China and the Wider World of the Asia-Pacific

我们的15人团队致力于中国与亚太地区的关系。我们在3年内组织了15个研讨会。其中两个是与“华人世界”和“社会”团队的联合项目，一个是与“南亚”项目的“世界体系”团队的联合项目，这是一种跨学科的方法。1998年6月，我们主持了五中全会的“中国与亚太世界”会议，试图与其他团队分享我们的研究成果。经过3年的共同研究，我们得出了一些初步结论。(1)随着冷战的结束，中国的影响和经济关系局限于亚太地区，其新的外交战略是培育亚洲邻国，以确保和平环境，抵御美国的“威胁”。(2)东南亚出现了一种新的“中国威胁论”，但它与冷战时期的“威胁论”有两点本质不同：一是认为通过中国的“建设性接触”可以控制“威胁论”；二是不再涉及华侨。(3)经济上，港台华侨的“华人网络”对中国的发展，特别是南方的发展，有很大的贡献。中国非常热衷于加强他们与海外华人社区的联系。(4)上述3点都表明了一定的结构性变化。香港回归中国和1997年的亚洲经济危机，可能会导致进一步的结构性变化。

Our team of 15 worked on China's relations with the Asia-Pacific region. We organized 15 workshops in 3 years. Of the 15 two were joint ones with the "Chinese World" and "Society" teams and one with the "World System" team of the "South Asia" Project, which were meant for interdisciplinary approaches. In June 1998, we took charge of the "China and the Asia-Pacific World" session of the 5th Plenary Conference in an attempt to share our findings with the other teams.3 years' joint research led us to some tentative conclusions. (1) With the end of the Cold War China's influence and economic relations became confined to the Asia-Pacific region and its new diplomatic strategy is to cultivate its Asian neighbours in order to secure peaceful environment and fend off American "threat". (2) A new "China threat theory" arose in Southeast Asia, but it is essentially different from that in the Cold War in 2 points : a) the "threat" is considered controllable through "constructive engagemenr" of China ; and b) it no longer involves the Overseas Chinese. (3) Economically, the "Chinese network" of Hong Kong, Taiwan and Overseas Chinese greatly contributed to China's development in general and that in the South in particular. China has been extremely keen on strengthening their ties with the Overseas Chinese communities. (4) All the above 3 points indicate certain structural changes. Hong Kong's return to China and the Asian economic crisis in 1997 could cause further structural changes.