This book attempts to identify change and continuity in PRC grand strategy, and the extent to which Chinese imperial history complicates PRC global outreach in the Xi Jinping era. Empires convey the wish to make the world a better place – even in the midst of oppression – and are eschatological in their rhetoric. However, empires that last longer have been more pragmatic in their grand strategy; sometimes appropriating the aura of past golden ages, and at other times learning from the mistakes of their predecessors. To date, Chinese strategic thinkers are preoccupied with learning lessons from the disintegration of the USSR and fascinated by the secrets of American power. Interdisciplinary in its reach, analysing grand strategy through both rhetoric and praxis, this book unpacks the Chinese world view through critical examination of the latest history textbooks currently in use in PRC middle schools. It also brings new evidence to bear on the debate in the West about Chinese strategic culture. Finally, it compares historical Japanese OFDI patterns with China in order to understand what makes the Chinese economy unique. China’s Grand Strategy Under Xi Jinping is aimed towards students and scholars of history, international business and wider Chinese studies.

To explore what extended competition between the United States and China might entail out to 2050, the authors of this report identified and characterized China’s grand strategy, analyzed its component national strategies (diplomacy, economics, science and technology, and military affairs), and assessed how successful China might be at implementing these over the next three decades.

An American Interest Book of the Year “Readers will not find a shrewder analysis as to why the Chinese act as they do.” —Robert D. Kaplan “An outstanding contribution to our understanding of that most urgent of contemporary geopolitical questions: what does China want?” —Rana Mitter Before the Chinese Communist Party came to power, China lay broken and fragmented. Today it dominates the global stage, and yet its leaders have continued to be haunted by the past. Analyzing the calculus behind decision making at the highest levels, Sulmaan Wasif Khan explores how China’s leaders have harnessed diplomatic, military, and economic power to keep a fragile country safe in a hostile world. At once shrewd and dangerous, Mao Zedong made China whole and succeeded in keeping it so while the caustic Deng Xiaoping dragged China into the modern world. Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao were cautious custodians of Deng’s legacy, but Xi Jinping has shown a mounting assertiveness that has raised concern across the globe. China’s grand strategies, while costly, have been largely successful. But will this time-tested approach be enough to tackle the looming threats of our age? “Written with verve and insight, this will become the go-to book for anyone interested in the foundations of China’s grand strategy under Communist rule.” —Odd Arne Westad, author of The Cold War “Khan’s brilliant analysis will help policymakers understand the critical rise of China...Crucial if we are to avoid conflict with this emerging superpower.” —Admiral James Stavridis, former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO “Khan argues that since before the People’s Republic of China’s founding, Chinese rulers have held remarkably consistent objectives, even as their definition of security has expanded.” —Mira Rapp-Hooper, War on the Rocks

This book examines the state of China’s grand strategy in the 21st century, including political, military and economic factors. Over the past two decades, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has attained the second highest gross domestic product in the world, taken a leadership role in East Asian regional organisations and substantially improved its military capabilities. Each of these developments – and many others like them – have attracted attention from scholars, journalists and policymakers. Less frequently acknowledged – but perhaps of greater significance – is the impressive congruence of Beijing’s accomplishments. This book highlights how the PRC’s successes support one another and pave the way for future accomplishments, and how these successes seem to be achieved in an unusually coherent and purposeful way. As Beijing’s relations with the rest of the world continue to evolve, with events ranging from the ongoing global economic crisis to the turbulence in China’s own stock market which may bring the PRC’s government under pressure to re-order its priorities, this book assesses China’s grand strategy and long-term approach to national policy. It identifies the political, military and economic instruments it is likely to use, the key challenges which it will face, and explores the implications for the global community. This book will be of great interest to students of Chinese politics, foreign policy, strategic studies, international security and IR in general.

Leading scholars examine China’s global strategic plans, from Hong Kong to military power, to economic dominance Over the past few decades, China has increasingly challenged the global influence of the United States. In China’s Grand Strategy, David B. H. Denoon brings together a group of eminent scholars to explain China’s rapid ascendance on the world stage, as well as its future implications for global politics. Contributors address the military, economic, diplomatic, and internal political factors shaping China’s strategy, in addition to highlighting Beijing’s objectives in different parts of the world, such as Central Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. Ultimately, they explore the promise and perils of China’s rapidly changing political ambitions, showing how the country has made its mark on the twenty-first century. China’s Grand Strategy provides insight into China’s quest to become a global leader, particularly at a time when the future of both China and the US remain uncertain in the context of current crises like the coronavirus pandemic, the ongoing protests in Hong Kong, and escalating tension between top leaders and officials. This book cannot predict the future for China or the US, but the insights offered can help make sense of where we have been and where we are going.

