At a recent forum China's Deputy Finance Minister Zhu Guangyao warned that a "zero-sum" mentality in economic relations between the US and China hurts both countries. He's right: rising protectionism, of the kind favoured by President-elect Donald Trump, is a danger to the still-sputtering global economy. What China doesn't accept is that much of the ire against free trade spreading around the world is a consequence of its own policies. If it wants to curtail the rise of protectionism, it should start at home.

China has arguably been the biggest beneficiary of globalisation. Thanks to open markets in the West that welcomed Chinese exports, and an ample inflow of foreign investment, it was able to largely wipe out poverty, become a premier manufacturing power and create a vast new middle class.

Yet a big reason why so many people in the US and elsewhere have come to see globalisation as detrimental is because it forces workers in high-cost countries to compete head-to-head with low-wage Chinese. Open markets have come to seem "rigged" against the West's hardworking households.

In response to President-elect Trump's tough talk, China has threatened to fight back. AP

For that, China can't be held responsible – unless you consider being poor a crime. But its government has made matters worse by not reciprocating the openness of its trading partners. For long stretches, China controlled the value of the yuan to promote its exports at the expense of others. It has subsidised major industries, such as steel, and keeps excess capacity churning, which skews global markets and pressures rivals. It continues to impede foreign firms by restricting their investment in sectors from insurance to entertainment, and tying them up in red tape.

Such tactics have convinced many politicians that they need to fight fire with fire. Mr Trump portrays China as cheating at the expense of American jobs and industry. His response has been to threaten to hike tariffs and label China a "currency manipulator". Some of Mr Trump's accusations are spot on – China does discriminate against foreign firms, for instance. Others, such as his tirades that China is still devaluing its currency, are off target. The point is that Mr Trump sees his hardball position as a response to China's own business practices.