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Futures beyond ‘the West’? Autoimmunity in China’s harmonious world

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 June 2015

ASTRID H.M. NORDIN
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Abstract

It has become fashionable among International Relations scholars to draw on the concept of ‘autoimmunity’, which some call ‘the ultimate horizon in which contemporary politics inscribes itself’. To these scholars, most of whom draw on the thought of Jacques Derrida, such logics open systems up to a future to come. At the same time, they tend to identify such logics with Europe, America, Western modernity, and/or democracy. Implied, and sometimes explicit, in their accounts is the denial of autoimmune logics at work outside such an imagined configuration.

This article challenges that denial through arguing that the system of ‘harmony’, deployed in contemporary China, also works on an autoimmune logic. If autoimmunity opens up a system to the future, this is not only so for European democracy or its derivatives. Moreover, the expulsion of ‘non-Western’ others from accounts of autoimmunity undermines their rethinking of difference by falling back on an immunitary logic, denying China an open future. This exclusion is their condition of possibility. At the same time, this exclusion is what keeps open their promise of its future to come. Paradoxically, the exclusion of the ‘non-West’ is what keeps the idea of an autoimmune ‘Western’ or European democracy alive.

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Articles
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Review of International Studies , Volume 42 , Issue 1 , January 2016 , pp. 156 - 177
Copyright
© 2015 British International Studies Association 

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Footnotes

*

I would like to thank three anonymous reviewers for constructive feedback on earlier versions of this article. I also owe thanks for helpful feedback to participants at the workshop ‘Temporalities of the Political’, at the Swedish Institute of International Affairs (UI) on 30 November 2012, and especially to Tom Lundborg, Dan Öberg, and Graham M. Smith.

References

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7 Readers objecting to my use of the term ‘system’ may prefer ‘promise’ or ‘hope’. Either ultimately fails to grasp what we may mean by ‘democracy’ (or ‘harmony’). Aware of the insufficiency of my language I nonetheless settle for ‘system’, for the lack of a better term. Interested readers may follow up on Derrida comments on the issue in J. Derrida, ‘The reason of the strongest (Are there rogue states?)’, in J. Derrida, P.-A. Brault, and M. Naas (eds), Rogues: Two Essays on Reason (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2005 [orig pub. 2003]), p. 82.

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41 Shixiong, Ni and Xuming, Qian, ‘Xin diyuan zhengzhi yu hexie shijie [New regional politics and harmonious world]’, Qinghua daxue xuebao (Zhexue shehui kexue ban), 23 (2008), p. 125Google Scholar.

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44 I have processed all Chinese white papers published 1991–October 2014 in Chinese and English, Reports on the Work of Government 2000–13 and all documents using the term ‘harmonious world’ on websites of Chinese embassies in English, Chinese, French, Spanish, Portuguese, or German (166 embassies). I also discuss speeches by key leadership figures, especially at key state visits and gatherings in national and international bodies.

45 I explore academic texts produced after 2005 that deploy ‘harmonious world’. I have read all documents that mention ‘harmonious world’ authored since 2005 by any of the twenty-five scholars identified as the most prominent Chinese IR scholars in a recent study that are available via the China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI). See P. M. Kristensen and R. T. Nielsen, ‘Constructing a Chinese International Relations theory: a sociological approach to intellectual innovation’, paper presented at ‘Innovation and Invention: China and Global Influences’, St Antony’s College, University of Oxford, (2011). I have also read all documents that mention ‘harmonious world’ published since 2005 in any of the most influential Chinese journals in this debate, available via CNKI, including: Shijie jingji yu zhengzhi, Guoji zhengzhi kexue, Liaowang, Xuezhi luntan, Dushu, Guoji jingji pinglun, Guoji zhengzhi yanjiu, Zhongguo fazhan guancha, Meiguo yanjiu, Jiaoxue yu yanjiu, Zhongguo yu shijie guancha, Zhanlue yu guanli, Xiandai guoji guanxi, and Guoji zhonglie. I also discuss additional books, articles, theses, and conference papers.

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47 Sow Keat Tok and Zheng Yongnian, ‘“Harmonious society” and “Harmonious world”: China’s policy discourse under Hu Jintao’, in University of Nottingham China Policy Institute Briefing Series (2007), summary.

48 I thank an anonymous reviewer for putting the point in these terms, and for highlighting its importance.

49 Stern, M. and Zalewski, M., ‘Feminist fatigue(s): Reflections on feminism and familiar fables of militarisation’, Review of International Studies, 35 (2009), p. 629CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

50 Ibid.; Derrida, J., ‘Sending: On representation’, Social Research, 49 (1982), pp. 294–326Google Scholar.

51 Hu, ‘Build towards a harmonious world’.

52 State Council, ‘China’s Peaceful Development Road’, Government white paper (Beijing: Information office of the State Council, 2005).

53 Xinhua, ‘CPC Constitution amendment advocates building of “Harmonious World”’ (25 October 2007).

54 Such speeches include Ambassador Wang Xuexian, ‘A Harmonious World Begins at People’s Heart’, Second ASEM Interfaith Dialogue, Cyprus, 4 September 2008; Ye Xiaowen in Xinhua, ‘Chinese official: Mutual appreciation, peaceful coexistence key to world harmony’ (20 February 2008); Hu Jintao, ‘Build towards a harmonious world’; Hu in Xinhua, ‘Chinese president calls for building harmonious world’ (24 September 2009).

55 State Council, ‘China’s Peaceful Development’, Government white paper (Beijing: Information office of the State Council, 2011).

56 State Council, ‘China’s Peaceful Development’, IV.

57 See, for examples, contributions in Tao, Cheung, Painter, and Li, Governance for Harmony in Asia, especially Yu, K. P., ‘The Confucian conception of harmony’, pp. 25–26Google Scholar; Chenyang, Li, ‘Harmony as a guiding principle for governance’, p. 49Google Scholar; and Barr, M. D., ‘Harmony, conformity or timidity? Singapore’s overachievement in the quest for harmony’, p. 75Google Scholar.

58 Examples are numerous and include Ni Shixiong and Qian Xuming, ‘New regional politics’; Xiaofeng, Yu and Jiangli, Wang, ‘Fei chuantong anquan weihu de “bianjie”, “yujing” yu “fanshi” [The “border”, “context”, and “form” defended by non-traditional security]’, Shijie jingji yu zhengzhi (2006), pp. 55–63Google Scholar; Xiaojiao, Fang, ‘Hexie shijie linian yu Zhongguo ruanshili jianshe [The harmonious world concept and China’s building of soft power]’, Jiaoxue yu yanjiu, (2008), pp. 67–72Google Scholar.

59 Shixiong, Ni and Xuming, Qian, ‘New regional politics’, p. 125Google Scholar.

60 Yiwei, Wang, ‘Tanxun Zhongguo de xin shenfen: Guanyu minzuzhuyi de shenhua [Inquiry into China’s new identity: On the myth of nationalism]’, Shijie jingji yu zhengzhi (2006), p. 16Google Scholar.

61 Lihua, Hang, ‘Hexie shijie shijiao xia de Zhongguo waijiao [Chinese foreign policy from the viewpoint of harmonious world]’, Gaige yu chuangxin (2010), p. 20Google Scholar.

62 State Council, ‘China’s Peaceful Development’, IV.

63 State Council, ‘China’s Peaceful Development Road’.

64 For examples of claims that such a harmonious nature is based in Chinese history, see State Council, ‘China’s Endeavors for Arms Control, Disarmament and Non-Proliferation’, Government white paper (Beijing: Information office of the State Council, 2005); State Council, ‘China’s Political Party System’, Government white paper (Beijing: Information office of the State Council, 2007), I; and State Council, ‘China’s Peaceful Development’.

65 Yiwei, Wang, ‘Inquiry’, p. 16Google Scholar.

66 State Council, ‘China’s Peaceful Development’, IV.

67 Chenyang, Li, ‘Harmony as a guiding principle’, p. 49Google Scholar. For the notion that various or all aspects of society need to be ‘harmonised’ within the larger whole, see also Neville, R. C., ‘Harmony in government’, in Tao et al., Governance for Harmony, p. 69Google Scholar.

