Is China a revisionist power?

Chinese Journal of International Politics

Volumn 2, Issue 3, 2009, Pages 313-334

  Huiyun, Feng ^a  

^a UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 66449113953     PISSN: 17508916     EISSN: 17508924     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1093/cjip/pop003     Document Type: Article

References (89)

1. Denny Roy, 'The China Threat Issue: Major Arguments', Asian Survey Vol. 36, No. 8 (1996), pp. 759-64
2. David Shambaugh, 'Containment or Engagement of China: Calculating Beijing's Responses', International Security, Vol. 21, No. 2 (1996), pp. 180-209
3. Alastair Iain Johnston and Robert S. Ross, eds, Engaging China: The Management of An Emerging Power (London and New York: Routledge, 1999).
4. Thomas Christensen, 'Chinese Realpolitik', Foreign Affairs, Vol. 75, No. 5 (1996), pp. 37-52
5. Thomas Christensen, 'Posing Problems Without Catching Up: China's Rise and Challenges for U.S. Security Policy', International Security, Vol. 25, No. 4 (2001), pp. 5-40
6. Paul Dibb et al., 'Asia's Insecurity', Survival, Vol. 41, No. 3 (1999), pp. 5-20
7. David Shambaugh, 'China's Military Views the World: Ambivalent Security', International Security, Vol. 24, No. 3 (1999-2000), pp. 52-79
8. David Shambaugh, 'Sino-American Strategic Relations: From Partners to Competitors', Survival, Vol. 42, No. 1 (2000), pp. 97-115
9. John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York: W.W. Norton, 2001).
10. Johnston so describes the principles of parabellum or hard realpolitik strategic culture: '[I]n essence ... the best way of dealing with security threats is to eliminate them through the use of force ... the operational strategic culture predisposes those socialized in it to act more coercively against an enemy as relative capabilities become more favorable'. Alastair Iain Johnston, Cultural Realism: Strategic Culture and Grand Strategy in Chinese History (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995), p. x.
11. Also see Alastair Iain Johnston, 'Cultural Realism and Strategy in Maoist China' in Peter J. Katzensterin, ed., The Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), pp. 216-68
12. Alastair Iain Johnston, 'International Structures and Chinese Foreign Policy' in Samuel S. Kim, ed., China and the World: Chinese Foreign Policy Faces the New Millennium (Boulder: Westview Press, 1998), pp. 55-90
13. Alastair Iain Johnston, 'Realism(s) and Chinese Security Policy in the Post-Cold War Period' in E. B. Kapstein and M. Mastanduno, eds, Unipolar Politics: Realism and State Strategies After the Cold War (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999), pp. 261-318.
14. In a recent article, Johnston qualifies his initial argument by citing problematic use of evidence that claims post-Maoist China is a revisionist or non-status quo state. He argues that in the 1980s and 1990s, China may well have entered a transitory period from Maoist revisionism to post-Jiang, quasi-fascism, and that this period saw status quo-oriented diplomacy. Neither a revisionist nor a status quo status, however, is static, but changes according to contexts or contingencies. In other words, today's status quo China could turn revisionist tomorrow. Alastair Iain Johnston, 'Is China a Status Quo Power?', International Security, Vol. 27, No. 4 (2003), pp. 5-56.
15. John K. Fairbank and Frank A. Kierman Jr, eds, Chinese Ways in Warfare (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1974)
16. John K. Fairbank, The United States and China (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1983).
17. Johnston distinguishes between parabellum and Confucian strategic cultures by the different rankings each culture assigns to different strategies. A parabellum culture ranks the strategies: Offensive/ expansionist strategy > defensive strategy > accommodationist strategy. 'If a state has revisionist or expansionist political goals it would presumably prefer the offensive/expansionist strategy over a defensive or accommodationist one'. Alastair Iain Johnston, Cultural Realism p. 113.
