119 How the Past Shapes the Present: Five Ways in Which History Affects China’s Contemporary Foreign Relations Harry Harding University of Virginia The history of China’s foreign relations is an interesting and controver- sial topic in its own right, as the essays in this special issue so amply demonstrate. 1 But it is also central to an understanding of China’s con- temporary international relations. The history of China’s foreign rela- tions is not just a chronicle of the past, but also a set of facts and ideas and images that are alive in the minds of policy-makers and the public today, thereby shaping the present and future of China’s relationship with the rest of the world. History influences China’s contemporary foreign relations in five ways: it provides an agenda of unresolved problems; it shapes the im- ages that China has of other countries and that they, in turn, hold of China; it is a contentious issue in some of China’s bilateral relation- ships; it presents a set of broad narratives that provide the context for China’s contemporary international conduct; and it offers positive and negative examples of national strategy and foreign policy behavior. These five dimensions of history are closely interconnected: narratives contain lessons, problems contribute to images, images constitute narratives, and competing narratives can become international issues. Still, for the sake of analytical clarity, it is useful to consider these five dimensions sepa- rately even though they are related in practice. But while history certainly influences the present, it does not com- pletely determine it. History’s message is ambiguous, its lessons are not always pertinent, and its influence is constrained by more contempo- rary factors. After analyzing, in turn, each of these five ways in which the past shapes the present, the paper therefore concludes with a brief consideration of the limits on history’s influence. History as an Agenda As in any country, the history of China’s foreign relations provides an agenda of unresolved problems, or what the Chinese often refer to as the The Journal of American–East Asian Relations, Vol. 16, Nos.1–2 (Spring–Summer 2009) © Copyright 2009 by Imprint Publications. All rights reserved. 1. This essay is based on my concluding comments at the “History and China’s Foreign Relations” conference at the University of Southern California in February 2008, and draws heavily on the presentations and subsequent discussion.