According to Party officials, the overall goal of the PRC’s foreign policy is to build a “community of common destiny” that seeks to shift the international system towards an architecture based on the CCP’s principles for how nations should interact. This goal is essential to how the PRC’s foreign policy supports its broader strategy to achieve national rejuvenation. From the PRC’s perspective, establishing this “community” is necessary to set the external security and economic conditions for the PRC’s national rejuvenation by “safeguarding world peace” and “promoting common development” according to the Party’s principles. The PRC recognizes it cannot achieve its goals in isolation and seeks “all countries” to adopt its diplomatic framework in order to “build a community with a shared future for mankind” and “actively control the new direction of China and the world.” Lastly, PRC officials acknowledge that aspects of the international order are inconsistent with its objectives. The PRC’s diplomatic framework seeks to remedy this by promoting changes in a more “just and reasonable direction.”
The PRC’s ambition to shape the international order derives from the objectives of its national strategy and the Party’s political and governing systems. The PRC does not frame its efforts as simply opportunistic challenges to the status quo or a significant deviation from the past. Rather, Beijing is acting upon its longstanding desire to redesign the architecture of the international order to support the PRC’s national rejuvenation, efforts that are married with growing resources and opportunities to do so. The PRC’s foreign policy seeks to revise aspects of the international order on the Party’s terms and in accordance with ideas and principles it views as essential to forging an external environment supportive of the PRC’s national rejuvenation and strategic goals.
The PRC’s foreign policy framework includes efforts to promote and accelerate the transformation in the distribution of power, revise the principles of interstate relations, and reform global governance structures. Within the context of “Major Power Diplomacy with Chinese Characteristics,” PRC officials have described how the PRC differentiates its goals and relations according to the power relationships among four categories of actors: major powers, peripheral nations, developing nations, and international organizations. Among the major powers, Beijing contends that a new framework for relations is necessary to construct a “stable and balanced development” between the powers—in essence a multipolar system. With peripheral nations, the PRC seeks to strengthen its relationships to create a more favorable environment along its maritime and land borders in accordance with the PRC’s view of justice and interests. For developing countries, the PRC emphasizes solidarity and cooperation as well as “actively” carrying out multilateral diplomatic work, to include continued “high-quality development” under its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). This likely refers to the importance that the PRC places on attaining support from developing countries within international organizations.
Another tenet of “Major Power Diplomacy with Chinese Characteristics” is the PRC’s ambition to construct “new types” of “omnidirectional” relations and bilateral partnerships among states. The PRC desires for its concepts of mutual respect, cooperation, and mutual benefit to provide the basis for these “new types” of relations. Politburo member Yang Jiechi describes China’s “new type” relationships as strategic partnerships that follow a new path of “major power relations.” Although distinct from alliance relationships, the PRC’s notion of strategic partnerships is
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OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY OF DEFENSE
Annual Report to Congress: Military and Security Developments Involving the People's Republic of China
