China S International Roles

This collection examines changes in China’s international role over the past century. Tracing the links between domestic and external expectations in the PRC’s role conception and preferred engagement patterns in world politics, the work provides a systematic account of changes in China’s role and the mechanisms of role taking. Individual chapters address the impact of China’s history and identity on its bilateral role taking patterns with the United States, Japan, Africa, the Europe Union, and Socialist States as well as China’s role in international institutions, the G-20, and East Asia’s Financial Order. Each of the empirical chapters is written to a common template exploring the role of historical self-identification, altercasting and domestic role contestation in shaping the PRC’s role. The volume provides an analytically coherent framework evaluating whether cooperation or conflict in China’s international engagement is likely to increase, and if so, the extent to which this will follow from incompatible domestic demands and external expectations. By combining a theoretical framework with strong comparative case studies, this volume contributes to the ongoing debate on China’s rise and integration into the international society and provides sound conclusions about the prospects for a transition of China’s purpose in world politics.

The global implications of China's rise as a global actor In 2005, a senior official in the George W. Bush administration expressed the hope that China would emerge as a “responsible stakeholder” on the world stage. A dozen years later, the Trump administration dramatically shifted course, instead calling China a “strategic competitor” whose actions routinely threaten U.S. interests. Both assessments reflected an underlying truth: China is no longer just a “rising” power. It has emerged as a truly global actor, both economically and militarily. Every day its actions affect nearly every region and every major issue, from climate change to trade, from conflict in troubled lands to competition over rules that will govern the uses of emerging technologies. To better address the implications of China's new status, both for American policy and for the broader international order, Brookings scholars conducted research over the past two years, culminating in a project: Global China: Assessing China's Growing Role in the World. The project is intended to furnish policy makers and the public with hard facts and deep insights for understanding China's regional and global ambitions. The initiative draws not only on Brookings's deep bench of China and East Asia experts, but also on the tremendous breadth of the institution's security, strategy, regional studies, technological, and economic development experts. Areas of focus include the evolution of China's domestic institutions; great power relations; the emergence of critical technologies; Asian security; China's influence in key regions beyond Asia; and China's impact on global governance and norms. Global China: Assessing China's Growing Role in the World provides the most current, broad-scope, and fact-based assessment of the implications of China's rise for the United States and the rest of the world.

The People’s Republic of China is now over fifty years old. Long considered an outsider, or a club of one, in international relations, China has recently become more active in international institutions. Is China becoming a responsible power in global and regional international relations? How accurate is the traditional perception of China? What factors may be motivating the changes in China’s approach to international institutions and its perceptions of its own role in the world? There is no certainty that China is becoming a more responsible power, recent developments may be just another manifestation of realpolitik. Power and Responsibility in Chinese Foreign Policy provides a vital insight into these issues, analysing the critical issues in China’s international relations– China’s regional and global diplomatic and security problems, the changing role of the People’s Liberation Army, human rights, religious and democratic movements, and the concept of responsibility. Power and Responsibility in Chinese Foreign Policy is an insightful and vital introduction to all sides of the current debate over China’s international relations.

The expanding scope of China's international activities is one of the newest and most important trends in global affairs. Its global activism is continually changing and has so many dimensions that it immediately raises questions about its current and long-term intentions. This monograph analyzes how China defines its international objectives, how it is pursuing them, and what it means for U.S. economic and security interests.

Focusing on the role of harmony in Chinese international relations (IR) theory, this book seeks to illuminate Chinese understandings of world politics and foreign policy. Taking a decolonial approach and rooted in China's cultural and epistemic terms, the title first describes three traditions of the concept of harmony in ancient Chinese thought and then analyses three strands of contemporary Chinese IR theory that draw upon this traditional thinking. Despite their similarities in advocating a radical deepening of China's relations with other countries and intense interdependence as essential for global peace and prosperity, these Chinese IR theories understand the concept of harmony in different ways and present different recommendations for achieving harmonious relations. Based on this framework of harmonious IR, Chinese social scientists also argue for new directions in Chinese foreign policy in a manner that is complementary with China's policymaking system. In the case-study section, the authors apply harmonious IR perspectives to the Belt and Road Initiative and demonstrate how a better understanding of Chinese IR theories can shed light on motivations behind Chinese foreign policy. This work will be a valuable reference for scholars, students, policymakers, and general readers interested in Chinese politics, Chinese foreign policy, Chinese IR theory, and ancient Chinese philosophy.

This book examines the processes, evolution and consequences of China’s rapid integration into the global economy. Through analyses of Beijing’s international economic engagement in areas such as trade, investment, finance, sustainable development and global economic governance, it highlights the forces shaping China’s increasingly prominent role in the global economic arena. Chapters explore China’s behavior in global economic governance, the interests and motivations underlying China’s international economic initiatives and the influence of politics, including both domestic politics and foreign relations, on the country’s global economic footprint.

Chinese Foreign Policy offers an unprecedented and comprehensive survey of China's foreign relations since 1949. The contributors include leading historians, economists, and political scientists in the field of Chinese studies, as well as noteworthy international relations specialists. The principal purposes of the volume are to assess the variety of sources that give shape to Chinese foreign policy, and to explain and analyse four decades of Chinese interaction with the world, using theories of international relations as an analytical framework. The first section considers the historical, perceptual, economic, and political domestic sources of Chinese foreign policy, and argues that China's rulers have long believed in their nation's centrality in world affairs, and that China has felt an overwhelming need since the start of the Cold War to ensure its own security and regain freedom of initiative in its foreign relations. The chapters analyze not only nation-state contacts but a broad range of economic and social interactions, giving an enriched sense of the totality of China's foreign relations. The role of ideology in motivating elites and forming foreign policy is also explored both at formal and informal levels. One major variable in China's foreign relations is economic development strategy, and this is considered in depth. The second part reviews the international systemic sources of China's foreign relations, such as strategic systems, and scientific and technological imperatives. China is seen as searching for a redefined role in a multipolar rather than a bipolar world order. The complex and cyclical Sino-US and Sino-Soviet relationships are analyzed, bringing to light the underlying patterns and systemic forces, as well as interpersonal relationships, shaping China's foreign policy. Other chapters deal with China's relationships with Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia, and with China's international behaviour in the sphere of economics, trade, and aid. The last part of this book relates the study of Chinese foreign policy directly to International Relations theory, concluding that the foreign policy can only be understood when the theories of international relations are supplemented by a specific knowledge of China's strategic and domestic milieu. Studies of these subjects are retrospective in that all contributors explore broad patterns of Chinese external behaviour based on careful and systematic analysis of the historical record and a full range of primary documentary sources, but they are also forward looking in that they consider various scenarios for the future evolution of China's relations with the world community. This book contributes through an interdisciplinary approach to our understanding of China's role in the evolving world order, and will be invaluable to academics, students, commentators and policy makers alike. It is the most comprehensive study of modern China's foreign relations published to date.

This Handbook, comprising around twenty-five chapters provided by numerous experts in the field, will prove invaluable to students of international affairs, academics, researchers, businesspeople and policy analysts. Chapters will give up-do-date and unbiased information on the current state of Chinese international relations in historical perspective.