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The People's Republic of China (PRC) celebrates its 60th birthday today marking the culmination of the long march to power in 1949. As the streets are swept, fireworks primed and banners unfurled across the country so the tide of analysis and speculation has intensified in the West. With China continuing its rise, shrugging off the financial hangover that enveloped Europe and the US, so the speculation on its sustainability and consequences for the global community has started afresh.

'Sustainability' has been key in the debate as China’s economy chugs on amid its vast annual population increase. Whether it can maintain the 9% yearly growth rate deemed vital to its continued development in the face of renewed pressure to curb its industrial output is soon to be seen. Chinese President Hu Jintao's commitment at the UN meeting last month to cut carbon emissions in line with its GDP development was a rough indicator of its intended path. For China, an approaching super power eager to be bracketed as a developing nation, one of its key tasks will be to separate its sustainable rise from industrial output and economic overheating.

Domestically, change is coming. Last year unofficial statistics identified 115,000 protests across the country and the administrations handling of the fiasco in Xinjiang just this year proves that Beijing may have make concessions in its policy to ethnic minorities. Last years Olympics proudly showed the new Beijing, a bustling, modern city content in its transformation but the time for real political change is approaching. With a new leader to be selected for 2012 and the rise of new media holding the party to uncomfortable account could reforms be around the corner?

Any change internally would have massive repercussions externally as China plays an increasingly vital role internationally. Alongside its progress economically, leapfrogging the European capitals into 3rd place during 2007, it has made according adjustments to its military expenditure. SIPRI reports that this totalled $84.9 billion last year placing China second only to the US. For a country emphasizing its 'peaceful rise' how does this investment fit in? Which policies should the West pursue in regards to China?

Beijing is finally beginning to mobilize its vast wealth in order to secure access to vital natural resources. Whether it does that by investing in the long dilapidated transport network of West Africa or in the construction of football stadiums in Costa Rica its template is clear. Aid with no caveats, no mandatory acceptance of an international human rights code or compromise on distasteful political administrations. This 'alternative model' of development clearly poses a challenge to the West but will this challenge evolve into conflict?

This brief editorial only touches the surface and we encourage the debate to grow from here and look at many issues related to China's rise, it's consequences and its sustainability. To accompany the debate we have produced a poll to gather data on what the policy priorities should be for Western leaders. We would appreciate your views and will collate the results, as well as the best of the debate, into Atlantic Memo 20.

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