By Qin Xiaoying

The TV documentary series "The Rise of Big Powers", recently aired on CCTV, explores the lessons drawn from the rise of major powers such as Britain, Japan and the United States. The series has triggered discussion on what is the best way for China to develop.

Some foreign observers have concluded that the series serves to defend China's "rise".
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They think that China will embark on the road of "sword and fire" as the old Western colonial powers did a variant of the "China threat" theory.

In fact, industrialization, which also involves universal application of information technology, is the way for China to join the ranks of the world's prosperous countries.
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But how to achieve industrialization? A host of approaches and models lead to that goal.
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The distinctly different geopolitical, historical and cultural factors and times enjoyed by China determine that the country's road to development is bound to differ from that of Western powers or Japan.

First, China is located in a temperate zone, with two big rivers, the Yangtze and the Yellow, flowing across its vast territory into the sea. In addition, the country abounds in resources and has four distinctly defined seasons. All this facilitates farming.

As a result, a sense of self-sufficiency and looking inward became very important components in the character of the Chinese nation.

Economically, its survival and strength came largely from "internal circulation," a salient feature of the self-sufficient economy.

All these factors generally dictated that the Chinese nation did not desire territorial expansion.

As a matter of fact, historically, most of China's wars against alien forces were triggered by invading nomadic tribes, such as the Monguls, who were bent on plundering or conquering China.

All conquests, as Karl Marx once observed, have but three outcomes. The conquerors destroy the culture of the conquered. They accept elements of the local culture. Or they are assimilated by the local culture.

In fact, all the nomadic conquerors wound up in the third category. Why?

First, because the Chinese nation, with its unique inward-looking mode of survival, is super stable by nature.

Second, traditional Chinese culture contributed to the country's lack of expansionist ambitions. The political ideas of Confucianism, for example, held that the relationship between Chinese civilization and the outside world was between the civilized and the barbarian.

Chinese civilization was to radiate out in all directions to influence all others, instead of the equal relations between sovereign states. As a result, there existed no relationship of conqueror and conquered in the minds of the ancient Chinese rulers.

The millennia-old system of surrounding vassal states' paying tribute to the rulers of the "Central Kingdom" was just the institutional expression of the theory of Chinese civilization being at the center.

It is true that this idea became fossilized, leading to China's total seclusion, with the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) declining sharply and Western powers rising rapidly in the 19th century.

However, historically these ideas helped steer the country clear of launching expansionist wars.

In addition, no unified State religion in the real sense of the word occurred in Chinese history. Pantheist, polytheist and atheist beliefs have coexisted throughout Chinese history.

As a result, China has never been the breeding ground for the religious zeal that drove Westerners to launch foreign wars in an attempt to eliminate heresy.

Third, great changes have taken place in our times, which determine that China will take a different road to development than the roads taken by Western powers.

China, in the course of its development, has run into problems such as underdevelopment of the market, shortages of resources and energy, lack of capital, environmental pollution, insufficient employment, low-level urbanization and weak scientific and technological creativity.

If China had been presented with these problems before the 20th century, the country might have followed in the rut of old colonial powers, seeking raw materials, cheap labor and investment venues overseas with the use of force.

Germany and Japan, latecomers in the world's political and economic arenas, went to war because they wanted to redivide the spheres of influence. They wanted to snatch a bigger share of raw material bases, investment venues and cheap labor force.

Everything, however, has changed with the arrival of the information age, particularly since the world entered the 21st century. The world market has become unified since the end of the Cold War two opposing blocks no longer confront each other. Economic activities and business transactions are conducted largely through transnational corporations.

The trend of economic globalization is irreversible. World economic and monetary organizations are increasingly blurring national boundaries for economic activities.

These profound changes taking place in the world's economic arena clear away the stumbling blocks to China's revival. Moreover, the changes cut off the option for such emerging big countries as China, India, Brazil and South Africa to follow the old track of Western powers' rise to power.

In fact, the Chinese government has time and again demonstrated to the world its determination to take the road of peaceful development and announced a foreign policy geared to helping bring about world harmony.

The author is a researcher with the China Foundation for International and Strategic Studies.

(China Daily January 10, 2007)