Assessing China's approach to regional multilateral security cooperation

Abstract

This article analyses factors that cause China to have different approaches to different regional multilateral security institutions. Current research not only has little to say about China's motivation to participate, but also little regarding the level of its participation in or support for regional security institutions. To explain why China's post-cold war participation in regional multilateral security institutions varies, this article argues that threat levels help explain China's conditions for participating in multilateral security institutions, and security interests help explain China's behaviour as a member of such institutions. The author stresses that these are useful variables that can explain China's behaviour with respect to regional multilateral security institutions. In the foreseeable future, China's general posture toward regional multilateral security cooperation will be passive participation and strong support. Australia should not only consider strategies which emphasise strengthened bilateral relationships between Canberra and Beijing, but also continue to positively support regional multilateral security institutions.

Notes

1. The author would like to thank Professor Yan Xuetong and the anonymous referees for their valuable comments and encouragement. This is a revised and developed version of the author's dissertation, entitled ‘China's Regional Multilateral Security Cooperation after the Cold War’ (in Chinese), at Tsinghua University, China. This work was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea Grant funded by the Korean Government (MEST) (No.NRF-2008-411-J00602).

2. Because the Renmin Ribao is controlled by the Communist Party, its pages are helpful in understanding the thinking of the Chinese leadership. All the contents of the Renmin Ribao reports on the ‘China threat’ object to the term. Accordingly, the degree to which Chinese leaders are paying attention to Western reports on the ‘China threat’ can be determined based on the frequency of the appearance of the term. However, since the late 1990s, China's understanding of the term has changed, as some scholars argue. According to Shi (2003: 37), China believes that the existence of the ‘China threat’ is inevitable and cannot be eliminated in the short term.

3. Zhu (2004b: 2–3) believes that this actually publicly demonstrated China's view toward North Korea's withdrawal from the NPT, and that it was the first time that the words ‘cannot’ and ‘unable’ were used by Chinese leaders. This is extremely rare.

4. According to Guo (2004: 10), after North Korea tested a missile in March 2003, China abruptly suspended North Korea's gas supplies due to ‘technical reasons’. This hinted to the North that China would not allow it to continue to escalate the crisis and that China's motions would not be restrained by the fact that the North was a buffer state. Scobell (2003: 278) believes that the pipeline was indeed shut down for ‘technical reasons’ and China decided its best interests would be served by allowing both North Korea and the USA to believe that this was an act of intentional pressure.

5. On 7 December 2005, the Tsinghua University Institute for International Studies and the Global Times co-hosted a Global Forum on the East Asia Summit and East Asian Regional Cooperation. One Chinese scholar in the forum some experts said raised this type of argument and received overwhelming approval from other experts. Additionally, the Chinese government and scholars’ viewpoints of the East Asia Summit are unified.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Taek Goo Kang

Taek Goo Kang is a research professor at Inha University, Korea. He completed a PhD at the Institute of International Studies, Tsinghua University, China. His research interests include China's foreign policy and international relations in East Asia