68 It is worth noting the resonance of this language of ‘contradictions’ with Marxist texts.

69 Dongjian, Liu, ‘Hexie shehui yanjiu shuping [Review of research on harmonious society]’, Jiaoxue yu yanjiu (2006), p. 43Google Scholar.

70 Yaqing, Qin, ‘Hexie shijie: Zhongguo waijiao xin linian [Harmonious world: Chinese diplomacy’s new concept]’, Qianxian (2006), p. 31Google Scholar.

71 Ibid.

72 Yizhou, Wang, ‘Zhongguo waijiao shi tese [The ten characteristics of Chinese diplomacy]’, Shijie jingji yu zhengzhi (2008), p. 14Google Scholar.

73 Zhiyong, Qin, ‘Cultural construction of a harmonious society’, in Guo Sujian and Guo Baogang (eds), China in Search of Harmonious Society (Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books, 2008), p. 67Google Scholar.

74 Shixiong, Ni and Xuming, Qian, ‘New regional politics’, p. 125Google Scholar.

75 Lafitte, ‘Tibetan futures: Imagining collective destinies’, Futures, 31 (1999), § 4, 5, 6; Kaltman, B., Under the Heel of the Dragon: Islam, Racism, Crime and the Uighur in China (Athens: Ohio University Press, 2007), p. 2Google Scholar.

76 Yu, , ‘The Confucian conception of harmony’, p. 22Google Scholar.

77 Sheng, Ding, ‘To build a “harmonious world”: China’s soft power wielding in the global south’, Journal of Chinese Political Science, 13 (2008), p. 196Google Scholar.

78 Ibid.

79 Ibid., p. 197.

80 Camicia, S. P. and Zhu, J., ‘Citizenship education under discourses of nationalism, globalization, and cosmopolitanism: Illustrations from China and the United States’, Frontiers of education in China, 6 (2011), pp. 607–611CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

81 See, for example, B. A. Rockman, ‘Open politics and disharmony’, in Tao et al., Governance for Harmony, p. 199.

82 Zhiyong, Qin, ‘Cultural construction’, p. 73Google Scholar.

83 Jianfei, Liu, ‘Heping jueqi shi Zhongguo de zhanlve xuanze [Peaceful rise is China’s strategic choice]’, Shijie jingji yu zhengzhi (2006), p. 38Google Scholar.

84 State Council, ‘China’s Peaceful Development Road’.

85 Ibid.

86 State Council, ‘China’s Peaceful Development’, IV.

87 State Council, ‘China’s Human Resources’, Government white paper (Beijing: Information office of the State Council, 2010). For a similar attitude in other party-state documents, see State Council, ‘China’s Ethnic Policy and Common Prosperity and Development of All Ethnic Groups’, Government white paper (Beijing: Information office of the State Council, 2009).

88 Tobin, D., ‘Competing communities: Ethnic unity and ethnic boundaries on China’s north-west frontier’, Inner Asia, 13 (2011), pp. 7–25CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

89 Yunling, Zhang, ‘Guanyu goujian hexie shijie de sikao [Reflections on building a harmonious world]’, Dangdai Yangtai (2008), p. 5Google Scholar.

90 Xiaojiao, Fang, ‘The harmonious world concept’, p. 70Google Scholar.

91 For a sample of literatures that discuss current deployments of ‘Tianxia’, see Tingyang, Zhao, ‘A political world philosophy in terms of All-under-heaven (Tian-xia)’, Diogenes, 221 (2009), pp. 5–18CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Callahan, W. A., ‘Tianxia, empire and the world: Chinese visions of world order for the twenty-first century’, in Callahan and Barabantseva (eds), China Orders, pp. 91–117Google Scholar; Nordin, , ‘Space for the future’, pp. 235–249Google Scholar; ‘Radical exoticism’.

92 Xiaojiao, Fang, ‘The harmonious world concept’, p. 70Google Scholar.

93 Ibid., p. 71.

94 Li Baojun and Li Zhiyong, ‘“Hexie shijieguan” yu “baquan wendinglun”: yi xiang bijiao fenxi [“Harmonious world outlook” and “hegemonic stability theory”: a comparative analysis]’, Jiaoxue yu yanjiu (2008), p. 82.