This book aims to build the ideal model of China's grand strategy framework, which is based on three key variables: national power, strategic concept and international institution. Taking the rise of China as an opportunity, this book adopts the assessment of national strategic resources as the beginning, focuses on the evaluation of strategic capability, the choice of strategic orientation, the establishment of strategic objectives, the planning of strategic content and the implementation of strategic means. Further, following this main line, this book establishes a China's grand strategy framework based on active participation and integration-transformation-shaping process. This book emphasizes that to achieve the goals of China's grand strategy; China should uphold this strategic attitude: It should not be seduced by praise and should not be made aggressive by criticism. It should learn to be glorious but remain humble, maintain a wealthy, influential but modest position by restraint. This book can be regarded as the essence of the author's 20 years long-term focus and research on the China's grand strategy. The author's postdoctoral tutor Professor Hu Angang’s comment of this book can hit the nail on the head: "This book is a pioneering theoretical study of China's great strategic research and makes a significant contribution to this research field. The basic arguments of this book have been submitted through various approaches to decision-making references or published in academic papers, and have received numerous positive responses and resonance. In my opinion, the basic ideas and important findings of this book will provide imperative reference to long-term strategy decision-making process. In addition, the fundamental theory and analysis method of the book will have an important influence in both domestic and international academic field."

For more than a century, no US adversary or coalition of adversaries - not Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, or the Soviet Union - has ever reached sixty percent of US GDP. China is the sole exception, and it is fast emerging into a global superpower that could rival, if not eclipse, the United States. What does China want, does it have a grand strategy to achieve it, and what should the United States do about it? In The Long Game, Rush Doshi draws from a rich base of Chinese primary sources, including decades worth of party documents, leaked materials, memoirs by party leaders, and a careful analysis of China's conduct to provide a history of China's grand strategy since the end of the Cold War. Taking readers behind the Party's closed doors, he uncovers Beijing's long, methodical game to displace America from its hegemonic position in both the East Asia regional and global orders through three sequential "strategies of displacement." Beginning in the 1980s, China focused for two decades on "hiding capabilities and biding time." After the 2008 Global Financial Crisis, it became more assertive regionally, following a policy of "actively accomplishing something." Finally, in the aftermath populist elections of 2016, China shifted to an even more aggressive strategy for undermining US hegemony, adopting the phrase "great changes unseen in century." After charting how China's long game has evolved, Doshi offers a comprehensive yet asymmetric plan for an effective US response. Ironically, his proposed approach takes a page from Beijing's own strategic playbook to undermine China's ambitions and strengthen American order without competing dollar-for-dollar, ship-for-ship, or loan-for-loan.

In the "Great Game" of the 21st century--gaining leadership and influence in Asia--the United States is rapidly being outflanked by China, which is investing in infrastructure, connectivity, and supply chains on an unprecedented global scale. In this first book to use China's Belt and Road Initiative, previously known as China's New Silk Road, as a point of departure to explain why and how China is about to supersede America with regard to influence in Asia, Sarwar Kashmeri argues that the United States has a narrow window of opportunity to find a way to fit into a world in which the rules of the game are increasingly set by China. U.S. opposition to the Belt and Road Initiative is doomed to failure, so America must find creative ways to engage China strategically, and he warns that the window to do so is closing fast. The Belt and Road Initiative is China's ambitious project to connect itself to more than 70 countries in Central Asia, Europe, Africa, and the Middle East through new roads, rails, ports, sea lanes, and air links. This cornerstone of Chinese foreign policy under President Xi Jinping is positioning China at the center of over half of world trade, and the loss of American influence and power could well lead to the end of the postwar liberal world order. Far more than merely an infrastructure investment, the Belt and Road Initiative is a masterful grand strategy to create nothing less than a new world order based on the Chinese model of government and its financial institutions. Yet, as the passing of the baton of world leadership takes place, the United States seems curiously incapable or uninterested in devising a counterstrategy. Even though the United States will no longer have the largest economy in the world, it will still be a powerful and rich country with global alliances.

This book describes the main contradictions in China’s actions on the world stage—peaceful vs. assertive—through a culturally informed framework that takes into account China’s historical memory and political culture. The author analyzes nine cases, including the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), as examples that show both China’s commitment to peace and development in the region, as well as its concerted effort to introduce alternative institutions on the global stage that could challenge the hegemony of the West and Western values.

This book identifies and assesses the grand strategy of Chinese foreign policy following a flurry of diplomatic and investment activities in recent years. Through its adept application of the concept of grand strategy, it examines a series of questions concerning China’s objectives, targets, theaters, operations, coordination, and purpose (teleology). By answering these questions, the book uncovers the deeper motivations behind China’s diplomatic policy, revealing the ‘pulse’ of China’s grand strategy and its implications more broadly to the structure of the international system. Additionally, it offers an evaluation of the external influence exerted by the United States as the incumbent hegemonic power, presenting both the probable policy attitudes of the United States and China’s possible reactions and responses. Through these discussions and evaluations, it ultimately reveals that China’s motivations are deeply rooted both in its political past and in the interests of its ruling communist party, whose determination is the main source of China’s current and future successes in ascending past any other nation. Offering an in-depth exploration of China's grand strategy this book will be of great value to students and scholars of Chinese politics, international relations, and diplomacy.