Soft Power and Great-Power Competition

The Cold WarCold War, The" is over, and Americans are trying to understand their place in a world without a defining Soviet threat.

Some skeptics object to the idea of soft powerSoft power because they think of power narrowly in terms of commands or active control.

“The concept of ‘smart powerSmart power’—the intelligent integration and networking of diplomacy, defense, development, and other tools of so-called ‘hard and soft’ power—is at the very heart of President ObamaObama, Barack and Secretary Clinton’s policy vision.”

There are two big power shifts going on in the twenty-first century.

I coined the term “soft powerSoft power” in my 1990 book Bound to Lead that challenged the then conventional view of the decline of American power.

Many Americans say they want a moral foreign policyForeign policy, but disagree on what that means.

Anti-Americanism has increased in the past few years. Thomas PickeringPickering, Thomas, a seasoned diplomat, considered 2003 “as high a zenith of anti-Americanism as we’ve seen for a long time.

In her confirmation hearings, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary ClintonClinton, Hillary said, “AmericaAmerica cannot solve the most pressing problems on our own, and the world cannot solve them without AmericaAmerica…We must use what has been called ‘smart powerSmart power,’ the full range of tools at our disposal.”

President Barack ObamaObama, Barack stated that some of America’sAmerica most costly mistakes since World War IIWorld War II were the result not of restraint, but of a “willingness to rush into military adventures without thinking through the consequences.”

US President Donald Trump’sTrump, Donald administration has shown little interest in public diplomacy.

US President Donald Trump’sTrump, Donald behavior at the recent G7 meeting in BiarritzBiarritz was criticized as careless and disruptive by many observers.

Friends and allies have come to distrust the United StatesUnited States (US), The.

Many analysts argue that the liberal international order ended with the rise of ChinaChina and the election of USUnited States (US), The President Donald TrumpTrump, Donald.

Ever since Thucydides’sThucydides explanation of the Peloponnesian warPeloponnesian War, historians have known that the rise of a new power has been attended by uncertainty and anxieties.

The United StatesUnited States (US), The was noticeably absent from the guest list when countries from AustraliaAustralia to IndiaIndia gathered recently in MalaysiaMalaysia for the first East Asian SummitEast Asian Summit.

Broadly defined, power is the ability to affect others to obtain the outcomes one wants. One can affect other individuals’ behavior in three main ways: by threatening coercion (“sticks”), by offering inducements or payments (“carrots”), and by making others want what one wants. A country may obtain the outcomes it wants in world politics because other countries want to follow it. They may display this desire by admiring the country’s values, emulating its example, or aspiring to its level of prosperity and openness. In this sense, it is not only important in world politics to force other countries to change by the threat or use of military or economic weapons, but also to set the agenda and attract others. This “soft powerSoft power”—getting other countries to want the outcomes that a particular country wants—coopts people rather than coerces them. In the debate about the rise of Chinese power and how it will affect the United StatesUnited States (US), The and global stability, one question that has received increasing attention in both countries is precisely that of China’sChina soft powerSoft power. After more fully exploring soft powerSoft power itself, this article explores the various aspects of this kind of power when applied to the Chinese context. To conclude, it considers how ChinaChina can best use its soft powerSoft power to be beneficial to the international community.

Last month, Chinese President Xi JinpingXi Jinping presided over a heavily orchestrated “Belt and Road” forum in BeijingBeijing. The two-day event attracted 29 heads of state, including Russia’sRussia Vladimir PutinPutin, Vladimir, and 1200 delegates from over 100 countries. Xi called China’sChina Belt and Road InitiativeBelt and Road Initiative (BRI), The (BRI) the “project of the century.” The 65 countries involved comprise two-thirds of the world’s land mass and include some four and a half billion people.

ChinaChina has invested billions of dollars to increase its soft powerSoft power, but it has recently suffered a backlash in democratic countries. A new report by the National Endowment for DemocracyNational Endowment for Democracy, The argues that we need to rethink soft power, because “the conceptual vocabulary that has been used since the Cold War’sCold War, The end no longer seems adequate to the contemporary situation.”

When the Munich Security ConferenceMunich Security Conference, The met in February 2020, ChinaChina was the most frequently mentioned country, while there was an exaggerated mood of Western decline. Yet as the recent COVID-19 pandemicCOVID-19 pandemic, The has shown, ChinaChina has both strengths and weaknesses. Its initial censorship, suppression of feedback, and curtailment of international information allowed the pandemic to develop and fester. Draconian quarantine of WuhanWuhan curtailed its spread somewhat; followed by a government propaganda campaign to attract others to the theme that China’s behavior had been benign. When the pandemic eventually subsides, however, China will be faced with the political and economic costs resulting from the exposure of both a failed public health system and an overly rigid party control system.

