To what extent have US-China relations since 1989 been affected by globalization?
Uploaded by roseline55 on Nov 19, 2003
Throughout the 1990s, China was identified as a major world military power as well as a US rival. Many feared that China’s large and growing population and prosperous economy would aid it in becoming a challenger to the status quo, not unlike Germany in the first half of the 20th century. A late modernizer like Germany, China’s identity is infused with ideas of victimization and the desire to take its “rightful place” in the world. America has continually viewed China with a dual image: a looming threat or a lucrative partner. In the eyes of America, a fat, happy China with stakes in proven international frameworks could be a cooperative and profitable ally; at the same time, a prosperous China, with an expanded and modernized army as well as a highly educated and media-savvy populace, could rise as a challenge to American dominance in both Asia and the rest of the world. Conversely, China, “where the leadership and citizenry alike see themselves as having only recently wrested control of their national destiny from the depredations of foreigners after more than a century of humiliation,” sees influences and demands by outsiders as another attempt to keep China down (Lampton 7). Thus, “America’s demands for market access, a lower trade deficit, and limits on weapons exports are often viewed as … as effort to retard China’s rise” (Lampton 9). America sees China as a valid competitor, yet China proudly bears the cross of the injured party. Thus duality of perception leads to misunderstanding and argument over issues such as trade and the environment since Beijing often wants the preferred treatment of a developing country while Washington insists that “China be judged by a higher standard” (Lampton 9).
Over the past fourteen years, one force has driven US-China relations above all others. That force is globalization, something which can be interpreted in a myriad of ways. Some say that globalization is a trend toward integration that has been present since early human society and cannot be controlled by any state, group, or individual. Trade among different societies has been present for thousands of years. Others state that globalization is a system perpetuated by several strong countries, corporations, and individuals. But as Daniel Yergin and Joseph Stanislaw put in their book The Commanding Heights, globalization is not a thing but a process and
“A move to a more connected world in which barriers and borders...