In the past couple of days I've had a handful of discussions about the future relationship between China and the United States. There is a growing concern about China's emergence on the world scene and the perceived threat to Washington's global hegemony, with some folks getting the sense that, in true realist fashion, the two will inevitably become rivals in a new Cold War-like scenario.
If China becomes a rival or enemy of Washington, it will mark the greatest strategic failure of the West in centuries. Both sides have far too much invested in one another, with China owning a significant portion of the U.S. overseas debt. Any significant provocation would thus spell disaster for the global economy. Militarily, China's build-up is actually more of a blessing for the United States because it will also somebody else to become responsible for handling crises that may/can/will arise in Asia. Washington may serve now as the global policeman, but it is a role that many are not comfortable with, either in the United States or around the world. China is merely assuming its natural role as a regional hegemon, and Washington would do well to be accomodating of that and work with China to strengthen bilateral relations so that they may work together on regional and global issues.
The predominant reason that China's military rise is seen as a threat is because of the US military guarantee to Taiwan. Washington fears (and justly so) that any increase of China's power will cause the leadership on Taiwan to get extremely antsy and provoke some sort of conflict between the island and the mainland, which would trigger a traditional great-power war between China and the US. That should be avoided at all costs. Both parties possess nuclear weapons, huge conventional standing armies, and a war between them would cost millions in lives. The fate of Taiwan is not worth that loss. I profess that I am not totally up-to-date on the status of relations between Taiwan and the mainland regarding unification, but these discussions should move along so that the natural reunification of China can occur without sparking a global incident.
We may not like some characteristics of the Chinese leadership and their political system, but we have far too much at stake to go down the traditional path of the realists and assume that any rising power is doing so automatically to challenge the United States for global supremacy. We need to integrate China into the functioning Core of world powers, give them the respect they deserve, and work alongside them to defuse some very testy issues in the region. We can and should still chide them (privately) for their record on human rights and urge them towards a more democratic system, but we should not allow such matters to cloud overall judgment on the best course. Statecraft has taken a major hit in recent years, but forging a partnership and working with China is a much greater objective in scale, scope, and ambition than merely acquiescing to traditional thinking that it is inevitable that rising powers will automatically challenge a hegemon for supremacy.
4 comments:
Hey Richard,
For obvious reasons, I took some interest in the post. I'm glad you're not joining the chorus of neo-realist scholars who 'fear' China, or advocate balancing policies against a rising China. The CCP is expanding its military, yes, and slowly broadening its sphere of influence (particularly in terms of soft power, but not without a hard power element).
With America's equivalent networks shrinking across the board, it *appears* as if the China-U.S. relationship is zero-sum. A more detailed analysis reveals that this really isn't true, and that American's shrinking and China's growth aren't absolutely connected with one another (industrial outsourcing to China notwithstanding, of course).
I think the main fear in U.S. corridors stems from offensive realism; proponents of the 'anti-China' view don't necessarily see China as a threat, period, but see China's growth relative to the U.S. as a 'potential threat.' They don't trust the current Chinese government, or, failing that, they think that future Chinese governments could suddenly turn a corner and change the 'peaceful rise' policy into a struggle for Pacific hegemony (or, depending on the scenario, global hegemony). Looking at the relationship in this light, a zero-sum assumption emerges. China's capabilities relative to the U.S. are of some importance, but China's absolute capabilities — regardless of those of the U.S. — are more important. And, of course, they must be limited.
There is also the fear that, barring some kind of democratic miracle, a future Chinese revolution could result in a failed state, or a mass catastrophe in which things such as nukes and other WMD end up on the wrong side of a 'rational' chain of command.
Sadly, as you point out, 'limiting' China's abilities will produce more aggressive, offensive behaviour from China. I get the feeling they see the whole scenario through a more defensive realist lens — while the U.S. was happy with, say, the 1980 status quo, China sees its status-quo as completely unacceptable. Relative to its surrounding neighbours — South Korea and Japan, the U.S. — China is weak.
Historically — and this is where I feel the White House has failed miserably — China has been operating at what it perceives as a strategic 'historical loss' since about 1500, or perhaps even before that. The two opium wars humiliated the Chinese leadership; conquests by Japan in World War I and World War II made this worse. Shanghai, for a long time, was essentially run by a system of foreign occupation. This is not to mention the profound, foundational influence of Chinese culture on the entire Asian continent, and what Han Chinese likely see as China's 'rightful' place at the centre of the Asia Pacific region.
Only with Mao's revolution and imposition of insular politics was China really removed from the antagonistic modern international system. Now the current leadership, glad to be done with the Mao period, is looking to China's past, especially those long-lost years when China's influence in the Asia-Pacific region was about on par with its size in tune with its tremendous cultural influence. Taking from this — and also taking from 500 years of history in which hard-power colonization ended up a failure — China is planning a peaceful, soft-power driven rise.
There are problems in this, of course. China sees Taiwan, Tibet, Xinjiang, Mongolia, a chunk of Korea, and various spots in Pacific as being part of their natural territory. Their historical claims over these regions vary in legitimacy.
