Hostname: page-component-7b7567c8c-wxvwp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-15T21:33:46.399Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

China, Russia, and the Third World*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2009

Extract

Nearly all Chinese, and many foreign students of China, will have it that China has never been, and is now unlikely to become, an expansionist power. A recent article in The Times said that China, being land-based rather than maritime, “never developed any sense of international relations”; instead of a Foreign Office, the old China had until 1842 an office for the management of barbarians, “whose respect for Chinese supremacy was demanded or exacted.” In other words, China's non-aggressiveness contains an element of semantic jugglery. How could China “expand,” and how could there be international relations when the Emperor was already regarded as ruler of the world? It is worth recalling that when the Ming fleets visited places as distant as Aden to “make known the Imperial commands,” this concept was in fact extended to peoples overseas; on their return, the envoys announced: “The countries beyond the horizon and from the ends of the earth have all become subjects … the barbarians from beyond the seas … have come to audience bearing precious objects and presents.”

Information

Type
Foreign Relations
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 1962

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable