China's Approach to International Peacebuilding from a Historical Perspective (Paper 3)

Intrastate conflicts are increasingly complex, generating greater threats to global insecurity and demanding multilateral, integrated approaches to end conflicts, build sustainable peace, rebuild infrastructure, and restart industry. Since 2000, the scale of destruction in civil conflicts has reached unprecedented levels, prompting global migration, extensive displacement, untold economic loss, and the deaths of millions. The evolution of international peacebuilding and development regimes, which emerged as a salient instrument of global governance since the Cold War, are being contended in the global community as efforts to intervene to contain and end violent conflicts have stalled. The assumed model of liberal peacebuilding is increasingly drawing criticism as some search for alternatives. China’s increasing role in global governance and position in international politics is prompting some to look East for answers.

China has long engaged with and in countries-in-conflict; however, its approach toward these states is not fixed to any singular policy or practice. More broadly, China has no explicit national policy toward engagement with conflict-ridden states. China has approached such relationships through various means including bilateral interactions (e.g. China’s direct support for the Sudanese Government), direct participation in regional and international platforms (e.g. China’s leading role in global peacekeeping as well as participation in UN agencies and institutions), and increasing multilateral participation (e.g. China’s development participation through the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank as well as through regional bodies like ASEAN, the Arab League, and African Union). This chapter will provide a brief history of China’s engagements in conflict-ridden countries since the opening and reform period and outline China’s evolving position toward and active role in bilateral and multilateral engagement in civil conflict from 2000 to the present.

I. Evolution of China’s Foreign Policy Toward Developing Countries since Opening and Reform

Since China’s opening and reform, Beijing has increasingly engaged in peacebuilding in war-torn countries. This approach is traditionally defined in economic terms and security terms, underpinned its pursuit of its own national sovereignty and non-interference. China advocates the mutual respect of non-interference and national sovereignty in its foreign relations. This, according to Yun Sun, is to deter states from embracing support for political movements in Xinjiang, Taiwan, and Tibet, which in China’s view represent a distinct threat to national security.^[1] This has played a critical role in the organization of Beijing’s diplomacy with Africa, Asia, and South America, particularly with contested states. States in war-torn countries benefit from this transaction. In exchange for supporting China’s diplomatic position and “respecting” China’s sovereignty, these regimes receive Chinese aid, investment, and development in a way that sustains the existing authority of the ruling regime without the systemic reform and restructuring endemic to liberal peacebuilding. The evolution of China’s foreign policy and diplomatic priorities, particularly in global development, have made Beijing’s engagement in conflicts an increasing reality.

As it expanded its footprint over the past two decades, most prominently, in Africa, it has become an active player in conflict-affected countries. China’s approach to contested states has been guided by a philosophy of “groping for stones to cross the river,” a process of experimentation and gradualism. Over the course of 1980s and 1990s, China’s domestic experience in economic development was exported to Africa through a process of trial and error and emphasized infrastructure development, resource-secured loans, food security-related projects, and scholarships for African students to pursue higher education.^[2]

During the Hu Jintao period (2003-2012) which oversaw China’s strategic engagement in Sudan, China’s foreign policy was organized on the principle of “all-round/all-directional” which, in theory, underlined balanced diplomacy and saw opportunity in building diplomatic ties with all important powers.^[3] Beijing defined the organization of its global diplomacy: “Big powers are the key; China’s periphery is the priority; developing countries are the foundation; multilateral platforms are the stage.^[4]” This underpinned a shift in China’s foreign policy to focus more on the multilateral engagement in global governance.^[5] Recalling the role of national interest in the act of organizing foreign policy, these principles are best conceptualized as guiding, but not orthodoxy. Namely, they do not always dictate the substance of China’s foreign policy, as Medeiros argues in the case of China’s actions toward great powers.^[6]

Certain geographic regions do mean more to China than others. China’s primary foreign policy focus fluctuates between great powers and its immediate neighbors.^[7] Both present a threat to China’s national security and interests. China remains embroiled in numerous territorial disputes with its neighbors. The threat of transnational terrorist activity in central Asia has implications in Xinjiang. The Rohingya crisis in Myanmar presents a risk of forced migration into Yunnan. The global debate over Tibet, Taiwan, and Xinjiang remain salient factors China had deemed existential for its national security, yet faces pressure from both neighboring countries and great powers in these regards.

