The Rise and Descent of Peaceful Rise

Suettinger, China Leadership Monitor, No.12 1 The Rise and Descent of “Peaceful Rise” Robert L. Suettinger An interesting and creative theory—or at least outlook—on China’s global role and responsibilities appears to have been set aside this year, in part as a result of leadership disagreements. The idea of China’s “peaceful rise” (heping jueqi) to international prominence as a responsible, peaceable, and nonthreatening global power was introduced by Zheng Bijian in November 2003. It caught the interest of many Chinese and Western scholars and observers, becoming the subject of intense and surprisingly open debate. General Secretary Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao both used the term in speeches in December, suggesting that the idea might become a more formal component of Chinese foreign policy. But Jiang Zemin and some members of the Politburo Standing Committee are rumored to have raised objections, and it was decided in April 2004 that the leadership would not make use of the term “peaceful rise” in public. The concept itself has not been anathematized, however, and it remains the subject of academic inquiry. Still, it has lost much of its policy salience and some of its intellectual luster, a casualty of China’s more open scholarly environment, the omnipresent Taiwan issue, and leadership jealousies. Origins of an Idea Zheng Bijian is a formidable intellectual figure within the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Born in Sichuan in 1932, he did postgraduate work in political economics at People’s University of China in the early 1950s. His career path in the 1950s and during the Cultural Revolution is not well known, but it is believed he worked within the Central Committee departments, probably on ideological issues. He may also have researched international affairs for the State Council. In the early 1980s, Zheng is reported to have been personal secretary (mishu) to General Secretary Hu Yaobang, and following that leader’s ouster, to Zhao Ziyang. In 1988, he was appointed vice president of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) and concurrently head of its Institute for Marxism, Leninism, and Mao Zedong Thought. In 1992, he was elected to the Central Committee and took up the post of executive deputy director of the Propaganda Department (a k a Publicity Department), where he very likely gained the appreciation of Jiang Zemin for helping fight off the political attacks of former propaganda chief Deng Liqun. Zheng also became executive vice president of the Central Party School (CPS), which was headed beginning in 1992 by Hu Jintao. Zheng and Hu were responsible for a notable change in the school’s reputation, from a stodgy charm school for senior cadres Suettinger, China Leadership Monitor, No.12 2 to an intellectual center for the study of political reform that attracted top-notch academic talent to its faculty.1 Zheng was not reelected to the Central Committee at the 16th Party Congress in 2002, having reached the retirement age of 70, and he likewise stepped down as vice president of the Central Party School. But he remained prominent as chairman of the China Reform Forum, as dean of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences in the graduate school of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), and in several other honorary roles. A man of considerable bearing and integrity, Zheng has never been reticent about advocating controversial ideas. While at the CPS, he traveled to several European countries to inquire about the transformation of communist parties to social democratic parties, the structure of multiparty systems, and other controversial issues concerning political reform. When Zheng spoke, people tended to pay attention. On November 3, 2003, Zheng addressed a plenary session of the Bo’ao Forum for Asia, a “nongovernment and nonprofit international organization” dedicated to facilitating communication between Asian business and government leaders, located in Hainan, China. In his speech, titled “A New Path for China’s Peaceful Rise and the Future of Asia,” Zheng introduced a new concept in international relations, which he termed China’s “peaceful rise” (heping jueqi): In the 25 years since the inception of its reform and opening up, China has blazed a new strategic path that not only suits its national conditions but also conforms to the tide of the times. This new strategic path is China’s peaceful rise through independently building socialism with Chinese characteristics, while participating in rather than detaching from economic globalization.2 Zheng insisted that although China would rely mainly on its own strength, it needed a peaceful international environment to accomplish the task of lifting its enormous population out of a condition of underdevelopment. He also pledged that