Abstract
Why the concept of a “period of strategic opportunity” was not expressed in the report on the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China in 2022, as has been the case for the past 20 years, is a question worthy of further investigation. The ebb and flow of the liberal international order, as well as Biden's implementation of a tougher and more effective China policy than the Trump administration, have made the CCP leadership aware of the reduction of China's strategic opportunities. This has triggered changes in the Chinese Communist Party’s grand strategic rhetoric in the short period from 2020 to 2022. Analysis of the usage of the term “period of strategic opportunity” in China’s official documents over three periods, namely the 2000s, 2010s, and after 2020, and identifying the differences among influential Chinese scholars provides the tools to demonstrate and confirm the argument described above. Moreover, Chinese leadership no longer expresses China’s grand strategic plans as optimistically as they have over the past 20 years, but they still hope to maintain strategic stability with Washington to avoid prematurely losing more strategic opportunities.
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Notes
“Period of Strategic Opportunity” [战略机遇期] is sometimes referred to as a “period of important strategic opportunity”.
For example, Men Honghua, a well-known strategist, believes that even in the Trump era, China’s PSO may still have exist (2020). The foundation of China's PSO lies in China's own continuous development and strategic innovation. The advancement of the Belt and Road Initiative has created a new PSO. China should be committed to extending and proactively shaping the PSO. Fang Changping points out that after 2012, Beijing proposed and implemented the Belt and Road Initiative, organized the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, and has actively shaped its relations with neighboring and developing countries in recent years (2020). These have been Beijing’s pioneering initiatives to take advantage of development opportunities. China should not only seize and use strategic opportunities but also shape and create them.
Chinese scholars have written about 500 articles explaining the CCP leadership’s related discourse over the past 20 years.
This is inspired by Mencius’s well-known statement: “The omens of Heaven are no match for the advantages of the Earth. The advantages of the Earth are no match for the common consent of People (see Dobson 1963)”.
China's three generations of supreme leaders have discussed this. Deng Xiaoping said that “development is the last word.” Jiang Zemin said that “development must be the party's top priority in governing and rejuvenating the country.” Hu Jintao said that “no matter what happens, we must single-mindedly seek development”.
It is worth noting that Dr. Yue Xiaoyong, who once worked in the Research Office of the State Council, the core decision-making body of the Chinese government, stated in a public report that PSO mainly refers to external factors. For example, the United States was the first country to put forward the concept of PSO. PSO defined by Americans refers to the disintegration of the Soviet Union. Washington's goal was to use this as an opportunity to establish a new world order centered on the United States (Yue 2019).
American international relations scholars rarely discuss the role of time in international strategy. See Edelstein (2017).
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The author would like to thank Chen Zhimin, Guo Sujian, Zhang Qingmin, Sun Guodong, Zheng Yu, Lin Xi, Pu Xiaoyu, Wu Chengqiu, Chen Yudan, Zhang Falin, Wang Zhongyuan, Wen Yao, and three anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments.
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Meng, W., Yao, H. The Disappearing “Period of Strategic Opportunity”: Implications for China’s Grand Strategy in a New Era. Chin. Polit. Sci. Rev. (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41111-023-00247-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s41111-023-00247-7