CHINA AS A PARTNER AND RIVAL? Qualitative Content Analysis Of China In Its Roles As ‘Partner’ And ‘Rival’ Vis-A-Vis European Strategic Autonomy

Abstract

The European Union’s pursuit of ‘strategic autonomy’ as a response to global challenges has recently been given more attention by public political debate and scholars in the field of European studies, yet remains an understudied concept. The following thesis aims to deepen the understanding of strategic autonomy vis-à-vis the EU-China relationship, and sets out to investigate how the EU conceives strategic autonomy from China while simultaneously constructing China as a ‘partner’ and ‘rival’. By conducting a qualitative content analysis of 36 official EU documents and employing role theory alongside neorealist and neoliberal International Relations (IR) theory, this thesis finds that although China is considered a partner by the EU in matters of shared global interests and trade, the EU primarily perceives China as a rival. As a result, the EU strives to diversify critical supply chains and enter into new partnerships as quickly as possible to reduce vulnerabilities, and guarantee its own economic security. The analysis further revealed that besides the EU’s role conceptions as a normative power, and promoter and defender of the liberal rules-based order, it also increasingly perceives itself as a security actor in its (trade) relationship with China. Both role conceptions are reflected in the EU’s understanding of strategic autonomy from China. Yet, despite efforts of becoming more strategically autonomous from China, institutional barriers, a lack of a common, coherent and EU-wide strategy as well as other political and economic factors limit the EU’s scope of action in reaching a higher degree of strategic autonomy.