Hemmed in by a Lack of Clarity

In a long term view, the rise of China is to be welcomed, but today China remains what the journalist Martin Wolf calls a "premature superpower." China's current reputation for power benefits from projections about the future. In one poll, 44 percent of respondents mistakenly thought that China already had the world's largest economy, compared to 27 percent who accurately picked the United States (which is three times larger).  Martin Jacques even entitled his recent book When China Rules the World: The End of the Western World and the Birth of a New Global Order. Some people draw analogies to the rise of Germany a century ago, and predict a coming conflict with the U.S. like that between Germany and Britain. Fortunately, these fears are exaggerated.

While most projections of Chinese power are based on the rapid growth rate of GDP, China has other significant power resources. In terms of basic resources, its territory is equal to that of the United States and its population is four times greater. It has the world's largest army, about 200 nuclear weapons, and modern capabilities in space and cyber space (including the world's largest number of internet users.)

In soft power resources, China still lacks cultural industries able to compete with Hollywood or Bollywood; its universities are not yet the equal of America's; and it lacks the many non-governmental organizations that generate much of America's soft power.  However, it is making major efforts to increase it soft power. China has always had an attractive traditional culture, and it has created several hundred Confucius Institutes around the world to teach its language and culture. The enrollment of foreign students in China has tripled from 36,000 to 110,000 over the past decade, the number of foreign tourists has also increased dramatically, and China Radio International has increasing its broadcasts in English to 24 hours a day. China has also adjusted its diplomacy to use more multilateral arrangements to alleviate fears, and reduce the likelihood of other countries allying to balance a rising power.

While China has impressive power resources, one should be skeptical about projections based solely on current growth rates, political rhetoric, military contingency plans, and flawed historical analogies. In both China and the U.S., perceptions of the other country are heavily colored by domestic political struggles, and there are people in both countries who want to see the other as an enemy. Even without such distortions, the military on both sides would be seen by its countrymen as derelict in its duties if it did not plan for all contingencies. As for historical analogies, it is important to remember that by 1900, Germany had surpassed Britain in industrial power, and the Kaiser was pursuing an adventurous, globally-oriented foreign policy that was bound to bring about a clash with other great powers. In contrast, China still lags far behind the United States economically, and has focused its policies primarily on its region and on its economic development. While its "market Leninist" economic model (the so-called "Beijing Consensus") provides soft power in authoritarian countries, it has the opposite effect in many democracies.  Nonetheless, the rise of China recalls Thucydides' warning that belief in the inevitability of conflict can become one of its main causes. Each side, believing it will end up at war with the other, makes reasonable military preparations which then are read by the other side as confirmation of its worst fears. This would be a major loss for both sides.