China's Foreign Policy since 1949

Continuity and Change

Kevin Cai

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2022
• ISBN:
  9780429536519
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Ethnic Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

This book provides a systematic and comprehensive analysis and overview of China's foreign policy since 1949. It starts with constructing an analytical framework for explaining Chinese foreign policy and then, on the basis of that, outlines and analyzes developments in different areas of foreign policy – such as security policy, international economic policy and policy toward multilateralism – and foreign policy toward different areas of the world – such as the United States, East Asia, Europe and developing countries. The book also examines decision-making in Chinese foreign policy, discusses issues of current concern, including maritime disputes, Xi Jinping's more assertive approach to foreign policy, the One Belt One Road initiative and the trade war with the United States. The book concludes with a comparative analysis of the three phases of China's foreign policy since 1949 and provides a brief assessment of how China's foreign policy is likely to develop going forward.

1 INTRODUCTION

DOI: 10.4324/9780429260926-1

This introductory chapter explains that this work provides a systematic and comprehensive study of China’s foreign policy through an analytical framework, which is constructed by incorporating the ideas of Waltz’s three-level international relations theory, realism and constructivism. Following this analytical framework, the chapter pinpoints a major theme that runs throughout this work, that is, China’s foreign policy since 1949 has revealed a persistent pattern of continuity and change. Under this general pattern of continuity and change, Chinese foreign policy since 1949 has been evolving through three major phases, namely, the first phase of the Mao era (1949–1979), the second phase of Deng’s influence (1979–2009) and the third phase that is primarily under Xi’s leadership (2009–present). As Chinese foreign policy has become highly complex today, the study of Chinese foreign policy accordingly becomes much more comprehensive and complex than before, covering a wide range of foreign policy issues. This study focuses on some most important topics of Chinese foreign policy, including Chinese foreign policy making, the evolution of Chinese foreign policy since 1949, Chinese national security strategy, Chinese international security policy, Chinese foreign economic policy and Chinese multilateralism policy.

This work is a study of the foreign policy of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) (thereafter China) since 1949. Chinese foreign policy has long been a widely studied subject in academia. Today, the study of Chinese foreign policy becomes all the more important in the context of the rise of China. This is because the foreign policy and external behaviors of a rising China inevitably exert increasing influence on almost all the major areas of the world today, including international security, geopolitics, global economy, development, environment, global public health, various nontraditional security issues and so on with a substantial impact on the existing international system. It is even speculated by some analysts that with its continuing rise, China will eventually replace the US as a new global superpower within this century. As such, it is all the more imperative today to have more and better understanding of China’s foreign policy.

This book is intended to provide a systematic and comprehensive study of Chinese foreign policy. Through an analytical framework that is constructed on the basis Waltz’s three-level international relations theory, realism and constructivism, this study shows that Chinese foreign policy since 1949 has been influenced jointly by a number of factors at the international, state and individual levels, each of which shapes Chinese foreign policy in its own way. Some of them are conditioning factors, which include the nation’s geographical and geopolitical environment, the country’s power (physical, economic and military), China’s philosophical traditions, long historical experience and communist ideology of the state; the others are determining factors, which involve the national/core interests as identified by the Chinese communist state and the personality traits and leadership styles of individual communist leaders. While the conditioning factors provide physical conditions, power foundation and parameters, and the historical, philosophical and ideological sources of Chinese foreign policy, the determining factors directly set the direction and specific objectives of Chinese foreign policy and the ways in which the nation’s foreign policy objectives are pursued and achieved.

On the basis of this analytical framework, a major theme that runs throughout this work is that China’s foreign policy over the past seven decades has revealed a persistent pattern of continuity and change. On the one hand, there is clear continuity in China’s foreign policy since 1949, which is most notably reflected in Beijing’s major foreign policy objectives, the important approaches adopted to achieve the nation’s foreign policy goals, the key elements and principles in China’s foreign policy, the major driving forces of Chinese foreign policy and the nation’s foreign policy primarily defined by the nature of the country’s relations with superpowers. On the other hand, however, there is also dramatic change in China’s foreign policy over time, reflecting changed conditions in both domestic and external settings. Change in China’s foreign policy is particularly reflected in the nation’s specific missions of foreign policy and specific substance of China’s national security policy, foreign economic policy, international security policy, policy toward great powers and the region and policy toward multilateralism. Apparently, many important aspects of China’s foreign policy since 1949 can be better interpreted and understood by referring to this pattern of continuity and change in China’s foreign policy.

