China’s Evolving Asia–Pacific Policy: From Asserting Chinese Interests to Coping with the Indo-Pacific Challenge

Abstract

The Asia–Pacific region is very important for China due to various historical and contemporary strategic reasons. Since the end of the Cold War, China has practised a number of major strategies in the Asia–Pacific region, including the ‘low profile’ strategy in the 1990s, a ‘soft power’ approach in the 2000s, and an assertive policy in much of the 2010s. One can make the argument that China’s regional policy has always been influenced by its perceptions of the regional strategic context, in particular the strategic posture of the United States in the Asia–Pacific. China’s assertiveness in the 2010s, for instance, was at least partially attributable to the weaknesses in Washington’s ‘strategic rebalance’ to the Asia–Pacific. China’s heavy-handed regional security policy during those years had a major negative impact on China’s relations with a number of neighbouring states. As China consolidated its presence in the East China Sea and South China Sea through various unilateral means, many regional states became more apprehensive of the future of China’s rise. In recent years, Washington began to promote its Free and Open Indo-Pacific (FOIP) strategy, a move commonly believed to further limit Beijing’s assertiveness and growing strategic influence in the Asia–Pacific region. China believes that the FOIP portends to be far more threatening than the ‘strategic rebalance’ to Chinese interests in the region. As a result, Beijing is stepping up efforts in its Asia–Pacific policy to cope with the challenges posed by the FOIP. This chapter analyses these changes in China’s policy in the Asia–Pacific region.KeywordsChina’s neighbourhood policyAsia–Pacific SecurityIndo-Pacific StrategyChina–United States relations