Considering the questions the international community has about China and its relations with the outside world, the just-concluded 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China gave an opportunity to the Chinese leadership to articulate to the rest of the world in clear terms what it is truly after at home and abroad. After all, with the sheer size of its economy, which has been woven tightly into the global economic fabric, what happens within China increasingly has international consequences, and countries are looking for clues as to what those may be.

The top leadership's report to the congress made clear that the country's continued ambition is to make greater contributions to world peace and development through its own development, in part by further increasing China's international standing and influence so that it can play a greater role in global governance. 

While the former colonial powers and their acolytes are seeking to discredit this endeavor as an aggressive undermining of the rules-based order, their smearing of China's actions and intentions has been motivated by China taking a clear-cut stand against their power politics in international affairs. 

China's effectiveness in gradually tilting global governance away from its inbuilt partiality has attracted the full weight of their resentment. In their attempts to maintain their systemic advantages these favored few are doubling down on their efforts to portray China as a malign actor. So it is important that China's diplomatic work put flesh on the bones of the objectives and orientations set out in the report to the congress. Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi made the diplomatic establishment's first move in that direction on Wednesday with a meeting with the resident diplomatic envoys from ASEAN countries. 

While briefing the diplomats of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations on the "epoch-making implications" of the CPC event, Wang called on ASEAN to adhere to the "ASEAN approach" and uphold a sense of regional community. The ASEAN countries will host three important multilateral meetings — the G20 Summit, the APEC Informal Leaders' Meeting, and the East Asian Cooperation Leaders' Meeting Series — which Wang said represented an "Asian moment" for global governance. 

Wang stressed that on its part, China would continue to prioritize relations with neighboring countries in its diplomacy, give precedence to ASEAN, and pursue common prosperity with ASEAN members. 

China's vision of global governance is encapsulated in its promotion of a human community with a shared future. It has offered two initiatives to facilitate the building of such a community: the Global Development Initiative and the Global Security Initiative. These will be the basis for China to play its part in upholding better global governance.