POLYCYCLIC PLATE TECTONIC MOVEMENTS AND THE CENOZOIC TECTONICS OF SOUTH CHINA SEA
多旋回的板块构造运动与南海新生代构造

The South China Sea structures have resulted from the evolution of the polycyclic plate tectonic movements.During the Cenozoic (including the Late Cretaceous), the South China Sea underwent plate tectonism of three cycles of Late Cretaceous-Eocene, Oligocene-Miocene, Pliocene-Pleistocene, resulting in the Philippine-Borneo orogenic zone that is characterized by polycyclic magmatic activities, sedimentary buildups, and folding and,faulting,and the Celebes, Sulu and South China Sea, and the West Zhongsha and Nansha continental fragments which underwent polycyclic spreading.The Cenozoic tectonics in the South China Sea shows that a complete plate tectonic cycle consists of six stages including crustal rifting, sea-floor spreading, plate drifting, plate convergence, plate subduction, and plate collision. The former three ones aresea-making movements and the latter ones are orogenic movements. These two kinds of movements are the different representations of geodynamics in the plate tectonic cycles; the sea-making areas and orogenic zones are the products of different periods in the plate tectonic cycles.