When viewed only from the Chinese perspective, the rise of China does not provide a complete picture. The same can be said when looking at it from a global standpoint. To get a more balanced and accurate assessment, it is essential to consider both factors. The result of this broader evaluation indicates that China’s rise is more of an exception than the rule.
From a historical angle, China has always been a "land of battles from the four corners", an ancient concept that originated in ancient China, which I introduced some time ago. This concept has also been applied in modern theories of territorial power to help explain and understand global conflicts. The basic notion is that a typical landlocked country, surrounded on all four sides by neighboring nations, faces a significantly higher likelihood of border conflicts on all fronts. In contrast, a country like the United States, bordered by oceans on two sides, experiences far fewer border-related conflicts. Therefore, the number of neighboring countries and borders plays a critical role in determining a nation's stability. China's borders touch 14 neighboring countries, which is second only to Russia in the world. Russia has borders with 16 countries, which contributes to its ongoing instability, and it is still involved in conflict today.
The astonishing number of borders that China shares with other countries proves that China has never been a quiet and peaceful place, but rather a nation constantly embroiled in conflict. China's history fully supports this, with wars and conflicts stretching from China to the northern steppes, from China to the Arab world, from Russia to Japan, and from India to the countries in its southern region. The conflicts between China and its neighboring countries, both internal and external, have been intertwined for centuries. Even when external conflicts paused, internal struggles continued. As a result, wars and conflicts have caused immense losses and destruction, making it difficult for China to achieve an environment conducive to peaceful development. Over the course of millennia of ongoing wars and conflicts, China has lost vast amounts of traditional territory, and its economic development has been severely hindered. Due to both historical and modern factors, such wars and conflicts continue to persist today, as evidenced by the current tensions along the China-India border and the complex disputes in the South Sea.
Fortunately for China, history provided it with a unique turning point. Due to its global strategy during the Cold War and the need to suppress, divide, and weaken the Soviet bloc, the U.S. extended an olive branch to China, who then seized this rare historical opportunity, transitioning from the periphery of the Cold War's two major blocs to gradually integrate into the Western camp. Subsequently, with China's economic reforms and its accession to the WTO, Western markets opened up to China, granting it a significant development opportunity. This period marked a special historical window of opportunity provided by the changing global geopolitical landscape. However, such a historical opportunity is, in fact, an "exception" and is unlikely to be repeated.
When it comes to economic development, China was also presented with what can be described as a “one-time, exceptional" opportunity. This was the period of the country's reform and opening-up, a time of rapid economic growth that coincided with the peak of globalization.
Globalization itself represented a once-in-a-lifetime historical opportunity. It brought about an explosive increase in the global market economy. While there have been previous instances in history of growth resembling globalization, the explosive growth brought about by globalization in the 21st century is unprecedented and has become the very launching pad for China's rise.
Globalization has significantly driven the growth of global trade. According to data from the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the total global trade reached a record-breaking USD 33 trillion in 2024. From a cyclical perspective, since the establishment of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 1995, the value of global trade has grown at an average rate of approximately 5% per year, while trade volume has grown at an average rate of about 4%. Comparing the two periods, namely 1985 to 1995, and 1995 to 2020, there is a noticeable difference in the growth rate of trade, with the second phase of rapid globalization seeing a 1.33 times faster growth compared to the first phase. This indicates that global trade expansion after the WTO's founding accelerated, growing about 33% faster than during the first phase.
Of course, this is just the aspect of goods trade. The benefits brought about by globalization go far beyond this. In addition to goods trade, there are massive capital flows, trade in services, and the globalization of resource allocation. Many resource-exporting countries have experienced synchronized growth due to the globalized market. Take Russia as an example: driven by the continuous and robust growth of China's economy, Russia's long-stagnant economy began to show signs of revival. Economists estimate that the capital and industrial transfers driven by globalization are roughly six times greater than those in previous eras. China's rise happened precisely at this moment, with globalization allowing China to ride the wave and seize a historically unique opportunity.
China's demographic dividend is also a unique exception in its rise. For a long period, China was the most populous country in the world, with a generally young population. This gave China a unique demographic advantage, which laid the foundation for its rise. The peak of China's population occurred in 2013, when the working-age population of 15-64 years old reached 925 million.