China served as an important partner for the development of the African continent, and many governments welcomed China’s support with relative open arms. Ayenagbo and others write that by 2002 “…the CPC [Communist Party of China] had established relations with more than 60 political parties in 40 Sub-Saharan countries, as many Africans have been convinced of China’s sincerity in respecting African political choices and helping to promote economic and trade cooperation. From that time, there was a focus on ‘economic codevelopment’ and cooperation was expanded in far more diverse levels than previously.^[8]” Moreover, in January 2006, China issued its Africa Policy whitepaper which paved a pathway for Chinese-Africa relations and China’s role in African development moving forward. It affirmed (on paper) China’s commitment to Africa in clear terms: equality, mutual benefit, mutual support, common development, and win-win economic cooperation.^[9] And, in turn, China reiterated the importance of African partners’ continued support of a united China, the refusal of diplomatic ties with Taiwan, and support for reunification.[10] China additionally committed itself to peace and security activities in support of African peace: military cooperation; conflict settlement and peacekeeping operations; judicial and police cooperation, and non-traditional security assistance (counterterrorism, small arms smuggling, drug trafficking, etc).^[11] Beyond states, China’s peace and security strategy emphasized the role of Africa regional organizations including the African Union.^[12]

China increased its engagement into Africa during a tenuous period in continent’s modern history. The 1990s witnessed some of the worst atrocities in modern history, including Rwanda. Meanwhile, conflicts still raged across the continent from Somalia to Liberia well into the 2000s. China could do little to avoid becoming an active player in regional politics and development, particularly in protracted conflicts evolving in Sudan. As it pursued lucrative contracts in resource-rich countries, Beijing became embedded. Chinese economic and political support to contested governments enabled their survival. China’s leadership in solving these conflicts would be essential. It enhanced its involvement through UN institutions, principally through the deployment of UN peacekeeping forces and the UN Security Council. By the late 2000s, China increased its participation beyond peacekeeping to include aid and development projects to support peacekeeping missions.

China’s approach toward developing African nations, Kuo argues, evolved into a norm which consists of three primary pillars: sovereignty, stability and state-led economic development.^[13] This norm can be conceptualized as a Chinese approach to peacebuilding. According to Kuo, the goal of China’s peacebuilding, the “Chinese peace” as he termed it, was economic development and poverty alleviation, rather than economic and political liberalization.^[14] Further, its focus, he argues, emphasized a strong state rather than good governance. This view was underpinned by a strong principle of Westphalian sovereignty and non-interference, which placed national sovereignty above a liberal view of human rights and prioritized strengthening state legitimacy and civil services—infrastructure, health care, education—over civil society.^[15] This view is largely in agreement with Zhang Xinping’s theory of Chinese reconstruction which he applies to China’s tentative involvement in the Syrian civil war. He offers that China’s approach to conflict-ridden countries occurs in four stages of “reconstruction”: (1) security reconstruction (reaching a complete armistice and countering terrorism), (2) political reconstruction (establishing a continuous and legitimate government rather than good governance), (3) economic reconstruction (predicated on poverty alleviation and growth of domestic industry), and (4) social reconstruction.^[16] In sum, both views underpin the common view of Chinese development toward the developing world and, more specifically, countries in civil conflict as state-centric and development-oriented. China’s pursuit of sovereignty and development in this context has also been applied multilaterally through China’s influence in the UN and multilateral organizations.

II. China’s Role and Contribution to the Global Development of Peace Interventions

China’s emerging global influence, driven by its domestic development and increasingly outward-oriented foreign policy, is underpinned by a deeper commitment to leadership in multilateral institutions. Beijing’s ascendance since its 2001 admittance to the World Trade Organization into primacy in multilateral engagement has placed it in a unique position to shape global governance. More specifically, China’s actions in the UN reflect a greater consonance to utilize multilateralism as a primary mechanism to further its interests. This agenda, under President Xi Jinping, is one concerned with underscoring China as a “power with specific responsibilities” in which China has a greater capacity for “regime shaping,” employing its characteristic political-economic model as a status indicator.^[17] More specifically, China’s pursuit of multilateral engagement through the UN is predicated on a vision of “democracy in international affairs.^[18]” By levelling the political playing field, China can more easily pursue its objectives in an environment more acquiescent to its position, reducing hegemonic power checks from the United States and other contending powers. Practically, through the UN Security Council, UN Peacekeeping, World Health Organization, UN Food and Agriculture Organization, Peacebuilding Commission, and more, China has exercised its status as a P5 member to exert a significant degree of structural power to shape the substance of UN normative approaches to the maintenance of international peace and security.

Structurally, China has emphasized the twin principles of state sovereignty and non-interference as fundamental to UN activities and approaches, especially those concerning international peacebuilding regime. And, within the framework of these principles, it has advocated economic development as the foundation on which peace and security is built. Beijing has vehemently defended this in UN Security Council debates and resolutions, particularly in the UNSC actions toward conflict-affected states.

