Search

What are the prospects of U.S.-China relations in the area of human rights? Skeptics maintain that human rights is no longer an issue between the United States and China. A traditional understanding of U.S.–China relations ignores the role of norms, while the constructivist perspective recognizes their independent effects. This paper links the traditional understanding of power politics between the United States and China with the study of constructivist norm research. The three findings of constructivist norm theories are relevant and applied to predict the status of human rights in U.S.-China relations: the historical construction of norms, the long-term and multifaceted effects of norms, and the persistence of norms. Based on these theoretical predictions, it is expected that, although convergence is not completely impossible, the past dynamic of competition and confrontation will continue and human rights will still be a contentious issue in U.S.-China relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With China's increasing dependence on imports of oil and gas, the Chinese government has been engaged in defining and implementing an energy security policy. This paper examines the implications of this policy for the security interests of its regional neighbours. It is certainly plausible to construct alarming and realist-driven scenarios whereby China's quest for energy security leads to competition and regional confrontation. However, this paper argues that the prospect for energy interdependence promoting co-operation and an improved regional environment is an equally probable outcome. China's neighbours, and the West more generally, should promote policies that support this more benign outcome. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Why does Ma Ying-jeou pursue a China-tilting policy when US-PRC relations become more competitive after 2010? Indeed, the president's mainland policy has gone far beyond the strategic requirements to satisfy international pressures for a stable cross-strait relationship. According to neoclassical realism, domestic politics acts as 'intervening variables' through which systemic imperatives are translated into a state's foreign policy response. Based, in part, on this author's interviews in Taiwan, this paper contends that due to Taiwan's internal political divisions on the 'one China' issue, elected leaders strive for their own nation-building projects, which, in turn, generate policies that undermine Taiwan's national security. Since 2008, the KMT tries to reshape Taiwan's identity through the rehabilitation of the ROC as the legitimate 'one China'. Though Ma's rapprochement with Beijing on the basis of the '1992 consensus' has contributed to cross-strait stability, his embrace of a China-centric national identity has also placed the administration increasingly at odds with Taiwan's public which gave the KMT a resounding electoral defeat in Taiwan's local elections of November 2014. As Taipei becomes more aligned to the PRC, its security ties with America and Japan could be compromised. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As states jostle to attract and entice others by deploying a range of innovative strategies, a ‘soft’ power competition era looms possibly in the Asia-Pacific. This paper argues that reflecting on this period of competitive policy innovation provides a valuable opportunity to re-assess the theory and practice of Joseph Nye's ‘soft’ power, given its conceptual and empirical frailties: how theoretically precise are the policies commonly described as projecting ‘soft’ power? To do so, it undertakes a comparative evaluation of Japan's and China's ‘soft’ power strategies. By paying close attention to the theory–practice linkage, it illuminates the disparities in their understanding of Nye's ‘soft’ power. Rather than a one-size-fits-all concept, ‘soft’ power strategies with distinctively Japanese and Chinese characteristics are emerging, bringing different advantages and weaknesses. The proverbial magic mirror would conclude that by more closely matching Nye's formulations and displaying a less competitive streak, Japan appears the ‘softer’ power. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Since the late 1990s, China, Japan, and South Korea – the core states in Northeast Asia – have gradually engaged in various initiatives and institutions for regional cooperation. Such initiatives extend from summitry to functional cooperation in finance, environmental protection, logistics, and other areas. Furthermore, the three countries have shown their willingness to vitalize cross-border economic activities by concluding commercial arrangements. Given these evolutions, this article seeks to address the following questions: what features are found in trilateral cooperative initiatives and how these features are evaluated in terms of ‘regional governance’? The paper advances two propositions. First, regional cooperation in Northeast Asia can be characterized as weak neoliberal orientation and intensive business involvements in cooperative projects in state-directed policy networks. Second, regional governance in Northeast Asia has gradually intensified the nature of regulatory governance in which the governments of the three countries sought to harmonize standards and regulatory systems through trilateral cooperation. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

