Organizer: Phillip Saunders, Princeton University
Chair: Samuel S. Kim, Columbia University
Discussant: Thomas J. Christensen, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
By almost any measure, China’s opening to the world economy has been a spectacular success. Foreign trade, investment, and technology have played a vital role in fueling the rapid economic growth that has not only helped maintain social stability, but also begun to transform China’s international position. Yet globalization and interdependence have also made China more vulnerable to fluctuations in the world economy (such as the Asian economic crisis) and to the use of economic leverage by its trading partners. As China’s economic and strategic weight grows, the principles of sovereignty, independence, and narrow self-interest that have governed post-Mao Chinese foreign policy increasingly clash with the reality of interdependence and new threats to national security that China cannot manage on its own.
This panel examines how Chinese foreign policy is adjusting to the challenges of globalization and interdependence. The papers address four major areas: China’s involvement in the world economy, relations with the United States, energy security, and nuclear and missile proliferation. In each area, the economic and strategic basis of China’s relationships with other international actors has shifted significantly in recent years. These changes have prompted China to adapt its foreign policy, to redefine its national interests, and to reexamine the principles that govern international relations. By examining how Chinese foreign policy in these areas has evolved in response to changes in economic and strategic conditions, the papers seek to illuminate Chinese thinking about the tensions between its self-interested foreign policy principles and its integration into an increasingly interdependent world.
Learning on the Job: China in a Regionalizing/ Globalizing World Economy
Thomas G. Moore, University of Cincinnati
This paper addresses a fundamental question: What is the impact of China’s growing participation in the world economy on Chinese attitudes towards interdependence and on Chinese foreign policy? Specifically, the paper will use two cases—China’s participation in APEC and its response to the Asian financial crisis—as a lens for examining how deepening economic interdependence (EI) is affecting Chinese views of world politics.
These case studies will be used to develop several related lines of inquiry. First, how does China perceive recent changes in the regional and global economy? What does China perceive to be the major constraints of EI? In what ways does it accept these constraints? How does it seek to resist these constraints? Here, the main objective is to identify the self-perceptions and world views that underlie elite understandings of the contemporary world economy. In China, as in all countries, there is an ongoing debate about whether economic interdependence heightens or ameliorates prospects for international conflict. One goal is to identify the regional/institutional fault lines which characterize this debate.
Another line of inquiry focuses on the strategic concerns raised by deepening EI. How has EI changed Chinese calculations about U.S. or Japanese behavior? Here, the paper will examine the impact of APEC and the Asian financial crisis on Beijing’s foreign policy preferences and strategies. For data, the paper will rely on three main sources: summer/fall 1998 interviews in China (Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Hong Kong), official government statements, and leading Chinese journals on international affairs.
Supping with a Long Spoon: Dependence and Interdependence in Sino-U.S. Relations
Phillip Saunders, Princeton University
Participation in the world economy offers China a means of increasing national power and fulfilling long-standing ambitions to wield greater international influence. Yet economic interdependence also implies increased vulnerability to foreign pressures. This dilemma is most acute in China’s relations with the United States, which dominates the current international system and is best positioned to either facilitate or obstruct China’s emergence as a great power. Chinese leaders have accused the U.S. of pursuing a strategy of "peaceful evolution" and denounced U.S. attempts to use economic leverage to force China to improve human rights conditions. Nevertheless, economic relations have continued to deepen and China’s dependence on the U.S. economy has continued to increase.
This paper explores the tension between Chinese fears of U.S. dominance and willingness to tolerate a high degree of interdependence. Since the 1995–1996 "missile tests" in the Taiwan straits, both the United States and China have sought to stabilize bilateral relations and are now working towards a "constructive strategic partnership." By examining the Chinese debate over policy towards the United States, the paper seeks to illuminate Chinese attitudes towards interdependence and international relations. Does the change in policy towards the United States reflect a new acceptance of interdependence, or merely the conclusion that China has few good alternatives to a constructive relationship with the United States? The paper will draw upon interviews with Chinese and American officials and analysts, official government statements, and Chinese journals on international affairs.
China’s Thirst for Oil: Energy Security and Interdependence
Erica Strecker Downs, Princeton University
One by-product of China’s rapid economic growth has been a dramatic increase in demand for energy. Over the last decade, China has shifted from a net exporter to a net importer of oil, with imports projected to supply about 70% of Chinese demand by 2020. China will also begin importing natural gas around 2005. China’s increasing dependence on foreign sources of oil and, eventually, gas presents a fundamental challenge to the Chinese government’s previous emphasis on self-reliance and resource sovereignty as the guiding principles for the development of the energy sector. Given China’s past use of oil exports as a source of political influence, it is not surprising that China’s leaders are worried about energy security. China’s recent emergence as an active player in the international oil market reflects these concerns.
Chinese analysts and political leaders have just begun to debate the strategic implications of foreign energy dependence. How China manages the trade-off between the efficiency of international markets and the security provided by more expensive direct control of energy supplies will be an important indicator of Chinese attitudes towards globalization and interdependence. China’s strategy for achieving a stable, sufficient, and reasonably priced supply of oil will be shaped by a variety of actors, including the central government, state-owned oil companies, the military, local governments, and factories producing for the export market. This paper will use Chinese writings and interviews with oil consultants to examine Chinese attitudes toward energy security and the international implications of China’s increasing reliance on energy imports.
China’s Changing Attitude Toward International Non-Proliferation Regimes
Roger Cliff, RAND Corporation
When the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) was first signed in 1968, China condemned the treaty on the grounds that it discriminated against developing nations. In 1982, China officially declared support for the norm of nuclear non-proliferation, but secretly aided Pakistan’s nuclear program throughout the 1980s. China is also believed to have maintained biological and chemical weapons programs during this period.
Since 1992, however, a fundamental change has occurred in China’s attitude toward international regimes aimed at controlling the spread of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). China has joined a number of non-proliferation regimes including the NPT, the Chemical Weapons Convention, and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. China also reached a bilateral agreement with the United States to abide by Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR) guidelines, although it has not yet formally joined the MTCR. Despite continuing concerns about possible Chinese violations, in general China appears to be committed to abiding by its international non-proliferation agreements.
This paper will evaluate the evidence regarding China’s commitment to non-proliferation regimes and examine the reasons for the apparent change in China’s attitude. It will focus on Chinese conceptions of national sovereignty, efforts to rejoin the international community in the wake of Tiananmen, and growing recognition of the dangers that the spread of WMD pose to China itself. Analysis will be based on China’s empirical behavior, Chinese writings on non-proliferation, and interviews with Chinese researchers.