This chapter spells out the constitutive elements of the ideal type of hierarchical order grounded in China’s traditional culture. These constitutive elements will then serve as a framework for the examination, in the chapters that follow, of China’s concrete historical experience during the imperial era, during the period of transition to modern times, and under the People’s Republic. Chinese foreign relations, like those of any major country, are complex, ever evolving, and multifaceted. By accentuating some of their significant features, an ideal type can serve as a guide to wade through that complexity and identify one particularly meaningful and consistent Chinese foreign policy aim. Although we use core elements of ancient Chinese political philosophy to build this ideal type, we do not pretend that a hierarchical inclination sums up the whole of its rich and diverse cultural traditions, or that those traditions are the only force that drives its behaviour even today. This is not an attempt to comprehensively classify and study all aspects of Chinese foreign policy in light of different orientations either. Rather, by examining its relations with neighbouring states in light of a particular set of values that Chinese statesmen hold dear and that is incarnated in the ideal type of hierarchical order, we wish to emphasize one significant purpose they pursue when they engage in interactions with other polities and to show that this purpose has stayed important to them over the centuries and remains so today.

This ideal type has at its core the idea of a moral duty of the individual to accept his role in a ranked society and to follow the rules of proper behaviour specific to his rank, and of a moral duty of the ruler to enforce those rules and to lead by example so as to maintain social order. The underlying values that it most strongly reflects are, simply stated, the achievement of social order as a goal in itself, the cultivation of the virtues that sustain individuals in the fulfilment of their social role, and respect for social rules of proper behaviour. None of these is particularly unique to the Chinese.