18. Johnston places such low-coercion policies, such as neorealist balancing alliance behavior for security seeking purposes, in the accommodationist strategic category. An accommodationist strategy relies primarily on diplomacy, political trading, economic incentives, bandwagoning, and balancing alliance behavior, among other low-coercion policies. See Alastair Iain Johnston, Cultural Realism, pp. 112-13. A Confucian culture shows a preference for accommodationist strategies and defensive strategies over offensive ones.
19. Both Jack Snyder's definition of strategic culture and Nathan Leities' and Alexander George's definition of operational code stated from the outset that the two concepts are collective and aggregate cultural constructs. Chinese leaders may not equally reflect Chinese strategic culture, but are all subject to the cultural context and social influence of Chinese strategic culture. The importance of the study lies in proving variations among the four generations of Chinese leaders via ANOVA and MANOVA tests. In his book Cultural Realism, Johnston reads and interprets historical texts according to his own coding scheme. I use operational code analysis to assess four generations of leaders and provide a different quantitative interpretation. Nathan Leites, The Operational Code of the Politburo (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1951)
20. Nathan Leites, A Study of Bolshevism (New York: Free Press, 1953)
21. Alexander George, 'The Operational Code', International Studies Quarterly, Vol. 13, No. 2 (1969), pp. 190-222
22. Jack Snyder, The Soviet Strategic Culture: Implications for Nuclear Options (Santa Monica: Rand Corporation, 1977).
23. See also Ken Booth, Strategy and Ethnocentrism (New York: Holmes and Meier, 1981).
24. In Chinese zonghe guoli. This is the major indicator the Chinese use when referring to capability.
25. John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics.
26. Alastair Iain Johnston, Cultural Realism; Alastair Iain Johnston, 'Is China a Status Quo Power?'
27. For example, during the Tang Dynasty when the court was strong both economically and militarily, the imperial court practiced the heqin policy of pacifying rulers of minority nationalities in the border areas by marrying daughters of the Han imperial family to them, as exemplified in the marriage of Tang princess Wencheng to Tibetan king Songstan Gambo. See John K. Fairbank, The United States and China.
28. Andrew Scobell and Larry Wortzel, The Lessons of History: The Chinese People's Liberation Army at 75 (Carlisle: Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College, 2003)
29. John K. Fairbank and Frank A. Kierman Jr, eds, Chinese Ways in Warfare.
30. Revisionist states or leaders here refer to political realist definitions of states or leaders who embody unsatisfied wills and who entail intentions to change and challenge the status quo, see for example, Randall L. Schweller, 'Status Quo Bias: Bringing the Revisionist State Back', Security Studies, Vol. 5, No. 3 (1996), pp. 90-121.
31. For works on the importance of beliefs and foreign policy analysis, see Valerie M. Hudson, 'Foreign Policy Analysis Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow', Mershon Review of International Studies, Vol. 39 (1995), pp. 209-38
32. Valerie M. Hudson, 'Foreign Policy Analysis: Actor-Specific Theory and the Ground of International Relations', Foreign Policy Analysis, Vol. 1, No. 1 (2005), pp. 1-30
33. Michael D. Young and Mark Schafer, 'Is There Method in Our Madness? Ways of Assessing Cognition in International Relations', Mershon International Studies Review, Vol. 42 (1998), pp. 63-96
34. Douglas Foyle, 'Public Opinion and Foreign Policy: Elite Beliefs as a Mediating Variable', International Studies Quarterly, Vol. 41, No. 1 (1997), pp. 141-69
35. Stephen G. Walker et al., 'Presidential Operational Codes and Foreign Policy Conflicts in the Post-Cold War Worlds', Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 43, No. 5 (1999), pp. 610-25.
36. Yuen Foong Khong, Analogies at War: Korea, Munich, Dien Bien Phu, and the Vietnam Decisions of 1965 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992).