With this general pattern of Chinese foreign policy in mind, it can be found that Chinese foreign policy since 1949 has been evolving through three major phases, that is, the first phase of the Mao era (1949–1979), the second phase of Deng’s influence (1979–2009) and the third phase that is primarily under Xi’s leadership (2009–present). In each of these three phases, Chinese foreign policy was/is pursued in different domestic and international settings and tasked with different missions. Hence, while some basic tenets and objectives of Chinese foreign policy have remained unchanged, the specific substance of Chinese foreign policy differs one phase from the other. In this process, some major trends of the evolution of Chinese foreign policy are clearly visible. Specifically, over the past 70 years, Chinese foreign policy has been moving from (1) primarily driven by ideology to basically driven by practical motivations, (2) from isolationist to actively engaging, (3) from antagonistic and confrontational to conciliatory and cooperative, (4) from basically one-dimensional (concerned primarily about national security) to multidimensional (concerned about a whole range of foreign policy issues, including national and international security, global economy, development, environment and many others) and (5) from unilateral to multilateral.

Despite the evolution of Chinese foreign policy, Beijing’s major foreign policy objectives remain unchanged, although the sequence of importance and specific elements of each of these objectives have been modified over time. Set to promote China’s national interests/core interests, these foreign policy objectives are closely related to each other and ranked on the basis of the Chinese communist leadership’s prioritization of the country’s national interests/core interests. Generally speaking, the Chinese communist leadership has been pursuing seven major foreign policy objectives since 1949, which include: (1) securing China’s existing political system of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)’s one-party rule; (2) maintaining state sovereignty; (3) safeguarding the country’s national security; (4) preserving the nation’s territorial integrity; (5) achieving national unification with Taiwan and keeping Hong Kong, Xinjiang and Tibet as integral parts of China; (6) ensuring the nation’s sustained economic development and modernization; and (7) enhancing the nation’s international position and restoring its great power status. Of these foreign policy objectives, securing the existing political system dominated by the CCP takes precedence over all the other foreign policy objectives. While the other foreign policy objectives are subordinated to the top objective of preserving China’s communist regime, the effective implementation of these other foreign policy objectives can logically help enhance the legitimacy of the CCP’s rule and to secure its one-party dominant political system in China. It is in this sense that the interests of the CCP and the interests of the Chinese nation as such are overlapped in some way.

While Chinese foreign policy has been evolving over time, the process of Chinese foreign policy making has also been gradually transformed. During the Mao era, foreign policy decision was primarily made by Mao in person on the basis of his personal intuition and ideological orientation. In the post-Mao era, however, the process of foreign policy making has gradually been institutionalized, particularly since the 1990s, which involves a growing number of actors, although final decisions of foreign policy, particularly those of strategic importance, are still made by the top communist leaders. In the meantime, think tanks have been playing an increasingly important role in foreign policy making by providing the communist leaders and foreign policy making bodies with professional advice and foreign policy analysis and suggestion reports. Moreover, as Chinese society becomes increasingly pluralistic and liberalized as a result of economic reforms, Chinese foreign policy has also been growingly subject to the influence of domestic interest groups, media and public opinion to some extent in the post-Mao era. As a result, Chinese foreign policy making in the post-Mao era has become a much more complex process than what it was during the Mao era.

Moreover, as the country has rapidly integrated into the mainstream international system as a result of dramatic economic reforms and opening policy in the post-Mao era, China now engages in almost all major areas of international affairs. Consequently, Chinese foreign policy has become highly complex today. Hence, the study of Chinese foreign policy accordingly becomes much more comprehensive and complex than ever before, covering a wide range of foreign policy issues, including national and international security, geopolitics, global economy, development, environment, global public health, various nontraditional security issues, multilateralism and many others. As such, it indeed poses a challenge for scholars who intend to pursue a comprehensive study of China’s overall foreign policy today.

This study focuses on some most important specific topics of Chinese foreign policy rather than on Chinese foreign policy toward individual countries or groups of countries or regions. However, when relevant, individual countries (particularly superpowers) and regions will be duly and fully addressed in the process of exploring each of these specific topics of Chinese foreign policy. Specifically, after constructing an analytical framework for explaining Chinese foreign policy, this work studies the following six topics: (1) Chinese foreign policy making, (2) the evolution of Chinese foreign policy since 1949, (3) Chinese national security strategy, (4) Chinese international security policy, (5) Chinese foreign economic policy and (6) Chinese multilateralism policy.

To investigate these topics, the book is organized into nine chapters.

After the introductory chapter, Chapter 2 constructs an analytical framework for explaining Chinese foreign policy. The framework adopts a symbiotic neorealist-constructivist approach, which explains how each of the factors at Waltz’s three levels (international, state and individual) influences and shapes Chinese foreign policy.

