On Several Features of International Situation

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Thursday, April 04, 2002

On Several Features of International Situation

Generally speaking, the basic world pattern and the general trend of the international situation remain unchanged. Peace and development remain the theme of the times. World polarization continues to move forward in a tortuous way. At present and for a period of time to come, the basic posture of the international situation is like this: overall peace, local war; overall relaxation, local tension; and overall stability, local turbulence.

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Increase of unstable factors in the international situation and the augmentation of the threatening factor on the non-traditional security question following the "September 11" terrorist attacks on the United States of America have caused the international security situation to be more complicated than before.

Generally speaking, the basic world pattern and the general trend of the international situation remain unchanged. Peace and development remain the theme of the times. World polarization continues to move forward in a tortuous way. At present and for a period of time to come, the basic posture of the international situation is like this: overall peace, local war; overall relaxation, local tension; and overall stability, local turbulence.

Relatively Relaxed Big-Power Relation, Basically Stable International Pattern

After the conclusion of the Cold War, along with the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the end of the Yalta system, the United States of America became the only superpower in the world. The outline of the basic international pattern featuring "one superpower and multiple powers" has initially appeared, and the trend of the world developing toward multi-polarization has begun to emerge. Although the "September 11" incident dealt a heavy blow to the United States, it, however, has not changed the basic pattern of the world. From the perspective of overall strength, the status of the United States as the only superpower has not been shaken. The European Union (EU) and Japan still have rather strong economic, scientific and technological strength; Russia still is the world's only country that militarily can rival the United States and has tremendous potential; China's economic strength is also growing rapidly and its international influence is rising with each passing day. There exist bonding points and conflicting points of interest among various big powers, and relative stability and balance are maintained in their relative strengths.

After it came to power last year, the Bush administration pursued a unilateralist policy and its relationship with other big powers thus tended to become strained. The "September 11" terrorist attacks have compelled the United States to make certain strategic and tactical adjustments, including a certain degree of change in its attitude towards other big powers. It adjusted its relations with other big powers in the direction toward cooperation and stability. US-European relations, Russian-US relations, and China-US relations have all undergone certain changes. The "September 11" incident has not led to frontal confrontation between big powers or to the unbalance of international forces.

Generally speaking, in this period of century alternation, big-power relations present these characteristics:

Although there still exist various differences and conflicts of interest between big powers, which, however, no longer carry the nature of all-round confrontation, various countries, to various extents, also avoid adopting such an attitude.

The economic ties among various big powers have tended to become closer, which contain something of each in the other, resulting in the increase and expansion in the fields of common interest.

The zero-sum nature of international relationships is decreasing, while the nature of coexistence, more wins, and the nature of destruction of the two sides (or several sides) is increasing. This characteristic has made countries tend to solve problems through dialogs, consultations, negotiations and other political methods and avoid going to extremes.

Economic Inter-dependence Exists Through Competition, Cultures Merge Through Agitation

Change in the world economic situation exerts important influence on the behaviour of the state and in the international situation. The rapid development of information industry, bio-engineering sector and other high-tech industries is altering the structures and needs of traditional industries. In modern economic life, although the importance of land and resources brooks no negligence, the training and use of personnel and the role of the soft social environment have become more prominent. The former can be obtained by the method of war or strength, the latter can only be realized through social development. Change in and requirement of the economic situation produce major influence on the method of international behaviour, the method for pursuing national interests is undergoing changes, in a certain sense, it even affects the method for the pursuit of hegemony and changes the form of war.

Regional economic cooperation and global collaboration have registered fairly big progress in recent years. The development of regional cooperation is playing a promotional role in the establishment of a just, rational and balanced new international political and economic order in the 21st century. In recent years, the great impetus of the EU economic and political integration, the development of the American free trade zone, the declaration on the imminent establishment an African alliance, the strengthening of east Asian regional cooperation and the momentum of the vigorous development of trans-regional Europe-Asia cooperation, etc. have brought about new integration of global political, economic and trade, diplomatic, military security and other areas, the rapid development of regional, transnational cooperative organizations of various contents. Different forms and multiple levels has provided more effective channels for solving regional contradictions and conflicts and promoting dialogs and cooperation, it also plays a definite role in restraining superpower unilateral acts. At the same time, the development of regional organizations has strengthened the interdependent and interaction relations among countries.