37. Ernest May, Lessons of the Past (New York: Oxford University Press, 1973)
38. Richard E. Neustadt and Ernest R. May, Thinking in Time: The Use of History for Decision Makers (New York: The Free Press, 1986)
39. Stephen G. Walker, 'The Motivational Foundations of Political Belief Systems', International Studies Quarterly, Vol. 27, No. 2 (1983), pp. 179-202.
40. Elizabeth Kier, Imagining War: French and British Military Doctrine between the Wars (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997).
41. Alexander Wendt, 'Anarchy Is What States Make of It: The Social Construction of Power Politics', International Organization, Vol. 46, No. 2 (1992), pp. 391-425.
42. Yaacov Y. I. Vertzberger, The World In Their Minds: Information Processing, Cognition, and Perception in Foreign Policy Decisionmaking (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990), p. 113.
43. Ibid., p. 113.
44. Mirroring effects refer to when beliefs serve as a necessary condition and reflect the situational environment. Beliefs can be both necessary and sufficient for decisions when they act as a steering force in situations where beliefs substitute for perceptions of the situation. Leaders refer to their beliefs for policy references by looking for cognitive shortcuts, or blocking different information or cues from the environment (cognitive bias), or referring back to familiar strategic choices made in the past (through analogies or comparisons with significant historical events). In this case, beliefs may also activate deep motivations, because of the interactive relationship between basic needs for affiliation, achievement and power on the one hand and operational code beliefs on the other, as people tend to adopt beliefs compatible with their core needs. Learning effects refer to belief changes (instrumentally or strategically) resulting from adjustments made as 'new information (perceptions) reinforces or reverses old information (beliefs)'. Learning may affect strategies, tactics, or simply moves by states in strategic interactions depending on the transparency of the situation and the complexity of an individual's belief system. See Stephen G. Walker, 'Political Belief Systems'.
45. Jerel A. Rosati, 'A Cognitive Approach to the Study of Foreign Policy' in Laura Neack et al., ed., Foreign Policy Analysis: Continuity and Change in Its Second Generation (Prentice Hall: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1995), p. 67
46. Herbert A. Simon, 'Human Nature in Politics: The Dialogue of Psychology with Political Science', American Political Science Review, Vol. 79, No. 2 (1985), pp. 293-304.
47. The transparency of the environment and the individual's receptivity to new information (personality and belief system complexity) determine the causal effects of beliefs on decisions. Nonetheless, it is still possible that beliefs have no effects and decisions are simply made in response to stimuli unmediated by cognitive processes. This, however, is unusual in public life, especially foreign policy decision making. Herbert A. Simon, 'Human Nature in Politics'. See Fred I. Greenstein, 'Can Politics and Personality Be Studied Systematically?', Political Psychology, Vol. 13, No. 1 (1992), pp 105-28
48. F. I. Greenstein, 'The Impact of Personality on Politics', American Political Science Review, Vol. 61, No. 3 (1967), pp. 629-41
49. F. I. Greenstein, Personality and Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1987)
50. R. C. Tucker, Politics as Leadership (Columbia: Columbia University Press, 1981)
51. A. L. George and J. L. George, Presidential Personality and Performance (Boulder: Westview, 1998)
52. R. C. Tucker, 'The Georges' Wilson Re-examined', American Political Science Review, Vol. 71, No. 1 (1977), pp. 606-18. These works lay out possible conditions under which beliefs have no effect on decisions, because they are either ignored or overwhelmed by strong emotion or forces outside the decision maker's control.
