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China: A Rising Power
January 21, 2011
China’s success story is led by a remarkable policy breakthrough in its quest to become a global power. Keeping in view the new dimensions, Chinese security strategy is based on protecting its ultimate national interests and this is an area which China has cleverly developed and where it has employed its national resources politically, economically and militarily to build up its power. China’s increasing power potential has led to the surfacing of a China threat theory, and only time will tell if the theory proves to be right or otherwise. To date, China has managed to resolve its borders issues with all its neighbours and successfully restored trust within the region including Russia, the Central Asian region countries, the South East Asian countries and rapidly improving relation with Japan as well as India. Therefore, the more the world and China invest for peace and stability, the more the whole global community will benefit from this fruits of peace. China’s power potential should be respected and engaging China will be better for the world and will promote a non-hostile environment. A powerful China will give a new balance to the power in the region and the world as a whole.
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In the early 1800s, Napoleon warned that “when it (China) awakes, the world will shake." China has awoken and during the past 25 years, the world has witnessed a profound transformation in its position on the world stage. China’s existence is difficult to ignore with its 1.3 billion people which accounts for a fifth of the world's population. By any standard, China’s potential power is enormous.
China has a total land area of 9.6 million square kilometres. It is the third largest country in the world after Russia and Canada. China is bordered by fifteen countries, and across the seas to the east and southeast, there are a further seven countries. These neighbours include Russia, India and Japan.
China’s economic progress has meant that it is now currently amongst world's top trading nations with a trade volume at USD 1.15 Trillion. China’s current GDP, at 9.1% of world output (at purchasing power parity), is second only to the US and China is now also the world's fastest developing economy, having grown at an average of almost 9.5% annually with a trade volume which reached USD 2.5 trillion in 2010. China could surpass the US as the world’s largest economy around the year 2040.
China’s ability to sustain its rate of economic growth in the future will largely depend on its capacity to ensure continued energy supplies for its ever growing needs. It is here that China’s fundamental interests lie. Effort to ensure continued economic prosperity that will directly affect its national interests and security as dependence on foreign oil can bring with it foreign economic and political pressures that can threaten national security. Because of this, China will have to continue to develop its comprehensive national power and these actions must be seen to be a ‘peaceful rise’ if rapid and sustained economic growth is to be maintained.
China’s Peaceful Rise:
Exaggerating the threat China poses will not be productive and could lead to a much more difficult world environment. As a Permanent Member in the UN Security Council, China will continue to play a prominent role. This alone has helped to place China in a central role where it exerts influence in shaping the global environment. This was especially notable with regard to China's reaction to US policies in the post-Cold War with regard to the Iraq war and the Iranian nuclear issue. It is important to understand the future role of China’s military, economic power and developing political philosophy that is to “uphold the principle of coordinated development of national defence and the economy and push forward the modernisation of national defence and the army on the basis of economic growth” by 2020.
Chinese Grand Strategy
Deng Xiaoping in 1978 initiated China’s ‘national development strategy’ based on an assumption that economic power is the most important and most essential factor in achieving comprehensive national power and where peace and development are the primary international trends to avoid world conflict. In this context, China still today, places top priority on efforts to promote rapid and sustained economic growth, to raise technological levels in its industry, to explore and develop land and sea-based national resources, and to secure China’s access to global resources. China’s quest is for a comprehensive national strength based on its large population, resources, economic power, technology, military revolutions, culture, education and diplomacy in order to achieve a balance of power internally, and externally with the world powers.
In order to comprehensively develop national power it will be crucial for China to focus on the need to maintain conditions of national unity and internal stability as its long-term national goals. Although this development strategy assumes that economic power is the most important factor in comprehensive national power, China’s strategy also prioritises the development of military power as a secondary, complementary strand to its reform policies in order to ensure that China’s economic power will increase, to protect national interests and to eventually support China’s global role policy. This role includes the growing trade and investment ties it is developing to achieve its political ends, which include continuing its policy of isolating Taiwan.
China’s quest for enhanced national strength and a more comprehensive international role is increasingly becoming recognised around the world. China is very much ready to take a wider global role in the future. As a Permanent Member of the UN Security Council, China should be encouraged to play a bigger role so as to consolidate its position as a global power. Economic power is becoming China’s main national grand and development strategy. This emphasises China’s ‘peaceful rise’ as its top priority is to promote rapid and sustained economic growth. China’s strategy also concentrates on modernising its military forces in order to ensure its economic prosperity and to protect its wider national interests both internally and internationally, including its ‘One China’ policy aimed at reunification with Taiwan. However, China's leadership have deliberately adopted a policy of good-neighbourliness under the concept of the ‘peaceful rise’.
China’s success story is led by a remarkable policy breakthrough in its quest to become a global power. Keeping in view the new dimensions, Chinese security strategy is based on protecting its ultimate national interests and this is an area which China has cleverly developed and where it has employed its national resources politically, economically and militarily to build up its power. China’s increasing power potential has led to the surfacing of a China threat theory, and only time will tell if the theory proves to be right or otherwise. To date, China has managed to resolve its borders issues with all its neighbours and successfully restored trust within the region including Russia, the Central Asian region countries, the South East Asian countries and rapidly improving relation with Japan as well as India. Therefore, the more the world and China invest for peace and stability, the more the whole global community will benefit from this fruits of peace. China’s power potential should be respected and engaging China will be better for the world and will promote a non-hostile environment. A powerful China will give a new balance to the power in the region and the world as a whole.
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