The PRC’s relations in the Asia – Pacific
The unification of China under a new and vigorous government was bound to present problems of adjustment to the countries of the Asia-Pacific. It was not clear how its historical assertions of centrality would be addressed in the very different modern world. Similarly, there was uncertainty as to how particular disputes over territory and borders as well as the legacy of the colonial era would be handled. How would the new China relate to the newly independent states and their regimes? What would be the relations between the new China and the overseas Chinese? These more particular concerns became inextricably linked for the first forty years after 1949 by the impact of the Cold War and by China’s changing conflictual relations with the two global powers. The end of the Cold War has raised new issues about adapting to China’s economic integration within the region and its rising power at time of increasing doubts about the durability of the American military commitment to East Asia.
The evolution of the relations with the Asia-Pacific are best treated chronologically, in order to demonstrate the significance of China’s relations with the two superpowers.