What the modern Chinese citizen wants is for China to be a strong nation-state, able to defend Chinese sovereignty and territorial integrity and her far flung interests. China wants to be respected by the world; it wants a seat at the top table.
I do not think China is a revolutionary power seeking to export either Chinese communism or the Chinese model of development, the so-called Beijing consensus. I do not have the impression that China is seeking hegemony at the global or regional level. I am also not persuaded by the view that China is scheming to exclude the United States from Asia.
China wants and needs a peaceful external environment to concentrate on internal development, and would oppose any attempt by any country or group of countries, to contain or impede its rise.
China has surpassed Japan to become the world’s second largest economy, although it is still a relatively poor country, with per capita income outside the top 100 countries. China is the world’s largest exporter and second largest importer. China’s growing prosperity is beneficial to its neighbours and to the world economy, as long as it continues to be open to the world and plays by the international rules governing trade, investment and monetary policy. The bottom line is that economically, China needs the world and the world needs China. The economic relationship between Australia and China is a paradigm case.
As part of its impressive growth, China is developing both hard and soft power projection. In 2010 China’s declared a military budget of US$78 billion. The US alleges this does not capture the totality of China’s military expenditure; the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute also suggests China’s total military expenditure could be as high as US$84.9 billion. In comparison the US spends US$607 billion: China is yet to realize the resources the US has made available.
In 2009 the US Department of Defence stated that, although China has increased its capabilities for local and regional operations in certain areas, a number of limitations persist. For example, according to the Pentagon, the PLA is only capable of the sealift of one infantry division and the delivery of 5,000 parachutists in a single lift. Therefore, in military terms, China is not yet a global power and is in no position to challenge US military supremacy.
In recent years, China has done an excellent job in projecting its soft power to the world. The spectacular success of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games earned the admiration of millions of people who watched the Games on television. The 2010 Shanghai Expo is another success story.
China is blessed with a rich and ancient civilisation. It initiated the Confucius Institute to disseminate its language and civilisation to the world and there are now 282 Confucious Institutes in 88 countries. An estimated 40 million foreigners study Mandarin with 223,000 foreign students studying in China.
China’s economic and military power will continue to grow. In this context, the wise use of soft power by China will make her less threatening and more inviting and attractive. In aligning soft power use, the Chinese need to consider what the world wants in return.
First, the world expects a powerful China to continue to practise a policy of good neighbourliness towards her smaller neighbours and to refrain from any attempt to bully them. In this context, the conduct of China in the South China Sea will be watched closely by Southeast Asia and by the world. China’s doctrine of a peaceful rise is at stake.
China has recently announced that the South China Sea is part of China’s core interests. It has claimed sovereignty over the Spratly Islands and her adjacent waters. The Spratly Islands are also claimed by Brunei, Malaysia, Philippines, Vietnam and Taiwan. The US has stated an interest in ensuring the freedom of navigation in the South China Sea. The US statement could have been provoked by the Chinese map with nine broken lines, a map not consistent with China’s note to the UN. Such a map could give rise to the legally untenable implication that China is claiming all the waters enclosed by the lines as China’s historic waters or territorial sea.
Singapore is not a claimant State and we will not take sides in the disputes between the claimant states. Our interest is to ensure that the region remains peaceful; the good relationship between China and ASEAN continues; the parties concerned comply faithfully with international law and the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and the 2002 ASEAN-China Declaration on the Code of Conduct in the South China Sea; and any disputes are resolved peacefully.
We urge the claimants to resume their negotiations and to heed Deng Xiaoping’s wise advice to set aside the sovereignty disputes and to focus on the joint development of the disputed areas.
Second, China should continue to play a constructive role in various international organisations, in global governance, and in upholding the rule of law in the world. China has benefitted from the rules-based multilateral system. As its power grows, the world has a right to expect that China will shoulder a greater burden of international responsibility.
Third, China should redouble her efforts to deal with her many environmental problems and to embrace sustainable development. China has made impressive progress in harnessing solar and wind energy and in transiting to a low carbon economy. A clean and green China would not only benefit the people of China, but the people of the world. I hope that China will play a positive and constructive role in the ongoing negotiations on global warming and climate change.
There are two animals which represent China: the dragon and the panda. I hope that a powerful China will be viewed by the people of the world as a lovable panda and not a fearsome dragon.
Tommy Koh is Professor and Chairman of the Centre for International Law, National University of Singapore and Ambassador-At-Large for the Government of Singapore. An earlier version of this article originally appeared in The Straits Times.