Foreword

The COVID-19 pandemic is now raging on not only as a serious threat to health and life security, but also a great shock to the current international strategic landscape. In order to set a clear goal for international strategy and have a better grasp on the logic behind the changes in the international strategic landscape, China should develop foresight and strategic sensibility, gain a profound insight into the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic as a catalyst for the current international strategic landscape, and mobilize world-wide players in striving for a more just and equitable international order and system.

Firstly, the regrouping of international strategic players is underway. The international strategic landscape, in short, is about the relative distribution of power between major strategic players in the world. In the early years of the post-Cold War period, the Western world led by the US came to dominate the international strategic landscape — a situation, however, that has been challenged over the past 30 years on a decade basis. From 2001 to 2003, international terrorism and the two wars that the then US President George W. Bush waged cost the US hegemony as the world’s only superpower. In 2008, the international financial crisis and the upgrading of the then-G20 finance meeting to a leaders’ summit forced major developed and developing nations to discuss international economic affairs together. In 2020, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, China’s efficient response strikes a stark contrast with the passivity and delay on the part of the Western countries. Moreover, in terms of major issues including health and life, the Western world led by the US is increasingly divided while emerging strategic players, China in particular, are exerting greater power over the international community. At its Foreign Ministers’ Meeting on March 25th, the G7 failed to issue a joint statement because the US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo insisted upon referring the coronavirus as “Wuhan virus,” which was opposed to by his counterparts of other member states. By comparison, at the G20 Extraordinary Leaders’ Summit on COVID-19, China gained support from most leaders of the member states.

Secondly, the relative distribution of power in the international community is on the verge of a qualitative change. With the changes in global affairs and international relations, the relative distribution of power between the players will see a qualitative change at a critical moment as a result of continuous quantitative changes. Years later from now, when looking back to today’s pandemic, we would probably take it as a prelude to a qualitative change in the international strategic landscape (or the relative distribution of power) for several major reasons. Firstly, the US capacity to unite the Western nations against presumed common enemies has been greatly undermined, and the global strategies based on geostrategy and geopolitics have proved unable to address many major challenges. Secondly, there is a growing consensus among other regional and global major nations than the US when addressing nonconventional security threats, thus setting a new trend in today’s world. However, the US unilateralism and its withdrawal from international agreements and organizations have become a stumbling block for the international community to address nonconventional security threats. Thirdly, with a sharp focus on issues related to development and the well-being of the people, major developing nations, notably China, are stressing the importance of a better and healthier life while striving for international cooperation, thus indicating their greater influence and leadership amid the pandemic. Fourthly, in peaceful times, the qualitative changes in the relative distribution of power take place in a step-by-step manner. Although such a change is around the corner, it will take some time for this to happen. Therefore, the international community should work for its early arrival and for its orderly progress after the critical moment.

Thirdly, the role of international strategic mechanisms is changing. The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the urgency and significance to deal with nonconventional security threats in the 21st century. In response to conventional and nonconventional security threats and a combination of the both, international strategic mechanisms have been enhanced and extended from conventional security sectors to nonconventional ones such as financial security, ecological security, public health, and cyber security. The World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the World Health Organization, and the United Nations Climate Change Conference, among others, have assumed new tasks. It is noteworthy that China is playing an increasingly important role in the aforementioned sectors and mechanisms, which shows that China is on the right track of the development of history, making more contributions as a shining example and trailblazer. Although now we cannot say that the emerging strategic players in the international community, notably China, have gained dominance in all international mechanisms, they have at least a greater say in many sectors and issues as well as in making relevant rules, as clearly exemplified by their leading roles in the G20 Extraordinary Leaders’ Summit on COVID-19.

Fourthly, strategic vision and responsibility are indispensable. Building a stable international strategic landscape based on balanced development requires a strategic vision that strikes a balance between immediate concerns and long-term interests, and a foresight that makes today’s endeavors serve the future development, so as to make progress in a sustainable and step-by-step manner. China has every reason to look at the current fight against the pandemic from the perspective of life and health, but what is needed is to have a sense of mission for building a global public health governance system and a global governance system as a whole, and to show the manner, style and hallmark of China as a responsible major country that is equal to historic tasks. Amid the pandemic, China has supported other countries with the goal to build a community of a shared future for mankind. “Kindness is true confidence. And the true mightiness lies in putting yourself in others’ shoes and viewing their difficulties as your own. Regardless of nationalities and beliefs, no one should mock or turn a deaf ear to the call for survival from helpless people,” said Jack Ma, co-founder and former executive chairman of the Chinese giant Alibaba Group, when his foundation donated medical materials like masks to other pandemic-stricken nations. China is closer than ever to realizing the goal of national rejuvenation. In addition, in terms of building a new international system and a new international strategic landscape, China is in the most advantageous period since the Age of Discovery. It should regard the fight against the pandemic as a step toward building a community of a shared future for mankind, and make greater progress in the way ahead.

After China gained a major, although not yet a complete, victory in the fight against COVID-19, the Shanghai Institute for International Strategic Studies (SIISS) invited 11 experts and scholars from Shanghai to share their insights into the interactions between the COVID-19 pandemic and international relations as well as the international strategic landscape. Their initial findings were released on the SIISS WeChat official account and then compiled into a book entitled A Research on the Interaction between the Current Pandemic and the Contemporary International Relations, which has been well received, with the number of online reads ten times higher than usual. They were used as a reference by government departments and republished on the Internet by some academic institutions. Then SIISS invited once again 13 experts and scholars to share more thoughts via the WeChat official account. Now their articles have been published as a collection entitled Changes in the International Strategic Landscape amid COVID-19 Pandemic. Any comments or suggestions from readers are welcome.

President of the Shanghai Institute for International Strategic Studies

Yang Jiemian

March 31, 2020

Source: Foreword for the collection of academic articles Changes in the International Strategic Landscape amid COVID-19 Pandemic by the Shanghai Institute for International Strategic Studies