China US Relations: It's Complex Interdepence Stupid!

 

Leon Panetta-the United State’s defense secretary- has assuaged and calmed Chinese fears about US’ encirclement and containment of China. Chinese fears were aroused after President Obama, sought a rebalancing and shift of the United States focus to the Asia Pacific. Panetta asserted that, ‘the United States’ effort to rebalance to the Asia Pacific region is not an attempt to contain China. It is an attempt to engage China and expand its role in the Pacific. These assertions, if taken at face value, suggest that the United States is reviewing its traditional posture in/toward the Asia Pacific where it has been the hegemon by default since the end of the Second World War. It may also reflect that the United States is veering to the idea of co-hegemony in the region. That is, exercise control and influence in the region jointly with China.

 

 

The contours of the emerging relationship between China and the United States then  suggest that a new dynamic is panning out in the Asia Pacific. This dynamic is not premised on the traditional and conventional understanding of international relations and politics. The core and thrust of this view is that rising powers inevitably clash and entre into a conflict with established powers and that conflict is the sine qua non of relations between states. The nature of the relationship between China – an emerging power or a potential superpower- and the United States suggests the obverse. Both appear to be disavowing outright conflict and focusing and working toward a relationship that is an admixture of co-operation, distance, caution and preparation for conflict. What explains this rather paradoxical relationship which defies crude caricature?

 

A range of factors explain this paradoxical relationship. The salient of these maybe that  the contemporary world order and international relations are in a state of flux, uncertainty and fluidity. Unipolarity –an aberrant interlude in world politics- is inexorably and inevitably giving way to either bi polarity or multi polarity. The United States appears to be seizing the moment and the initiative  and in the new or potential grand chess board of international politics making moves that ensure its leadership or more accurately world leadership. Leadership in today’s world does not necessarily accrue from hard power and other indices of power or coercion. It is premised on smart power or a combination of hard and soft power which in turn can lead to or translate into influence. Contextual intelligence, to use Joseph Nye’s term, determines or is a pivotal component of leadership in today’s world. The context is changing. So is the United States approach and strategy.

 

This is the prosaic and the obvious reason for the United States strategic review. There is, however, a more compelling reason for the United State’s review and approach to both the Asia pacific and the world. It stems from what has been termed as ‘complex interdependence’. Put simply, complex interdependence means that states are bound together in a framework (usually economic) in such a manner that their trajectories are interlinked and bound. This framework reduces and obviates the traditional actions and reactions of states- balancing, security dilemmas, and the attendant conflicts- and makes states co-operate. This then becomes the national interest of states or in the least coeval with the national interest of states.

 

The contemporary wave of globalization has brought states of a different nature and complexity into the framework of complex interdependence. The most critical of these relationships and frameworks is the relationship between China and the United States. Both are deeply enmeshed into the complex interdependence paradigm. The volume of trade and capital flows between the two countries has increased by a staggering margin. The oft quoted relationship where China buys United States’ Treasury bills and which in turn impacts interest rates in the United States and ultimately the entire world is perhaps the most compelling and poignant example of this relationship. It is one which serves both countries well and which neither would want to disturb.

 

Does this mean that all is and will be hunky dory and complex interdependence will inevitably lead to harmonious relations between the sole superpower and the emerging one? The answer is no. The prescriptions and political philosophies of the great Thucydides and the eminent Hans Morgenthau remain relevant as well. States view for power and security and take measures to bring these to fruition. What complex interdependence does is inject prudence, caution and sobriety into the calculations and calculus of states. It makes recourse to conflict and war less likely. Or it can be said that conflict mutates into the domain of low politics.

 

It is then an admixture of the tenets of realism and complex interdependence- a curious combination- that explains the United States approach and strategy. This can only be salubrious for world order, peace and amity. Less conflict and the lesser likelihood of war means a peaceful world where people and states are liberated from paradigms that impinge negatively on people’s welfare and security. It is a world that should be welcomed and efforts made to hasten its crystallization. And the catalyst for this is globalization and complex interdependence. The trajectory of both be set in stone. This is owed to humanity and future generations.