BEIJING, Jan. 26 -- It is a media tradition to look back at what has happened in the past year and how things will go in the year ahead. For Western media in general, a popular topic in the recent year-ender and prediction season is China.

    The Independent (daily newspaper) of Great Britain, for example, ran a series of articles about China on its online edition earlier this month. The authors described China as the world's newest superpower, the third largest economy in the world, the leading consumer society and an engine of economic growth. They said China's contribution to the world economy surpassed that of the US, that "Owned by China" will one day be as common as "Made in China" and that China's culture of innovation will spread to the rest of the world, and so on.

A scene in the street of east China's Changzhou city. (Xinhua/Reuters Photo) Photo Gallery>>>

    The US-based bi-monthly Foreign Affairs carried in its January-February issue an article titled "The Rise of China and the Future of the West", with a summary that begins by saying "China's rise will inevitably bring the United States' unipolar moment to an end". And the author (G John Ikenberry) lays out this view in the first paragraph: "The rise of China will undoubtedly be one of the great dramas of the twenty-first century. China's extraordinary economic growth and active diplomacy are already transforming East Asia, and future decades will see even greater increases in Chinese power and influence." The author holds that America's "unipolar" era is bound to expire, but the international system it heads is now more vital thanks to its "openness" and "freedom". He says conflicts and war can be avoided by embracing China.

    There are others with somewhat different views, including those who describe China as "rich and poor" and "strong yet vulnerable superpower".

    Taken in whole, the Western media's discussion of China this year really reflects a wide range of opinions, some which are not as sentimentalized and morally conceited as we are used to hearing. Instead, they are more focused on assessing China as it is in reality. Be it praise or sneer, people are better off not reading too much into such babbling anyway. And by saying so I include my fellow Chinese as well: just respond to comments by the foreign press by saying: "So what?"