China–Japan relations are frequently analyzed either in the light of disputes about different interpretations of history, the consequence of a strategic power shift in the Asia-Pacific resulting from the rise of China or as a conflict between Chinese and Japanese national identities. This paper argues that bilateral relations should be assessed on the basis of a comprehensive approach. It concludes that the current state of bilateral relations can be understood as the result of identity crises of the political systems in Beijing and Tokyo. Owing to the rapidly changing environment in East Asia and their inherent conservative natures, both political systems' perceptions and policies lag behind present realities. This renders it difficult for them to effectively address important domestic and international problems and consequently affects bilateral relations negatively as it complicates the accurate redefinition of the representation of ‘self’ and ‘other’ with regard to foreign relations. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In contemporary East Asia, political rivalry between China and Japan is often discussed. However, little has been done to systematically analyze the bilateral relationship and possible conflict escalation. In this paper, I employ the multiple-hierarchy model of regional politics offered by power transition theorists, in order to examine the recent Sino–Japanese relationship. After examining the effect of the factors suggested by the theory, I conclude that China's rise does not pose immediate destabilizing effects on regional security because the relative rise of China's capability is at best moderate. I also argue that the dyadic relationship has been pacified by several factors such as interest similarity and defense-dominant geography, in spite of China's overall rise. Finally, I offer some policy recommendations suggested by the theory-driven analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

China has become Taiwan's most important export and investment destination. This phenomenon is puzzling to realism as concerns for security externalities should discourage commerce between adversaries. Liberalism also has difficulty in accounting for this phenomenon because an absence of facilitative institutions should discourage commerce across the Taiwan Strait. This paper applies recent theoretical development on credible communication to this seemingly baffling situation. Whereas it has been suggested that commercial ties enable states to signal resolve short of military demonstration, I argue that these ties can also be used to credibly communicate reassurance and commitment to peaceful cooperation. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In 1946, the Philippines raised claims in the South China Sea over an area already known as Spratly Islands. This claim advanced through peculiar stages, starting when Thomas Cloma allegedly discovered islands in 1946, later named as Freedomland, and maturing to some extent in 1978 by the government's claim over the so-called Kalayaan Island Group. Considered as an oceanic expansion of its frontiers, this paper reviews the basis of the claim, first over the nature of Cloma's activities, and secondly over the measures the Philippine government took as a reaction of Cloma's claim of discovery of an area already known in western cartography as the Spratlys. Eventually, what is the nature of the link between the 1978 Kalayaan Islands Group's official claim and 1956 Cloma's private one? [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Historical controversies continue to plague northeast Asian politics today, with Chinese and Koreans protesting Japanese history textbooks and Japanese politicians' visits to Yasukuni Shrine, and Koreans protesting Chinese claims that the ancient Kingdom of Goguryo was Chinese, not Korean. Yet, there is little empirical research exploring what, if any, impact historical beliefs have on threat perception and foreign policy preferences in northeast Asia today. On the basis of surveys of Chinese, Japanese, and South Korean university students, this paper explores the relationships among beliefs about the past, perceived threat in the present, and foreign policy preferences for the future. Results and their implications for northeast Asian security are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

China and Japan used to have good energy cooperation before China switched into a net oil importer in the mid-1990s, but the recent years have witnessed an increasingly intensive competition between the two countries over petroleum supplies. While many saw such competition as inevitable with China's growing energy demands, the paper argues that the energy relationship between the two countries was never separated from political and strategic concerns, and heavily affected by the concern of ‘relative gains’, as suggested by the neorealists. Like the case prior to the mid-1990s when the non-energy factors underpinned the Sino–Japanese energy cooperation, the key factors that prevented the two from continuing energy cooperation today also lay in political and strategic aspects. Being two regional powers in East Asia, China, and Japan need to recognize the fact that their lack of energy cooperation due to mutual political distrust will not only impair their own energy security, but may also have negative implications on regional stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nearly for 15 years as the Chairman of China's Central Military Commission, Jiang Zemin, albeit lack of real military experience, has gradually developed his military theories and principles in the process of consolidating military authority. Unquestionably, Jiang is not only the core of the third generation leadership in