Acta Universitatis Danubius. Relationes Internationales, Vol 12, No 1 (2019)

Abstract

China’s rise is one of the most heated topics in today’s international world. China’s stubborn economic and military rise over the past three decades and also its regional and global behavior arises inquiries related to what sort of emerging power China is?. Does China play the role of supporter of the existing order, or, put it simply, it just wants to overthrow it?. On the other hand, to what extent China is a free rider of today’s global politics?. Indeed, China backs the free markets rules, while it disagrees Western institutions or other legal norms. China’s free rider approach is closely tied to its ineffective involvement in today’s liberal (economic) order considering the economic gifts it has offered to China, so far. Given the United States of America’s offshore retrenchment and China’s unwillingness to take on the global responsibilities, how strong the current international is?; and how it will look like without an orderer? Without any doubt, China is looking for regaining the prestige it had during its past dynasties, but it seems has no interest to take on the global responsibilities. Prestige is the most valuable asset when come to deal in international affairs. Considering those mentioned so far, we are going to assess, using the hegemonic stability theory, wheater China is committed to conserving the US-led international order, or it is ready to topple it. The article, also, will be divided into four parts, as follow- the first part concerns the introduction in the subject, the second part regards the exposure of the hegemonic stability theory. On the other hand, the third part is concerned with how China views the liberal order, while the fourth part is dedicated to the study case- ‘Why should China keep the liberal order’?.