Asia will likely choose peace through Chinese hegemony over balanced multipolar conflict

Evidence

Perhaps, as Friedberg suggested, Europe’s past is Asia’s future. More probably, Asia’s past will be Asia’s future. The choice for Asia is between power balanced at the price of conflict or peace secured at the price of hegemony. Western societies might go for conflict and balance. History, culture, and the realities of power strongly suggest that Asia will opt for peace and hegemony. The era that began with the Western intrusions of the 1840s and 1850s is ending, China is resuming its place as regional hegemon, and the East is coming into its own. — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 653

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The core Huntington insight that Asian states, drawing on their own historical traditions, might prefer a hierarchical order under a hegemon to the Western balance-of-power model — a genuine and counterintuitive civilizational claim, though it has aged uncertainly.
• SEED: Angles: ‘tribute system redux’ essays on how East Asian regional order diverges from Westphalian assumptions; compare Sinic hierarchy with modern-day China’s Belt and Road as a non-balancing form of order.