The World, China, and China-New Zealand Relations

--Remarks by Ambassador Wang Xiaolong at the Cullen Breakfast

Wellington Club, 19 March, 2026

Thank you, Peter, for inviting me to speak at your prestigious namesake event. Soon after my arrival as ambassador more than four years ago, it came to my knowledge that the Cullen Breakfasts is one of the most important institutions of Wellington, as it is here that many of the most interesting people in this country would congregate on some of the most interesting issues of the day.

Indeed, we are living in unprecedented times, meaning we are never in want of topics to talk about.

What I plan to focus on today is three-fold: first, how we in China see the affairs of this world; second, China’s approach both internationally and domestically; and third, where China-New Zealand relationship would come in amid all this. After that, I shall be glad to answer your questions.

As some of you may know, there is a now well-known observation by President Xi Jinping that the world is undergoing transformations unseen in a century. When he first made that assertion, nearly ten years ago, very few people understood, let alone agreed, what it meant. If you read or listen to the global commentariat today, that has changed dramatically, as many have come to realize the prescience of the observation, with those transformations unfolding and accelerating right before our eyes.

In many ways, this is arguably one of the most seminal eras in world history, as we have never witnessed so many world-shaping or reshaping vectors in play simultaneously. From among them, three mega drivers stand out.

The first is the unrelenting pace of technological change.

Revolutionary progress in technologies, including but not limited to, AI, is redefining fundamentally the way we work and produce, the way we live, the way we fight wars, the way we create and impute values, and the way we organize ourselves as societies. How individuals, communities, states and above all, humanity as a whole, harness the potential of these technologies will also change the distribution of wealth and power both within and across borders and determine our collective ability or inability to address the biggest common challenges facing the world for decades to come.

The second mega trend is the profound re-balancing of global power, driven by the collective rise of the Global South.

It started with China, but is no longer confined to China alone. An increasing number of Emerging Markets and Developing Countries are making their way into the league of the fastest growing economies, moving up the technological ladder and value chains in that process, and playing ever more important roles in international affairs.

The rise of the Rest is not a zero-sum game, although it is often framed as one. That explains the efforts being attempted to slow, impede or even reverse that process. Regardless, the historical process is becoming somehow inexorable, albeit with the caveat that it may not follow a linear trajectory.

The third mega trend driving the changes in the world unseen in a century is the drastic reconfiguration of the global architecture of institutions and rules underpinning the international order.

The Canadian PM Mark Carney in his widely noted Davos speech characterized it as a rupture. The Munich Security Conference, in its 2026 report, claims that the international order as we know it is under destruction.

For a long time, particularly after the end of the Cold War, there have been virtually two renditions of the so-to-speak international order as such. One is the broad-based and widely accepted international order based on international law and gravitated around the UN. The other is the “liberal rules-based international order,” under which it is actually a small number of countries that tried to call the shots.

The two are not the same, though the differences between them are often shrouded in deliberate ambiguity. The West sought to dominate the international order, imposing their values and wills on the rest of the world, reaping the best part of the benefits.

That began to change when cost and benefit for them increasingly no longer align. Things have come to a head when the putative leader of the “rules-based order” sees itself losing control, and starts to undermine or even tear down the order they took the lead in building up.

Borrowing an economics concept, the pre-existing equilibrium for the international order has broken down, and the world has yet to settle into a new equilibrium. In between during the transition, we shall almost unavoidably go through a patch featuring greater unpredictability, instability and uncertainty.

A key question being increasingly asked around the world these days is: Whereto international order? Whereto our world? Whereto humanity?

Indeed, this is one of the most important questions to be answered.

To answer it, I do think we need to go back to the basics: what kind of world do we want to live in? And what do we hope to achieve with an international order in the first place?

For us in China, the international order we aspire to will need to conduce itself towards at least three fundamental goals.

First, it should maintain lasting peace and universal security in the world, rather than ensuring security for only a small number of countries at the expense of security for others, or worse still, allowing the major powers to resort to the use of force wantonly and bomb their way around with impunity.