China’s advantage lies not only in its large population, but also in the fact that this labor force consists largely of individuals who have risen from poverty. These are people who are willing to work tirelessly, often more than 10 hours a day, earning relatively modest incomes by global standards, but still much higher than what they received in the past. What is especially noteworthy is that a significant number of these individuals are young, intelligent people who, inheriting China’s traditional culture, have dedicated themselves to studying STEM subjects. It is precisely these individuals, during this unique historical period, who completed higher education and laid the groundwork for China’s later technological advancements. Some scholars argue that 25% of China’s economic growth over the past 35 years can be attributed to its demographic dividend. This unique phenomenon is unlikely to be replicated in other countries, making it yet another exceptional factor contributing to China's rise.
There is also the issue of resources. The process of China’s rise has clearly been one of resource consumption. China is a vast country with abundant natural resources. For much of its history, it has indeed been such a country: geographically expansive, rich in minerals, and largely self-sufficient. This also contributed to China’s traditional awareness and inherent concepts regarding resources. After China became involved in the tide of globalization, with the expansion of production and rapid economic development, the consumption of resources surged. Food, oil, water, and land, once abundant, have been rapidly depleted in a cost-effective manner. This consumption has not only supported China’s rapid economic growth, helping it transform from a poor country into a rising power, but it has also gradually pushed China into a state of resource scarcity today.
Today, droughts in China have become a regular and significant problem. The depletion of water resources in the northern regions has made Beijing's water situation comparable to that of Saudi Arabia in the desert. Once self-sufficient in oil, that is now a thing of the past. China is now a major energy importer, with its reliance on oil imports reaching as high as 80%. At the same time, with the real estate sector consuming vast amounts of land and large populations migrating from rural areas to cities, the country emerges as the world’s largest importer of food.
Therefore, it should be recognized that China's abundant internal resources, including land, in the early stages of its rise, were made available at unimaginably low prices, supporting its ascent and enabling it to rapidly transform from a weakened nation into a powerful one. At the same time, it should also be acknowledged that the rapid consumption of such cheap resources in this manner is likely an unparalleled exception for China. This is because, in any society with private property rights, such a phenomenon would be impossible to occur.
The rise of a nation is always influenced by a variety of factors. For example, China’s reform and opening-up, which can also be considered as yet another exception, opened a window for traditional Chinese society, providing the critical institutional support for China’s first integration into the world market. All of these "exceptional" factors contributing to China's rise, from the changes brought by the Cold War to the wave of globalization, from the demographic dividend to the supply of cheap resources, and of course, the well-known and widely recognized reform and opening-up—seem to be sufficient to explain why no other country in the world will be able to replicate China's path to rise, making China's ascent an enduring exception in the history of global development.
What then, does the future hold for China?
This is a frequently asked question, as the world is rapidly changing. Globalization has entered the phase of de-globalization, and the wave of conservatism is sweeping across the globe with unprecedented momentum. The WTO has become increasingly irrelevant, and the world is now caught in a complex situation of rebalancing. The issue is that, at this very moment, people are discovering that post-rise China has already seen the complete retreat of its demographic dividend. China has become a society facing extreme aging, where the reality of two young people supporting one elderly person is becoming imminent. At the same time, its economic growth rate, which once boasted double-digit figures during the peak of globalization, has steadily dropped to around 5% today. Yet, China still maintains its position as the world’s top importer of resources.
Given the unprecedented complexity of the current situation, China's strategic choices after its rise are quite limited. The answers provided by the history of global geopolitics boil down to just two options: either choose external balance or choose internal balance. It is a "choose one" situation, with no other alternatives.
Final analysis conclusion:
Looking at both domestic and international factors, China’s rise is merely an exception. From the changes brought by the Cold War to the wave of globalization, from the demographic dividend to the supply of cheap resources, and of course, the well-known and widely recognized reform and opening-up, these "exceptional factors" are likely enough to explain why no other country in the world will be able to replicate China's path to rise. As for its future strategic choices, there are essentially two options: either choose external balance or choose internal balance.
