4 “China's Exploration” of the Construction of the Nontraditional Security Community

The construction and exploration of the non-traditional security community is of vital importance for China's peaceful development and participation in global governance. The response to non-traditional security threats highlights the importance of an emerging major country's participation in global governance and the necessity of enhancing the “supra-state” governance capability (such as the capability of providing international public products and the supra-sovereign capability of coordinating international affairs). “Pluralistic all-win” is China's overall strategy of first choice under the guidance of the paradigm of “peace-cooperativism”. The construction of the non-traditional security community through “multidimensional-multilateral cooperation” is not only an important means for China to participate in global governance and build regional order but also a vital path for China “to forge new international relations with cooperative all-win as the core and build a community of shared future.” The building of a community of shared future is a comprehensive, systematic engineering involving many fields, such as politics, economy, security, society, and culture, namely a comprehensive community with economic community, security community, and cultural community as its bases while the construction of a multilayer, network-like nontraditional security community is an important component of building a community of shared future for humankind. At present, China actively implements the idea of “a community of shared future” and participates in the building of the non-traditional security community in such non-traditional security areas as ecological environment, maritime security, and terrorism at sub-regional, regional, and global levels.

4.1 Practice of China's Participation in Global Climate Governance

In global non-traditional security governance, there exist “intercrossing interests” and“absence of rules” which easily become the extended “battlefield” of the inter-state game. The non-traditional security community provides a possible option for “nonwar”and especially the peaceful atmosphere arising from “multidimensional-multilateral cooperation” “provides an option in value, attitude, and action against the impact of violence, hatred, and war culture”. “Multidimensional-multilateral cooperation” in the non-traditional security governance is not only an important path for participating states to control constructively inter-state disputes and achieve cooperative all-win outcomes but also an optimum choice for China to join the global non-traditional security community and play a role as a responsible major country.

Take China's participation in global climate governance for example. As the largest developing country in the world, China is an indispensable force in global climate governance. The Paris Agreement gives impetus to the shift of the global climate governance pattern from “top-down” to “bottom-up” and global climate governance has embarked on a multilayered and pluralistic governance stage. With the UN Climate Change Conference as the prime platform and multilateral climate negotiation as the core mechanism, China delivers its promises made in the Kyoto Protocol, the Cancun Agreement, and the Paris Agreement, coordinates interest relations between countries, safeguards the rights and interests of developing countries and upholds the position of “common but differential responsibilities, the principle of respective capability, and the principle of equity”. An increasing number of Chinese cities participate in the global climate governance network, promoting energy conservation and emission reduction and reducing carbon emission intensity. Since 2011, China has successively launched pilot carbon emissions trading in seven provinces and cities directly under the central government with altogether 42 pilot low-carbon provincial districts and cities. At the same time, many Chinese cities have launched their own initiative for low-carbon development. Furthermore, many Chinese cities are involved in a variety of transnational city climate networks. For instance, Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Wuhan, Guangzhou and Nanjing are all member cities of the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group, Shenyang, Guiyang, Xiamen, etc. being partner cities of Local Governments for Sustainability, ICLEI.

State governments and local cities make more contribution to the response to global climate crisis but the participation of other non-state actors such as enterprises and nongovernmental organizations should be enhanced. Both states and individuals are “international stakeholders”. The involvement of international businesses and research institutions is conducive to the improvement of the interaction system of global climate governance, expands the implementation space of security governance policies, and strengthens policy enforcement. It is also aligned with the interests and needs of the regional and global security co-existence to construct the non-traditional security community and provide all “international stakeholders” with security--a public product.

The practice of China's active participation in global climate governance shows that the construction of the non-traditional security community helps to increase China's institutional power of discourse in the world in an all-around way, that is, increase China's guiding power and influence in global security governance. China will not only have more voting rights and more say in the UN and other international organizations but also strengthen its power to guide agendas and participate in decision-making in emerging regional non-traditional security communities.

4.2 China's Endeavor to Build the Lancang-Mekong Non-traditional Security Community

“The Chinese outlook on relationships with neighboring countries has begun to return”, sub-regional and regional non-traditional security communities are important carriers on which China builds new relationships with neighboring countries and new order. The practice of the idea of diplomacy with neighboring countries characterized by friendship, sincerity, reciprocity, and inclusiveness and the implementation of the Road and Belt Initiative are closely related to the building of the non-traditional security community. The Lancang-Mekong Cooperation mechanism is an active endeavor made by China to build a non-traditional security community and also the first new sub-regional cooperation mechanism with neighboring countries initiated and led by China. It is also an important breakthrough point for the construction of the sub-regional non-traditional security community and has achieved leading and demonstration effects. Launched less than two years ago, this cooperation mechanism gives full expression to and interpretations of the features of the non-traditional security community.

4.2.1 “Water Resource-Induced Dilemma” Is the Triggering Factor of LancangMekong Cooperation.