China, but also the most powerful man in China's military until now. That makes researchers interested in exploring military thought of this man controlling the largest armies in the world. In this paper, Jiang's basic military framework, ‘Five Sentences’, including ‘Politically Qualified’, ‘Militarily Tough’, ‘Attitudinally Excellent’, ‘Strictly Disciplined’ and ‘Materially Guaranteed’ will be separately discussed. With interpretations of ‘Five Sentences’, the author will thereafter provide personal comments and analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In its relations with Taiwan and China, Washington has begun to implement separate dual strategies in order to simultaneously deter unilateral action while balancing out the rival political and military forces of each side. A simple standard strategy just is not sufficient to maintain the status quo. The way to maintain peace is for Washington to keep its role as a moderator between the two sides while preventing both from taking unilateral steps toward goals that would naturally provoke the other. US policy has to mirror the duality of the cross-strait arena by implementing dual balancing and deterrent strategies. It is also imperative that policymakers realize the complexity of the situation so as not to unwittingly provoke either side. This paper is an analysis of the emerging US strategy of deterring both sides of the Taiwan Strait from taking unilateral action while maintaining a balance of military and political forces, and gives some suggestions as to the further development of this strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers whether an alliance can have a reassurance effect on a third-party. It uses hypotheses derived from balance-of-power realism and a revised version of balance-of-threat theory called balance-of-malevolence theory. Using the revised 1997 US–Japan Defense Guidelines as a primary case, Chinese reactions are found to provide greater support for balance-of-malevolence theory. Side-evidence from Japan's decision in the early 1990s to begin deploying troops overseas to participate in humanitarian and UN peacekeeping operations, and its dispatch of naval ships to the Indian Ocean in the wake of 9-11, confirm the centrality of Chinese concerns about Japan's disposition as a military power and the reassurance value of the US alliance and other ‘containment frameworks’ such as UN peacekeeping. This also suggests that the demonstration effect of benign overseas deployments can be effective in overcoming negative attributions about a state's disposition as a military power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The United States today dominates the globe and many regional geographical subsystems in an unprecedented way, maintaining a hegemonic order that is in no way similar to the ‘anarchy’ assumed in realist analyses. The global system today is not simply unipolar; it is a hegemonic system that is increasingly globalized, in which the basic concepts of realism (anarchy, self‐help and power balancing) provide little guidance or understanding in explaining state behavior. This paper describes the US hegemonic system, analyzes the roles of China and Japan within this system, and examines how the Bush administration's plans for missile defense might transform the system. The conclusion points to some critical implications from this analysis for realist interpretations of international politics. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This study explores conceptual variants underpinning the prolific threat of China's global information operations, shedding light on the under-examined role of strategic psychology in China's quest for global primacy. Ancient stratagems underlying the Chinese cultural identity and character are applied through a framework to provide clarifying insights into the motivations, intentions, and capacities of China's pre- and nonkinetic actions. The aim is to identify the individual rationales and cognitive mechanisms that underlie the vast array of China's national instruments short of war and provide an indigenous, localized perspective to fully understand China's whole-of-nation strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article draws on prospect theory to explain the variation of China's risk propensity during the 2012–14 Diaoyu/Senkaku islands disputes with Japan. China's initial reference point 1.0 regarding the disputed islands was the 'shelving agreement' 'shelving the sovereignty dispute and a tacit acceptance of Japan's de facto exclusive control. So after Japan's 'nationalization' of the Diaoyu/Senkaku islands, China was clearly in a domain of losses. China was thus highly risk-acceptant by intensifying maritime and air patrolling, engaging in provocative behaviors, and suspending crisis management mechanisms. Meanwhile, China's reference point evolved. Discourse analysis of Chinese official statements and media coverage indicated that regularized patrolling or joint control became China's reference point 2.0. As it started to act from a domain of gains, Chinese behaviors turned risk-averse by scaling back patrolling and resuming negotiations over crisis management mechanisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's rise in the Pacific has brought the region into the limelight, but research into the views of Chinese scholars of Pacific Studies is limited. Building on a survey and interviews of 39 Chinese scholars, this article analyses China's motives, influence, and prospects in the Pacific. It finds out that Chinese scholars list China's diplomatic strategy, the