There's also the much larger problem of domestic legitimacy, and how the CCP commands power in a rapidly decentralizing domestic economic system. "Xiaokang," the Chinese notion of middle-class, upward movement, and access to prosperity (hell, let's just call it the American Dream adapted to China), is a key element to CCP rule. Decentralization is never good for an authoritarian system that plans to last, but the CCP will allow decentralization so long as it encourages economic development and allows Xiaokang to foster, even if there are some awful and very substantial side effects (environmental collapse; widespread corruption; human rights abuses, etc). The regime itself is meanwhile trying to run a tight ship by blaming local governments for the aforementioned 'side-effects', drafting legislation that addresses problems of corruption and environmental degradation (this is to say nothing of enforcement, though, which tends to be very uneven), strictly controlling FDI so that China's internal economy is not controlled exclusively by foreign investment, engaging in mass infrastructure projects such as transnational highways, dams, etc., and severely persecuting and controlling 'means of mobilization' such as religious groups, media freedom, etc. etc.
Internationally, this balancing act requires a tremendous effort to secure resources, attract FDI, and "feed the dragon," so to speak. In fact, one could say that 95% of what probably dominated Hu Jintao's day-to-day thinking are domestic matters. China needs resources. Where can we get them?
This plays into the global struggle in a very significant way. China is concerned that a major proportion of its resources comes through the Strait of Malacca, but it has no real direct ability to protect it. The Strait is also where over half of the world's maritime piracy takes place. A single problem in the Strait could prove to be the impetus necessarily to cause a major cool-down in the Chinese economy — and a REAL problem for the CCP if the 'cool down' turns into a recession.
A consequence of this is that China is expanding its physical sphere of influence in attempt to improve its resource security. Ideally, the Chinese navy has ships operating in the Indian Ocean. Ideally, China operates a military and container port in Bangladesh. Ideally, China has access to Canadian oil and has major pipelines going to through Central Asia to the Middle East.
On the U.S. side, all of this idealism looks strongly like an expansionist China — it is, in a way — and because of the U.S.'s massive sphere of influence, is interpreted as a threat (take naval dominance in the Indian Ocean for example, or something as simple as the Taiwan Strait).
On that note:
I profess that I am not totally up-to-date on the status of relations between Taiwan and the mainland regarding unification, but these discussions should move along so that the natural reunification of China can occur without sparking a global incident.
I believe the current policy is such:
-The U.S. recognizes the One China principle, but also feels obligated to intervene if China mounts an invasion of Taiwan;
-China is OK with the 'two countries, two systems for now' idea, preferring instead a gradual reintegration (right now through increased economic transactions); it will only reclaim Taiwan by force if it declares independence;
-In Taiwan's own domestic politics, independence and constitutional amendment are popular political ideas to throw around, esp. in election campaigns, but neither have actually gotten very far vis-a-vis implementation, probably for the obvious reasons.
Chris,
Thanks for taking the time to pop by and make such a lengthy post. China, while always being an area of interest for me, has never graduated into being an area of expertise, so I'm always glad when somebody who knows a lot about it can throw some knowledge and insight my way.
The sense that I get from your post is that China merely feels that after decades/centuries of under-performance, it is now stepping up its capabilities to where it believes it should be; that is to say, re-assuming its position of a regional leader and true global power. I can see why the US feels a little threatened by it, especially the realists and the hawks in the Pentagon that are still itching to get back to a traditional great power confrontation. Things seemed so much simpler then, so why not, seems to be their thinking, and that is something that I think is very dangerous for all of us.
One item that I've heard about China is that the next generation of its leadership will come to power after growing up and being educated in the United States. Do you think that this will result in a leadership that is more understanding of America and its reservations about rising China, peacefully or otherwise, and thus will make concerted diplomatic efforts to assuage American concerns about China taking its rightful place in Asia? Moreover, will their youthful experience with democracy and republicanism influence their own political thinking and guide China towards more democratic governance? I'm not calling for the "democratic miracle" that you briefly mentioned in your post, merely positing a theory that I think a lot of people would like to see happen. A lot of Americans are still sore about Red China, and who knows what kind of psychological effect it would have to see China officially moving away from its communist system.
On Taiwan, in the last book I read, The Pentagon's New Map: Blueprint for Action - A Future Worth Creating (unwieldy I know), the author suggested the idea of the US taking its military guarantee to Taiwan off the table. His explanation that a rogue action by the Taiwanese government, such as officially changing the name of the "country" to The Republic of China (Taiwan), is not something that the US should allow itself to be drawn into. My sense is that there will only be "two Chinas" if Taiwan makes such a move, and we know that the mainland would never allow that. Thus, through its Taiwan policy, America is essentially rendered hostage to Taiwan's political posturing, which seems a bizarre anachronism given that the US doesn't give a permission slip to any external source to affect its policies. One final question: is the US military guarantee a bilateral agreement, or do other countries and/or the UN have something on the books to come to Taiwan's aid in the event of conflict?
Thanks again for the post.
Richard, a few responses:
The sense that I get from your post is that China merely feels that after decades/centuries of under-performance, it is now stepping up its capabilities to where it believes it should be; that is to say, re-assuming its position of a regional leader and true global power.
