Regional Multilateralism with Chinese Characteristics

While it is notable that China has become a member of almost all international organizations (excepting the OECD, International Energy Agency, and Missile Technology Control Regime), much less noticeable has been China’s steadily increasing involvement in regional multilateral organizations and groups of nations. As China has expanded its global footprint into literally every continent and part of the planet, Beijing has sought to join existing institutions in those regions—but what is particularly noteworthy is that China has stimulated and created a wide range of new organizations and regional groupings all around the world. That is what this chapter is about—China’s regional multilateralism. Such Chinese initiatives most notably include: the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), Association of Southeast Asian Nations Plus China (ASEAN + 10), Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa (BRICS), Forum for China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), China–Arab States Cooperation Forum (CACF), China–Central and Eastern Europe Countries (CEEC), and a series of groupings in Latin America (China–Latin America Forum, China-Caribbean Economic and Trade Cooperation Forum, China–Latin America Common Market Dialogue, and China–Latin America Business Summit). China has been either the initiator of, or actively engaged in, the creation of all these groupings.

China’s Relations with Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East

Over the last two decades, developing countries have become central to China’s increasingly ambitious foreign policy makers. This chapter begins by explaining China’s conceptualization of the developing world and its position in Beijing’s geostrategy. After describing the three characteristics of China’s approach—asymmetry, comprehensiveness, and its interlocking structure—the chapter then explains the various economic, political, and security policy tools that comprise it. China works to bring the separate strands of its foreign policy together in a comprehensive whole and to build synergies between component parts. Ultimately, the chapter concludes that Beijing’s primary objectives—regime survival and advancing China’s position in an increasingly multipolar world—are probably insufficient to engender widespread political support among developing countries for a China-led world order.

China’s Relations with Russia

Russia’s relations with China (and vice versa) have evolved steadily during the post-Soviet period. Leaders on both sides have proclaimed, for a number of years now, that their bilateral relations are at their best point in history. How did the China-Russia relationship reach such a stage, especially given their long (and largely discordant) history? This chapter traces the evolution of China-Russia relations since the collapse of the Soviet Union. It identifies the commonalities and common purposes Moscow and Beijing have in world affairs, as well as their bilateral economic, cultural, and military relations. The China-Russia relationship has important implications for the United States, as well as American allies in the world.

China’s Relations with the United States

This chapter reviews Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and People’s Republic of China (PRC) interactions with the United States since the 1940s, and it reveals a general pattern of the United States at the very top of China’s foreign priorities. Among those few instances where China seemed to give less attention to the United States was the post-2010 period, which saw an ever more powerful China advancing at US expense. However, China’s rapid advance in economic, military, and diplomatic power has progressively alarmed the US government, which now sees China as its main international danger. Looking forward into the future, deteriorating US-China relations have enormous consequences for both countries, the Asia-Pacific region, and the world.

Nationalism, Social Influences, and Chinese Foreign Policy

This chapter assesses the domestic sources of contemporary China’s foreign policy. In particular, it examines the importance of national identities, China’s worldviews, the socialization of Chinese, and particularly the role of nationalism. The chapter begins by arguing that social influences matter: the CCP has inextricably linked itself, society, and foreign policy by staking its domestic right to rule upon its foreign policy performance. The chapter then turns to the thorny empirical question of what we know about Chinese feelings and attitudes toward different parts of the world, from China’s Asian neighbors, to the admired and resented Euro-American First World, to Russia, and the dark and backwards Third World of Africa and Latin America. It then turns to the causes/drivers of these worldviews, arguing that both demographics (e.g., age and location) and individual predispositions (e.g., nationalism and cosmopolitanism) matter, but that political and peer socialization has a powerful constraining effect on the international attitudes of the Chinese people.

China’s Relations with Europe

The relationship between China and European nations has been rewritten and largely turned around in the last four decades. From presence and influence in China, the main issues have shifted and now revolve around China’s presence and influence in and near Europe. Crucially, Chinese investment in Europe has now overtaken European investment in China. China’s relations with Europe are extensive and still growing. They include intensive state-to-state diplomacy, public diplomacy that involves European elites, an outsize trade relationship as well as an investment strategy leading to increasing friction, people-to-people exchanges that consist primarily of tourist and student flows from China to Europe, and cultural influences or soft power.

China’s Global Economic Interactions

Since 2009–2010, China has developed a distinctive set of international economic policies that were by no means inevitable. These policies grew out of the unusual economic events that marked the first part of the twenty-first century—including the Global Financial Crisis (GFC)—and from the determination the Chinese leaders displayed thereafter to exert worldwide global economic influence. The broad policy orientation that grew from these forces can be best considered by examining two complex policy initiatives: renminbi internationalization and the Belt and Road Initiative. Each can be seen as a response to the surplus of domestic saving that emerged in the wake of sustained rapid economic growth, and they are to a certain extent competing strategies. The chapter also assesses China’s overall international economic position as of 2018. It concludes with some prognostications about the future of China’s position in the global economy.

China’s Global Governance Interactions

In recent years the Chinese approach toward global governance has shifted beyond a traditional defensive stance and toward more active engagement. This new alignment in Chinese foreign policy suggests a growing confidence on the part of the CCP leadership in China’s domestic governing arrangements as well as its capacity to lead by example in international affairs. New shifts in Chinese discourses, diplomacy, and responses to key global challenges seem to reflect a new global leadership ambition on the part of the Xi Jinping administration. China’s deepening engagement in global governance is a reflection of its rising power and international status as well as a long-standing aspiration to contribute toward the making of international order on its own terms.

China and the World

This chapter speculates about the major factors in, and challenges to, China in its relations with the world between 2020 and 2030. It first considers several dimensions of China’s likely growth over the next two decades: GDP, energy consumption, research and development spending, and military expenditure. It then examines seven separate challenges—the impact of domestic politics, relations with the United States, governance, and soft power—and posits the likely trajectories in each category. China’s future relations with its neighbors and the United States will be particularly difficult for Beijing to manage.

China’s Global Cultural Interactions

As China continues to “rise” in world affairs, its international image is becoming more and more important. The Chinese Communist Party and government has become interested in—some would say obsessed with—its international image. In recent years it has sponsored mega events such as the Shanghai Expo and Olympic Games, G-20 Summit, and Belt and Road Forums. Beijing has also established Confucius Institutes (CIs) and classrooms worldwide, and has internationalized the Chinese media. This chapter examines China’s “soft power” and traces the historical precedents behind the contemporary promotion of Chinese culture abroad. It finds that, despite enormous investment, China’s internatonal image continues to be mixed and challenged by a number of domestic impediments.