China would rise to the status of a great power without destabilizing the international order or oppressing its neighbors: The rise of a major power often results in drastic change in international configuration and world order, even triggers a world war. An important reason behind this is [that] these major powers followed a path of aggressive war and external expansion. Such a path is doomed to failure. In today’s world, how can we follow such a totally erroneous path that is injurious to all, China included? China’s only choice is to strive for rise, more importantly strive for a peaceful rise.3 As for China’s aspirations in Asia, Zheng sought to reassure: Generally speaking, in the coming two to three decades . . . Asia will be facing a rare historical opportunity for peaceful rise and China’s peaceful Suettinger, China Leadership Monitor, No.12 3 rise will be a part of it. This not only means that China’s reform, opening up and rise are partly attributable to the experience and development of other Asian countries, but it also means that China, as an Asian country, will play a more active and useful role in the development, prosperity, and stability of all other Asian countries, its neighbors in particular.4 Zheng did not launch this speech out of the blue. According to subsequent explanations, the idea had been circulating in academic and think-tank circles, especially in Shanghai. Zheng began to explore it after a trip to the United States in late 2002 that reinforced for him the prevalence of concerns there about two possibilities for China’s future: either that it would emerge rapidly (à la 19th-century Germany or Imperial Japan) to threaten U.S. security, or that it might collapse as a failed state.5 His presentation at Bo’ao followed a keynote address by Premier Wen Jiabao, in which the premier advocated a “new security concept” for Asia, one that featured “mutual trust, mutual benefit, equality and cooperation, . . . mutual respect, amicable coexistence and seeking common ground while setting aside differences.”6 Wen actually used the term jueqi he zhenxing several times to describe the end result, for Asia as a whole, of this process of “win-win” cooperation.7 Xinhua English translated the term as “rejuvenation and renewal.” From a Speech to a Theory to a Strategy Wen took the initiative to push the concept of peaceful rise further toward a policy formulation when he used the term in a speech at Harvard University on December 10, 2003, near the end of his visit to the United States. He told his audience: China today is a country in reform and opening-up and a rising power dedicated to peace. It is neither proper nor possible for us to rely on foreign countries for development. . . . [W]hile opening still wider to the outside world, we must more fully and more consciously depend on our own structural innovation, on constantly expanding the domestic market, on converting the huge savings of the citizens into investment, and on improving the quality of the population and scientific and technological progress to solve the problems of resources and the environment. Here lies the essence of China’s road of peaceful rise and development.8 The overall tenor of Wen’s speech—delivered at the same forum Jiang Zemin used for a major speech in his 1997 visit to the United States—was positive, upbeat, and reassuring. On December 26, at a workshop celebrating the 110th anniversary of the birth of Mao Zedong, General Secretary Hu Jintao used the term, this time before an audience that included many of his Politburo Standing Committee colleagues. In a lengthy address that paid all the proper obeisance to Mao, Deng, and Jiang’s “three represents,” Hu said: Suettinger, China Leadership Monitor, No.12 4 We must persist in taking the development path of peaceful rise, persist in getting along with every country on the basis of the five principles of peaceful coexistence, open up contact and cooperation with other countries on the foundation of mutual respect and mutual interest, and make a contribution to the lofty cause of peace and development for all humanity.9 This kind of leadership attention gave the subject a great deal of impetus, and various institutions and publications began discussing the “theory of China’s peaceful rise” at considerable length over the next few months. Among them were the Chinese Academy of Sciences; Liaowang (Outlook) magazine; Xuexi shibao (Study times), published by the Central Party School; and even Liberation Army Daily, which pronounced the theory “correct and appropriate.”10 In late February 2004, Hu Jintao again raised the issue with his Politburo colleagues. At the 10th “collective study” session of the Politburo, Hu exhorted his colleagues to “persist in the development path of peaceful rise and the peaceful foreign policy of independence and self-reliance.”11 In March, at the Second