Hypotheses

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1.2. RESEARCH QUESTIONS

In the framework of this research, I would like to answer following questions.

What significant changes Czech-China relations have recently undergone?

What are the critical factors beyond economic concerns in China-Czech relations?

Due to the fact that this research will be mainly established on the analysis of relatively complex sources, I decided to establish another sub-questions.

What is the linkage between political and economic cooperation in the case of Czech-China relations?

Why does China have an interest in Czech, is there anything particularly special in this relationship, compared to other Visegrád group countries?

How different Presidents influence the development of Czech-China relations?

Are there any concerns that could negatively influence Czech-China cooperation?

1.3. HYPOTHESES

In my opinion, the year 2004 means a great mark in Czech-China mutual relationship history, because after the Czech Republic joined the European Union (EU) in 2004, the country had to adapt to new regulations and agreements. There is a common consensus among the EU that all member countries should follow the same path when it comes to cooperation with countries outside of the EU. After the joining, Czech started signing agreements with other countries involving economic, academic and other forms of cooperation. I believe that there have been recent significant changes in Czech-China relations, especially on the economic field. Those changes lead to more tight and equal economic cooperation between Czech and China. On the political sphere, the biggest change, in my opinion, is in the engagement of the Czech President Zeman; his presidency started in 2013; in Czech-China negotiations. I observed that during past few years, the Czech head of state has been actively supporting a prosperous relationship between China and Czech.

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Besides obvious efforts of President Zeman, I argue that there are other actors recently trying to promote Czech businesses in China, especially in Shanghai. From the cultural perspective, I see the changes in the increasing interest in China. The Czech capital, Prague, is planning to establish a close relationship with Beijing, they are about to sign the sister city agreement. As far as I am concerned, in the EU this type of agreement is not an exception, the same type of agreement was already signed between numerous cities, for instance, Copenhagen, Madrid or Paris. But in the V4 (Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary), Czech is the first country that will sign this type of agreement with Beijing, so far other countries have achieved to sign sister city agreements with Shanghai and other Chinese cities, but not with China’s capital.

I argue that economic side of Czech-China relations is probably the most crucial, but it could not exist without adequate political support. Therefore, I suggest that political affairs are equally important. When looking at the current situation, I believe tourism should be mentioned as one of the factors that influence Czech-China relations. For the Czech Republic, tourism is an important source of money income.

In my opinion, especially after sanctions placed on Russia, there are fewer tourists that are willing to spend money in Czech. In this situation, when Czech is looking for another customer that can afford to spend money while traveling in Czech, China could be a perfect target. Personally, I see a good example of the importance of tourism in the establishment of direct flights between Czech and China, which will, of course, be in favor of businessmen as well. Having a proof of the effort to make commuting between the two countries easier is a good evidence for active improvement.

Another factor that shows us the level of understanding and prosperity of mutual relations is the number of foreign people living in the country. In the case of my research, I believe it is important to examine if the number of Chinese people living in Czech in increasing. In my opinion, we can see an increase in Chinese living in Czech and that proves a raising interest of Chinese and China in general in Czech.

Lastly, I consider China’s soft power as one of the factors influencing relations between China and other countries. When I specifically look at European countries, then Confucius institute should be mentioned. In the Czech case, Confucius

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institute can influence Czech-China relations, especially because of the capital they can afford to use. I assume that this influence will not be crucial for Czech-China relations, because I am not aware of any evidence, which shows spreading the influence of the Confucius institute outside of the home city, Olomouc.

In my opinion, political and economic cooperation are tied closely together.

Some might argue that this occurrence is not essential because there can occur a situation when political cooperation is ongoing, together with academic, but not economic cooperation. I argue that such a cooperation would be to some extent vague. For good and boosting mutual relations, the economic, as well as political cooperation is necessary. I believe that the Czech government would agree with me because as I have observed, meetings and negotiations on political matters that are ongoing between Czech and China do involve government officials, but a topic of their discussion is almost always including the economic cooperation. As an example, in Czech-China relations, the Czech Presidents promotes Czech trade, businessmen, and companies during his talks with China’s high government officials. Therefore, I argue that the current situation of Czech-China relations requires the involvement of politicians, and improvement of foreign relations, in order to strengthen the economic cooperation. Then, it will be possible for a trade to become more independent from the government bodies, as it is according to the neoliberal society.

I believe that China might have many reasons why to engage with the Czech Republic; however, it seems that there is no particular bond between those two countries that would not be observed in cases of other Visegrád group countries.

Actually, I assume that Czech could be seen as even less important European country from China’s perspective, as it has been originally planned that China’s initiative

“One Belt One Road” will most probably not include Czech. But on the other hand, I argue that there is also a possibility that this will not have a negative impact on Czech-China relations, because “the compensation” of this disadvantage can come in other forms, such as the opening of a branch of the Bank of China or more promises for Czech businesses entering Chinese market. From China’s perspective, I see the interest in Czech for mostly two reasons: First, a tighter relationship with Czech China has, the greater influence in EU can be performed (by China). Second, there may not have been any particular interests at the beginning, but because of efforts

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made mostly by the Czech President, China is being the most approached by Czech among V4, and if China previously did not have any preferences between V4, why not to favor the country that is the most open and most willing to cooperate. To demonstrate a special treatment of Czech by China, which seems to be performed despite no specific evidence of China’s benefits from it, I would like to mention a planned visit of President Xi Jinping. President Xi has scheduled to visit the Czech Republic as the only European country during his stop in Europe before going to the United States. Why did Xi decide to visit only the Czech Republic? I argue that here again we should give a credit to the Czech President Zeman, who gained a promise from President Xi to visit Czech during his visit to China.

