China’s Grand Strategy Under Xi Jinping: How History Complicates Beijing’s Global Outreach

This book attempts to identify change and continuity in PRC grand strategy, and the extent to which Chinese imperial history complicates PRC global outreach in the Xi Jinping era. Empires convey the wish to make the world a better place – even in the midst of oppression – and are eschatological in their rhetoric. However, empires that last longer have been more pragmatic in their grand strategy; sometimes appropriating the aura of past golden ages, and at other times learning from the mistakes of their predecessors. To date, Chinese strategic thinkers are preoccupied with learning lessons from the disintegration of the USSR and fascinated by the secrets of American power. Interdisciplinary in its reach, analysing grand strategy through both rhetoric and praxis, this book unpacks the Chinese world view through critical examination of the latest history textbooks currently in use in PRC middle schools. It also brings new evidence to bear on the debate in the West about Chinese strategic culture. Finally, it compares historical Japanese OFDI patterns with China in order to understand what makes the Chinese economy unique. China’s Grand Strategy Under Xi Jinping is aimed towards students and scholars of history, international business and wider Chinese studies.