China’s push to build an “autonomous knowledge system” dates to 2016, when President Xi Jinping called for the development of philosophy and the social sciences with Chinese characteristics. In 2022, he stated the goal more explicitly, saying that the effort ultimately came down to building China’s own knowledge system.
Leading international-relations scholar stresses original research, internal academic debate, and researchers’ freedom to set their own agendas.
Against this backdrop, 外交评论 Foreign Affairs Review, a journal published by China Foreign Affairs University under the supervision of China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, recently invited four leading Chinese international-relations scholars to reflect on the subject. The essay below, by Yan Xuetong, Honorary Dean of Tsinghua University’s Institute of International Relations, is the final installment in the four-part symposium in the 3rd issue of the bimonthly in 2026—and it reads rather differently from the others.
Tiếp tục đọc “An autonomous knowledge system needs more than Chinese characteristics”
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