Contradictions in Chinese Foreign Policy
This thesis argues that Chinese foreign policy has two distinct and contradictory tracks of behaviour. One, a "peaceful development track", reflects China's desire to promote a peaceful international environment and project a view of China as a benign, constructive, and non-hegemonic rising power. China demonstrates this peaceful development track in its cooperative and constructive engagement with the international community, within established, global political and trade frameworks, and in resolving disputes peacefully. The other track, the "assertive self-interest track", is characterised by China's aggressive pursuit of raw self-interest, using its asymmetry of power to pressure others to accede to its will, and eschewing options of compromise, conciliation, or cooperation with other stakeholders. China's "assertive self-interest track" engenders suspicion about China's true intentions in light of its political, military, and economic rise. While these two tracks of Chinese foreign policy behaviour are contradictory they are also complementary as they have the same driver: to achieve the Chinese Government's primary goal of regime survival. For the Chinese Government, as for many governments around the world, regime survival is dependent upon economic growth which requires resource security to fuel that growth. The peaceful development track assists this goal by projecting an image of China as a peacefully rising power to prevent other countries taking action that would constrain China's rise. Through the peaceful development track of foreign policy, China also aims to promote an environment of peace and stability necessary for China's continued economic development. Concurrently, the assertive self-interest track assists China in achieving the resource security needed to fuel its economic development and thus to achieve its primary goal of regime survival. This thesis highlights the contradictory nature of Chinese foreign policy using three case studies, all with China's pursuit of resource security as the ...