Second, it should promote common development and prosperity, rather than enabling only a small number of countries to enrich themselves while locking others in underdevelopment or even perpetual poverty.

And third, it should empower the humanity as a whole to better address common challenges, rather than allowing a small number of well-heeled countries to secure their own narrow and very often short-sighted self-interests while leaving the most vulnerable to fend for themselves.

Let me take these up one by one, starting with what we think will not work and then on to what we think will work.

On maintaining peace and security, first and foremost, we do not believe in empires. In this connection, it is deeply concerning that empire is these days being openly and unabashedly celebrated by leading politicians of some of the biggest powers in the world, in a brazen attempt to reverse the wheels of history and to evoke the “glories” of a past that inflicted humiliation, oppression, poverty and other untold sufferings on hundreds of millions of people across continents.

This is an open affront to countries that acquired their independence in the decolonization process, to historical justice, and to the post-war international order that has maintained overall peace and stability.

Humanity has progressed past that era. Trying to conjure the ghost of past empires and using that to justify latter-day imperialism is immoral, arrogant, and above all, extremely dangerous.

Another narrative referenced frequently in the current discourse on geopolitics is spheres of influence, or how the major powers could or even should divvy up and then rule the different regions of the world. This is something else we in China do not believe in, as it is neither morally tenable, nor practically possible.

Morally, what lies at the heart of a world order based on spheres of influence is, in essence, a system of domination, subjugation and exploitation. Again, that belongs to the long gone colonialist era. I do not think anyone with any sense of decency or morality can justify that logic anymore.

Practically, the interconnectedness and interdependence between countries across the world is such these days, that despite efforts to decouple, it is no longer possible to segregate the different regions of the world from one another. Even if you might be able to do that for a while, those efforts will hardly be sustainable.

Indeed, geographically, culturally, ethnically and economically, we all have neighbours and neighbourhoods, but they are not and should not be anybody’s spheres of influence or backyards.

The next non-solution I want to debunk is military alliances, which we believe is, often a de-stabilizer rather than a stabilizer for the world. These alliances, by definition and by design, are meant to win wars rather than to keep the peace. If your aim is to make yourselves absolutely secure by making others absolutely insecure, the chance is that everyone will end up less rather than more secure.

More importantly, when tensions occur, the entanglements of these military alliances will likely escalate rather than de-escalate the situation, and spread rather than limit the conflicts.

That is exactly what happened at the start of the WWI.

A more recent example is NATO, the role it has played in European security or rather, European in-security. Instead of preventing a conflict over Ukraine, through its expansion, it became part of its root cause. Four years on, the conflict is still raging, and everybody has lost out as a result.

This brings me to the broader issue of the use of force or war as an instrument of choice in settling disputes between states.

The Charter of the UN, in explicit and unmistakable terms, prohibits the use of force or the threat of force in settling international disputes, and advocates in its stead diplomacy and negotiations on the basis of respect for sovereign independence of states.  The UN, and the rules and architecture it embodies, rose from the ashes of the scourge of WWII. It seems, however,that the painful lessons learned at the time are being forgotten, as a result of deliberate choice out of convenience or memories of those untold sufferings fading with time.

Diplomacy and dialogue is giving way to guns and missiles. Rather than seeking peace as a desirable goal in itself, “war is back in vogue, and a zeal for war is spreading,… all for asserting one’s own dominion”.

Increasingly, you also hear people talk about great power rivalries or even a WWIII as something conceivable, acceptable or even inevitable. Such talk is beyond irresponsible. Great power rivalries could be a very slippery slope. And another world war, involving this time countries armed with nuclear weapons, would lead to consequences beyond devastating: it might as well mean the end of humanity as a species.

Let me turn to the second of the three major goals for a desirable international order: common development and prosperity.

