10. Access, Assurance and Acceptance

Other arguments focus on the nature of Communist regime as the fount of aggressive intentions towards the Western based international system but these have been left out of the analysis to focus solely on IR structural analyses pertaining to Chinese foreign actions and intentions. Examples of these arguments include Gertz (2000). The China Threat: How the People’s Republic Targets America. Washington: Regnery Publishing; Menges (2005). China: The Gathering Threat. Nashville: Nelson Current; Moshar (2001). Hegemon: China’s Plan to Dominate Asia and the World. New York: Encounter Books; Timperlake and William (1999). Red Dragon Rising: Communist China’s Military Threat to America. Washington: Regnery Publishing.

The assertive China narrative suffers from serious theoretical and methodological flaws which not only question its legitimacy as an accurate description, let alone explanation, of this supposed decisive shift but also unpacks the possibilities that China studies are once again increasingly becoming overtly politicized (Matsuda 2014). First, there are very few sources which define the term assertive, simply using it interchangeable with a host of other terms such as abrasive, obstructionist and revisionist which confuses their distinct definitions and applications in international relations and foreign policy analyses. Second, there is no definitional criteria to determine when China is or is not acting ‘assertive’, thus complicating attempts to justify the timelines usually employed signalling the assertive turn (usually sometime between 2008 and 2010). As a result, therefore, there is a selective mining of the historical and contemporary record to demonstrate that post 2008 there has been a more assertive China vice a less assertive one before; this necessitates, unfortunately, the omissions of both instances of previous ‘assertive’ behaviour on the part of Beijing and also issues and areas of co-operation and collaboration (Johnston 2013). Domestic forces, while a welcomed addition to China studies conducted by IR scholars who usually neglect these to favour structural factors, have simply not been studied extensively to decisively explain how and to what degree they influence Chinese decision-making (Johnston 2011; Chubb 2013). Questioning of the assertive narrative does not, as a logical extension, assume China is a completely benign agent which is continuously being misunderstood by the international community. Instead, the argument has not been made that there exists a distinct and holistic transformation of Chinese foreign policy in the last half-decade.

For perhaps the most succinct definition see, Morgenthau (1967). Politics Among Nations, 4th Ed. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. pp. 36–37. While originating from his realist theory of international politics, his definition of status-quo/imperialism (which can be substituted for revisionism) has been broadly accepted by many in the debate from varying theoretical backgrounds. Robert Gilpin offers the most detailed criteria for determining whether a state is status-quo or revisionist, moving beyond changes to the balance of power to include also an explicit wish to alter the ‘rules of the game’. Gilpin, however, like many neo-realist and power transition scholars, interprets all rising powers as inevitably revisionist as they wish to further alter the international system to accommodate and solidify their augmenting power and influence in a system defined by mistrust and uncertainty between states. See Gilpin (1983), War and Change in World Politics.

This is most evident in Mearsheimer’s (2014) revised edition of The Tragedy of Great Power Politics. The author admits that most of the books are virtually unchanged from its 2001 publication, except for an extensive chapter focused on applying offensive realism’s predictions to the rise of China. He concludes that China cannot rise peacefully and will increasingly come to challenge the US as a regional hegemon due to the structural factors outlined in offensive realism.

Even the decision to use the term ‘peaceful development’, chosen over the phrase ‘peaceful rise’, debated within the upper echelon in the Party from 2003 to 2005 in a pursuit of finding the best one to reflect their non-aggressive intentions is indicative of the sensitive and important nature that status and image have in Beijing’s foreign policy. Lampton (2008), The Three Faces of Chinese Power: Might, Money and Minds. Los Angeles: University of California Press.

See “China’s Peaceful Development Road”, Part IV-Seeking Mutual Benefit and Common Development with Other Countries.

“China Defense 2008”—The Security Situation. The increasingly regularity, about every 2 years, of releasing Defence White Papers outlining China’s military modernization plans and strategic interests is another manoeuvre to reduce levels of uncertainty of China’s use of the military in their development.

Peacekeeping Operations are in fact seen as an important facet of China’s defense strategy, see “China Defense 2008”—Section XII: International Security Cooperation; “Chinese naval fleet sails into Gulf of Aden”, China Daily, 6 January 2009. Such missions, as well, have practically training value for China’s military and allows further interaction with other militaries.

See “China’s Position on Establishing a New International Political and Economic Order”, The Foreign Ministry of the People’s Republic of China, 18 August 2003.

On all three aspects, however, Russia’s placement is hazy.