95 State Council, ‘China’s Ethnic Policy’, III.

96 Wong, E., ‘Riots in Western China amid ethnic tension’, The New York Times (6 July 2009)Google Scholar; Jia, Cui, Lu, Liu, Jia, and Chen, ‘Self-immolation acts condemned by deputies’, China Daily (8 March 2012), p. 5Google Scholar.

97 State Council, ‘China’s Political Party System’, I.

98 For an example in the case of the Dalai Lama, see Xinhua, , ‘Chinese political advisors: Dalai Lama not harmony promoter but trouble maker’ (11 March 2009)Google Scholar. For a discussion related to ‘harmonious world’, see Callahan, , ‘Conclusion’, p. 173Google Scholar. For a press release which equates supporting Liu with not being harmonious, see Embassy of PRC in the US, ‘Chinese Embassy spokesman Wang Baodong: Don’t politicize the Nobel Peace Prize’, USA Today (10 December 2010).

99 Since 2000, the only mention of harmony in a government work report prior to Hu’s 2005 speech to the UN was by then Premier Zhu Rongji in 2003. Harmony gained significantly more prominence in Wen Jiabao’s 2005 work report. The work report in the subsequent year, the first one after Hu’s speech to the UN, mentioned ‘harmonious world’ for the first time. Work reports in 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2012 continued to use ‘harmonious world’ as a marker and descriptor of the government’s foreign policy ambitions. The work report of 2013, after Xi Jinping’s leadership takeover, used the term ‘harmony’ repeatedly, but not ‘harmonious world’.

100 The term ‘harmonious world’ was central to ‘China’s Peaceful Development Road’ (2005), and ‘China’s Peaceful Development’ (2011). It is given a foundational position at the outset of others, such as State Council, ‘China’s Endeavors’. In general terms, ‘harmony’ has featured in white papers at least since the early 1990s, but saw a sharp rise in popularity after 2005. In the 14 years before 2005, 22 white papers used the term ‘harmony’, and 19 did not. In the 7 years after 2005, 30 white papers used the term, only 7 did not. From Hu’s retirement to the time of writing, 3 white papers have used the term, 5 have not.

101 For example, Hu Jintao, ‘Jointly Create a Better Future for World Peace and Development’, New Year address delivered by Hu Jintao, Beijing, 31 December 2009; Xinhua, ‘Chinese President calls’.

102 For example, Wen Jiabao, ‘Expo Spirit Forever’, Expo 2010 Shanghai China Summit Forum, Shanghai, 31 October 2010.

103 For example, Yang Jiechi, ‘Advance China’s Diplomacy amid Peaceful Development’, Symposium on China’s Peaceful Development white paper, Beijing, 15 November 2011; Embassy of PRC in USA, ‘Symposium on “China’s Peaceful Development” is Held in Beijing’, 16 September 2011.

104 For example then Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, Wu Bangguo, ‘Report on the work of the standing committee of the National People’s Congress’, Third Session of the Eleventh National People’s Congress, 9 March 2010; then State Councilor Dai Bingguo, ‘China Is Committed to the Path of Peaceful Development’, Symposium on China’s Peaceful Development white Paper, Beijing, 15 September 2011; and Ye Xiaowen, then head of the State Administration for Religious Affairs of China (SARA), Xinhua, ‘Chinese official’.

105 For a small selection, see Chen Duqing, ‘Parceria Estratégica entre a China e o Brasil [Strategic Partnership between China and Brazil]’, XIX National Forum, Rio de Janeiro (2 May 2007); Embassy of PRC in Chile, ‘Se inaugura Salón Confucio en el Instituto Nacional [Inauguration of Confucius Institute in the National Institute]’, 7 April 2011; Wang Yingwu, ‘La Chine suit fermement la voie de développement pacifique [China firmly pursues the peaceful development road]’, Embassy of PRC in DR of Congo, 30 September 2011; Embassy of PRC in Germany, ‘Photoausstellung über Expo 2010 in UN-Außenstelle in Genf [Photo exhibition on Expo 2010 in UN-branch in Geneva]’, 27 April 2010; Ding Wei and G. Cubeddu, ‘Quarant’anni d’amicizia “Parlarsi sinceramente, ascoltarsi reciprocamente” [Forty years of friendship “Speaking frankly, listening to each other”]’, 30 Giorni, 6 July 2010; Embassy of PRC in Mexico, ‘Celebran Aniversario del EPL en la Embajada de China en México [Celebrating the anniversary of PRC in the Embassy of China in Mexico]’, 2 August 2011.

