The Principle of Non-interference and China's Role in International Conflict in the New Era: China in Sudan and South Sudan, Syria, and Afghanistan

Abstract: Nowadays, China has made great efforts to make international hotspot issues peacefully settled in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. One challenge China faces on its road to global prominence is how to balance the increasing international responsibility and the established foreign policy principles that have been upheld for decades. The thesis attempts to answer why China sticks to the non-interference principle, how it deals with the contradictions between the international responsibility and the non-interference principle. The thesis adopts a combined methodological strategy, including content analysis and case study. To examine China’s position on sovereignty and non-interference, I attempt to make a content analysis of Chinese leaders’ speeches at the General Assembly of United Nations and Chinese representatives’ statements on the selected intra-state conflicts and civil unrest. The thesis tries to find out how China mediates the antagonist parties in the three civil conflicts mentioned above, and whether the mediation practices abide by the non-interference principle. The thesis selects China’s mediation practice in Sudan and South Sudan, Syria, and Afghanistan as cases to make deep investigation of China’s mediation strategy and approaches, and the main reason to choose these cases is that they are quite relevant with sovereignty and the principle of non-interference. To answer why China does not abandon the seemingly old-fashioned non-interference principle when the principle seems no longer practical or in line with Chinese national interests, I refer to David Welch’s theoretical framework which includes organization theory, cognitive and motivational psychology, and prospect theory.