Under the impetus of economic requirements, humanity has reached more and more common views on the establishment of international order and formulation and observance of the norms guiding international relationship. The representativeness of the United Nations, the World Trade Organization and other international agencies and their ability to handle international affairs have tended to become larger, and the so-called anarchist condition in international affairs has been improved to some extent. This is one of the factors guaranteeing peace and stability in the overall situation of the world.

Over the past 10 years and more after the Cold War, many conflicts in the world bear the religious, cultural and national colour. The Cold War was followed by a period witnessing the significant advancement of economic globalization and the information revolution. Since the start of the information revolution, various countries have seen unprecedented development of information and cultural exchanges. This development has brought two faceted reaction: on the one hand, the trend featuring different countries and nations engaging in cultural and information exchange, integrating, absorbing and learning from each other has developed rapidly; on the other hand, cultural clash and inadaptability have surfaced. In developing countries, weak culture has rebounded upon the strong culture of the West, nationalist sentiment is rising, the revival of fundamentalism has emerged in some countries with a fairly strong religious tradition. A certain kind of demand for the "defence of cultural purity" or "protecting the cultural features" has actually emerged in developed countries, and there is even the tendency of regression of Christian fundamentalism. The above-mentioned cultural factors have, in a sense, entailed the overall and local characteristics of the current international situation. The influence of the "social factor", the "cultural factor", etc. on international relations may enlarge. The dissemination of different ideologies, the concept of value, religious beliefs, etc. may all become means for trial of strengths among different countries or nations.

Generally speaking, the fusion of culture is the general development trend in correspondence with the new economic and social development. Collision is the inevitable reaction in a certain period of change. The two will lead to the development of a kind of civilization featuring diversity and the contradictory unity of globalization.

Multiplication & Modification of International Security, Global Problems Need Prompt Solutions

The occurrence of the "September 11" incident indicates that the current international security problem tends to become more diversified. Traditional security factors and non-traditional security factors are interwoven. In fact, after the Cold War, the non-traditional security problems, such as the environment, refugees, terrorism, cyber crimes and financial crimes, have increasingly possessed a global nature and have become an important international security topic. The "September 11" incident has made the problem of terrorism more striking, the internationalized, network-based and large-scaled terrorism has become a major international problem.

After the Cold War, in some regions around the world, regional conflicts with national cultural colour have increased or intensified, in addition, the involvement of big powers in these regions or the existence of the clash of interests have resulted in the fact that some hot spots still exert serious influence on regional and even international security.

Since the United States is nowadays the only superpower, its movement has great influence. In the past two years, the United States has frequently taken unilateralist action, and showed an extremely strong desire for holding the leading position, and it relies heavily on military strength to solve problems and has thus brought about considerable negative effects on international security. The policies and measures the US adopted in the process of solving the problem of terrorism as well as the strategic intention it displayed merit attention. Due to the common effect of various factors, there still exist local war-caused chaos, tension and turbulence in the international situation.

Behind the non-traditional security problem, there are actually some global social problems, such as the gap between the South and the North, the gap between the rich and the poor, cultural compatability, the marginalization of some developing countries. Simultaneously with economic globalization, social problems have become a global topic. This year has seen the convocation of the two conferences - global economic forum and the global social forum, which carried considerable symbolic significance.

In the past, the governments of various countries were the mainstays of conduct in international activities. In recent years, non-governmental organizations have become activists in international activities, this is also a phenomenon worth noting.

In short, today's world is in a transitional period wherein the old pattern has collapsed, while a new one has not yet formed. It is full of various changing and relatively invariant factors. Only by accurately grasping the trends of the times and the characteristics of the situation, judging the hour and sizing up the situation and giving guidance in light of the trend, can we correctly cope with the challenges posed by the complicated international environment, develop ourselves and effectively safeguard world peace and promote human progress.

By People's Daily Online

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