ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the question of whether China’s grand strategy was realist or liberalist. Like the preceding, this chapter scrutinizes China’s current culture of anarchy, which means, the idea that China has of the international system. And because the preceding chapter was not conclusive on the question, answering the question of whether China’s culture of anarchy was realist or liberalist helps us anticipate what use it will make of its preponderance of capabilities. In the process, the chapter reveals the possibility of China’s use of agential capacity to concoct its own third way. The history and the identity of China, as well as the pragmatism it has demonstrated, allow for contemplating such a possibility.
