From Traditional to Non-Traditional Security: Energy in China's International Relations

Abstract

Energy has increasingly become a key security concern for China since the mid 1990s when the country became dependent on foreign oil. There are signs, however, that Chinese thinking about energy security has shifted from a geo-political and traditional security focus to broader concerns and non-traditional security thinking such as sustainability and environmental protection. These two sets of concerns seemed to have generated contradictory behaviour in Chinese foreign policy. On the one hand, China is seen to have become more assertive internationally in areas such as Africa and Latin America in search of energy resources. Yet at the same time, China seemed to be very keen about international cooperation and the promotion of renewable energy. This paper examines how the energy security debate in China and the multiple calculations on energy security have shaped China's international behaviour inrecent years.