Learning from the EU?: China’s changing outlook toward multilateralism

There is some irony in China’s studying the European Union (EU). At first glance, many differences separate the domestic and international environments in which China and the EU respectively evolve. China is a one-party dominated polity developing at high speed in a region where the remnants of the Cold War confrontation are still perceptible, in particular in the Korean peninsula and the Taiwan Strait, and where the principles of sovereignty and unilateralism still occupy the pinnacle of international relation rules. The EU, on its part, is a post-World War II adventure based on shared political values and democracy, as well as the principles of non-use of force, multilateralism, and limited sovereignty.