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Because of its scope, the plan has been met with the sort of scepticism initially raised by Pudong, Shanghai’s new zone of the 1990s. But, just as Pudong succeeded where some expected it to fail, this project may too: China’s deep pockets and its infrastructure firms’ experience have the potential to make the vision real, barring unforeseen geopolitical obstacles.
This special issue of China Analysis concerns the geopolitical underpinning of China’s new outward-looking economic policy. It documents, through examining the writing of some of China’s best-known international relations specialists, the shift in foreign policy that has caused Xi Jinping’s government to prioritise China’s neighbourhood again. The authors here represent a broad (although not complete) spectrum of opinion from within Beijing’s expert community (from which Zheng Yongnian, a scholar from the People’s Republic of China who lives in Singapore, should perhaps be excepted). Wang Jisi, the dean of the School of International Studies at Peking University, is usually considered to be a realist with liberal tendencies; he has been more outspoken than most on the deficiencies of China’s soft power. Yan Xuetong, the leading international relations scholar at Tsinghua University, can be described as an assertive realist: he has, for example, advocated for China adopting alliance policies rather than continuing its policy of non-intervention. Jin Canrong, like Wang Jisi originally a scholar of China’s relations with the United States, is based at Renmin University. He is a versatile analyst who tends to focus on China’s own initiatives. What is most striking about their opinions is their general agreement on several central tenets, often linked to Xi Jinping’s speech at the Central Foreign Affairs Work Conference held in Beijing in November 2014.
Our sources point to several new policy principles that China should adopt. China is right to recognise that diplomatic efforts must be made within the neighbourhood and should make this its first priority. It has to accept that Japan is a US ally and therefore unlikely to be won over. Thus, Japan will remain the object of long-term competition. China also needs to focus on its economic leverage and try to deploy a “win-win” strategy rather than trying to utilise hard power or soft power – a priority which echoes Xi Jinping’s call for the country’s neighbours to “free-ride” on China’s economic development.
Access and download the full ECFR special issue at: http://www.ecfr.eu/page/-/ChinaAnalysisEng_Special_issue_1503_Final_v3_%282%29.pdf