Xi Jinping Government's Foreign Policy toward South Korea

Abstract

China and South Korea have normalized their relationship in 1992. Before diplomatic normalization, there has been indirect trade between China and South Korea which set the ground for the later rapprochement. Since the diplomatic normalization, China and South Korea have achieved brilliant progress in their bilateral relationship. For instance, South Korea decided to participate in the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) in 2015, which was initiated by China as a means to break out of the dollar trap for establishing a regional trading bloc in Eurasia. China and South Korea also concluded a free trade agreement in the same year.

Xi Jinping became the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China and the President of the Peoples Republic of China on November 15 of 2012, with worlds heated debates over the rise of China on both economic and military facets. At the time Xi assumed office, both international and domestic circumstances have shifted drastically. Thus, Xis diplomatic strategy as well as the South Korean policy have also been altered accordingly.

Due to the authoritarian characteristics of Chinas Communist Party (CCP), Chinas foreign policy towards South Korea has its own consistency. However, along with Chinas rise of both economic and military power, its South Korean policy has been revised as time changes.

Thus, this thesis will utilize the classical realism to analyze the shifts in international and domestic circumstances of Xis government faced, and then further investigate Xis diplomatic strategy as well as the South Korean policy in comparison with his predecessors.