Belt and Road Initiative, and economic interests as the three main causes of China's Pacific diplomacy. The majority of these scholars rate the performance of China's Pacific diplomacy as pass/average. Most Chinese scholars are cautiously optimistic about the Belt and Road Initiative in the Pacific, and they expect China to both compete and cooperate with traditional powers in the Pacific in the foreseeable future. Some of these scholars' views on issues like the China–Taiwan diplomatic competition and the impact of Chinese aid on local corruption contradict the official Chinese line strikingly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article tackles a conceptual topic of postcolonial feminism—self-feminization. Specifically, the article explores the femininity of Taiwanese professionals' bridging role between the head and branch offices of multinational firms in Taiwan, as well as between an allegedly universal ethos in science, market, and the globalization on the one hand and the humanist concerns for emotion, relation, and nuance on the other. The femininity of financial office as well as other local capacities demonstrates how they can improvise relationships for mutually estranging actors. Then, the article extends the discussion to allude to international relations, divided by an allegedly universal (usually conversional) and indigenous (usually resistant) force in terms of value, institution, relation, or identity. I use the local branch office qua the indigenous, the head office qua the universal, and the professionals who bridge between them as metaphors for China, the West or the global forces, and Taiwan, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article makes a novel contribution to the literature on Bhutan's International Relations (IR) by shifting the focus away from an exclusively India–China framing. First, it points out how small states are increasingly salient but under-studied in IR and how non-European non-island states like Bhutan are even more so, and why we gain by addressing this. Second, it shows how the conventional study of Bhutan has solely focused on its friendship with India and the threat to it/this from China, and why it is important that these conventional narratives be critically examined. In doing so, we perceive the endogenous drivers of Bhutan's foreign policies, for instance via Bhutan's stance on the Doklam issue. Third, going beyond the three typical determinants (economic factors, bilateral relations with India, and threats from China), the article provides two additional axes of understanding Bhutan's foreign policies – bridging of attributional distances and learning from experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China and Japan continue to partly live in the shadow of World War II (WWII) with recurrent expressions of anti-Japanese nationalism in China periodically ebbing bilateral relations. How does the Chinese government manage anti-Japan public manifestations of nationalism and what factors explain it? The government has to walk a fine line by managing the nationalism it has bred without undermining its own rule and considering elite divisions, heightened public nationalism, and the developments in its external environment. Six case studies from the Hu-Wen era provide a comprehensive understanding of what pertains to Chinese nationalism, the means used to express it, and more importantly the way the government chose to tackle them. While nationalism can be a mean of garnering legitimacy and exercising pressure on Japan to bend to its wishes, the Chinese government is embarked on the sinuous task of preventing an escalation beyond its control at both the domestic and international levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines United States (US)-China trade disputes under the World Trade Organization (WTO) and argues that both countries are increasingly resorting to the WTO's dispute settlement mechanism to target issues of most critical concern to their respective domestic constituencies. While the United States' WTO complaints against China tend to challenge Chinese industrial policy, cases involving anti-dumping and countervailing duties dominate China's WTO disputes against the United States. In addition, the significant expansion of bilateral trade relations in the past decades has provided opportunities for Chinese leaders to identify or to threaten retaliation against anti-protectionist groups in the United States in order to mobilize them against the disputed measure. Overall, United States–China trade disputes under the WTO increasingly reflect a distinctive political logic whereby domestic political considerations not only figure prominently in the decision to launch WTO disputes, but also frequently influence the way the dispute is played out either within or outside of the WTO framework. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

