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Regime Realism and Chinese Grand Strategy

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Regime Realism and Chinese Grand Strategy Regime Realism and Chinese Grand Strategy By Hal Brands November 2020 Key Points • The US-China contest is a clash of systems as much as a clash of interests. China is chal- lenging American influence and America’s conception of what values an international order should embody. • China’s behavior is difficult to understand solely, or even primarily, through a “realist” lens. A paradigm of regime realism—one that combines an understanding of power and anarchy with an appreciation of ideology and the nature of a country’s government— offers greater insight. • The US-China contest is one for the long haul, even though its intensity will wax and wane over time. The United States cannot cease being a threat to the Chinese Communist Party without ceasing to be what it is—a democracy concerned with the fate of freedom around the world. And China cannot cease being hostile to the US-led international order without ceasing to be what it is—an autocratic regime whose strength masks pervasive insecurity. Theories of international relations—and explana- century, Washington pursued a China policy meant tions of state behavior—rise and fall with the geo- to overcome the grimmest predictions of realism political tide. What we now call “realism” emerged by drawing China into the thriving, liberal world during and after World War II. The events of the order made possible by the Cold War’s end. That 1930s and 1940s had shown that the world was the opposite seems to have happened—that China rough and lawless and created an opening for an used the prosperity and influence gained through intellectual paradigm that emphasized the primacy economic integration to underwrite a policy of of power and the ruthlessness of geopolitics. The neo-totalitarianism at home and assertive expan- end of the Cold War, by contrast, dealt a sharp blow sion abroad—has upset more than the balance of to realism, by seeming to shatter its core premise. power. China would seem to be the country realists How, in a world ruled by power and self-interest, have been waiting for, one whose ambition and could a country as mighty as the Soviet Union penchant for geopolitical disruption rise inexorably simply acquiesce in its own decline and destruction? along with its power. The rise of China and the emergence of a sharp Thus, the administration of Donald Trump Sino-American competition are causing another described its National Security Strategy as a strategy swing of the intellectual pendulum. For a quarter of “principled realism”—a recognition that rivalry AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE 1 is inevitable because states are driven to compete such as Hong Kong and Taiwan, back into the fold. by elemental antagonisms.1 Thucydides, considered A third goal includes reestablishing a sphere of the ancient founder of realism, is often invoked to semi-exclusive interest in China’s geopolitical explain how China’s rise has led inevitably to Sino- neighborhood, in which smaller countries defer to American hostility.2 Noted academic realists, some Beijing’s wishes and outside actors—namely, of whom accurately predicted that breathtaking America—are powerless to interfere. Finally, China Chinese growth would lead to trouble, have taken is seeking global influence as a means of weakening intellectual victory laps.3 If the post–Cold War era the US-led liberal order and, perhaps, constructing saw realism in eclipse, the era of great-power rivalry a Chinese-led order in its place. has seen realism’s revenge. That paradigm is increas- That China is pursuing this grand strategy rep- ingly the lens through which Chinese grand strategy resents a defeat of sorts for the strategy America and the Sino-America competition are interpreted. pursued after the Cold War. For a quarter century beginning in the 1990s, American policymakers sought to prevent exactly what has arisen today— a fierce competition for global leadership with an The United States doesn’t need a aggressive, authoritarian China—by drawing Beijing strategy of regime change vis-à-vis into the open, prosperous world taking shape around it. To be sure, they discouraged China from China. But it does need a sense of challenging the existing balance of power in the regime realism to understand the Asia-Pacific, by maintaining formidable military behavior of a potent rival. deployments and alliances in the region. But they also sought to make China a supporter of the US-led international order, by showing that membership The reality is not so simple. China’s unapologetic therein was the path to prosperity and influence. assertiveness and vaulting ambitions are, of course, More subversively, they hoped that economic inte- intimately related to the massive power shift under- gration would turn out to be a poisoned carrot—that way. The more brutish aspects of Chinese strategy as the Chinese economy grew and a middle class recall realist tenets going back to the dialogue at emerged, the