The recent flurry of Asia-Pacific summits is, indeed, a clear sign of the shifting global balance, as Kishore Mahbubani rightly points out. But they also raise pertinent questions at a more basic level than the “humane authority” advocated by Yan Xuetong (which, itself, involves some tricky questions where China is concerned).
What is striking about the evolving regional situation is the extent to which China has walked into trouble. Under Deng Xiaoping, it followed a policy of “biding time and hiding one’s talents” while it grew economically. That has been abandoned. But Beijing has failed to craft a coherent regional – let alone global – policy in its place as interest groups, from the army to the export lobby, make their influence felt. The foreign ministry appears to have little clout.
Regionally, China says it is all for cooperation and variable geometry with Asean but it has generally sought to deal with its neighbours on a bilateral basis. Its insistence that it has sovereignty over the whole of the South China Sea runs into claims from other states, notably Vietnam and the Philippines. Its trawlers have got into a series of maritime clashes against the backdrop of tough nationalistic rhetoric from Global Times, the Communist party tabloid. Though small in scale, such incidents and the underlying tussle for under-sea energy deposits have served only to remind smaller east Asia states (not to mention Japan and South Korea) that their security depends on the US. In some cases it has driven them into one another’s arms.