The opening of China, the adoption of neo-liberal economic reforms by Deng Xiaoping in the late 1980s, and China's membership in the World Trade Organization (WTO) signal a new era in international relations between China and the world's major trading partners like the United States and the European Union (EU). Globalization and China's desire to reinvigorate its stalled economy demanded new approaches from Beijing toward international relations. As Noesselt claims, "To realize China's interests, the PRC began to establish partnership relations, which would allow the PRC to pursue her national interests by following a soft power approach and avoiding open military conflicts" (14). Today China is a global power due to these reforms.
In contrast to China's partnership diplomacy, international relations theory toward China where the EU is concerned is anachronistic at best. Fox and Godement claim that "Europe's approach to China is stuck in the past. The EU continues to treat China as the emerging power it used to be, rather than the global force it has become" (1). Despite decisions in Beijing being significant to nearly every EU global concern (environment, nuclear proliferation, economic growth, etc.), the EU continues an IR theory of "unconditional engagement," a policy that permits China access to all economic and other benefits of cooperation with the EU while "asking for little in return" (Fox and Godement 2). This analysis will discuss the emerging shape of IR theory with respect to EU-China relations.
China's international relations with the EU are based on the same principles of peace, economic development, and cooperation that it pursues with other trading partners. Its current international relations with the EU is based on the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence: 1) mutual respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity; 2) mutual non-aggression; 3) non-interference in each other'...