China has also utilized the UN to further bolster its image as a responsible power, particularly through its increasing participation in global development and aid provision. For China, economic development through the cooperation of a consenting, sovereign state is central to sustainable international peace and security. China’s emphasis on domestic development from the Deng Xiaoping era has rapidly transformed outwardly, with President Xi Jinping’s externalization of China’s domestic “model” of economic development as a salient contender to western liberal development, through the Belt and Road Initiative. This China view of development, which Joshua Cooper Ramos terms the Beijing Consensus[19], Yang Yao defines as a “combination of mixed ownership, basic property rights, and heavy government intervention.^[20]” Its preference for state-directed development tends to sideline input from non-state actors and civil-society.

The role of development is central to China’s global narrative, both in word and in action. The development emphasis is rooted in China’s domestic experience, which rapidly propelled the country to the second largest economy in the world. For international observers, China’s commitment to reducing global poverty and improving conditions in developing countries was first exemplified at home. Through the Millennium Development Goals, China showed its commitment to growth. China’s success, according to the UN Development Program (UNDP) was attributed to “rapid economic expansion coupled with gradual reforms; development and inclusive-oriented government; and particular domestic and social demographic contexts.^[21]” Through its participation of multilateral initiatives, China exhibited itself an alternative model of national development which could be replicated by developing countries.

Through multilateral organizations, China has also actively advocated its development agenda as a critical component of peacemaking, peacekeeping, and peacebuilding. To China, it is not only a means of sustaining peace post-conflict, but it is the necessary means to end a war. The development-conflict nexus is central for Chinese diplomacy. In 2017, President Xi touted China’s development path at the World Economic Forum as the path that prioritizes “people” and “people’s interests”, pursues reform and innovation, and pursues “common development through opening up.^[22]” This internationalization of China’s development experience was realized in the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), in which Xi has termed a “road for peace.” However, the success of BRI relies strongly on China’s ability to stabilize environments along the BRI, which Xi references as regions associated with “conflict, turbulence, crisis, and challenge.^[23]” Yet, China’s policy and experience toward civil conflicts is limited.

At the 2001 UN Security Council debate on “Peace-building: toward a comprehensive approach,” Chinese Deputy Permanent Representative to the UNSC Shen Guofang emphasized the centrality of development in creating durable peace in conflict countries: He defined peacekeeping in the following way:

“…armed conflicts most often occur in poor and backward developing countries, notably the least-developed countries. Poverty leads to social instability, which will in turn be a threat to peace and security at the national and even regional levels…The realization of cease-fire or peace in a country or region through United Nations peacekeeping operations does not necessarily mean that the root causes of the conflict will die out immediately thereafter… it takes a long process to address and eliminate the root causes such as poverty, backwardness, social injustices and ethnical disputes…the early realization of the disarmament, demobilization and re-integration [DDR] of ex-combatants and the promotion of the repatriation, resettlement and the economic recovery of refugees and displaced persons constitute the short-term objectives of peace-building. The long-term objectives, however, are the eradication of poverty, development of economy as well as a peaceful and rewarding life for people in the post-conflict countries and regions.^[24]

In practice, China has structurally carried this view into UN peacebuilding both on the ground and at the UNSC. On the ground, China’s role in UN peacekeeping, while slow at the onset, rapidly scaled its participation. Now, China has more UN peacekeeping forces deployed than any other permanent member of the UNSC. Furthermore, China has also slowly increased its contributions to the international humanitarian regime, including financial donations and goods and services, to assist in humanitarian crises in the Middle East ($26 billion in 2018) and Africa ($60 billion in 2018).[25]

In conclusion, China’s role in conflict countries has been a consideration in its foreign policy since 1948. Over the decades that followed, China’s opening and reform brought China back into global politics after years of political isolation. Fueled by its own domestic development successes, China actively pursued diplomatic relations with the developing world across Africa, Asia, and Latin America. At the international stage, China played an active role in global development, pursuing bilateral diplomatic ties with developing countries, most notably in Africa. By the early 2000s, China was a leading economic and political partner to countries across Africa. This same period, numerous civil wars raged in China’s partner countries, creating widespread instability, threating China’s own economic interests, and creating considerable international movement toward military intervention. In response, China pursued a more active role in these conflicts in order to solve them in a manner that addressed the underlying roots of conflict through state-led national development and reinforced the twin principles of state-sovereignty and non-interference.

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[1]  Yun Sun, “Africa in China’s Foreign Policy,” Brookings Institute, April 2014: 15, https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Africa-in-China-web_CMG7.pdf.

[2] Steven Kuo, Chinese Peace in Africa: From Peacekeeper to Peacemaker (Routledge Publishing, 2019), 12-14. Print.

[3] Ibid, 13.

