These collective changes in the content, character, and execution of China’s foreign policy over the past ten years represent an important evolution from Beijing’s narrow and reactive approach to global affairs in the 1980s and early 1990s. Yet potentially even more significant changes are now taking place. Within the last three years, and especially since September 11, 2001, the writings of Chinese strategists have begun to reflect a critical shift in their view of the international system and China’s role in it. For example, provocative articles have recently run in major Chinese newspapers and journals advocating that China abandon its long-held victim mentality. The writers reject the persistent emphasis on China’s "150 years of shame and humiliation" as the main lens through which Chinese view their place in modern international affairs. Influential Chinese analysts have begun to promote instead China’s adoption of a "great-power mentality. " This emerging notion would replace Chinese victimhood with a confidence born of two decades of impressive economic growth.
