Perspectives on power

Drawing from Chinese official government statements, academic discourse, and policy behavior, this dissertation examines China's rise from the Chinese point of view. The first essay examines the key debates within the Chinese policy community that drive China's current foreign policy behavior and simultaneously shape its objectives and priorities for the future. After exploring China's current grand strategy, I consider the paths China might pursue in the future, such as developing a more aggressive regional policy, establishing broader spheres of influence, becoming a responsible stakeholder in cooperation with the United States, or becoming a competitor of and rival to the United States. Finally, I identify the factors that might shape China's long-term choices, and consider how China's leaders might implement a new grand strategy for the future. The second essay explores Chinese strategies to define and measure national power in the post-Cold War period. I begin by reviewing and recreating the leading quantitative equations for calculating comprehensive national power (CNP), and then survey current debates about China's relative strengths and weaknesses. Highlighting the government's recent emphasis on sustainable or "scientific" development across a variety of factors, I note that economic competitiveness and soft power have emerged as preferred metrics of power and international status. To conclude, I present a typology of assessments of China's national power and the policy preferences that often accompany those conclusions. The third essay examines changes in China's policy toward pariah states such as Burma, Sudan, and Zimbabwe. I find that economic and security interests often prompt leaders to use quiet bilateral engagement to protect China's overseas investments. China has also responded to international attention and pressure, cooperating with the international community to manage China's international reputation and preserve China's centrality in key multilateral debates. It is not clear, however, that the pressure surrounding the 2008 Olympic Games prompted meaningful policy changes toward pariah states. China's changing behavior toward pariah states should not be understood as an acceptance and internalization of global human rights norms, but rather as an effort to avoid exclusion and to secure a role in shaping the intervention precedent for the future.