"
Smart Power, Chinese Style" is the title of a 2008 article by a renowned Singaporean analyst of global affairs, Kishore Mahbubani. In his essay, [1] Kishore praised China for the "competence" of its diplomacy. He contrasted China's "deft geopolitical instincts" with American "incompetence" and "arrogance."2008 was then; 2010 is now. The sheer muscularity of recent Chinese diplomacy in East Asia has made Kishore's assessment seem, in retrospect, wishfully Sinophilic. The "smile diplomacy" in Southeast Asia that China watchers used to describe has been reversed by Beijing - into a frown. Full story
