The end of the Cold War following the fall of Berlin Wall in 1989 and the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991 led scholars in the International Politics arena to discuss the nature of a newly emerging world system. It has been estimated that the new international order will face a structural transformation from the bipolar structure to the unipolar system under U.S. hegemony. For some, it was obvious that the post-Cold War era would bring a period of unipolar American power unlike the Cold-War period, which was based on the two powers under the NATO and Warsaw Pact. However, two significant legacies from the Bush administration to President Barack Obama have forced us to re-consider the borders and limits of American power: "War against Terrorism" and "Global Financial Crisis." As argued by some scholars like Stephen Walt, it is indeed time to face a declining American power in all spheres of the world affairs due to such a devastating economic crisis in 2008 and more importantly the rising of other powers, especially China.In this sense, China became and is still the main area of interest in the twentieth century for the Obama administration, unlike other regions such as the Middle East. This policy change has been labelled as the "pivot to Asia" or "rebalancing," and it was announced by Hillary Clinton that Asia-Pacific with its huge population and economy has become "a key driver of global politics." This policy is actually none other than the awareness and acceptance of a situation - referred to as American decline. Thus, the pivot to Asia became Obama administration's biggest and most open-ended foreign policy approach.In the beginning China was an economic partner, and then from 2009 to 2012 President Obama considered the nature of bilateral relations as a "competitor" and even "adversary." In order to understand the latest phase in U.S.-Chinese relations it is enough to look at the President Obama's latest remarks in State of the Union on Jan. 20. What the President declared is that "As we speak, China wants to write the rules for the world's fastest-growing region. That would put our workers and our businesses at a disadvantage. Why would we let that happen?" By referencing the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), seen as the most serious trading agreement of this century including 12 countries within the Pacific region except China, he then added that "We should write those rules. We should level the playing field." What lies at the background of such a declaration is mostly that the U.S. will not allow China to write "the rules" for the Asia-Pacific trade and set its own agenda for a Chinese-dominated Asian regional bloc.Under the leadership of Xi Jinping, who came to power in 2012, there has been a serious transformation in Chinese diplomacy in world affairs. This can be considered as the emergence of a new China with its changing role from being one of the participants in global affairs to taking a leading role in the international order. This is also reflected well in the latest official slogan - "Asia for Asian" signaling a tectonic shift in today's economic, political and security order and American-led international system. As a rising power in its own path, China, with its four significant and highly strategic projects, will continue to shape the nature of this century's power structure. The projects such as the New Development Bank, a new Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, the New Silk Road and a new 21st Century Maritime Silk Road deserve to be seen as an outcome of its self-confident foreign policy vision and major-power diplomacy.According to one report, published by Merics (Mercator Institute for China Studies) under the title of China Monitor on Oct. 28 2014, such a "shadow foreign policy" approach developed by China is based on a systematic realignment of the international order through establishing parallel structures in a wide range of international institutions. By doing so, China is looking to take a leading role through alternative mechanisms - designed to increase China's autonomy vis-á-vis U.S.-dominated institutions such as the WTO, IMF and the World Bank and expand its international sphere of influence. This however does not mean that China will not continue to be involved in existing institutions. The new foreign policy is not aiming to exit from the current international organizations and multilateral regimes, but rather constructing supplementary, in part complementary and competitive channels, in order to shape the international order beyond Western-oriented claims to leadership.The ultimate aim of the new administration's assertive foreign policy under President Xi Jinping is to replace the American economic and political influence in the region and America-led international order. Accordingly, the relationship between the U.S. and China has to be re-defined under the condition without American primacy in which China as a major power will participate and the U.S. will leave its traditional containment policy toward China. As Henry Kissinger highlighted, that China doesn't consider itself a rising power, but rather a returning one, which was predominant in its region for two millennia.The author of Liberal Leviathan, G. John Ikenberry, argues on the rise of China that this would obviously be a struggle between China and American power. What he offers to the American policy makers is to expand the scope of this struggle from the bilateral structure between China and the U.S. toward a struggle between China and the revived Western order for an ultimate triumph. Then, the whole western order together with the U.S. and Europe will easily surpass the economic capacity of China in the near future. This is actually a central argument behind the liberal international order under American power - supposed to be "easy to join and hard to overturn" for the countries like China as a stakeholder within it. However, a realist approach would think of this as a reflection of the historical idea of "Western exceptionalism" under the universal American values. At the end of day, America will be remembered in the diplomatic history as one of the great powers like Great Britain, and the Soviet Union, not beyond it.It is obvious from now that this century's competition between the Western world order and Asian-oriented system will differ from that of the last century since China has been emerging as a militarily, economic and hegemonic rivalry in the whole Asia-Pacific region. The most serious challenge for American hegemony is not China; it is actually itself. That is, the economic system with its regime of accumulation and hegemonic mentality accompanied with liberal western-oriented order. For Americans, dealing with the rise of China as a great global power will basically require a new language diversified from that of the last century in a bipolar world order. There is no doubt a multi-polar international system is emerging in which each regional power has been re-inventing and re-positioning itself.Today's China's administration seems to have nothing to "hide" and "bide" as in the last two decades. They are well aware of the fact that China cannot become an alternative without going beyond economic reforms with Chinese characteristics through adopting social and political institutional reforms as well. They are also informed in Acemoğlu's latest book - Why Nations Fail highlighting the importance and role of institutions for a successful administration during the history of humanity.What is the actual and ultimate target of the Chinese leaders? One of the most significant questions of this century is whether China aims to replace U.S. power as a new hegemon in world politics. Such questions are particularly related to this central question: what does the world look like with China in charge? Maybe we are required to wait to witness the new structure of the international system until the year 2030 that was regarded for many as the date marking the handover ceremony of American hegemony. Beyond all these, the real question should be as follows: whether the 250-year reign of Western civilization's hegemonic role will come to an end with the disappearance of the Last Man - the U.S. in the world system - or will it continue in the Asia-Pacific region with Chinese characteristic.