106 See Ministry of Foreign Affairs of PRC, ‘Xi Jinping and Le Hong Anh Jointly Meet with the Youth Representatives of China and Vietnam’, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of PRC, 22 November 2011.

107 State Council, ‘China’s National Defense in 2008’, Government white paper (Beijing: Information office of the State Council, 2009), VIII.

108 Embassy of PRC in UK, ‘Chinese Embassy Holds Film Reception in Commemoration of the 66th Anniversary of the Chinese People’s Victory Against Japanese Aggression and the 80th Anniversary of the “September 18th Incident”’, 27 August 2011.

109 Liu Xiaoming, ‘China’s Perspective on Cybersecurity’, Second Worldwide Cybersecurity Summit, Embassy of PRC in UK, 2 June 2011.

110 Embassy of PRC in Chile, ‘Inauguration’.

111 Xiaoming, Liu, ‘The 12th Five-Year Plan: China’s Scientific and Peaceful Development’, Royal Institute of International Affairs, London (18 March 2011)Google Scholar.

112 Embassy of PRC in UK, ‘“Fashion Shenzhen” Won Great Popularity in Britain Ambassador Liu Xiaoming Couples Attend The “Fashion Shenzhen” Event at London Fashion Week’, 23 September 2011.

113 A number of PRC embassies make such examples available, for example in French: Wang Yingwu, ‘China follows’; Italian: see Ding Wei and Cubeddu, ‘Forty years’; German: Embassy of PRC in Germany, ‘Photo exhibition’; Spanish: Embassy of PRC in Mexico, ‘Celebrating’; and Portuguese: Chen Duqing, ‘Strategic partnership’.

114 D. Kerr, ‘Paradoxes of tradition and modernity at the new frontier: China, Islam, and the problem of “different heavens”’, in Callahan and Barabantseva (eds), China Orders, p. 171.

115 Tok and Zheng Yongnian, ‘Harmonious society’.

116 Callahan, , ‘Conclusion’, p. 262Google Scholar.

117 Rockman, , ‘Open politics and disharmony’, p. 207Google Scholar.

118 Torfing, J., ‘Harmony through network governance?’, in Tao et al., Governance for Harmony, p. 257Google Scholar.

119 Ibid., pp. 257–58.

120 Ibid., p. 258.

121 Ibid.

122 Nordin, A. H. M., ‘Bordering on the unacceptable in China and Europe: “Cao ni ma” and “nique ta mere”’, in J. C. H. Liu and N. Vaughan-Williams (eds), European-East Asian Borders in Translation (London: Routledge, 2014), pp. 166–181Google Scholar; Nordin, A. H. M. and Richaud, L., ‘Subverting official language and discourse in China? Type river crab for harmony’, China Information, 28 (2014), pp. 45–65CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Nordin, A. H. M., ‘Un-innovative censorship, innovative resistance: the Internet, forbidden words and the humorous homonyms of egao’, in N. Horsburgh, A. Nordin, and S. Breslin (eds), Chinese Politics and International Relations: Innovation and Invention (London: Routledge, 2014), pp. 175–198Google Scholar.

123 Buckley, C., ‘Tibetan monk burns to death in China protest-group’, Reuters (16 March 2011)Google Scholar.

124 Haddad, , ‘Democracy at risk’, p. 37Google Scholar.

125 Derrida, , ‘The reason of the strongest’, p. 35Google Scholar, emphasis in original.

126 Cf. Ibid., pp. 35–6.

127 Ibid., p. 36.

128 Cf. Ibid., pp. 36–7.

129 Ibid., p. 38, emphasis in original.

130 Derrida, , ‘Autoimmunity’, p. 121Google Scholar.

131 Cf. Derrida, , ‘The reason of the strongest’, pp. 35–36Google Scholar.

132 Cf. Ibid., p. 36.

133 Again, I thank an anonymous reviewer for putting the point in this way and for highlighting its importance.

134 Nordin, China’s International Relations and Harmonious World.