Chapter 3 explores foreign policy making in China, focusing on Chinese foreign policy making in the post-Mao era by examining the institutional structure of Chinese foreign policy making, the rising role of Chinese think tanks in foreign policy making and the growing influence of interest groups, media and public opinion in Chinese foreign policy making.

Chapter 4 provides an overview of how Chinese foreign policy has evolved through three phases from the founding of the PRC in 1949 to the present day, reflecting changing conditions at both the domestic and global settings.

Chapter 5 studies the evolution of Chinese national security strategy in response to the changing domestic and international conditions, which involves two mutually complementary components, that is, diplomatic maneuvers and military doctrines.

Chapter 6 looks into China’s international security policy in two major areas, namely, control and disarmament of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and security/military confidence-building measures (CBMs), explaining how and why China has been moving from nonparticipation in security multilateralism in the 1950s–1970s to growing involvement in multilateral cooperation in multiple areas of international security from the 1980s onward.

Chapter 7 scrutinizes Chinese foreign economic policy. After a brief overview of Chinese foreign economic policy during the Mao era, the chapter focuses on post-Mao Chinese foreign economic policy with respect to trade, foreign direct investment (FDI), the renminbi (RMB) and free trade agreements (FTA).

Chapter 8 investigates China’s policy on multilateralism by explaining how China’s multilateralism policy has evolved since 1949, the motivations of China’s pursuit of multilateralism, the major features of the evolution of China’s multilateralism policy and the impact of China’s rising influence in international organizations on the existing multilateral system.

The concluding chapter offers a comparative assessment of three phases of Chinese foreign policy and explains how effective Chinese foreign policy of each of the three phases was/is in helping pursue the nation’s major foreign policy objectives.

It is hoped that this study will help contribute to the understanding of Beijing’s foreign policy and external behaviors from a new perspective and provide an assessment of the current status of Chinese foreign policy under the leadership of Xi Jinping.

2 CONSTRUCTING AN ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK FOR EXPLAINING CHINESE FOREIGN POLICY^*

DOI: 10.4324/9780429260926-2

Kenneth N. Waltz in his 1959 book, Man, the State and War: A Theoretical Analysis, developed a three-level analysis to explain the causes of war through what Waltz called individual, state and international images.¹ Thereafter, Waltz’s theory became very influential and was widely used by scholars to explain international relations. With proper adjustment, Waltz’s three levels of analysis can also be used to explain a country’s foreign policy. This chapter is intended to transform Waltz’s three-level analysis into an analytical framework that can be used to explain Chinese foreign policy.

Constructing an analytical framework

An overall review of the major factors that have been influencing Chinese foreign policy since 1949 shows that all these factors fit Waltz’s three levels or images. Specifically, China’s geographical and geopolitical environment is a major factor at the international (external) level that influences Chinese foreign policy; there are multiple factors at the state level that impact China’s foreign policy in different ways, which include the country’s physical, economic and military power, China’s rich philosophical traditions, long historical experience, communist ideology of the communist state and the national interests/core interests as identified by the Chinese communist state; and finally, the personality traits and leadership styles of individual communist leaders can be seen as a factor at the individual level that influences Chinese foreign policy.

All these factors apparently play different roles in influencing and shaping Chinese foreign policy. Based on their different impacts on Chinese foreign policy, the factors identified above can be put into two categories, conditioning and determining. While conditioning factors provide physical conditions, power foundation and parameters, and the historical, philosophical and ideological sources of Chinese foreign policy, determining factors directly set the direction and specific objectives of Chinese foreign policy and the ways in which the nation’s foreign policy objectives are pursued and achieved. According to these criteria of classification, under the conditioning factors are the nation’s geographical and geopolitical environment, the country’s power (physical, economic and military), China’s philosophical traditions, long historical experience and communist ideology of the state, while the determining factors include the national/core interests as identified by the Chinese communist state and the personality traits and leadership styles of individual communist leaders.

Moreover, given their complexity, these factors that influence and shape Chinese foreign policy can hardly be analyzed fully by a single theoretical approach. Rather, all these factors as the concepts of study appropriately fall into two major theoretical approaches, namel...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Endorsements Page
• Half Title Page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication Page
• Brief Contents
• Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Abbreviations
• Preface
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Constructing an analytical framework for explaining 
Chinese foreign policy
• 3 Chinese foreign policy making
• 4 The evolution of Chinese foreign policy since 1949
• 5 Chinese national security strategy
• 6 Chinese international security policy
• 7 Chinese foreign economic policy
• 8 Chinese multilateralism policy
• 9 Conclusion
• References
• Index