China often cites its status as the world’s largest developing country as a factor in determining its policy on a number of issues – from combating climate change and Ebola to justifying its stance on human rights and even military action. But as China continues to modernize and grow economically, it will eventually be unable to credibly label itself developing. This change will have serious implications for China’s foreign policy.

While China has generally used its developing country status to argue that its burden on a number of issues should be lighter than that of developed countries – both because it contributed less to the problem and has less capability to deal with it – China’s economic rise has brought about a divergence in its use of developing country rhetoric. On international issues, China is taking up greater developed country responsibilities, but on domestic issues China still lags behind.

China’s burden has become greater despite its developing country status. For example, on the Paris climate change agreement, President Xi remarked“ [we] should protect the achievements of global governance.” There was no shirking of responsibility by China and importantly no mention of China’s special status of a big developing country to excuse behavior in the Chinese Foreign Ministry’s statement on President Xi’s meeting with President Macron. This stands in notable contrast to China’s stance just a few years ago, where in Copenhagen China saw climate change talks as a Western plot against developing countries. Apart from global governance, China also contributed the most troops to U.N. peacekeeping missions and increased efforts to fight disease like Ebola.

China’s international growth has not been limited to these relatively non-controversial issues. The most recent example of China’s growing international ambitions have been in Djibouti, where it officially set up its first overseas military support base. This is a remarkable move for a country that has gone at length to emphasize its peaceful rise and how it was different from hegemonic and imperialist Western powers by not holding overseas bases.

But controversial or not, these areas share two major common themes – firstly they are significant to China’s international stature and secondly China has elected to take a greater role, not citing its developing country status to evade burdens. 

China is making smaller efforts to portray itself as a developed country on domestic issues. During last year’s 68th anniversary of Human Rights Day, the Chinese Foreign Ministry released a statement that emphasized as a developing country, China has made great progress on social and economic rights. As for the more Western conception of human and political rights, those remained a “lofty ideal” with “no universally agreed path.” Rather than highlight human rights on the Human Rights Day statement, it proclaimed “development is the eternal quest of mankind.”

Beyond these “lofty ideals”, other internal issues such as economic and trade liberalization have been directly tied to China’s developing country status – for example China uses its status to comply with obligations more favorable to developing countries in the WTO. While China’s economic liberalization has some overlaps with the international community’s approach to globalization, especially with respect to trade, there is little doubt that for the Chinese leadership, economics is mainly a domestic issue tied more to political legitimacy than international standing.

Taking all of the Chinese government’s public stances and actions into account, a clear pattern emerges: China appears to be more willing to use its developing country status on domestic issues that garner a smaller amount of international attention compared to global issues, where China is increasingly trying to be viewed as a responsible major power.

For the most part, this phenomenon should be interpreted as modestly positive for the international community. The effects will be especially acute as the United States moves towards a period of “America First” that appears to come at the expense of the rest of the world (and probably its own interests). The best way for China to be seen as a responsible major power is to act like one on major international issues – and on the issues mentioned previously, China has proven itself capable of such action.

So while China-watchers can expect to see an even greater burden sharing by China on these issues – climate change and humanitarian assistance – as it further develops both itself and its global ambitions, there remains the question of more contentious issues. On disputes such as in the South China Sea and the Doklam standoff vis-a-vis India, China appears to be focused more on the “major power” part of its rise rather than the “responsible” part.

This is not to say that China’s claims are illegitimate or even that its actions are unjustified, rather the territorial disputes highlight a discrepancy between China’s apparent goal of being seen as a responsible major power and its actual actions which can appear to be flexible or aggressive. Completely separate from the question of whether these policies are right or beneficial for China, there is little doubt that China’s continued military buildup in the South China Sea and hardline rhetoric on Doklam works against China’s narrative of a “peaceful rise” and “responsible major power.” One only needs to look at foreign media’s headlines to see the real and deleterious effects of these disputes: “Chinese Daily Turns Outright Hostile” and “Vietnam, a Lonely Voice Challenging China’s Claims.”

There exists at least two explanations for this discrepancy between China’s goals and actions. Firstly and optimistically, there may be a time lag in China’s policy goal of good international stature and actual policies in these territorial disputes. After all, it did take decades for China to fully climb aboard the climate change train, but when it did with the Paris agreement, it made clear that is was fully aboard and would help support the international community in efforts against climate change. But this explanation seems unlikely as China continues to view its territorial integrity as part of its core interests and while the South China Sea may have recently been more stable, there is little evidence that China is moderating its position.

The more realistic explanation for these actions is that China has calculated it is in its strategic interests to pursue these more controversial goals that involve military build up and territorial disputes, than to fully commit to its goal of being seen as a responsible major power. Despite this conflict, China is not totally ignoring its international standing on controversial issues – for example, official media has carefully noted the Djibouti base a support base, not a military base. Additionally, the base itself is intended as part of the international community’s anti-piracy mission. And on the South China Sea, China has worked intensely to be seen in the most favorable light possible, most recently on the ASEAN foreign minister’s statement which notably did not criticize China specifically.

All things considered though, China’s shifting use of developing country rhetoric away from many international issues is a signal to the world that it wants to be seen as an emerging and responsible major power. For China to achieve this goal, it should make progress on both domestic and strategic issues just as it has done on issues like climate change, peace keeping, and other burden sharing issues.

As for the rest of the world and existing great powers, perhaps the focus should not just be on its maritime disputes, which admittedly harm China’s narrative, but also allowing China assume a greater position that corresponds to its greater development.

Nathaniel Wong is a research assistant at the Institute for China-America Studies.