[4] Yun Sun, “Africa in China’s Foreign Policy,” 15; Evan Medeiros, “China’s Foreign Policy Actions,” in China’s International Behavior: Activism, Opportunism, and Diversification (Rand Corporation: 2009): 93.

[5] Zhou Zhaojun, “Interview with Qin Yaqing: After the 17th National Congress of the People's Republic of China, China's diplomacy will pay more attention to the multilateral stage,” China News Agency, October 12, 2007. http://cpc.people.com.cn/GB/100804/6370470.html.

[6] Medeiros, “China’s Foreign Policy Actions,” 93-95.

[7] Ibid, 95; Sun, “Africa in China’s Foreign Policy,” 13-16.

[8] Kossi Ayenagbo, Tommie Njobvu, James V. Sossou, and Biossey K. Tozoun, “China’s peacekeeping operations in Africa: From unwilling participation to responsible contribution,” African Journal of Political Science and International Relations 6, no. 2 (Feb. 2012): 27. http://www.academicjournals.org/AJPSIR.

[9] People’s Republic of China, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “China’s Africa Policy,” January 2016. https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/zflt/eng/zgdfzzc/t481748.htm.

[10] Ibid.

[11] Ibid.

[12] Ibid.

[13] Steven Kuo, “An Emergent Norm in African Peace Operations,” China Quarterly of International Strategic Studies 1, no.1 (2015): 178-179. https://www.worldscientific.com/doi/pdf/10.1142/S2377740015500086.

[14] Ibid, 178-179.

[15] Ibid, 178.

[16] Zhang Xinping and Dai Jiaxun, “Motives, Challenges, and Methods of China’s Participation in Syrian Reconstruction,” International Outlook, no. 1 (2019), http://www.siis.org.cn/UploadFiles/file/20190114/201901010%20%E5%BC%A0%E6%96%B0%E5%B9%B3.pdf.

[17] Rosemary Foot, “China and the International Human Protection Regime: Beliefs, Power and Status in a Changing Normative Order,” Kokusai Mondai, no.661 (May 2017): 11.  https://www2.jiia.or.jp/en/pdf/kokusaimondai/kokusaimondai661_Dr_Rosemary_Foot.pdf.

[18] Medeiros, “China’s Foreign Policy Actions,” 170. 

[19] Joshua Cooper Ramos, “The Beijing Concensus,” The Foreign Policy Centre, January 1, 2004. http://www.chinaelections.org/uploadfile/200909/20090918021638239.pdf. 

[20] Yang Yao, “The End of the Beijing Consensus: Can China’s Model of Authoritarian Growth Service,” Foreign Affairs, February 2, 2010. https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/china/2010-02-02/end-beijing-consensus.

[21] United Nations Development Programme, “China’s success on Millennium Development Goals provides an example for others to follow for the post-2015 development agenda, says new UNDP report,” UNDP, February 17, 2015. https://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/presscenter/articles/2015/02/17/china-s-success-on-millennium-development-goals-provides-an-example-for-others-to-follow-for-the-post-2015-development-agenda-says-new-undp-report0.html.

[22] Xi Jinping, “Jointly Shoulder Responsibility of Our Times, Promote Global Growth,” President Xi’s Keynote speech at the World Economic Forum, CGTN America, January 17, 2017.  https://america.cgtn.com/2017/01/17/full-text-of-xi-jinping-keynote-at-the-world-economic-forum.

[23] Xi Jinping, “President Xi says to build Belt and Road into road for peace, prosperity, ” Speech to the UN, May 14, 2015. http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2017-05/14/c_136281412.htm.

[24] Shen Guofang, “Statement by Ambassador Shen Guofang, Deputy Permanent Representative of China to UN at the Security Council on the Topic of ‘Peace-Building: towards a Comprehensive Approach,’” Permanent Mission of the People’s Republic of China to the UN, February 5, 2015.  http://www.china-un.ch/eng/gjhyfy/qqwt/t85714.htm.

[25] Song Lili, “The Power of Giving: China Deepens Involvement in Refugee Affairs,” in China Story Year Book 2018, eds. J Golley, L. Jaivin, and P. Farrelly (Australian National University Press, 2019). 314-315. For the Middle East, see Laura Zhou, “China pledges US$23 billion in loans and aid to Arab states as it boosts ties in Middle East,” South China Morning Post, July 10, 2018.  https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomac-defence/article/2154642/china-pledges-us23-million-loans-and-aid-arab-states-it; For Africa, see Christian Shepherd and Ben Blanchard, “China’s Xi offers another $60 billion to Africa, but say no to ‘vanity’ projects,” Reuters, September 3, 2018. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-africa/chinas-xi-offers-another-60-billion-to-africa-but-says-no-to-vanity-projects-idUSKCN1LJ0C4