Whither Chinese IR? The Sinocentric subject and the paradox of Tianxia-ism

• Published in: International theory Vol. 14; no. 1; pp. 57 - 87
• Main Author: Chu, Sinan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cambridge, UK Cambridge University Press 01.03.2022
• Subjects: Cues; Culture; Ethnocentrism; Indigenous peoples; Intellectuals; International relations; internationale Beziehungen; Philosophy; Political attitudes; Political leadership; Politikwissenschaftliche Theorien; Politischer Diskurs; Sociology; Theorie der internationalen Beziehungen; Theory; China; global IR; Tianxia Theories; non-Western ethnocentrism; Chinese IR
• ISSN: 1752-9719; 1752-9727; 1752-9727
• DOI: 10.1017/S1752971920000214

This essay critically assesses the Tianxia Theories, a line of indigenous International Relations (IR) theorizing in China organized around the concept of Tianxia (‘all-under-heaven’). My goal is to tackle a seemingly prevalent issue among non-Western IR theories, that is, the indigenous scholars' subservience to state cues and often uncritical attitude toward their own ethnocentrism. To that end, I strategically target a recent contribution to this scholarship that explicitly seeks to articulate a non-ethnocentric theory: Xu Jilin's New Tianxia-ism (xin tianxia zhuyi). I first examine the main thesis of New Tianxia-ism to reveal its internal tensions. Then I examine what enables the formulation of New Tianxia-ism from a discursive perspective. I argue that a particular subject position, to which I refer as the ‘Sinocentric Subject’, plays an instrumental role in enabling contemporary Chinese intellectuals to think along the logics of New Tianxia-ism. The result, however, undermines the agenda to articulate an alternative theory that rectifies the ethnocentrism in IR. In conclusion, I suggest that Chinese indigenous scholarship ought to engage more critically the ideological inclination and the politics of knowledge within its own epistemic community.