China is Shooting Itself in the Foot: The Self-Sabotage of a Would-Be Superpower

A recent Foreign Affairs article explores how China is actively sabotaging the very international system that enabled its meteoric rise. The piece is worth reading, but the deeper truth is even simpler: Beijing is shooting itself in the foot, and the bullet wounds are becoming increasingly obvious.

For decades, China benefited enormously from the post-WWII liberal international order. Open markets in the West, access to capital and technology, stable sea lanes protected by the U.S. Navy, and a rules-based trading system allowed it to become the workshop of the world. Deng Xiaoping's "hide your strength, bide your time" approach was pragmatic. It worked.

Then came Xi Jinping. The mask slipped. The wolf warrior diplomacy emerged. And China began actively undermining the system that made its success possible.

The Self-Inflicted Wounds

1. Economic Overreach and Hostage-Taking. China's use of economic coercion against Australia, Lithuania, Canada, and others has backfired. Countries that once saw China primarily as a market, now view it as a risky dependency. Supply chain "de-risking" and friend-shoring are accelerating. The result? Slower growth, capital flight, and a growing coalition of nations quietly reducing exposure to Beijing.

2. Military Aggression and Regional Backlash. Bullying in the South China Sea, threats against Taiwan, and border clashes with India, have united China's neighbours in ways nothing else could. QUAD, AUKUS, and stronger U.S. alliances in the region are direct responses. China has turned potential partners into wary adversaries.

3. Domestic Repression and the Tech/Investment Chill. Zero-COVID, the crackdown on private enterprise, the property crisis, youth unemployment, and suffocating political control have damaged China's attractiveness. Foreign investors who once rushed in are now rushing out or hedging aggressively. Demographic decline (the one-child policy's bitter harvest) compounds the problem. No amount of propaganda can hide the reality of a shrinking, aging workforce.

4. Global Overconfidence. The Belt and Road Initiative has left a trail of debt-trap projects and resentment. "Wolf warrior" diplomacy has alienated elites across the West. Attempts to export digital authoritarianism and create a parallel China-centric order have mostly produced suspicion rather than admiration.

The Irony of Great Power Hubris

China's leaders seem to believe their own propaganda about inevitable dominance. In doing so, they are repeating the classic mistake of rising powers: abandoning the patient, low-profile strategy that actually worked in favour of aggressive assertion before they were truly ready.

The United States and its partners still have enormous structural advantages, technological edge, alliances, demographics (relative to China), and the world's reserve currency. China's sabotage of the system that lifted it up is giving those advantages new life.

Australia feels this acutely. Trade coercion, interference in domestic politics, and strategic pressure in our region have hardened attitudes across the political spectrum. The "wonderful" rise Patience and others once celebrated now looks considerably less benign.

The Bottom Line

China is not ten feet tall. It is a powerful but flawed civilisation-state making serious strategic errors. Its current path: economic retaliation, military intimidation, domestic repression, and ideological export, is accelerating de-coupling rather than securing dominance.

The greatest threat to China's rise may not be America. It may be China itself. By sabotaging the international system that enabled its ascent, Beijing is proving a painful truth: great power status is not inevitable. It must be earned and sustained through wisdom, not just raw power. Right now, China is choosing the latter, and the rest of the world is taking notice. The backlash is beginning.

The dragon is roaring loudly, spitting "fire" (test missiles) in our region. But it is increasingly tripping over its own tail.

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/china/china-sabotaging-world-enables-its-rise