A Geopolitical Imagination with Chinese Characteristics: Analysis from American Studies of the Evolution of China?s Foreign Policy in its Geopolitical Projects

This article analyzes, from the American studies, and through a theoretical and discursive review, the evolution of China's geopolitical imagination as an approach to Critical Geopolitics. It is worth asking how this dimension has conditioned Chinese foreign policy in its international insertion in the last two decades. It is hypothesized that the changes in the geopolitical imagination in China materialize in differentiated geopolitical codes and two moments. The first moment corresponds to the period between 1990 and 2008, with a foreign policy whose axis was to maintain a low political profile and advance participation in international regimes and trade agreements; while the second moment is set from 2008, towards the end of the Hu Jintao administration and consolidated to the present with Xi Jinping, characterized by a more active and assertive foreign policy. It is a product of the transformation in its international reintegration strategy and the need to stabilize its entire geopolitical space, moving towards consolidating China's status as a global power. At this moment, Latin America is established as a strategic region in the materialization and search for consolidation of its geopolitical imagination.