US–China Foreign Relations

Power Transition and its Implications for Europe and Asia

Robert S. Ross, Øystein Tunsjø, Dong Wang, Robert S. Ross, Øystein Tunsjø, Dong Wang

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9780367521349
• eBook ISBN: 9781000204698
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Chinese History
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This book examines the power transition between the US and China, and the implications for Europe and Asia in a new era of uncertainty.

The volume addresses the impact that the rise of China has on the United States, Europe, transatlantic relations, and East Asia. China is seeking to use its enhanced power position to promote new ambitions; the United States is adjusting to a new superpower rivalry; and the power shift from the West to the East is resulting in a more peripheral role for Europe in world affairs. Featuring essays by prominent Chinese and international experts, the book examines the US–China rivalry, the changing international system, grand strategies and geopolitics, foreign policy, geo-economics and institutions, and military and technological developments. The chapters examine how strategic, security, and military considerations in this triangular relationship are gradually undermining trade and economics, reversing the era of globalization, and contributing to the breakdown of the US-led liberal order and institutions that will be difficult to rebuild. The volume also examines whether the adversarial antagonism in US–China relations, the tension in transatlantic ties, and the increasing rivalry in Europe–China relations are primarily resulting from leaders' ambitions or structural power shifts.

This book will be of much interest to students of Asian security, US foreign policy, European politics, and International Relations in general.

1

The new US–China superpower rivalry

Challenges for Asia and Europe

Øystein Tunsjø and Wang Dong

This volume addresses the impact of the rise of China on the United States, Europe, transatlantic relations, and Asia. In a previous study, we examined the US–China–EU “diplomatic triangle.”¹ Several developments suggest that focusing on triangular relations is no longer the best approach to study the relationship between China, the United States, and Europe. The most important development over the last decade is the unprecedented rise of China. The international system is entering a new bipolar era and China has emerged as a peer-competitor of the United States.² The power shift is fuelling a more conflictual US–China relationship. Thus, the contributors to this volume examine this new superpower rivalry and focus on how it affects Asia and Europe in unprecedented ways.

A period of engagement, shaped by absolute gains and mutual cooperation within a diplomatic triangle is now gradually replaced by a more competitive and strategic US–China relationship, resulting in a gloomy outlook for stability and prosperity. The relationship between China, the United States, and Europe has entered a more uncertain era in which the security–economic nexus of the US–China superpower rivalry dominates. The main consequences of this development are beginning to emerge. First, arguably, the process of globalization is gradually being reversed, and trade, investments, and value chains are undermined, fragmented, or reshaped. Second, global norms, rules, and institutions are reconfigured. Third, confidence-building measures and crisis management are compromised. Fourth, Asian and European states are seeking to avoid having to choose between the US and China. Fifth, transatlantic ties are challenged. Sixth, Europe is awakening to a new reality of power politics and geopolitical tension. Seventh, the risk of conflict in East Asia and Europe has heightened.

These implications of growing Sino-US rivalry and competition show that since the publication of our previous volume, US–China relations have gradually deteriorated. This began under the period of the Obama administration, accelerated with the emergence of the new Chinese leadership, and has currently culminated with the Trump administration. Over the last decade and looking towards the future, we observe that the main actors in China–Europe relations and transatlantic relations are individual European states and not so much the EU. The EU is lacking a coherent foreign, economic, and security policy toward China and the United States. While we examine the potential for the EU to rise to the challenges posed in this new age of uncertainty and develop a more coherent foreign, economic, and security policy, the volume focuses more on individual European states.

When examining the explanations for worsened US–China relations and discussing potential implications, uncertainty became a buzzword in the discussions among our contributors. There is a new era of uncertainty related to power shifts and the future world order. The structure of the international system is changing. The unipolar era is ending. A US–China bipolar system is emerging with a “mosaic” of orders primarily shaped by China, the United States, European states, and the EU.

The uncertainty we are witnessing also relates to structure and agency. Trump has undermined US credibility and transatlantic ties, but the diverging threat perceptions of China have also contributed to weakening the relationship between the US and Europe. Europe and the US are likely to remain divided in their views of China’s conventional military threat. However, China’s rise provides structural incentives that could unite the transatlantic alliance on governance, ideology, international law, and human rights issues, and in new and unconventional security domains, including cybersecurity, the economic–security nexus, regulations and standards on investment and technology. Arguably, US–China relations have worsened not only because of, at the personal level, political leaders’ strong personalities and ambitions but also because of, at the structural level, the relative power rise of China and the relative decline of the United States. Leaders alone are unlikely to reverse the deteriorating trend and the conflicting trajectory in US–China relations.

For the first time in more than 100 years, the United States is facing a peer competitor that is rising, while it is in relative decline. The United States is not only uncertain about Chinese capabilities but also uncertain about itself and the role it should play in world affairs. The US needs a new grand strategy for the twenty-first century. President Xi and many others in China have a “China dream” and a vision for the rejuvenation of China’s role as a preeminent regional power and a leading global power in the new era. New strategies and policies are a result of a strong leader and a more powerful China. However, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is not accustomed to having power. It is uncertain about how it should use its power.

