Hello, welcome to visit Shanghai Forum
The coming ten years will be a criticalperiod for China, Asia and even the world. In this period, the most importantthing is to create good ideas. I hope that the Shanghai Forum will continue tocreate good ideas through the collision of minds within the next ten years andpush forward the progress of China, Asia and the world. The forum theme is“Asia’s Responsibility”, and China is an important member of Asia, which meansthat China’s foreign policy will influence the development of Asia. Therefore,I’d like to put forward three points on the Major-Country Diplomacy withChinese Characteristics.
Firstly,it’s timely to put forward the concept of Major- Country Diplomacy with ChineseCharacteristics. On the Central Meeting on ForeignAffairs Work held in November 2014, President Xi Jinping indicated that Chinashould have the major-country diplomacy with its own characteristics. Thisissue was raised in time. If we look back through the history over the pastcentury, we’ll find that nowadays China is at the top status in history. Over thepast century, China had been at the periphery of the world stage for a longtime. There was little discourse power for China, let alone major-countrydiplomacy. Nevertheless, China became the world’s second largest economy in2010 and there’s no doubt that China has approached the centre of the worldstage. Changes which are taking place in the world right now may be the mostprofound one in the history of mankind. Under the circumstance, the worldexpects that China will have a role to play. Thus it’s timely to put forwardthat China should have the major-country diplomacy with its owncharacteristics.
Secondly,there are two keys to the Major-Country Diplomacy with Chinese Characteristics. It’s a new situation for China to move to the centre of the worldstage, and there must be a process of enrichment and development for theMajor-Country Diplomacy with Chinese Characteristics. In the process, threeimportant factors should be taken into account: 1. the world; 2. China; 3. thefundamental interests of Chinese and world people. The Major-Country Diplomacywith Chinese Characteristics is raised based on the fundamental interests ofworld and Chinese people. There are two keys:
The first key is “to construct new-typeinternational relations centered on win-win cooperation”, which was advocatedby President Xi Jinping in March 2013. If we review the Westphalia System in1648, the Versailles- Washington System in 1919 and the Yalta System after theWorld War II, we’ll find that the common feature of these systems is that majorcountries rule the world and small countries should comply with them. The ideaof “constructing new-type international relations centered on win-wincooperation” advocated by President Xi Jinping has considered the change of thetimes. The theme of the times has converted from “war and revolution” into“peace and development”, which is the most profound change in the internationalhistory. In recent years, the failure of “color revolution” also shows that thetime of “war and revolution” has passed away, and “peace and Development” willbe the method to solve the problems which the world is meeting with today.
Moreover, China always insists theprinciple that major countries and small countries are equal. After thePeople¡¯s Republic of China was founded in Oct 1st, 1949, one basic principleof its diplomacy is equality. What Chinese people had struggled for over 100years was to gain an equal situation with other countries, and therefore Chinawould treat them equally after independence. No matter a country is major orsmall, powerful or weak, it should be treated equally in the world.
The second key is that China willconsistently adhere to the strategy of peaceful development. Its specificmeaning can be generalized into “three should” and “three shouldn’t”.
“Three should” means that China shouldmaintain peace, develop itself and cooperate with others. Peace is theprecondition of development. If there is no peace, development won’t beachieved. China’s development in the past 30 years was realized in thecondition of peace, and these 30 years may be the most peaceful period forChina since the Opium War. The critical factor for a country is development,and without development other things are out of the question. Cooperation is anessential section for Chinese modernization. It is impossible to achieve themodernization with the door closed. Only through international cooperation canChina gain great development. That’s the profound significance of the reformand open policy raised by Deng Xiaoping. China’s development in the past 30years was achieved in this framework.
“Three shouldn’t” means that Chinashouldn’t expand, dominate and ally. China is rising, and it’s a rise of 1.4billion people, which doesn’t occur before in the history of human development.“Shouldn’t expand” means that China won’t follow the old routine of colonialexpansion of Western countries. It’s an impasse and China won’t follow it.“Shouldn’t dominate” means that China won’t follow the same old disastrous roadof the Soviet Union to compete for the world hegemony or spark an arms racewith the U.S. These aren’t consistent with the interests of Chinese and worldpeople. “Shouldn’t ally” is the third point which I’ll focus on especially.
Thirdly,China should insist the policy of nonalignment. Recently,a public opinion that a new bipolar structure is emerging has spread all overthe world. One polar is U.S.-Japan alliance and the other is China-Russiaalliance. This structure will lead to a new Cold War. Therefore it’s essentialto make clear how the bipolar structure and the Cold War emerged in history.
The Cold War was based on the confrontationbetween the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Warsaw TreatyOrganization. In 1991 the Warsaw Treaty Organization was dissolved and NATOstill existed, expanding from 16 countries to 28 countries after the end of theCold War. Lately Prime Minister of Japan Shinzo Abe visited the U.S. andfinalized the New Japan-U.S Cooperative Defense Guidelines, which shows thatthe military alliance between the U.S. and Japan still exists. However, Chinadoesn’t ally itself with Russia. There are three reasons why Chinese peopleinsist the nonalignment policy:
First,China has considered the change of the theme of times. In the time of “war and revolution”, it was necessary to ally, butthat time has passed away.
Next,China has summarized the historical experience. Chinahas entered alliance with the Soviet Union, but the effect wasn’t good. In theearly days of the "reform and open" in 1970s, we summarized theexperience of Chinese Diplomacy under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping. Oneimportant part of it was insisting nonalignment policy. Prime Minister ZhouEnlai advocated to “seek common ground while reserving differences” on theBandung Conference, which became the foundation of ten principles of BandungConference. Among these principles, the sixth one is that “don’t use collectivedefense to serve the special interests of any major countries”. And the“Non-Aligned Movement” in 1961 was initiated on the basis of the BandungConference. We have to admire the far-sight of Prime Minister Zhou.
Last,China has taken the fundamental interests of Chinese and world people intoaccount. What’s the greatest interest of Chinesepeople? As Deng Xiaoping once said, “development is the absolute principle”. Inthe 21st century, it means that we should maintain the momentum of development.The current momentum of Chinese development is the best one since the OpiumWar. To maintain it, we should keep open and cooperate with foreign countries.Alignment will bring enemies, and China needs friends. We are willing to makefriends with countries and people all over the world.
And what’s the interest of people aroundthe world? The world needs peace and development, and it doesn’t need an armsrace. During the Cold War, the U.S. and the Soviet Union invest a lot in thearms race. But nowadays, facing with various problems, the world needs fundsfor development. If these funds are used to spark the arms race, those problemswon’t be solved. Taking the fundamental interests of world people into account,we will insist the nonalignment policy.
When I visited Singapore and Indonesialately, they expressed that they wanted to keep good relationship with both theU.S. and China. The thought of Southeast Asian countries also reflects thethought of the world. If China allies itself with a major country, a new ColdWar will begin and there won’t be any winner. On Nov 29th last year, PresidentXi Jinping indicated clearly on the Central Meeting on Foreign Affairs Workthat China should insist the principle of nonalignment and make friends insteadof alignment. China is willing to make friends with various countries in theworld and cooperate with them on the basis of common interests. The fact thatChina insists nonalignment policy shows that China has taken the interests ofboth Chinese people and world people into account. We’ll continue to go alongthis way.