Besides the economic side of the relationship, where for example there are more and more Chinese firms investing in Czech, China often uses her soft power in other countries. One of the biggest tools of China’s soft power is a Confucius

institute; however, it does not seem that, particularly in Czech, this institute has a significant influence.

Looking to the past, as I mentioned before, Czech-China relations have changed rapidly, not only considering growing economic exchange but also on political matters. I believe that a President, any President of the Czech history, has very significant influence on the development of those mutual relations. So far, I consider the current Czech President as the one who has made the biggest efforts, compared to his two predecessors, to strengthen ties with China. As I mentioned above, Zeman has been very active during his talks with the President Xi Jinping in order to make his home country more attractive to China.

If I were asked to evaluate the first Czech President Havel’s efforts to improve Czech-China relations, I would be rather negative. Negative in terms of Czech-China foreign relations improvement; I would like to state that my intention is not to say that Havel did little in Czech foreign politics; I believe that because of the values he considered as the most important, there was a certain clash between honoring these values and favoring China. When I talk about Havel’s values, it is worth to mention democracy and human rights, which I believe, he considered as the most important. I see the significant difference between Zeman and Havel, but between Zeman and the

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second President Klaus, there are rather more similarities. In my opinion, so far, the President always has had a significant influence on in which direction will Czech-China relations develop during those five years of his presidency.

I believe that a possible reason why the Czech Republic wants to improve the relationship with China is an economic need. When we look back to the past, when the Czech Republic was a new country, her enthusiasm about China was not so great among society, as well the government body, especially a President. We can see a huge change nowadays, when not only the President but also Czech society becomes more aware of China. Reasons seem obvious to me – a search for new markets and strengthening economic cooperation with a big strong country.

As I see it, the biggest concern for Czech-China relations is that a relationship between those two countries would come back to as it was during Václav Havel presidency. To specify, this situation could occur if Czech society, but mostly government criticizes China for the way of their acting, for instance in the matter of human rights, particularly the issue of Tibet or Taiwan. But so far, I observe that the current government seems fond of China, renouncing the possibility of bringing up aforementioned issues. There is a possibility that if Czech-Taiwan relations are improving rapidly, China might notice that and push Czech to loosen their ties with Taiwan. I argue that the current situation suggests that Taiwan issue is not a threat to Czech-China relations and vice versa. The evidence for that can be seen in no recent official complaints by China involving Czech’s relationship with Taiwan. I assume that even despite the statement made by President Zeman, when he said that Taiwan is a part of China, Czech-Taiwan foreign relations did not worsen, because the economic and academic cooperation between the Czech Republic and Taiwan is already well-established and Zeman’s statement did not mean any threat to nor economic neither academic Czech-Taiwan cooperation.

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While examining Chinese investments and financial engagement in the Visegrád group, we can see an obvious increase of all various activities. China’s interest in Central and Eastern Europe has raised during past few years, especially after 2006 (Coyer, 2015; Grapin, 2015; Szunomár, 2014; Tiezzi, 2013; Zeneli, 2014;

Zhen & Wu, 2015). There are two main reasons why China is interested in this region. The first element that influences China’s acting is simply a globalization, when the world is turning towards more global focus in economy, big countries like China simply want to spread their influence. Global economy transformation,

therefore, leads China towards a greater interest in Central and Easter Europe (CEE), which can be also specifically applied to V4 (Grapin, 2015; Szunomár, 2014). The second reason is that China sees a potential, challenges, and most importantly opportunities in CEE (Coyer, 2015; Grapin, 2015; Szunomár, 2014; Tiezzi, 2013;

Zeneli, 2014). It means that China, while spreading her power, chooses particularly CEE, not because it is another region “to conquer”, but because this region has much to offer to China, mostly from an economic perspective. I used a term “conquer”, because some argue that a thing China wants the most is to gain power and influence, I am not challenging that argument, but I suppose that despite that impression, China offers a good deal to other countries by investing there – it is beneficial for both sides.

After 1993 the Czech Republic during her first phase of foreign politics (FP) focused mostly on a good relationship with countries of the same region, the second phase of Czech FP started in the year 2004 and the Czech Republic became more open to the West (Pick & Handl, 2004). Václav Kotyk (2000) divides the first phase of Czech FP into two phases: 1993−1998 and 1998−present². During the first phase the Czech Republic started orienting more towards the West and her cooperation with geographical Eastern Europe was weaken, Czech FP started focusing more on trade economy, as the most important trading partner was considered Germany, in 1996 the Czech Republic applied for and started preparing to join the European Union, and in 1997 the Czech Republic was promised to join The North Atlantic Treaty

2 The article was published in 2000, thus I suggest not to apply Kotyk’s evaluation on current years after 2000.