Session of the 10th National People’s Congress (NPC), Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing and Premier Wen again used the term in televised press conferences. Li seemed uncomfortable with a reporter’s question about peaceful rise. He quoted “Western scholars of vision” to the effect that a “peacefully rising” China would not represent a threat, but rather an opportunity for other countries.12 Wen Jiabao was far less ambiguous, pointing out five “essentials” (yaoyi) of China’s peaceful rise: 1. It would involve taking advantage of world peace to promote China’s development and safeguarding world peace through China’s development; 2. It would be based on China’s own strength and independent hard work; 3. It could not be achieved without continuing the “opening-up policy” and an active set of international trade and economic exchanges; 4. It would take several generations; and 5. It would “not stand in the way of any other country or pose a threat to any other country, or be achieved at the expense of any particular nation.”13 Wen’s articulation of the essence of the peaceful rise concept further opened up what looked like a national debate. Several scholars wrote lengthy articles in journals and on Internet web sites on different aspects and interpretations of peaceful rise, with some even referring to it as a “national strategy.”14 Conferences were held at universities and think tanks to look at various aspects of the theory, including its prospects, likely international reactions to it, its theoretical validity, and its potential pitfalls. There were, to be sure, voices of doubt. Wang Yizhou and Wang Jisi, from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, urged a more fulsome debate to work out some of the inconsistencies and theoretical problems inherent in the concept. Shi Yinhong of People’s University was one of the first to raise the Taiwan issue as a potential complicating factor for China’s peaceful rise.15 Suettinger, China Leadership Monitor, No.12 5 But for the most part, the bandwagon rolled on. Minister of Defense Cao Gangchuan used the term during a visit to Thailand,16 and People’s Daily began to give the issue prominent play. Zheng Bijian put together an impressive list of speakers and contributors for a seminar on “China’s Peaceful Rise and Economic Globalization,” scheduled for the late April 2004 Bo’ao Forum for Asia. Among the speakers and discussants were former Malaysian president Mohammed Mahathir, former U.S. national security adviser Brent Scowcroft, John Hamre of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Charles Wolf from RAND Corporation, Nicholas Platt of the Asia Society, and prominent Chinese academics and officials such as Bo’ao Forum Chairman and former WTO negotiator Long Yongtu, College of Foreign Affairs President Wu Jianmin, CPS Vice President Li Junru, Vice Minister of Commerce Lou Jiwei, CASS American Studies Institute Director Wang Jisi, and several others.17 But the highlight was expected to be a keynote address by President Hu Jintao on April 24. The Story Gets Murky In his highly anticipated speech, however, Hu Jintao made no mention whatsoever of peaceful rise. His theme, and the key slogan, was “peace and development” (heping yu fazhan), which had been a key principle of China’s foreign policy dating back to Deng Xiaoping. Hu also mentioned “peace and stability,” “peace and security,” and “peaceful coexistence,” but not “peaceful rise.”18 Xinhua News Agency seems to have been caught off guard by his presentation, its coverage hinting that something had changed in the script. Its initial coverage of the speech led off: Though not hearing the term “peaceful rise” in Chinese President Hu Jintao’s keynote speech here Saturday, observers have noticed that the concept had become the strategic choice for China. Observers have focused their attention on China’s peaceful rising and economic globalization from the content of Hu’s speech . . . and the discussion of officials, economists and experts at a round-table meeting held Saturday as part of the [Bo’ao] Forum. Subsequent coverage did not call attention to the discrepancy.19 Zheng Bijian’s speech to the forum, and the discussions that took place there, did focus on peaceful rise, and the concept continued to get positive play during the Bo’ao meeting, including plaudits from former president George H.W. Bush. Zheng added to his presentation on the background of peaceful rise that it was not a new idea, but in fact represented the path that China had been following for 25 years, under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, and Hu Jintao.20 But the air clearly went out of the peaceful rise balloon following the Bo’ao Forum. Zeng Qinghong pointedly ignored the term in a speech to the U.N. Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific on April 26, 2004, instead citing the words “peace and development” (heping yu fazhan) more than a dozen times in his brief Suettinger, China Leadership Monitor, No.12 6 address.21 In a mid-June interview, Zheng Bijian himself seemed a bit defensive, repeatedly connecting peaceful rise to Deng Xiaoping and Jiang Zemin and concluding his summary of peaceful rise uncharacteristically with a series of propaganda slogans: “[H]old high the great banner of Deng Xiaoping Theory and the important thinking of the ‘Three Represents,’ more closely rally around the CPC Central Committee with Comrade Hu Jintao as General Secretary,” etc.22 The academic debate on peaceful rise continued to percolate in scholarly journals, although more of the commentary focused on the shortcomings of the concept and the problems of achieving peaceful rise. Scholars continued to highlight such issues as whether the concept of jueqi itself would create fears and opposition in Asia, or from the United States. Others pointed out that China’s economic problems and political shortcomings were too great to support a linking to other Asian economies. Some viewed as demeaning the idea that China would accommodate itself to U.S. leadership in the world. Many focused on the Taiwan problem, pointing out that the use of force against “Taiwan independence” should not be constrained by a pledge to pursue a peaceful international strategy.23 By the end of the summer, scholars were asking whether peaceful rise was even achievable, and they were identifying the Taiwan issue and the United States as the principal obstacles to China’s aspirations to accomplish its peaceful rise in the world. In an article in the Central Party School’s newspaper, Xuexi shibao, on August 30, two scholars wrote, “If Taiwan separatist elements go for ‘Taiwan independence,’ if foreign forces represented by the United States interfere in China’s unification, China will not be able to ‘peacefully rise.’”24 Three Caps on Peaceful Rise What had happened? The obvious answer is: we don’t know. The idea had gone from being a strategic concept promoted by the leadership to becoming just another academic theory, and an underdeveloped one at that. No explanation of the change has been offered by the official media in China. Three possible explanations do present themselves, not unrelated to one another. None can be presumed to be authoritative, since all are dependent either on tea-leaf reading of one sort or another, or on “stories in circulation”—the sort related by Western journalists in Beijing or by Chinese who visit or are visited by colleagues and friends within the community of U.S.-based China watchers. First and most obvious is the issue identified by the Xuexi shibao authors, and numerous other scholars, as the principal flaw in the idea that China can accomplish a transition to global-power status in a peaceful manner: the need to maintain the threat, and perhaps the necessity of acting on the threat, of using force to prevent Taiwan from declaring independence. Shortly after Wen Jiabao’s detailed explication of peaceful rise at his NPC press conference, Taiwan voters went to the polls and—to the shock and consternation of People’s Republic of China (PRC) leaders and citizens alike—reelected Chen Shui-bian as their president. The effect this outcome had on China’s policy can hardly be overstated. Not only have Beijing’s policies toward Taiwan been adversely Suettinger, China Leadership Monitor, No.12 7 affected, but the course of U.S.-China relations also has trended downward ever since that event.25 Even relations with Singapore—a key to China’s aspirations in Southeast Asia—were set back when that country’s new prime minister, Lee Hsien Loong, made a brief and unannounced trip to Taiwan in August. Despite the fact that Lee publicly warned Taiwan against pursuing independence, PRC-Singapore relations became strained because Lee did not notify China in advance of his visit. In the face of China’s increasing anger—both public and private—over Taiwan’s direction, and amid gloomy prospects for a nonmilitary resolution of cross-Strait issues, the cheery tone of the peaceful rise theory seems increasingly inapt. Second, the theory itself did seem somewhat rushed and incomplete. Whereas central leadership endorsement of an idea in the past might have been sufficient to have it widely praised and disseminated, China’s intellectual climate has changed considerably since then, and for the better. With encouragement from at least some leaders in Beijing, Chinese scholars subjected the peaceful rise theory (heping jueqi lun) to intense critical scrutiny and found it wanting in some areas. Foreign scholars and commentators provided additional inputs and critiques. As Evan Medeiros has noted, this development is modestly encouraging, providing “evidence of increasing openness in foreign policy thinking and in official policy formulation.”26