Conceptualization of Chinas Foreign Policy: A Product of Ambition or Circumstances?

Abstract

Amid the escalating disagreements in US-China relations, which became the main theme of the global foreign policy agenda in 2010s, the contours of the new policy of Chinese Foreign Ministry have been showing more and more clearly. Traditionally, the narrative of Western analysts has described this policy as a well-thought-out scheme designed by Beijing to take over the global leadership, linked directly to the figure of the Communist Party of China Chairman, Xi Jinping. The purpose of this article is to examine the origins and milestones of the current Chinese foreign policy doctrine. Having analyzed them, the author came to the conclusion that the PRC’s behaviour in international politics is largely reactive. During the Republican administrations in the U.S. it was China that was the main advocate of the idea of «global peace» and was forced to undertake fundamentally new international commitments.