ABSTRACT
China reconsiders multilateralism One of the most visible changes in China’s foreign policy since the Dengist foreign policy reforms began has been in the country’s approach to multilateralism and international regimes and organisations. As the country’s global interests have expanded, China has optimised its engagement of various types of organisations in order to gain more “goods” and information from the international system. Moreover, as China’s power grows, it has developed a greater ability to help shape the policies and directions of political, economic and strategic organisations, and as a result has seen its structural power rise. Structural power is a concept broadly described as the ability to influence rules, norms and the “structure” of the relationship patterns within the international system. This type of power is also based on the ability and capacity of an actor to “socialise” with other actors in foreign relations to gain either material or political (such as prestige and diplomatic power) goods. This stands in contrast to the more traditional “coercive power”, namely the ability to use force or other inducements to prompt an actor to do something they would not normally do.1 China has gone from having structural power levels which were, at best, negligible under Mao to possessing an abundance, as has been demonstrated by Beijing’s recent behaviour towards a growing variety of institutions ranging from international (the United Nations) to more regional (such as the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO)). As the number of international organisations continues to grow in the post Cold War system, China is embedding itself more intensively in global networks. The effect of this deep engagement on modern Chinese foreign policymaking is a question worthy of further study.