There is also uncertainty over what this new era means for the EU and states in Europe and East Asia. In contrast to Europe, there is no collective security in East Asia. The EU and European states can seek more independence from the superpower rivalry and aspire to take a more active role in East Asian affairs. While both European and East Asian states hedge, aiming to avoid taking sides and cooperating with both China and the United States, increased US–China rivalry compels states to choose sides. The US is facing a potential regional peer competitor in East Asia, not in Europe. From a regional perspective, East Asia is bipolar and Europe is multipolar. Thus, the US is more likely to prioritize its resources toward the Asia-Pacific and sustain its security commitments to East Asia rather than Europe. Such developments could increase the risk of conflict in both East Asia and Europe. The United States’ balancing and containment of China increases the risk of a limited war in the maritime domain of East Asia, and potential US retrenchment from Europe increases the risk of conflict on the European continent.

Superpower rivalry and great power politics are back on the agenda in international politics. China is consolidating and enhancing its strategic partnership with Russia, but there are few signs of a traditional alliance emerging. There is a potential for closer US–Russian ties in order to balance China, but such a strategic shift is unlikely in the years to come. In short, US–China relations will shape security, the international economy and the new international order, and the security and economic nexus is becoming vital. Crisis management and confidence building are becoming more challenging.

This volume examines the new US–China rivalry, the changing international system and order(s), grand strategies and geopolitics, foreign policy and security flashpoints, geo-economics and institutions, Europe–China relations, transatlantic relations, and military and technological developments. Although the contributors do not necessarily endorse each other’s view, together, they show how strategic, security, economic, and military considerations in this triangular relationship are gradually undermining trade and economics (more relative gains, decoupling and zero-sum thinking), slowing down if not reversing the era of globalization and contributing to the breakdown of the US-led liberal international order and institutions that will be difficult to rebuild.

Organization of the volume

The volume is divided into four parts. The first part examines power shifts, China’s new ambitions, and increased US–China rivalry. The second part deals with the implications of growing US–China rivalry for Europe and transatlantic ties. The third part explores new strategies developed in the US, China, and Europe in response to global power shifts and a new era of uncertainty. The fourth part considers the implications of US–China rivalry for crisis management and mitigating conflict.

The chapters in Part I address different aspects of the sharp relative increase in China’s combined capabilities, including the narrowing power gap between the United States and China and the widening power gap between the two top-ranking powers (US and China) and any third-ranking power.

Avery Goldstein’s Chapter 2 notes that China has emerged as the only plausible candidate to end the post–Cold War unipolar era of American supremacy. He argues that once that reality dawned, each country recognized that the other was its most capable strategic competitor and that there would not be third parties weighty enough to alter the balance of power between them. The ongoing shift in the distribution of power helps explain both the sharp increase over the past decade in American concerns about China’s growing international economic role and its expanding (if still limited) military presence from Africa to the Arctic, as well as China’s sensitivity to US measures that address those concerns. Goldstein shows how bipolarity encourages zero-sum thinking that fosters acute attentiveness to the capabilities and behavior of one’s most important potential adversary. The slogan of “America first” and China’s strive for “national rejuvenation” contributes to zero-sum thinking, which is gaining more influence on economic policies.

Wang Dong provides in Chapter 3 a critical review of the liberal international order. The chapter surveys the contending views and challenges confronting the liberal international order. Wang argues that the liberal international order is not an accurate description of the post–World War II international order. Rather than being a “singular” liberal order as assumed by the narrative of the liberal international order, the post–World War II order is in fact mosaic-like, composed of different layers of sub-orders including a multilateral political order centered on the United Nations and a multilateral, international financial order centered on the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. The author concludes by noting that in the future, there will be a multipolar world, one without dominant powers, but diverse ideals and government structures.

In Chapter 4, Øystein Tunsjø compares what he defines as the origins of a new bipolar international system and the superpower rivalry between the United States and China with the previous bipolar system and the superpower rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union. Tunsjø argues that there are significant differences when it comes to economic interdependence, ideology, technology, and institutions, but that the most important difference shaping balancing and stability when comparing the two bipolar systems is geopolitics. Different geopolitical factors explain why there is less arms-racing and balancing in the new bipolar system; why the risk of a limited war is relatively higher; and why the United States and China are likely to focus their military rivalry on East Asia and be less involved in proxy wars in the periphery. While Tunsjø emphasizes the differences between the two bipolar systems of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, he notes that current economic, ideological, technological, and military rivalry resembles some of the developments during the previous superpower rivalry in the twentieth century.

