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Legacy of Tiananmen Square Incident in Sino-US Relations (post-2000)

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Abstract

The Tiananmen Square Incident of 1989 was one of the most influential events in the last few decades on China’s relationship with the world. In the aftermath, a united front was formed by the international community against China led by the USA. Tiananmen had negatively impacted the views of the American public and Congress on China, and it has not recovered since. At the turn of the century, the international context of US-China relations and China’s domestic, economic, and political conditions had changed drastically since 1989. This study sets out to understand what is the legacy of Tiananmen Square Incident of 1989 in Sino-US relations post-2000. Taking into accounts of the American media, relevant Congressional Committees, Congress legislations, and Department of State from 2000 to 2015, extensive research has been conducted on several aspects of American foreign policy to understand the lasting impacts of Tiananmen. At the start of the year 2000, references to Tiananmen seek to use its strength, as a symbol to associate with contemporary events remained strong in the media and was relatively weak in the discourse of US policy, but the Tiananmen arms embargo debate revived its value in the collective foreign conscience. With China’s increasing prominence on the international stage, American policy toward China is changing particularly with Obama administrations’ introduction of the pivot to East Asia. Invoking negative views of China created by the Tiananmen Square incident could gain greater influence in Sino-US relationship when its symbolic value can enforce traditional power interests.

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Acknowledgments

I would like to thank Professor Hongying Wang for providing her support and guidance on writing this paper.

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Correspondence to XueYing Hu.

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Hu, X. Legacy of Tiananmen Square Incident in Sino-US Relations (post-2000). East Asia 33, 213–232 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12140-016-9259-5

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