Beijing’s perception of the international system and foreign policy adjustment in the post-cold war world

This study, applying an international system-centered approach, represents a modest attempt to analyze Beijing’s official perception of the change in the international system from the Cold War bipolar confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union to a new post-cold war multipolar world, and to examine China’s foreign policy adjustment in recent years. It argues that Beijing’s perception of a multipolar system is a matter of normative truth rather than an empirical or analytical assessment. Because the multipolar system is its goal, Beijing “perceives” it. While working hard to encourage a multipolarity, Beijing in fact finds a unipolar reality in the post-Cold War era and has accommodated to it through its foreign policy adjustment. He will join the faculty of Colby College at Maine in the fall of 1993.