In February 1995, the US Department of DefenseUS Department of Defense, The published United States Security Strategy for the East Asia–Pacific RegionUnited States Strategy for the East Asia-Pacific Region, sometimes referred to as the “Nye Report.” It was broadly welcomed in most capitals in the region, though some critics portrayed it as “ossified” traditionalism. Friends have sometimes remarked on the irony that someone so closely associated with the concept of transnational interdependence should have helped produce a report that rested heavily on Realist thinking. I reply that in my textbook Understanding International ConflictsUnderstanding International Conflicts, I tell students that RealismRealism and LiberalismLiberalism each have something to teach policymakers, depending on the circumstances. And in 1995, American strategy toward East AsiaEast Asia needed a healthy dose of RealismRealism.

For several years, American officials have pressed ChinaChina to revalue its currency. They complain that the undervalued renminbi represents unfair competition, destroying American jobs, and contributing to the United StatesUnited States (US), The’ trade deficit. How, then, should US officials respond?

The twenty-first century is witnessing Asia’sAsia return to what might be considered its historical proportions of the world’s population and economy. In 1800, AsiaAsia represented more than half of global population and output. By 1900, it represented only 20% of world output—not because something bad happened in AsiaAsia, but rather because the Industrial RevolutionIndustrial Revolution, The had transformed EuropeEurope and North AmericaNorth America into the world’s workshop.

The decline of AmericaAmerica and the ascendancy of ChinaChina has become a popular theme, and nothing seemed to provide a clearer marker to those disposed to the idea than the financial crisisFinancial crisis of 2008, The of 2008 and the great recession that followed. AmericaAmerica, larded with personal debt, saw the jewel in its empire, Wall StreetWall Street, stumble and fall, while China, its great factories spewing exports across the PacificPacific, The, became America’sAmerica lender, holding more than $2.5 trillion of foreign exchange reserves, much of it in U.S. bonds.

Citing an escalating dispute over islands in the East China SeaEast China Sea, The, The EconomistEconomist, The warned last week that “China and JapanJapan are sliding toward war.” That assessment may be too alarmist, but the tensions have bolstered the efforts of some American analysts who have urged a policy to “contain” ChinaChina.

When Xi JinpingXi Jinping visits the U.S. this autumn, one of the items on his agenda is bound to be what he has called a “new type of major power relations.” The term remains ambiguous, and some Americans fear that it is a device for disrupting American alliances. Chinese scholars reply that it is a genuine effort to avoid the dangerous dynamics between a rising and an established power that helped precipitate the Peloponnesian WarPeloponnesian War and World War IWorld War I.

As US President-elect Donald TrumpTrump, Donald prepares his administration’s policy toward ChinaChina, he should be wary of two major traps that history has set for him. The “Thucydides TrapThucydides trap,” cited by Chinese President Xi JinpingXi Jinping, refers to the warning by the ancient Greek historian that cataclysmic war can erupt if an established power (like the United StatesUnited States (US), The) becomes too fearful of a rising power (like ChinaChina). But Trump also has to worry about the “Kindleberger TrapKindleberger Trap”: a China that seems too weak rather than too strong.

On a visit to BeijingBeijing in October, I was often asked whether US Vice President Mike Pence’sPence, Mike recent harsh criticism of China marked the declaration of a new Cold War. I replied that the United StatesUnited States (US), The and ChinaChina have entered a new phase in their relationship, but that the Cold WarCold War, The metaphor is misleading.

The 90-day “truce of Bueno AiresBueno Aires” buys time for negotiations during the USUnited States (US), The-ChinaChina trade war, but President Trump’s subsequent proclamation that he was “Tariff Man” and the ambiguities about what was agreed at the Trump-Xi dinnerTrump-Xi dinner, The left markets shaken. An increase in China’s purchase of soybeans or natural gas might alleviate some political aspects of America’sAmerica bilateral trade deficit, but it would do little to address the real problems of the China-US relationship. That will depend on the coming negotiations over the technological and intellectual property aspects of trade that will be led on the American side by Special Trade Representative Robert LighthizerLighthizer, Robert.

With the coronavirus outbreak, nature has reminded us how much the USUnited States (US), The and ChinaChina are economically entangled. But politics is also involved as some in WashingtonWashington form strategies for a second Cold War and economic decoupling.

American relations with ChinaChina are at their lowest point in 50 years. Some say Donald TrumpTrump, Donald has bequeathed Joe BidenBiden, Joe a new Cold War, which they define as intense competition without shooting. But it is not yet a Cold War, and Mr. Trump is not the sole source of the problem.

In his recent address to the US CongressUS Congress, The, President Joe BidenBiden, Joe warned that ChinaChina is deadly serious about trying to become the world’s most significant power. But Biden also declared that autocrats will not win the future; AmericaAmerica will. If mishandled, the US-China great-power competition could be dangerous. But if the United StatesUnited States (US), The plays it right, the rivalry with China could be healthy.