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Why Does China Reassure South‐East Asia? *
Author(s) -
Sun Xuefeng
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
pacific focus
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.172
H-Index - 12
eISSN - 1976-5118
pISSN - 1225-4657
DOI - 10.1111/j.1976-5118.2009.01027.x
Subject(s) - china , east asia , dominance (genetics) , development economics , political science , shadow (psychology) , declaration , dual (grammatical number) , order (exchange) , international trade , economics , law , finance , psychology , art , biochemistry , chemistry , literature , psychotherapist , gene
This article addresses the following provocative puzzle: why has China chosen to reassure South‐East Asian states during the past decade? The author develops a dual pressure model to explain China's reassurance policy. This dual pressure model maintains that US dominance and China's domestic priorities have combined to compel China to reassure its South‐East Asian neighbors. In the shadow of US dominance, a rising China has no other choice but to reassure its neighbors in order to alleviate strategic pressures against it. The reassurance policy not only sends benign signals to the USA, but also neutralizes China's neighbors in the case of US containment of China. At the domestic level, China's top priorities lie in maintaining social stability in the process of economic development and preventing Taiwan's declaration of de jure independence. These tremendous tasks require the cooperation of China's South‐East Asian neighbors. Therefore, it is in line with China's domestic priorities to reassure the South‐East Asia states. Based on the dual pressure model, the author takes an optimistic view that China will continue to follow the reassurance policy towards its South‐East Asian neighbors in order to foster a peaceful and prosperous neighborhood in the decade to come.