The world has never been fully convinced of having these as a shared commitment, or at least of the imperative to put money where the mouths are. The closest we got was the two decades starting from the 1990s when climate change and sustainability became the rallying call that galvanized the global community into actions on facing down a common existential threat, when WTO came into being on the back of the belief that open markets drive and spread growth and that a rising tide will lift all boats, and when later on, the UN adopted first the MDGs and then the SDGs, crystallizing the seeming consensus on eradicating poverty and achieving sustainability for all.

Looking back, those were the heydays of international economic and development cooperation. The thinking at the time was that by promoting broad-based development, we would lay a solid foundation for peace and security and improving the welfare for all peoples in the world, leaving no one behind.

These are now being dismissed as naive, even sinister globalist wokeism. And the result is deeply troubling.

On the trade front, the Multilateral Trading System (MTS), with WTO at its core, is under systemic assault, leaving WTO largely incapacitated or in virtual paralysis. The fundamental principles underpinning the fair and effective functioning of the MTS -- openness, a rules-based approach, predictability and non-discrimination -- are being openly challenged by some of the leading builders of the system, as they no longer see it as working in their favour. In largely these countries, unilateralism and protectionism have reared their ugly heads, putting the MTS under severe strain.

Increasingly, tariffs, trade and financial restrictions and outright decoupling are being weaponized by those launching trade wars on virtually the entire world. And they use these as instruments of coercion to maintain dominance, keep rivals down, and achieve geopolitical objectives.

It has become abundantly clear, however, that no country can emerge a winner from trade wars. The balance of trade of a specific country is a reflection of its endowments and its comparative advantage. It is also a function of its fiscal position as a result of its macroeconomic policy choices. No surprise, therefore, despite the tariffs and other restrictions imposed since Liberation Day, the trade deficit of the US in 2025 increased rather than decreased on the previous year.

And by imposing these tariffs and restrictions, they have disrupted and hurt the world economy. At the same time, there is growing realization that their gambits are also hurting themselves by disrupting their own supply chains, and pushing up cost for their businesses and consumers.

Bearing the brunt of all this are developing countries, particularly the least developed ones, which are the most vulnerable. Not only are they being hit by some of the most inexplicable tariffs and attendant uncertainty, they are also being subjected to the double whammy from drastic reductions in aid from Western developed countries.

In fact, ODA from developed countries collapsed over the past two years, particularly in 2025.

Although ODA from developed countries has never reached the target set by the UN, they used to generally hold up to play a useful role in supporting developing countries in addressing humanitarian crises, eradicating poverty and achieving sustainable development. Where the axe has fallen, leading to aid having been more than halved in the case of some leading donors, we have seen devastating consequences in education, public health and humanitarian programmes, in many instances costing real lives.

What is most disheartening is that in international discourse today, eradication of poverty and achieving broad-based sustainable development hardly feature as legitimate goals any more. Some of the biggest developed countries no longer even bother to pay lip service.

The final major goal for a functioning international order would be to enable the world to deal with the huge common challenges we face as one world, as one humanity. Some of them are existential, such as climate change and pandemics. It does not help to be in denial that such threats exist or are real in the first place, even though data-based and reality-proved science says otherwise. Efforts to address these challenges have been dealt a body blow when the biggest country in the world took the lead to exit the institutions designed for such purposes.

No less important is the emerging, pacing challenge arising from the exponential progress in AI, bringing with it infinite possibilities, both on the upside and on the downside. The nature of AI and its potential application is such that countries would need to work together to develop a common framework for its governance to harness its maximum opportunities and at the same time, minimize the risks.

It is reckless just to win at all cost, to try to gain competitive supremacy or absolute dominance, even at the expense of increased risks for humanity as a whole.

At this point, you may say: Well, you have told us what you don’t think will work. But tell us what you think WILL work, what you stand for. What would China think be the answer to that big question of our times? What does an international order look like that would deliver on peace, prosperity and common challenges?

For us, the answer at the foundational level is pretty straightforward: in building a Community of Shared Future for Humanity, which was proposed by Pres. Xi Jinping as a condition, a solution and an aspirational goal.

