“Diplomatizing” the Border Governance

During the period of the Republic of China, border governance showed an obvious “diplomatic” orientation. In the early 1930s, the national government theorized and politicized the “diplomatizing” of border governance. The “diplomatizing” of border governance mainly adopted the border integration strategy of shelving and compromise. In essence, it was to transfer the relevant rights and interests of border areas to the great powers. Therefore, at that time, both the government and public opinion regarded the “diplomatizing” policy of border governance as an expedient measure, that is, through border diplomacy under the situation of insufficient national strength and bad geopolitical environment, the central government will try its best to stabilize the border situation and safeguard border sovereignty. From the perspective of the implementation process of the “diplomatizing” of the frontier governance of the national government, with the differentiation and reorganization of geopolitical factors and national strength factors, their ways and expectations of frontier governance are also different in different stages and places. When the national government tried to “diplomatize” border governance, it showed that the national government had deeply realized that border governance needed to coordinate the overall situation at home and abroad. Specifically, in the border areas, it is necessary to unite the hearts of the local upper political and social knowledge elites to achieve the consistency of the central and local foreign policies and actions; In terms of diplomatic relations, it is necessary to obtain the understanding of relevant stakeholders as much as possible, eliminate the possibility of foreign powers interfering in China’s border areas, and take advantage of the situation when the time was ripe.