53. Having strong, prestigious backgrounds in Chinese revolution, the two paramount leaders were able to exert control over crucial events during their lifetimes. Mao was a very authoritative leader in this regard. During his leadership, decisions were made mostly under his direct instructions. Although the opinions of other core leaders - Chairman Liu Shaoqi, Premier and Foreign Minister Zhou Enlai, Chen Yi, military generals Zhu De, Peng Dehuai, and Lin Biao - were also important on different occasions, the final decisions usually reflected Mao's will. Mao's revolutionary worldview and his emphasis on the role of ideology are crucial to understanding Chinese external behavior during his leadership during the Cold War era. Deng was different. He tended to be more pragmatic. During his lifetime, he was purged three times from different offices. His strong personality and belief in reform rather than revolution, plus compromise when the opposition is strong, reflected his personal style and experience. See Valerie M. Hudson, ed., Culture and Foreign Policy (Boulder, London: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1997)
54. Michael H. Hunt and Niu Jun, eds, Toward a History of Chinese Communist Foreign Relations, 1920s-1960s: Personalities and Interpretive Approaches (Woodrow Wilson Center Asia Program, 1995)
55. Cheng Joseph Y. S. and Zhang Wankun, 'Patterns and Dynamics of China's International Strategic Behavior', Journal of Contemporary China, Vol. 11 (2002), pp. 235-60
56. Chen Jian, Mao's China and the Cold War (Chapel Hill & London: The University of North Carolina Press, 2001).
57. There are different explanations for this difference, e.g. lack of military background, a weak personality, lack of experience in decision making, political institutionalization, and elite politics. See Mark A. Ryan, David M. Finkelstein, and Michael A. McDevitt, eds, Chinese Warfighting: The PLA Experience since 1949 (New York: M.E. Sharpe, 2003).
58. Ron Christman, 'How Beijing Evaluates Military Campaigns: An Initial Assessment' in Laurie Burkitt et al., eds, The Lessons of History, p. 255 (Carlisle Barracks, PA:US Army War College Strategic Studies Institute, July 2003).
59. Ron Christman, 'How Beijing Evaluates Military Campaigns', p. 256.
60. Chinese Foreign Ministry web page: http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/eng/c477.html.
61. Purposeful rather than random sampling of foreign policy speeches during the time period covered in the paper is adopted to ensure coverage of leaders' important public statements. The author acknowledges that there are recent Chinese publications of more speeches, public and private, by these Chinese leaders. Given the language translation difficulties involved in reliable content analysis and the limited goal of this article, however, they are not included in the author's sample.
62. The three wars (Korean, Sino-Indian, and Sino-Vietnamese) were major wars fought by the People's Liberation Army (PLA) under Mao and Deng after the PRC was founded. The May 1999 bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, the April 2001 EP-3E incident and the Taiwan crises were major recent Chinese foreign policy crises.
63. Mao (1946-1953) and Deng (1978-1981) are coded as heads of state, because they were in complete control during the time periods of the speeches cited.31 Jiang's role is coded as subordinate=1 (1993-1996) and head=2 (19972003), Hu's role is subordinate=1 (1998-2002) and head=2 (2003). Hu assumed office as the President and Party secretary in 2003 and the Chairmanship of the Central Military Committee in 2004.
64. Philip E. Tetlock and A. S. R. Manstead, 'Impression Management versus Intrapsychic Explanations in Social Psychology: A Useful Dichotomy?', Psychological Review, Vol. 92 (1985), pp. 59-77.
65. The 'self-in-situation' as the basic unit of analysis positions the operational code research program with a focus on agents. Walker and Schafer state that 'the central puzzle in this research program is when and how do the beliefs of leaders act as pivotal causal mechanisms in explaining and anticipating the processes of strategic interaction between states at several levels of decisions: Moves, tactics, strategies and policy preferences?' Stephen G. Walker and Mark Schafer, 'Operational Code Analysis and Foreign Policy Decision- Making' in Alex Mintz, ed., Advances in Foreign Policy Analysis Yearbook (New York: Palgrave, 2005).
66. Nathan Leites, The Operational Code of the Politburo
67. Nathan Leites, A Study of Bolshevism.
68. George divided the beliefs in Figure 1 into philosophical beliefs (image of the other) and instrumental beliefs (images of the self). Philosophical beliefs also refer to the assumptions and premises made by an actor regarding the fundamental nature of politics and political conflict. Instrumental beliefs are to do with assumptions about effective strategy and tactics. Alexander George, 'The Operational Code', pp. 190-222.
