The subtleties of diplomacy

The non-confrontational posture and the principle of non-interference are consistent with a policy of strategic independence whose objective is more about diminishing the risks of making enemies than the pursuit of alliances. One can make the mistake of labeling China's disposition to non-interference as an isolationist tendency if one postulates that isolationism is the opposite of interventionism.

However, far from being mutually exclusive, isolationism and interventionism are in fact expressions of the same propagandist spirit, isolationism being frustrated interventionism. China, which has never been agitated by a desire to convert the world to its norms and beliefs, does not have the idiosyncrasies of a disappointed crusader.

Third, subtle power envelops a permanent readiness for change. Beijing's recent moves toward pivotal Sudan can be seen as an illustration of this point. Despite its strong links with Khartoum - Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir had talks in Beijing at the end of June - Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi visited Juba one month after South Sudan's declaration of independence, becoming the first foreign minister representing one of the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council to make such a visit.

Restraint should be considered the fourth feature of subtle power. When Henry Kissinger evokes the 1979 Sino-Vietnamese war in his magisterial On China he remarks: "As in the Sino-Indian War, China executed a limited 'punitive' strike followed immediately by a retreat." More generally, China is well aware that the capacity to limit oneself and to avoid any kind of excess including unnecessary military adventures is in the long term the condition to preserve one's relative strength.

By contrast with European historical dynamics, the effort to unify the Chinese world has always been one of the Chinese civilization's main trends. In this perspective, the future of Taiwan is, with the territorial integrity of the People's Republic of China, one of the most important issues for Beijing's leadership. In 2010, 1.6 million mainlanders visited the island injecting more than $3 billion (2.1 billion euros) in Taiwan's economy. Expectedly, Beijing reacts with strong statements when it considers that the US is interfering in China's internal affairs but the mainland's Taiwan policy also illustrates Beijing's use of restraint.

Ambiguity is the fifth mark of subtle power. Subtle power is also the cultivation of ambiguity and vagueness which are too often poorly interpreted as mystery and obscurity.

The attempt to define subtle power is almost self-contradictory; it is not a set of predetermined rules or procedures to follow mechanically but the art of creating a favorable context; it is not a self-proclaimed indispensability, superiority or grandeur but, in a constantly changing configuration, the capacity to maintain centrality.

Instead of its complacent litanies on what it perceives as China's essential imperfections, the West should seriously focus on what it could learn from the nuances of Beijing's subtle power. To a certain extent, it is a relatively Sinicized West and a reasonably Westernized China and their constant interactions which could constitute for mankind an infinite source of synergies.

Being so deeply congenial with the Chinese culture, subtle power carries the Chinese traditional emphasis on moderation and peace embodied in the character he or harmony, and as such it supports the idea that a major redistribution of power does not necessarily have to emerge from the tragedies of wars.

David Gosset is director of the Euro-China Center for International and Business Relations at CEIBS, Shanghai & Beijing, and founder of the Euro-China Forum. The opinions expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.