2 China’s Contemporary Foreign Strategy: Ideology, Basic Platform, Current Challenges, and Chinese Characteristics

In the Post-Deng Xiaoping era, the ideology of contemporary Chinese political leaders regarding world politics and foreign policy has featured new richness and useful complexity. The ideology of the leaders is composed of three elements. First, visions on international relations and basic beliefs are embedded in Marxism, Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought. The second element is China's patriotism, or China's modern radical nationalism. Third, pragmatic thought on international politics and foreign policy, i.e., the realpolitik concept is only bound to Chinese. Since the start of the reform and opening-up drive, a new element that can be called "neo-internationalism" has been added to the ideological framework of the Chinese political leaders. The unhealthy economic growth pattern is the common source of all of China's bottleneck problems, including both domestic and external challenges. This chapter discusses traditional Chinese characteristics and partially summarizes and anticipates China's national development direction and foreign policy orientation. Keywords: China's patriotism; Deng Xiaoping; foreign policy; Mao Zedong; Marxism; traditional Chinese characteristics