My Thesis

I just officially finished writing a 11-page thesis in Chinese. I wrote around 8,300 characters, equivalent to about 15-16 pages written in English. I am quite proud of it and want to post all of it on here, but it's all in Chinese and I think a majority of my readers don't speak Chinese, nor have that deep an interest in Deng Xiaoping's Foreign Policy. But I will put the Abstract on here, which I had to translate into English, as all the Chinese students have to do as well. But you know what the said part is? When I was translating my abstract into English, I had to use the Chinese-English dictionary to help me more than 15 or so times. Oh dear, what am I going to do when I get back to GW and have to write in English again? Actually it is kind of funny, my friends and I that have been in China for a year now both agree that we're at this point where we're not really good at either language, our Chinese and our English sucks at the same time. oh dear.

 

摘 要

 

邓小平的外交政策对每个中国人的生活都产生了有意义的影响。他的思想和指导主要包括三个方面：和平的国际环境是发展的前提，独立自主是每个国家的权利，以及对外开放政策与结盟无关。邓小平所倡导的对外思想和政策有三个具体特点：判断的科学性、坚定的牢固性、实行的灵活性。最后，为了有效地评价邓小平的外交思想，笔者亲自采访了部分中国老百姓，以获得他们对邓的普遍看法，并且分析了美国外交专家的观点。

 

关键词：独立自主；对外开放；牢固性；灵活性；主权；人权

 

 

 

Abstract

 

Deng Xiaoping's foreign policy has influenced every Chinese person's life in a significant way. His thinking and guidance have three main foundational aspects: that a peaceful international environment is a pre-requisite for development, self-determination is every country's right and privilege, and that an open-door policy does not mean creating alliances with other countries. Deng Xiaoping's advocated using three specific stratagems when determining foreign policy: use scientific judgments, remain firm on your position, and practice flexibility. Finally, in order to evaluate Deng Xiaoping's thinking, I personally investigated the average Chinese person's opinion, and analyzed American diplomatic experts' point of view.

 

Keywords: self-determination; open-door policy;firmness; flexibility; sovereignty; human rights