Nationalism and Globalization, 1988–2018

China’s domestic economic development and foreign policies were part and parcel of the ambitious goals of a new China, called by some, China’s “Third Revolution,” following Mao’s and Deng’s. At the turn of the twenty-first century, the global trend toward free trade agreements was the rage. At the end of 2017, there were more than 669 global bilateral and multi-lateral trade agreements in a “complex system of multiple overlapping agreements,” called by one social scientist “the spaghetti bowl.” In the early years of the twenty-first century, China’s relations with Japan were endangered by disputes over the ownership of the Diaoyu Islands or Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea. China remained an ally of North Korea, though it made it clear that it would not step in to provide support when the Soviet Union fell in 1991.