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Charm Offensive at Beijing’s Free Will?. Yang Jiang. 1809. Diplomatic Strategy. From: 韬光养晦 tao guang yang hui (hide the blade and accumulate strength) To: 与时俱进 yu shi ju jin (advance with time) ‘a responsible great power’. connotation. Yang Jiechi March 2008:
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Charm Offensive at Beijing’s Free Will? • Yang Jiang
Diplomatic Strategy • From: 韬光养晦 tao guang yang hui (hide the blade and accumulate strength) • To: 与时俱进 yu shi ju jin (advance with time) • ‘a responsible great power’
connotation • Yang Jiechi March 2008: • to deepen strategic and political mutual trust between China and other countries, and to create a good environment and atmosphere for international economic cooperation; • to propel multilateral and bilateral free trade cooperation and resolve economic disputes through dialogue; • to support the realisation of important cooperation projects and to protect legal rights of overseas Chinese citizens and companies.
instruments • bilateral trade agreements (FTA) • (regional) financial cooperation • outward investment • resource diplomacy • WTO • foreign aid
FTA Policy: Liberals vs. Protectionists • Lack of imperative to enforce domestic reforms, in contrast to the WTO • Liberals: MOFCOM, exporters • Protectionist forces • Agriculture: ‘Three Agricultural Problems’ and MOA • Services and Investment: economic security, partial reform and monopoly profits • NDRC (National Development and Reform Commission) • Ethnic problems • National People’s Congress
FTA policymaking: Politics and Economics • Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) • Ministry of Foreign Affairs: ‘big country morality’ of ‘giving more and taking less’? • The leadership • Bureaucratic capacity and coordination
(regional) financial cooperation • From response to responsibility? • Asian Monetary Fund • Chiang Mai Initiative: surveillance? A supra-national body? • Exchange Rate Coordination... • constrained by the exchange rate policy, a closed capital account and weaknesses in the banking system
IMF and World Bank • Call for increased voting power for developing countries, for Asia--G20 • International Reserve Currency - Special Drawing Rights: ‘testing the water’ • Experimenting internationalization of RMB • Issues: • conditionality - Beijing Consensus/China Model? • transparency • call for a new international economic order?
outward investment • 2001 from restrictive to encouraging • 2004 more supportive measures • 2006 reflection on ‘neo-colonialism’ • 2008 from caution to aggression • now in the process of making a strategy...
MFA CCP Chinese company foreign company SASAC NDRC MOFCOM banks SAFE Outward Investment • MFA: support, service, bridge • SASAC: the great butler; unclear • Dept. of Organization of the CCP: personnel • NDRC: the small State Council; proposals • MOFCOM: contracts • SAFE: supportive • banks: policy, commercial • SOEs: central, local
Climate Diplomacy? • support for other developing countries: solar water heaters, bio-energy and nuclear? a green development fund? • COP15
To be continued... • State-business relations? • A national strategy for economic diplomacy? • Political and economic interests? • China’s identity?