This is the theory and the general sense one gets from an analysis of Chinese statements, domestic politics, white papers, and so on. This is not to say that the PLA doesn't have a few generals (or more, perhaps) who would like nothing more than to invade Taiwan later this afternoon; nor does it really give one insight into what the members of the Politburo's Standing Committee "actually think."
They do know, regardless of the inner-feelings about the U.S., Taiwan, or what have you, that the course China is currently to is the best of short-term and long-term Chinese interests.
Well, from the the CCP's point of view, anyway.
One item that I've heard about China is that the next generation of its leadership will come to power after growing up and being educated in the United States. Do you think that this will result in a leadership that is more understanding of America and its reservations about rising China, peacefully or otherwise, and thus will make concerted diplomatic efforts to assuage American concerns about China taking its rightful place in Asia?
I'd like to think so, but who knows. You're right, though: the third and fourth generations of leaders (Hu Jintao is fourth; Jiang Zemin was third; Deng Xiaoping was second) were mostly all educated either in China proper (Hu's generation is full of engineers) or within the global communist community. As far as I know, the generations directly after the fourth are the first to be largely educated in elite universities in the UK, EU, U.S., probably some in Canada, too.
The fifth generation will come to power sometime next decade, and there are reports out there that cite "political reform" as the top political concern of fifth and sixth-geners. What that means, precisely, I don't know, but an educated guess would peg the future generations as being more open to finding ways of making democratic compromises while keeping the CCP largely in tact and in power — opening the system up, allowing for a more complex and negotiable system of checks and balances within the governmental system itself (currently there are a few ones de jure already, but almost none de facto), and opening up the way CCP leaders and government officials are selected (one example is the township election; such elections might find go all the way up to the top). Public transparency and rule of law are also major issues, particularly vis-a-vis workers rights, migrant rights, and freedoms such as expression, which will likely still be the top domestic issues 5-10 years from now.
This doesn't mean that the next generation will support a multi-party or 'democratic' system by Western standards, though; in fact, I would bet most still think that a multiparty political system would be bad for China. It also doesn't indicate how the next generation will behave internationally; they may be (as is predicted) even more nationalistic than the current generation, and this could have a major impact on relations with Western countries, Japan, Tibet, Xinjiang, and Taiwan So long as the Chinese leadership remains convinced that those last three are natural parts of China, reform on human rights issues in other areas (media; labour) won't necessarily translate into a softer approach toward secessionist speech or action, or large, organized religious organization that conceivably threaten the CCP's intellectual hegemony.
Thus, through its Taiwan policy, America is essentially rendered hostage to Taiwan's political posturing, which seems a bizarre anachronism given that the US doesn't give a permission slip to any external source to affect its policies.
It is a bit weird. I'm not up on my Taiwan lit, but at this point I think it's become more of an ideological-driven phenomenon rather than a strictly realist one. Strategically-speaking, though, Taiwan is sort of one way the U.S. reminds China who is boss; if anything were to happen, the U.S. might still want to step in for fear that China will have called their bluff — a bad international precedent to set if you're interested in making similar sphere of influence claims elsewhere (South Korea, for example).
The "we will step in regardless" statement is then just a very up-front way of codifying this. In practice this is supposed to create a sobering effect between China and the U.S., sort of like nuclear deterrence, whereby the grim reality and consequences of action means that China takes a more measured stance toward Taiwan; the U.S., for its part, does not interfere with this measured response. Thus, actual fighting isn't supposed to happen — the threat of action is supposed to result in a more agreeable and utility-maximizing framework for all parties involved. It's a bit of a game of chicken (or, framed slightly differently, prisoner's dilemma) whereby both parties have stepped out of their vehicles and have agreed that they will only get back into their vehicles if X or Y happens. Knowing that the simultaneous pursuit of maximum utility will result in the worst outcome, they have both agreed on a defined middle-ground that satisfies most of their interests and avoids bad outcomes. And I think the CCP, for the time being, would agree that this is the best course of action.
Thanks Chris, this has been an enlightening discussion for me.
On the prospect of China becoming a multi-party system, would you say that the future will more like resemble Japan's political system, where there will be "factions" or entrenched "camps" within the dominant party, and power never really transfers to a different party but instead to different wings of the CCP? As you say, they may not really want to open up to a pluralistic system, but it seems almost inevitable that there will emerge a tug-of-war between the technocrats, the traditional hardliners, the democrats, and so forth. It would actually be an interesting experiment.
I like the way you characterize the US-China-Taiwan situation as well. It sums it up pretty succinctly. For that Winham paper where our mission was to look at the future of IR, I ventured a little into that territory and surmised that while it is both preferable and more likely that Beijing and Washington will come closer together in the coming decade (thus denting traditional realist thought regarding rising powers and established hegemons), Taiwan could be the monkey wrench. The other scenario I came up with that proposes an obstacle to closer relations is China forcibly resolving the status of the Spratly Islands, which supposedly hold a significant level of undiscovered oil reserves that could satiate China's ever-growing demand.
Those two scenarios aside, I do believe that the integration of China into the functioning Core of the globe is all but inevitable.
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