It being a condition as it describes our world as it is, the way we are, like it or not, highly interconnected and interdependent upon each other.

It being a solution in that working together to give effect to mutuality of interests gives us the best chance for countries to coexist peacefully, enjoy greater prosperity and overcome global challenges that impact all of us.

It being an aspirational goal given the reality that as all are not yet on board, we need to work hard to build up the consensus and get from here to there.

More specifically, President Xi has proposed four Global initiatives to take the world towards that goal, the Global Development Initiative, the Global Security Initiative, the Global Civilizations Initiative, and the Global Governance Initiative.

These four Global Initiatives are closely inter-related and mutually supportive, and they make up an integral, holistic whole.

Underlying all four of them are some overarching, fundamental beliefs we hold deeply in China as crucial to an international order that is open, inclusive, stable, predictable, and above all, fair and effective.

First, peace is precious, and should be sought after proactively, on the basis of sovereign equality of states, mutual respect for independence, dignity and territorial integrity, and the settlement of disputes peacefully through consultation and negotiation. If efforts at peaceful settlement of disputes according to jointly agreed rules is seen not to work, the world may quickly degenerate into a jungle, where the strong will do what they want, while the weak will suffer what they must. At the end of the day, even the strong may lose out in a conflagration running out of control.

As has been shown by recent events, for some of the smaller countries, making binary choices or embedding themselves in the war-fighting machinery of a big power has not made them safer. On the contrary, it has put them in inordinate danger by roping them into a conflict they do not want, the course of which they cannot control, and above all, the consequences of which they can hardly afford to bear.

Second, all countries have the right to development, and no one should be left behind or kept behind. Wide-spread poverty and underdevelopment is an indefensible stain of guilt on the world’s collective conscience. Even from the angle of self-interest, as has been amply evidenced, no seas will be vast enough, and no walls high enough to keep the impact of the gap between the rich and the poor from coming ashore. We should and can grow the pie together, from which all could benefit.

Third, it is a reality of our world that different countries may have distinct cultures, civilizations and values, which, together with their own history and endowments, have fashioned their respective economic, social and political systems through the choice of their own people. In this sense, no culture, or a particular set of values is superior to others. All are equally worthy of respect. Attempts to impose one’s own values or system on others are intellectually wrong, and practically, they almost always fail. Instead, countries, and the whole world at that, will benefit from humility, mutual respect and mutual learning, rather than arrogance and worse, hubris of power.

The final overarching principle which we believe is fundamental to a peaceful, prosperous and just world is that a broad-based approach is in order towards global governance, be it the building and operation of the institutions or the setting and the application of the rules. That is why it is our firmly held position that commonly defined, widely accepted and consistently applied rules as manifested in international law must be the basis of our international order, instead of rules as set down, superimposed but liable to be bent or even ditched wantonly by one or a small number of countries, and that multilateralism and the multilateral system with the UN at its centre that brings together all countries, be it major powers, middle powers, or even the smallest countries, for all its warts and all, gives us the best chance for a better world.

In other words, international order and international rules, both by definition and by necessity, should be truly international. Cooperation, based on mutual respect, peaceful co-existence and mutuality of benefit is the best choice to ensure long-term and fundamental interests of all countries and humanity as a whole.

Sadly, the world is going through a period of regression or deviation right now. But we should never underestimate the human capacity to correct course with the help of reason and a dose of reality. Sooner or later, and hopefully sooner rather than later, humanity will come back to the right path, as the jungle and the precipice of darkness it leads to, is simply not an alternative.

Let me turn now very briefly to what China is doing domestically amid these drastic changes in the world.

You may have noticed that a week ago, China concluded its annual “Two Sessions” of the country’s legislature and political consultative body when the 15th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development was adopted.

The Five-Year Plan is an instrument employed by the Chinese Government to map out the course of development for the country to ensure both clarity and unity of purpose nationwide as well as policy coherence over years and even decades. It is one of the top secret weapons behind the remarkable success story of China’s dual miracle of decades of economic growth on one hand, and social stability on the other.

