerful” nation by 2049. Nevertheless, he definitively told the WEF meeting that for his country, common prosperity was “not egalitarianism”. Instead, he said, the intention was to ensure that every Chinese citizen received “a fair share from development” and that there was more equal income distribution. To achieve this objective, Beijing has begun to lean on big business and the super wealthy to make heavy donations to charity and it is also expected that a property tax would come into play.
China watchers (a real term assigned to the people who have been doing just that for decades; there are even Young China Watchers groups at universities around the world today), as could be expected, have been dissecting this term and its likely effects as well as offering thoughts on whether or not it will ultimately succeed.
However, if one were to remove China from the equation, isn’t common prosperity what every politician seeking power or to remain at the helm promises people? Governments and politicians the world over hold themselves up as being able to implement policies that would cater to meeting way beyond people’s basic needs. Quality healthcare, decent and affordable housing, and jobs paying livable wages feature highly among the undertakings pledged along with sound education and social security support for the most vulnerable as needed. Without ‘Robin Hooding’ it, isn’t lifting people out of poverty or promising to do so in fact promoting a form of common prosperity?
In Guyana, the masses have been fed versions of this for decades. Among the more memorable were the PNC slogan during the Forbes Burnham administration about “making the small man a real man” and former president Cheddi Jagan’s vow that under his party’s governance everyone would earn enough to meet all needs and still be able to afford “some sweets for the children”. More recently, there was the APNU/AFC’s promise of a “good life” for all. There were several others, but none of them ever eventuated. In the current age, they would have been rich fodder for memes.
An erstwhile green champion and could-have-been regional agricultural giant, our resource-rich country, or rather its leaders, have chosen to embrace oil production. The myth spun around the over one billion barrels that were first found – there have been further discoveries since then – was that all citizens will ultimately be rich; common prosperity to the nth degree, perhaps? Maybe not.
At a very basic level, some citizens had high hopes of receiving monthly cash payments once the ‘oil money’ began rolling in. Lest we dismiss them as fanciful, let’s recall what the then minister of Natural Resources Raphael Trotman told Ber-bicians at the May 26, 2017 flag-raising ceremony at New Amsterdam: “We have discovered offshore of Guyana over a billion barrels of oil. With less than one million people and being entitled to 50% of that…, every Guyanese, you and I are already a millionaire”.
Meanwhile, we would all do well to pay heed to the far less than perfect, one-off $25,000 cash distribution meant to supplement lost earnings as a response to the economic deprivation in households wrought by the COVID-19 restrictions. That effort must be chalked up as yet another learning experience. A look at the past will reveal that it was not the first time some in desperate need were unable to receive benefits, while many who had no need collected the disbursement as extra pocket money.
Indeed, the fractious atmosphere surrounding how the oil money the country has earned thus far from the thousands of barrels already recovered – much less than it should have garnered – should or should not be spent do not bode well for contentment in the future.
Whether China will attain common prosperity, especially given its unique approach is certainly worth watching. In Guyana, considered from all angles, common prosperity is absolutely Sisyphean. We therefore need to be wary of those politicians who will try to continue to dispense the Kool Aid on this.
