Lately, I’ve been re-inspired to write whiny diaries, but unlike before, I’ve decided to keep them private, in a password-protected file. Sadly, you won’t be reading about the grievances I’ve been suffering personally any time soon, but I can offer you some academic political papers on various subjects, like this one on China that scored me a near-perfect mark in a Chinese International Relations course. I hope this satisfies at least a few of you.
After the Chinese Communist Party under Mao Zedong took power in China, the country was quick to create a strategic alliance with the Soviet Union, which culminated with the signing of the Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship, Alliance and Mutual Assistance on the 14th of February, 1950 (Li, 2012). Out of the two major world powers at the time, the United States (US) and the Soviet Union, the Chinese government decided to actively seek a relationship with the Soviets over the Americans. Eventually, this relationship would sour and the world would see a normalizing in Sino-US relations (Blanchard, 2015). Nonetheless, why Mao Zedong’s government chose an alliance with Joseph Stalin’s is a mostly explainable phenomenon, when looked at through the lens of the International Relations theory of Shared Values.
Shared values theory explains that countries with similar political ideologies and values are likely to align with each other (Neumayer, 2008). The perception of similarity in interpretations of Marxism between the two countries, the perceived scope of difference between Chinese and US values by the Chinese, and the change in leadership, which brings with it varied political and ideological interpretations and aspirations are all potential influencers on China’s decision to ally itself with the Soviet Union in 1950. In theory, if China perceived itself as having a more similar political ideology to the Soviets, also perceived itself as having a completely incompatible ideology with the other major world power, and felt as though the leader of the Soviet Union was a reasonable and suitable interpreter of Marxism, then China would be more likely to ally itself with the Soviet Union. Moreover, in the case that China’s perceived difference from the US shrunk and its perceived difference with the USSR grew, then it would be expected that China would shift its alliance towards the US.
If this theory were true, then it would be expected that China would be allied with the Soviet Union for as long as it felt that it, and the leader at the nation’s helm, was similarly interpreting Marxism, the cornerstone political ideology of China. Likewise, the same would be observed especially if the Chinese perceived the other major world power, the US, to have a political ideology completely juxtaposed to its own, since that would create an even stronger contrast between Marxism and Capitalism. The most appropriate way to measure how ideologically various states are is to compare their official, explicit political ideologies (i.e. is the Communist party in power or not), and to seek out proof of the relevance of ideology in international interaction.
Post World War Two, China and the USSR were both under Communist Party rule, with the former being led by Mao Zedong and the latter, Joseph Stalin. The leaders had similar, highly-restrictive readings of Marxism. In particular, their shared elimination of political dissidents and bourgeoisie emulated this (Graziosi, 2016). Mao also emulated a number of Stalin’s policies and looked up to him as a true Marxist. Most notably, Mao’s Great Leap Forward of the 1950s was based heavily off of Stalin’s Five Year Plans of the 1930s. Both plans failed and resulted in large loss of lives (Graziosi, 2016). Simultaneously, the US was in the midst of McCarthyism, a movement that was extremely hostile to any Marxist sentiments (Michaels, 2017). Moreover, Mao regarded Stalin as an effective, non-revisionist leader, and made that very clear to Stalin’s successor, Nikita Khrushchev, after Khrushchev gave his Cult of Personality speech in which he denounced Stalin. Mao is thought to have told Khrushchev that “out of Stalin’s 10 fingers, 7 were rotten”, implying that the majority of Stalin’s actions were warranted and good (Kuo, 2001). When Khrushchev began his liberalization of the Soviet Union, known colloquially as the “Khrushchev Thaw”, he freed political prisoners, eased censorship policies and began seeking peaceful coexistence with other nations, including the US. Mao saw this as not only a betrayal of the Soviet relationship with China, but also as a complete betrayal of the principles of Marxism (Bittner et al., 2008). Meanwhile, McCarthyism was dying down in the US (Michaels, 2017).
It was around this time that China’s rift with the Soviets began, and normalization of relations with the US began (Bittner et al., 2008). What this demonstrates is that the theory of Shared Values is largely adequate at explaining China’s relations with the Soviets. While similar versions of Marxism were implemented in the two countries, while the leaders had similar views and while the other power seemed too distant ideologically, the Sino-Soviet relations were good and there was reason for their alliance. Once the two countries began to view each other’s Marxism to be misconstrued, once the leaders began to look down on each other’s interpretations of Marxism, and once the other power’s ideology became less polarized, a disintegration of relations began.