The transboundary water resources issue is a most outstanding non-traditional security problem in the region along the Lancang-Mekong River. “A country's sustainable development of social and economic life will be threatened by other countries' utilisation of water resources.” Although there are a number of cooperation mechanisms in the Lancang-Mekong sub-region, the Greater Mekong Sub-region Economic Cooperation is the only one that involves China, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam, covering the whole Lancang-Mekong region. With subregional economic development as its main purpose and highly “externally dominated”, this mechanism is unable to resolve water resources issues effectively. China lies in the upper reaches of the Lancang-Mekong River and its planning and construction of hydropower stations in recent years have given rise to disputes between countries and clamors of “China's dam threat” and “China's water threat”. “Water resourceinduced dilemmas sharpen the disputes between sub-regional countries and affect the security environment of China's neighboring countries. By employing all kinds of interest links, such as political trust, economic all-win, non-traditional security, ecological conservation, and environmental protection, China should join the countries along the Mekong River to form an organic whole. It is from this prominent security dilemma that Lancang-Mekong Cooperation has arisen. Involving six countries in the Lancang-Mekong basin, Lancang-Mekong Cooperation is a non-traditional security cooperation mechanism intended to resolve the water resource-induced dilemma and can be regarded as the nascent stage of the construction of the Lancang-Mekong nontraditional security community.

4.2.2 Comprehensive Governance of Non-traditional Security Is Top Priority of Lancang-Mekong Cooperation.

The four main characteristics of the non-traditional security community (the “diversity”of security referents, the “comprehensiveness” of the area of security problems, the“low political quality” of security topics, and the “field” ways of security response) are unified and their comprehensiveness and low political quality determine that comprehensive governance of non-traditional security can be implemented in complex security fields. When the Lancang-Mekong countries fail to reach consensus on the utilization of water resources in a short time, the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation mechanism applies the concept of “field security” to address with concerted efforts the pressing non-traditional security problem in the Lancang-Mekong region to resolve the water resource-induced dilemma.

In view of the economic development level and security situation in the LancangMekong region and with political and security issues, economic and sustainable development, and social, cultural and people-to-people exchanges as the three cooperation pillars, the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation sets five key priority areas during its initial stage, namely connectivity, production capacity, cross-border economic cooperation, water resources, agriculture and poverty reduction. In addition, it deepens the cooperation in other areas of non-traditional security, such as law enforcement and security, production capacity, cultural exchanges, public health, and tourism. That is to say, it intensifies exchanges through cooperation in infrastructure construction, technology, energy resources and other areas of non-traditional security, facilitates the formation of “regional identity” and collective identity, thereby promoting the solution to the water resources security problem for shared regional security.

4.3 Mutual Consultation and Common Contribution is the Core Principle of Lancang-Mekong Cooperation.

The security subjects of the non-traditional security community cover states, local governments, civil organizations, and even individuals. Multi-layer actors and diversified cooperation areas determine the openness and inclusiveness of the nontraditional security community. Both the formulation of security policy and the implementation of security cooperation are based on the principle of “mutual consultation, common contribution, and benefits sharing” with a view to striking a balance among the needs and differences of all the countries involved to maximize economic and security benefits.

Inevitably, there exist some obstacles to the further operation of the LancangMekong Cooperation mechanism mainly because there is much to be done to improve the “fragmented” ways of governance of the water resources security problems in this region. Fragmented ways of governance is a practical situation of the water resources security governance in Southeast Asia. “If a specific problem area concerns more actors, the determination of responsibility will be more complicated and the solution will be more uncertain and thus the degree of fragmentation in this problem area will be much greater.” In addition, the water resources problem resulting from China's development brings pressure to the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation mechanism.

Can the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation mechanism break away from the once fragmented ways of governance and relieve the pressure of China's water resources shortage? It depends on the degree of this mechanism's consolidation and the degree of integration of other security governance mechanisms. “In the process of community building, there exist differences and disputes during the interaction among community members but for the preservation of relationship, community members will constantly adjust their identity and coordinate interests with the constant change of relationship, identity, interest, and behavior, and finally achieve accommodation, integration, optimistic cooperation, and evolution. By way of the golden mean and harmony and by means of preserving the relationship process, a new synthesis comes into existence.” Actually, non-traditional security cooperation and the desire to build the non-traditional security community enable both parties with tense relations in terms of resources to put aside their differences and cooperate through consultation and negotiation. The increase of cooperation opportunities is sure to promote mutual political trust and lay a solid foundation for the creation of the non-traditional security community, thus resolving traditional security conflicts in turn.

Lancang-Mekong Cooperation is conducted within a framework featuring “leaders' guidance, all-round cooperation, and broad participation. In addition to such decisionmaking bodies as the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation leaders' meetings, leaders' special meetings or informal meetings, foreign ministers' meetings, senior diplomatic officials' meetings, and working groups' meetings, it is proposed to establish organizational mechanisms such as a law enforcement body, a center for water resources cooperation in the Lancang-Mekong basin, a cultural and person-to-person exchanges platform, a Lancang-Mekong tropical disease monitoring and early warning platform, and a Lancang-Mekong tourist city cooperation alliance. These formal and informal organizational institutions will take such non-traditional security cooperation areas as transnational crimes, water resources, public health, and travel security as pivots to build a systematic network for the preservation of non-traditional security through a“government-guided, multiple-participation, and project-oriented cooperation model”. Lancang-Mekong Cooperation is an open and inclusive mechanism which not only emphasizes within this community “consensus through consultation, equal treatment, mutual consultation and coordination, voluntary participation, common contribution, and co-sharing” but also complement the existing regional cooperation mechanisms, including ASEAN + 3 (China, Japan, Korea) cooperation mechanism, East Asia Summit, and ASEAN Regional Forum, thereby further enhancing the flexibility and vitality of Lancang-Mekong Cooperation and providing more cooperation resources and development opportunities for the countries along the Lancang-Mekong River”.