pressure to liberalize politically would Melos. Yet the reason the Chinese challenge is so become irresistible. In retrospect, however, Chinese stark is that China blends the claims of a rising power leaders proved remarkably adept at exploiting the with the insecurities of an illiberal autocracy. The benefits of economic integration while limiting its nature of the regime, as much as the nature of the dangers and evading its shackles. international system, drives Beijing’s conduct. China used its entry into the global market to This dynamic, in turn, will make the competition power historic growth. Yet it simultaneously clamped between America and China more fundamental down on dissent to ensure that economic change and more protracted than it would be if it were did not open the door to political change, and it “merely” driven by realpolitik. The United States used unprecedented prosperity to buy a degree of doesn’t need a strategy of regime change vis-à-vis domestic legitimacy. As a result, China was able to China. But it does need a sense of regime realism to develop “comprehensive national power” without understand the behavior of a potent rival. making major political concessions. Rather than supporting the US-led international order, Beijing What China Wants used its surging power to blunt that order’s reach and begin challenging it in increasingly ambitious Today, China is pursuing a concentric circles grand ways—through a determined military buildup; a strategy, organized around four major ambitions. drive to build new international organizations and At the core is the eternal goal of the Chinese Com- capture the agendas of existing ones; an effort to munist Party (CCP)—preserving and strengthening seize the technological high ground of the 21st- the party’s power. A second goal is restoring national century economy; a multi-continent project to unity, by bringing wayward regions and provinces, spread Chinese economic, diplomatic, and perhaps AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE 2 military influence far and wide; and other initiatives. realists believe, as the scholar Robert Gilpin wrote, Whereas 15 years ago China’s leaders assiduously that the “most important factor” in international disclaimed any intent to disrupt the international affairs is the “dynamics of power relations over status quo, now they have become far less embarrassed time.”9 Put simply, rising states inevitably want to about advertising Beijing’s ambitions.4 reshape the international system to their benefit— Xi Jinping has said that China seeks “Asia for to gain more wealth, prestige, and territory—and Asians” and intends to build “a future where we will this produces conflict with established powers. As win the initiative and have the dominant position.”5 Nicholas Spykman, the great realist scholar of the The “community of common destiny” he describes, mid-20th century, wrote, “The number of cases in writes Liza Tobin, would entail vast changes in which a strong dynamic state has stopped expanding how the world works. or has set modest limits to its power aims has been very few indeed.”10 A global network of partnerships centered In fact, realists would have no trouble explaining on China would replace the U.S. system of many aspects of Chinese behavior. Realists would treaty alliances, the international commu- nity would regard Beijing’s authoritarian point out that China is hardly the only country in governance model as a superior alternative history to seek to translate growing power into a to Western electoral democracy, and the geographic sphere of influence and a global system world would credit the Communist Party defined on its terms; that is just what the United of China for developing a new path to States did during the 19th and 20th centuries. They peace, prosperity, and modernity that would note that surging economic powers, from other countries can follow.6 Athens to Imperial Germany, frequently turn money into military might. Other scholars have offered different versions of Likewise, many realists would argue that a rising what a Chinese-led order might entail. But a growing China was never going to become a responsible body of evidence shows that Beijing ultimately stakeholder in a US-led system, because doing so aims for global parity if not global primacy—that it would have required accepting arrangements— seeks an international environment in which such as Washington’s military presence and alliances norms, institutions, values, and power dynamics on China’s periphery and America’s protection of increasingly reflect Chinese preferences rather 7 Taiwan—that no great power would forever tolerate than American ones. Chinese grand strategy is once it had the capacity to change them. And realists now oriented toward a historic change in the balance would fully grasp why Chinese assertiveness has of power and the rules of the international road, seemed to peak at moments of American weakness, even if that means an undisguised competition such as in the aftermath of the 2008–09 financial with Washington.
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