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Asia’s history challenge
Posted By Graeme Dobell on June 22, 2015 @ 06:00
Never has a nation [China] moved so far, so fast, up the international rankings on all dimensions of power. In a generation, a state whose gross domestic product was smaller than Spain’s has become the second-largest economy in the world. If we were betting on the basis of history, the answer to the question about Thucydides’s trap appears obvious. In 11 of 15 cases since 1500 where a rising power emerged to challenge a ruling power, war occurred.
The argument that strong countries are bound to seek hegemony does not apply to China. This is not in the DNA of this country given our long historical and cultural background. Also China fully understands that we need a peaceful and stable internal and external environment to develop ourselves. We all to need to work together to avoid the Thucydides trap—destructive tensions between an emerging power and established powers, or between established powers themselves.
Imagine a world where institutions, rules and norms are ignored, forgotten or cast aside; in which countries with large economies and strong armies dominate, forcing the rest to accept the outcome. This would be a world where, in the words of the Greek historian Thucydides, ‘The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must’.
It should not be a world where might is right, where the strong do what they will and the weak suffer what they must. It should be a world where legitimacy and constructive engagement are the international norm, and every country, big and small, can compete peacefully for the chance to prosper.
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[1] Image: http://www.aspistrategist.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/9936824013_cb7cedded1_k.jpg
[2] Community: https://www.rsis.edu.sg/rsis-publication/nts/co15028-what-is-the-asean-community-2015/#.VYNE0fmqpBc
[3] New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/05/world/asia/philippine-leader-urges-international-help-in-resisting-chinas-sea-claims.html?_r=0
[4] visit to Japan: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/03/china-nazi-germany-south-china-sea-philippine-president-benigno-aquino
[5] version of the trap: http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/5d695b5a-ead3-11e1-984b-00144feab49a.html#axzz3dOsDcCT4
[6] told the Berggruen Institute: http://berggruen.org/topics/a-conversation-with-president-xi-at-big-s-understanding-china-conference
[7] Thucydides moment: http://www.aspistrategist.org.au/athens-and-sparta-come-to-the-south-china-sea/
[8] dark history: http://www.isis.org.my/attachments/apr28/Najib.pdf
[9] worried about the same history: http://www.pmo.gov.sg/mediacentre/transcript-keynote-speech-prime-minister-lee-hsien-loong-shangri-la-dialogue-29-may-2015
[10] expressed by Wang Gungwu: http://www.aspistrategist.org.au/china-rises-china-acts/