The Self-Absorbed Dragon

Noticeably absent from the first 90 minutes of Hu's speech was much talk of foreign policy; the only mention of Taiwan came when Hu actually thanked its citizens for supporting China's economic modernization. When he did finally turn to discuss the difficult island head-on, he spent barely five minutes on the subject. After swearing (to applause) that China wouldn't permit Taiwan to secede from the "one motherland," Hu called for the "peaceful development" of cross-Strait relations and promised to negotiate anything, any time, with anyone in Taiwan who recognizes a one-China policy.

The explanation for his pacific approach was simple: China's governing Communist elite has bet its political future on continued economic growth—and nothing would endanger that more than military tensions with Taiwan or the United States. Beijing and Washington share the same nightmare: that Taiwan will declare independence, forcing the great powers into a conflict they'd rather avoid. This is why Hu recently stood shoulder to shoulder with President George W. Bush at a summit meeting in Australia, warning Taiwan not to rock the boat.

It's also why the Chinese military received even less attention in Hu's speech to the Congress than Taiwan did. When the topic came up, he mentioned the need to reorganize the People's Liberation Army, cut it by 200,000 troops and make better use of civilian technology—and then gave a stern reminder that the party remained in control of the military. On foreign affairs, Hu reiterated China's policy of nonintervention, "soft power" engagement in Asia, and his belief that global interdependence has rendered "balance of power" politics obsolete. Rabble-rousing it wasn't.

For decades, the policy of the West has been to encourage the Chinese to renounce global revolution and power politics and to focus instead on how to get rich. China has done just that, becoming a successful, self-absorbed, status quo power. It's still not democratic, and should its economic growth falter, it could still fall prey to social protest and disorder, greater repression, a conservative military and resurgent nationalism. But if the West has anything to fear, it's not the resurgent Red Dragon, nor that China's government will succeed in its grand ambitions—but rather that it won't.

Moravcsik, a professor of politics at Princeton University, is currently based in Shanghai.Moravcsik ,

© 2007