HOW THREAT ASSESSMENT COULD BECOME SELF-FULFILLING PROPHECY: CASE OF U.S.-CHINA RELATIONS

This article tries to explain how misperception can trigger conflict between countries. The article would employ spiral model of conflict proposed by Robert Jervis as a theoretical framework to scrutinize contemporary US and Chinese contemporary competition. As a result, this paper shows how threat assessment could trigger a spiral of conflict through state’s tendency to overestimate threat level and its failure to perceive that defensive behavior can be interpreted as offensive by the belligerent. Based on this analysis, the probability of conflicts can be reduced as each country tries to comprehend motivations that drive other behavior, perceptions and reactions that might arise as a result of the strategic empathy.


INTRODUCTION
Is war between the United States and China inevitable? Will "China threat" theory be a self-fulfilling prophecy? What is the nature of the U.S.-China relations? What are the options available, if there is any, for policy-makers in Washington and Beijing to avoid the collision between the great powers? These are arguably the most pertinent questions facing the International Relations scholars today. For "the most significant bilateral international relationship over the course of the next several decades is likely to be between the United States and the PRC" (Friedberg, 2005, p. 8). The current development suggesting the worsening relations between U.S. and China, from the prospect of trade war to the military confrontation in the disputed waters in the South China Sea, further increase the need to explore the nature of the relationship between the two great powers.
The structural realists' postulation maintains that the anarchic, self-help international system, great powers are bound to conflict. 1 For at the top of the international power structure there is supposedly one place for the hegemon. As convincing and parsimonious as it is, the structural explanations of the U.S.-China conflictual relations and the prospect of war between them discount domestic-level variables in both countries that could potentially increase, or in that matter decrease, the prospect of conflict between the two great powers. In this respect, a closer look at the psychological dynamic between the leaders of both U.S. and China and how they (mis)perceive each other as threats, could enhance our understanding on what is really at work with regard to the great powers relations. Moreover, for policy-makers, this understanding could answer the pertinent question of whether the hegemonic clash between the U.S. and China is really inevitable.
In this paper, I try to answer the question on how state's threat assessment could become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Built upon Robert Jervis's (1976) "spiral model", my answer to that question is that state's threat assessment could become a self-fulfilling prophecy through the initiation of conflict spiral. In so doing, I try to explain recent development of U.S.-China relations in terms of how both sides apply two different logics -perceiving other as hostile while believing that the other is aware of its benign intentionand how this has been leading the two states towards a conflict spiral recently.
This paper is structured as follows. In the first section I provide a brief synopsis of the "spiral model" by consulting existing literatures on the topic. I then move directly towards the application of this theoretical framework on the case of U.S.-China relations.
This paper will be concluded with some short prescriptions on how U.S. and China could avoid the hegemonic clash by escaping the conflict spiral through clearer communication.

Spiral Model
In the anarchic international system where there is no higher authority above states to govern the relations between them, states basically pose potential threat to each other.
Almost all of the states possess military capabilities, although the strength is varied. In other words, states possess the means to physically harm and possibly destroy each other. 2 A logical consequence from such situation is the Hobbesian bellum omnium contra omnes, "war all against all." This outcome fortunately does not occur because state does not consider every other state as threat; states pick out specific states as the ones who could threaten them the most. 3 Indeed "decision-makers act in terms of the vulnerability they feel, which can differ from the actual situation" (Jervis, 1978).
When states assess threats, however, they tend to misperceive and miscalculate. 4 Whilst there is no shortage of works on the misperception as a cause of war, 5 the causal mechanism that explains how misperception can lead to the outbreak of war is still underdeveloped. Nevertheless, Robert Jervis's "spiral model" can guide us to understand on how threat assessment involving misperception can lead the conflict between states.
In his seminal work of Perception and Misperception in International Politics, Robert Jervis (1976, pp. 58-113) provides two models which can explain the outbreak of war by attributing it to the role of misperceptions: deterrence and the spiral model. 6 In "deterrence model," war can break out when an aggressive state believes that the status quo, defending powers are weak in capability and resolve. Such believe will further increase when the defending state, believing that appeasement would lead to the prevention of conflict, concede to the demand of the aggressor. The aggressor would then push even further wishing for further concessions until it is too late for the defending state to change course and war breaks out.
In contrast to the "deterrence model," in "spiral model" the outbreak of war is attributed to the very opposite kind of misperception. Instead of believing that appeasing aggressor would lead to a more preferable behaviour, in "spiral model" the defending state tends to overestimates the hostility of the aggressor, and vice versa. Being aware of the consequences of living in anarchic international system where there is no higher authority above states to enforce rules and protect the bullied, states tend equate arms with hostile intentions. 7 Hence, when state witness other states arming, it would regard those capabilities aims to undermine its security; a hostile image is attached on the arming states. As soon as the hostile image has been attached, any further move by the arming states would be regarded as a proof for their hostile intentions. Weapons, purchased for defensive purposes, could be regarded as means to attack. This overestimation of the hostility of other states is the first logic that states apply in "spiral model." In most cases, however, states fail to understand that their own behaviour can be easily interpreted as hostile behaviour by others as well. This second logic tells that state's own move to strengthen its capabilities is always peaceful and that the other states are aware of this peaceful motive. When two states, in a dyadic relations, applying these two logics, the result is a mutual hostility that could lead to conflict.
In the next section, I try to apply the "spiral model" on the case of ongoing U.S.-China relations. In doing so, by using primary data from U.S. and China's official publications and their officials' statements, I try to show how both states, to a certain degree, apply the logic mentioned before. The application of the logics, or in other words the misperception both states have towards each other, has been driving them towards a conflict spiral.

Misperception in U.S.-China Relations
The rise of China as an emerging power, which started in 1980s when Deng Xiaoping initiated economic reform in the country, has brought the country an unprecedented economic growth. According to World Bank database, during the time of 1989-2013, China experienced 3.8 to 14.2% of annual growth of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). As China's economic grows, so does its national interests. China, in particular, needs to keep its growth steady. In order to do so, China needs to secure access to resources, energy in particular. Therefore, it appears to be a natural phenomenon when China increases its defence expenditure in line with its economic growth (Tellis, 2005  to note here how Clinton frames that U.S. rebalancing is not desired by U.S. only, but also by the region itself, hence justifying U.S. continuing presence. Another important note is how U.S. seems to truly believe that it has been a Pacific state. This statement can be regarded as a way U.S. tries to frame that its presence expansion in Asia-Pacific is for benign purposes. U.S. "rebalancing" strategy, which was initially intended to preserve stability in the region, turns out generate the very opposite outcome. China considers U.S., with its "rebalancing" strategy as a revisionist power that seeks to curtail China's political influence and harms China's interests; as China rises, the U.S. will resist (Nathan & Scobell, 2012). This view appears to be much influenced by China's understanding of U.S., as well as China's view of the international system and how to behave  to the hostile tit-for-tat relations between U.S. and China.
As the faith of international system is very much determined by the strategic behaviour of great powers, the development of U.S.-China relations is perhaps the most significant feature of international relations today (Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, 2001). Whilst some argue that hegemonic clash between the two is inevitable, 12 this paper has provided a hint that U.S. and China could escape the prophecy.
As the spiral of conflict is very much attributed to misperception in states' threat assessment, we can argue that more intense and clear communication can perhaps break the spiral of conflict. Both states, U.S. and China, should commit to put an effort on transmitting messages regarding their intentions as clear as possible towards each other.