The European Union and China in Security Relations--Already Strategic Partners?

[[abstract]]The provision for security policy is a rather new factor in EU-China relations. Since the foreign and security policy of the EU has advanced in recent years, most of the EU policy papers and bilateral EU-China summits place security at the heart of the relationship. Since 2003, the EU conducts a so-called “strategic partnership” with China. China´s erstwhile stiff foreign policy recently experiences incremental change, more international engagement and activity. Its credo of non-interference in sovereign states is not rock-solid any more. This paper analyzes recent changes and developments in EU-China security relations with the question of interest, whether and where China modifies its foreign and security policy towards more international engagement and what that means for EU-China security relations. By using a constructivist-realist approach on analyzing selected cases, where change in China´s security policy appears, skepticism arises about China´s normative motivations, that were supposed by some authors. The paper concludes that China carefully approaches towards multilateralism and international cooperation, but doesn´t take positions of the EU seriously. Changes in China´s foreign policy doctrine might be based stronger on realist than on normative goals.[[journaltype]]國內[[booktype]]紙本[[countrycodes]]TW