Chapter 5, by Robert S. Ross, examines how China’s naval build-up is challenging the regional balance of power. As China has modernized and expanded its capabilities, the US Navy has experienced relative decline. The Chinese Navy now possesses a larger fleet than the United States Navy, and advanced technologies, challenging US maritime supremacy in East Asia. Ross shows that the United States retains advantages, but these advantages are eroding and the trend of China’s rise persists. US declining capabilities has prompted the region’s secondary powers to reconsider their alignments within the US–China great power competition; they are moving toward equidistance between the great powers. In conclusion, Ross contends that China’s economic growth rate will slow, but there is little likelihood that the United States can halt the trend in the maritime balance. Rather, as the regional balance of power continues to evolve, the regional order will continue to evolve.

Part II considers how increased US–China rivalry and adversarial antagonism is affecting Europe. Where once Europe perceived itself to be in a tutelage role with respect to China, and the United States sought engagement with a China that it could recognize as a “responsible stakeholder”, there is far greater equivalence in today’s relationships and less agreement between Europe and the United States on how best to deal with a resurgent China.

Rosemary Foot’s Chapter 6 examines how deterioration in Sino-American relations, a more ambitious China, together with a disruptive force in Washington has led European governments to face several policy dilemmas. A primary dilemma involves addressing the divisive challenges posed to Europe by China’s growing material power and political influence, and the continent’s continuing interest in the actual economic benefits that come from a close trading and investment relationship with Beijing. A second requires dealing with the turbulence that the Trump presidency has introduced into Europe–US relations. This includes determining how closely to align with the antagonistic approach that the Trump administration has adopted with respect to China. Foot argues there is a fluidity in policies not seen in earlier periods of discord that presages increased fragmentation across the Western world.

Following on from Foot’s chapter, Gerlinde Groitl’s Chapter 7 examines how the European model and the transatlantic partnership is in an existential crisis. This comes exactly at a time when rival powers such as Russia and China assert themselves on the world stage. Groitl argues the Western-shaped structures and Europe’s regional order erode from within as much as they are challenged from non-Western competitors like Russia or China from without. The two established templates for European security, the alliance with the United States as well as European integration and political transformation, have become mired in crisis. In considering changed power realities and gridlock in international institutions, Groitl points out that it is not surprising to see the US act more unilaterally, disrupting the status quo. However, she maintains that the Trump challenge goes beyond previous crises in transatlantic ties as he sets out to destroy the liberal international order his predecessors had cultivated. As such, Groitl warns that Trump threatens to upend the political, economic, and normative grand strategic consensus that has tied Europe and the United States together for more than 70 years.

In Chapter 8, Philippe Le Corre focuses on how European states and the EU have adjusted to Chinese foreign direct investments (FDI) and the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) linking China and the European continent. From the early 2000s, China’s “going global” policy encouraged Chinese companies, both state-owned and private, to pursue opportunities abroad in order to acquire technologies and expand their footprint, using Chinese state aid to develop. While the Chinese government has been promoting the BRI towards European countries, the reality is that most Chinese FDI, including by state-owned enterprises, has been targeting countries that did not officially join the BRI. Overall, Le Corre argues, Chinese FDI, especially state-backed, has tended to target the strong industries in advanced economies. This includes advanced manufacturing industries, with automotive, chemical, agribusiness, energy, and machinery taking a significant share of non-infrastructure (non-greenfield) investment. As Le Corre shows, it is mainly in those countries where infrastructure is weaker and who have a connection to the BRI that China has focused on building up railways and ports to connect its commerce routes. This is particularly the case with Greece and Balkan countries, which have attracted most “BRI-labelled investments.”

Part III examines how the United States, China, the EU, and European states are adopting to new uncertainty. Anarchy and the rise and fall of great powers have been an enduring theme in international politics. The new superpower rivalry and uncertainty inherent in an anarchic international system reinforces security concerns about interdependence that have recently come to the fore with greater clarity in US–China relations. The US is now for the first time facing a potential power transition whereby it is the declining power.

In Chapter 9, Joshua Shifrinson shows that this has spurred the most intense grand strategy debate in the United States since after the Cold War. He discusses four grand strategies: Second Generation Primacy; Deep Engagement; Offshore Balancing; and Restraint. Regardless of what emerges, American grand strategy – its foundational “theory” over how to create security for itself using the political, economic, and military tools at its disposal – will be substantially different from those that preceded it. All things being equal, Second Generation Primacy and Deep Engagement are poised to gain traction the longer proponents can plausibly argu...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Endorsements
• Half-Title
• Series
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of illustrations
• List of contributors
• Acknowledgments
• 1 The new US–China superpower rivalry: Challenges for Asia and Europe
• PART I STRUCTURE, ORDER, AND US–CHINA RELATIONS
• PART II IMPLICATIONS FOR EUROPE
• PART III THE US, CHINA, AND EUROPE: TOWARD NEW STRATEGIES?
• PART IV CRISIS MANAGEMENT AND MITIGATING CONFLICT
• Index