In conjunction with the CPC Central Committee decision last October, the Plan affirms three key messages.

Message NO. 1: Regardless of how the international landscape may evolve, we remain sharply and firmly focused on achieving our central goal of the Great Rejuvenation of the Chinese Nation by growing the economy and improving our people’s lives.

Message NO. 2: Endogenous innovation in both the technological and industrial domains will be the key driver for progressively higher-quality growth in emerging and future sectors, including through the triple digital, AI and green transitions.

Message NO. 3: Despite the sometimes tumultuous upheavals globally, we shall not insulate ourselves from the rest of the world. We shall continue to open up, even on higher levels, and in that process, share more opportunities with the rest of the world from China’s continued growth and its mega market.

Note the crucial difference here from the approach being adopted by some of the other major powers. While we will not apologize for prioritizing the rejuvenation of our own nation, we shall not do it at the expense of others, by denying them the right to develop THEIR countries.

Besides, what we plan to do going into the next years is fully open, transparent and predictable, building on what we have been doing over the past decades.

In this way, we are adding to the stability, predictability and certainty in our world to counter the instability, unpredictability and uncertainty being created by some of the others. As a responsible major power, we see it incumbent upon ourselves to do so.

Finally, how do we see, in this context, China-New Zealand relations.

For both China and New Zealand, a stable and growing bilateral relationship yields benefits that extend well beyond our two countries.

There are no historical grievances nor fundamental conflicts of interest between China and New Zealand. In the more than five decades since the establishment of diplomatic relations, our relationship has consistently been at the forefront of China's ties with Western developed countries, delivering tangible benefits to both our peoples.

Friendship, cooperation, and mutual benefit have long constituted the mainstream of our relations.

There is every reason for us to keep it that way.

China and New Zealand share far more common ground than is perhaps immediately apparent. Going into the future, that common ground will only grow.

Both our countries have benefited from, and remain committed supporters of, the multilateral trading system. Both our peoples cherish peace, oppose armed conflict, and uphold the United Nations-centred international system and multilateralism. Both nations respect cultural diversity and embrace the harmonious mutual enrichment of civilizations. And both value the natural environment, pursue innovation, and share a common aspiration for a better future.

You may call these either values or interests. However you name them, they represent what is important to our peoples and thus constitute the basis of a robust partnership between us at the bilateral, regional and global levels.

As far as we are concerned, China and New Zealand should continue to regard each other as opportunities and partners, rather than as challenges or threats.

On our part, China stands ready to work with New Zealand to cultivate a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership grounded in mutual respect, mutual accommodation, and mutually-beneficial cooperation.

Mutual respect calls for honoring each other's sovereignty and territorial integrity, giving due consideration to each other's core interests and major concerns, and refraining from interference in each other's internal affairs. China has never interfered in the domestic affairs of other countries, and firmly opposes any interference in ours.

Mutual accommodation means ensuring that differences do not define our relationship. It is only natural that China and New Zealand may see or do things differently. However, as I have noted before, our shared interests far outweigh our differences. We should address those differences in a constructive and pragmatic manner to keep them in perspective, so that they do not get in the way of our overall relations.

Mutually-beneficial cooperation entails making the most of our highly complementary economies, including by exploring and cultivating new drivers of growth in trade and economic cooperation, strengthening people-to-people bonds, and deepening communication and coordination on regional and international affairs, including in the South Pacific.

Allow me to reaffirm: China’s commitment to the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership with New Zealand has not changed. China’s dedication to deepening friendship with the people of New Zealand has not changed. And China’s resolve to join hands with New Zealand in promoting world peace, stability, and development has not changed.

I am deeply convinced that the best days for China-New Zealand relations are still ahead of us. Amid the profound and drastic transformations of our time, a solid relationship between us will serve as an anchor of stability for both our countries and at the same time, contribute to peace, stability and prosperity more broadly. China looks forward to working with New Zealand to build a bright future together, for our two peoples, and for the world at large.

Thank you.