World Order: Reflections on the Character of Nations and the Course of History

Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 2014

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Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Introduction

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Conclusion

Key Figures

Themes

Index of Terms

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

Chapter 6Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapter 6 Summary: “Toward an Asian Order: Confrontation or Partnership”

Kissinger dedicates a separate chapter to China and organizes it accordingly: “Asia’s International Order and China,” “China and World Order,” and “A Longer Perspective”. He examines several relevant areas, such as the relationship between the unique Chinese historic style of diplomacy and its 21st-century counterpart as well as China’s relationship with other Asian nations and the rest of the world.

In general, strong national identities arose throughout Asia as a response to the colonial rule in the region. They perceive the world order as “rebalancing after an unnatural Western interruption over the past several centuries” (212). Kissinger considers the region volatile and challenging to the existent world order because every country in the region has been pursuing programs to amplify national status as well as build up military arsenals.

According to the author, for the entirety of its existence since 221 BCE, China has perceived itself as the center of the world order, literally the Middle Kingdom. This perception meant that the “world order reflected a universal hierarchy, not an equilibrium of competing sovereign states” (213). Diplomacy, as a result, affirmed the existing hierarchy rather than fostering negotiations between sovereign interests. Typically, China preferred to “dominate psychologically by its achievements and conduct” (215) as well as occasionally through its military campaigns. However, from the mid-19th century onward, China experienced what it refers to as a century of humiliation. This time period began with the domination by Western powers, including the opium wars, and ended with the Japanese occupation. More recently, the modern West attempted to incorporate China into its own Euro-Atlantic world system.

After facing Japanese aggression in the first half of the 20th century, the People’s Republic of China arose in 1949 under Mao Zedong. This new state entity found itself between China’s historic political heritage, an ideological alliance with the Soviet Union, and the West. Kissinger argues that this country managed to produce “a form of Communism intrinsic to China” (222). Later, what was started by Mao was consolidated and made sustainable by Deng Xiaoping.

Kissinger notes that China has not been part of defining the current international “rules of the game” (225) even though it plays by them. However, the author foresees China becoming more active and, indeed, central to shaping the international rules and the global affairs in the future. This increasingly important role might challenge the United States, which considers itself exceptional and entitled to disseminate its own vision around the world. The nature of the relationship between the United States and China will inform international relations at large in the 21st century. Sino-American relations are also complicated by military maneuvering and defense issues, China’s support of North Korea, as well as the American unilateral promotion of liberal democracy and human rights. In the United States, “the fear is that a growing China will systematically undermine American preeminence and thus American security” (228).

Chapter 6 Analysis

Kissinger’s personal interest in China—and his professional experience as a statesman in the Nixon administration—are made apparent in Chapter 6. Kissinger’s text exudes respect for the ancient and uninterrupted Chinese civilization. He is also considerate of Chinese grievances about the century of humiliation (1839-1949), especially Britain’s devastating opium trade, and opium wars, in that region:

The Western powers, to their shame, eventually brought matters to a head over the issue of free trade in the most self-evidently harmful product they sold, insisting on the right to the unrestricted importation of—from all the fruits of Western progress—opium (218).

Kissinger believes that China is a separate civilization, not unlike the aforementioned Huntington civilizational model. Indeed Kissinger endorsed Huntington’s 2011 The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order. Civilizational differences are not the only area of consideration in international relations, but they are important to the author. The Chinese themselves go further and perceive their country as a world order in itself. This order is hierarchic, and China is at the center of it, according to Kissinger:

The rich fertility of China’s plains and a culture of uncommon resilience and political acumen had enabled China to remain unified over much of a two-millennia period and to exercise considerable political, economic, and cultural influence—even when it was militarily weak by conventional standards. Its comparative advantage resided in the wealth of its economy, which produced goods that all of its neighbors desired. Shaped by these elements, the Chinese idea of world order differed markedly from the European experience based on a multiplicity of co-equal states (220).

However, he acknowledges that the Chinese sense of superiority is rivaled by the West. At present, it is China that is part of the Euro-Atlantic order. However, as time goes on, China’s rise might result in it setting—and redefining—the rules of the global order:

China rejects the proposition that international order is fostered by the spread of liberal democracy and that the international community has an obligation to bring this about, and especially to achieve its perception of human rights by international action (229).

This position challenges American international messianism and its perception that American values are universal values.

China in the 21st century is an economic powerhouse that has become increasingly assertive in the international political arena. China’s critics disparage its ban on certain Western social media platforms and call its politics authoritarian. China’s supporters praise the establishment of its own Internet and payment systems that make it more independent of Western political actions such as sanctions.

Kissinger repeatedly compares 21st-century China and the US as if the two sides are equivalent:

Both sides are reinforced in their suspicions by the military maneuvers and defense programs of the other. Even when they are “normal”—that is, composed of measures a country would reasonably take in defense of national interest as it is generally understood—they are interpreted in terms of worst-case scenarios. Each side has a responsibility for taking care lest its unilateral deployments and conduct escalate into an arms race (229).

Whereas both the US and China might indeed be equally suspicious of each other, it is the US that remains the sole superpower. Unlike the US, China has not been at war since the 1970s. It is also American warships provocatively maneuvering in the East and South China Seas rather than the Chinese warships off the coast of Seattle.