ABSTRACT
In the not-too-distant future we might look back on 2017 as the year that China truly became a Great Power. Until Donald Trump became U.S. president, China had been viewed as a rising challenger to the United States, but one that lacked some of the requisite characteristics of a global leader. Perceptions quickly changed in the turbulent months after Trump entered the White House. While Trump alienated traditional U.S. allies in NATO and the European Union, China’s president Xi Jinping pushed ahead with his signature Belt and Road Initiative, a series of mega-infrastructure projects linking China more closely with its Asian neighbors, the Middle East, Russia, Europe, and even Africa. As Trump turned the United States inward economically, abandoning the Trans-Pacic Partnership, Xi defended free trade at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. While Trump announced that the United States was withdrawing from the Paris climate accord, China emerged as the global leader against climate change, accelerating its lead as the largest investor in renewable energy in the world. While Trump stressed “America First,” Xi said in February 2017 that China “should guide the international community to jointly build a more just and reasonable new world order.” On issue after issue, and in region after region, China seemed eager to ll the vacuum left by a retreating United States.