69. Stephen G. Walker et al., 'Operational Codes of Political Leaders';
70. Stephen G. Walker et al., 'William Jefferson Clinton: Beliefs and Integrative Complexity. Operational Code Beliefs and Object Appraisal';
71. Stephen G. Walker et al., 'Saddam Hussein: Beliefs and Integrative Complexity. Operational Code Beliefs and Objective Appraisal' in Jerrold Post, ed., The Psychological Assessment of Political Leaders (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2003).
72. Stephen G. Walker et al., 'Operational Codes of Political Leaders', p. 217.
73. Stephen G. Walker et al., 'Operational Codes of Political Leaders', pp. 225-31.
74. The scores are provided by Mark Schafer, Department of Political Science, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803, USA. At the time this article was written, the norming group contained 255 written speeches by 35 world leaders. Standard deviations from the mean are plotted after converting the leader's raw scores to standard deviations. One standard deviation for the norming group's scores on key indices are P1=0.32, I1=0.47, and P4=0.12.
75. Johnston concedes the possibility of using operational code analysis and reports that the reason he avoids using it is because it focuses on the individual; Alastair Iain Johnston, Cultural Realism.
76. This might be due to the Korean War case study I selected for analyzing Mao's beliefs. As China was fighting the USA, a super power in the Korean War, Mao's P4 consequently appears low. Mao's P4 during the Sino-Indian conflict of 1962 is significantly higher.
77. Face validity is the first criterion for selecting items for an index. When measuring the political conservatism, for example, the appearance of each item should instantly denote conservatism or its opposite, liberalism. See E. Babbie, The Practice of Social Research (Belmont: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1998), p. 170.
78. Face validity does not depend on established theories for support. See A. Fink, How to Measure Survey Reliability and Validity (Thousand Oaks: Sage, 1995).
79. Discriminant validity is the lack of relationship among measures that theoretically should not be related. E. G. Carmines and R. A. Zeller, Reliability and Validity Assessment (Beverly Hills: Sage University Paper, 1979), p. 23.
80. I apply 2 × 2 MANOVA designs because my data do not permit more rigorous four-factor or three-factor designs. The empty cells resulting from unavailability of the speeches of all leaders relating to all variables render the controlling designs statistically impossible and incomparable.
81. As Mao and Deng were the heads of state in the samples I chose, I ran the MANOVA test on Jiang and Hu only.
82. The ideological debate between the Deng group and Hua Guofeng's group was still going on, but by the late-1970s, Deng had triumphed and taken control; see Chen King, China's War with Vietnam, 1979: Issues, Decisions and Implications (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1987).
83. Mel Gurtov and Byong-Moo Hwang, China's Security: The New Roles of the Military (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1998), p. 59.
84. Tang Jiaxuan, 'New China's Diplomacy Over the Past Fifty Years.
85. As Shambaugh states, China decreased its direct security threats, increased its international stature and accrued substantial benefits from the West-dominated international finance, trade, and technological systems. David Shambaugh, 'China's Security Policy in the Post-Cold War Era', Survival, Vol. 34, No. 2 (1992), p. 91.
86. According to the Defense White Paper issued in 1998, 'the work in defense must be subordinate to and in the service of the nation's overall economic construction. 'China's National Defense', March 25, 2009, http://www.china.org.cn/e-white/5/index.htm.
87. James C. F. Wang, Contemporary Chinese Politics: An Introduction (Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall, 2002), p. 255.
88. Li Cheng notes, 'What is most distinctive about the fourth generation of leaders is their own diversity rather than their differences from previous generations', 'in terms of political solidarity, educational background, career path, and policy preferences'. Li Cheng, China's Leaders: The New Generation (New York: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, INC, 2001), p. 217.
89. Alastair Iain Johnston, 'Is China a Status Quo Power?', pp. 5-56.