Review: How Xi Jinping Shapes China Southeast Asia Strategy
New book by ambassador and ex-premier examines Xi's centrality to China's foreign policy outlook, with implications for Southeast Asia and the Indo-Pacific.
A new book by an ambassador and ex-premier examines how President Xi Jinping’s worldview will drive China’s approach to Southeast Asia and the world into the 2030s and beyond.
WonkCount: 2,124 words (~10 minutes)
Review: How Xi Jinping Shapes China Southeast Asia Strategy
Context
“[T]he Global Security Initiative is being implemented by China in the region,” read the hedged language in the ASEAN-China statement as part of the round of just-concluded regional summitry in Laos1. As we have been noting on ASEAN Wonk, that language is just one manifestation of how ASEAN states are navigating China’s ideological framework set forth under President Xi Jinping centered on the so-called “community with a shared future” for mankind and four key initiatives — the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI); Global Development Initiative (GDI); Global Security Initiative (GSI) and Global Civilizational Initiative (GCI) (see ASEAN Wonk graphic below)2.
Select Recent China-Southeast Asia Policy Developments
A new book On Xi Jinping by ambassador and ex-premier Kevin Rudd sheds light on how China’s current and future regional and global worldview is being shaped by Xi3. In doing so, it adds to conversations across Indo-Pacific capitals about how to navigate China under Xi into the rest of the 2020s and likely into the 2030s in aggregate as well as in sectors ranging from technology to the media. This comes amid recent works on China’s wider trajectory within the past few years we have cited and reviewed here on ASEAN Wonk, including by Elizabeth Economy, Evan Medeiros and Susan Shirk4. On Xi Jinping has over 400 pages of text. Unlike Rudd’s earlier book The Avoidable War on US-China relations, which had no footnotes, On Xi Jinping has nearly 200 additional pages for its notes, bibliography and index5.
Analysis
The book makes a comprehensive case for the centrality of Xi’s ideological framework in understanding China’s future regional and global approach. Rudd argues that given the centrality of Xi in China’s political system, his ideological framework — which he terms “Marxist Nationalism” for short — is a critical precursor and signaling device for foreign policy change or lack thereof, rather than just intellectual fiction or ideological post-facto rationalization6. A case in point is the persistence of China’s assertive foreign and security policy amid escalating costs seen in 2023 which Rudd dubs Xi’s “annus horribilis” — including slowing growth; the rise of minilaterals like AUKUS; and negative reputational effect of wolf warrior diplomacy and economic coercion in parts of the developing world. Rudd argues that within Xi’s ideological framework, such costs are merely “political downpayment” for more major gains to come, including a more disciplined party, controlled private sector and confident China abroad7. “Put simply, China, under Xi Jinping, is no longer a status quo power,” Rudd writes. “Xi’s intention is not just to change China, but to change the international order itself,” with China as a geopolitical and geoeconomic fulcrum of that order amid the decline of the United States and the West8.
On Xi Jinping also forecasts how Xi’s vision is likely to affect specific policy areas that are important to watch and will be of interest to scholars, policymakers and businesses alike (see table below for a summary of these priority areas, along with major issues to watch and notable details. As usual, paying subscribers can also read the rest of the “Analysis” section and “Implications” section looking at how these dynamics play out in the future).