Alternatively, the Sino-Soviet alliance could be explained through the Balance of Threat theory (BOT), which it similar to the Balance of Power theory, though different. It assumes that a country perceives threats from others global actors and forms alliances accordingly (Walt, 1987). Some independent variables that would affect why China would align itself with the Soviets would be perception of threat from major world actors, which would itself stem from the perceived aggregate power, offensive capabilities, and ideology of the world power in question, among other aspects. In 1950 China’s case, the US obviously seemed like a more threatening power than the Soviets, which made it understandable that the Chinese would align with the Soviets.
Naturally, if China perceived the US to be a greater threat to it than the USSR, it would choose to align itself with the latter, assuming that states inherently desire alliances. Likewise, if threat perceptions, and the ways they are measured shift, then China would shift its alliance to the US. If this theory were true, then China would see itself aligned with the USSR until it perceived the Soviet threat to be greater than the US’s, which would stem from the perception of the Soviet’s aggregate power, offensive capabilities and political ideology. To adequately measure this, finding documents that explicitly state a perception of threat of one nation, as well as corroborating information on reasonable measures that could render a country threatening, like military capacity and ideological positioning, is key.
Using GDP, export rates and military strength (factors that could be used to assess the threat a country poses), it is clear that in 1949, the Soviet Union was a lesser threat than the US to China. The USSR had a significantly lower GDP per capita, sitting at just over 1500$, comparable to the US’s approximately 12000$ (Maddison, 2006). The USSR was largely self-sufficient, and exported very little, compared to the US’s 8% of GDP. Moreover, 1949 was the year that the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance, which China would go on to join, was founded by the Soviets to encourage particularly communist countries to not stray towards the US-offered Marshall Plan (Weiner, 1981). In the same year, the USA founded NATO, which was seen as a bolstering of their military might (Wood, 2015). Meanwhile, the USSR’s Red Army was suffering at the hands of Stalin’s military purges. All of these factors made it reasonable for China to see the USA as a bigger threat, particularly when that is combined with China’s long-lasting belief that the US is an imperialist force (Kuo, 2001). Thus, it would be reasonable to assume that China would create an alliance with the less-threatening of the two nations, so as to create some mutual support against a common enemy, whilst not giving up any autonomy, as would be expected in siding with the USA.
The main issue with this theory is that it fails to hold up when the reasons for the Sino-Soviet rift are considered. The USA remained a seemingly bigger threat to China throughout the 1960s and 70s. Their economy and military were both stronger than the Soviets (Wood, 2015). Their political ideology also greatly differed. China’s rift with the Soviets had to have stemmed from something other than pure threat perception, unless other factors dictating threat came to the forefront of Chinese perception, making the Soviets seem more threatening. Examples of such factors could include rift in ideology, proxy wars, or geographic proximity.
Despite their flaws, the first theory, Ideological Affinity, seems to better describe the true outcomes of the Sino-Soviet and its eventual demise, since it seems to face less counter-arguments and aligns better with historical facts.
Both theories assume that nation-states inherently want alliances with other states. Though, in China’s case, an argument could be made that because of the country’s frail post-war state, an alliance with a stronger, more-well-to-do country like the Soviet Union would be needed and obviously preferable to being isolated, it still is wrong to make a blanket assumption that any type of state prefers alliances to isolationism. Furthermore, the ideological affinities theory relies a lot of subjective evidence, which I feel is common throughout the political sciences field. This is because it is very hard to reach a non-contentious conclusion on what the proper and true implementation of a political theoretical concept, like Marxism, is. Essentially, the entire theory relies on attempting to justify perceptions. This links in with what could be claimed as the primary flaw of the second theory, which is that it assumes states -and their leaders- consistently operate in wholly rational ways, which is untrue (Duru, 2014). Granted, some states may accurately perceive and interpret threats and changes in threats. Often, however, states can sour relations with each other for irrational reasons, like personal distastes or historical memories, and then mold narratives to fit their opinions accordingly.
Moreover, my hypotheses were both somewhat subjectively phrased, so as to fit the research findings better. If more time and writing space were allotted to this assignment, I would have phrased my hypotheses in more objective ways, and I would actively search out information about other Marxist countries international relations, as those would offer similar foundations, but possibly different outcomes in alliance-formation. Also, I would search for more varied and specific evidence. I felt quite a crunch in this paper in including plenty of evidence, while simultaneously carrying out solid critical tests.
Using the ideological affinity theory, it is evident why China chose to align with the Soviets in the 1949-1950 period. Their leaders had similar interpretations of Marxism, and even emulated each other in implementing Marxist politics sometimes. Though the threat perception theory has its merits, it is harder to argue since it fails to explain why Sino-US relations would improve despite a significant lack in change of threat level of either or the two major powers. Realistically, a single theory cannot explain broad foreign policy decisions since they are made up of an array of political, historical and irrational factors.