There is an assumption in international relations literature that junior allies must choose between supporting a dominant global alliance partner and engaging with a rising power. Yet, Australian policy-makers have paradoxically managed to deepen Sino-Australian relations despite their bilateral alliance with the United States. They have developed a discrete China policy on the assumption that they could persuade Washington to accept it over time. They reasoned that this outcome was more likely if Australia used diplomacy to facilitate Sino-American cooperation and to develop an Australian China policy non-prejudicial to ANZUS. This article explores how this ‘diplomatic formula’ supported expansion of Sino-Australian relations under the Whitlam, Hawke, and Howard Governments. It explains Australia's intra-alliance influence and paradoxical foreign policy behavior and contributes to understanding the dynamics of asymmetric alliances during power transition. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In recent years, many observers perceive ascendant Chinese influence in Southeast Asia. Existing research attributes China's recent advances in the region to Beijing's successful implementation of a dual strategy of coercion and inducement or Washington's lack of commitments to the region. In a departure from the literature, this article emphasizes the agency of Southeast Asian states. It argues that great power competition empowers the secondary states by reducing their vulnerability, increasing available resources, and lending credibility to their threat of exists. As a result, domestic agenda plays a predominant role in determining a secondary state's foreign policy orientation. To illustrate this proposition, the changing dynamics of China's relations with Myanmar and the Philippines are examined closely. This article demonstrates that although the two states had realigned away from China since 2010–11, new agendas that emerged from their domestic politics in late 2016 tipped the balance in favor of China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article considers 13 instances in which China has used tourist sanctions as an instrument of its foreign policy. It finds that the effectiveness of those sanctions has been limited by target state considerations including the ability to diversify source markets, constraining effects of international alliances, and national security, sovereignty and territorial considerations, matters which are also of importance to China. The article highlights the ways in which the Chinese government regulates outbound travelers through directives, travel advisories, granting or denying countries Approved Destination Status and disseminating information through the state-owned media and indicates that social actors such as consumers and netizens play a role as well. It also investigates the goals of China's actions which usually have to do with protecting core interests broadly defined. Among the cases covered are ones involving Japan, the Philippines, Turkey, Taiwan, South Korea, the Vatican, Palau, North Korea, Australia, the United States, Canada, New Zealand and Sweden. Not covered are Belt and Road countries with whom China is practicing positive forms of tourist statecraft which may be more effective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The scholarly literature on paradiplomacy has tended to focus overly on subnational governments in federal systems rather than those in unitary and centralized countries. However, it is important to note that some subnational governments in these countries have been increasingly proactive in international relations (IR). This study explores the paradiplomatic activities of Yunnan, a province in the south of China which, since the early 1990s, has actively engaged in cross-border cooperation. Combining the concept of paradiplomacy with the theory of actorness, this study first argues that Yunnan has been incentivized to conduct paradiplomacy through the decision of Beijing to open China's borders; the inefficiency of the central government in managing border-related issues; and the interprovincial competition over economic and diplomatic clouts in the Mekong subregion. Second, this study argues that Yunnan's new external affairs powers have been consolidated by a host of new opportunities stemming from the external environment. Third, it argues that Yunnan's new external affairs powers have enabled it to leverage two broad instruments (infrastructure development and economic statecraft) to make neighboring countries more dependent on cooperation with it. And finally, it is argued that Yunnan's role as an IR player has been acknowledged both by neighboring countries and by Beijing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the end of the Cold War, establishing partnerships has been part and parcel of the grand strategy of great powers. The partners that great powers seek fall under the two categories of security partners and political-economic partners. Statistics show a significant variation in the proportions of great powers' security partners. The authors argue that such variation is mainly determined by two factors, namely, great powers' strategic threats, and their ways of maintaining national security [self-help or security-dependent (on the United States)]. Specifically, both the security-dependent great powers that are under China's strategic threat and the self-help great powers that are under the US's strategic threat have a higher proportion of security partners than the security-dependent great powers that are not under China's strategic threat and the self-help great powers that are under China's strategic threat. These findings will help to refine the current theories of great power politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite systemic internal and external differences, Australia and China have shown striking similarities in their pursuit of disputed maritime resource and jurisdictional claims. This high-stakes area of international politics is governed by a codified, globally accepted international legal regime (the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea), making it an important case for examining the relationship between states' foreign policies and the 'rules-based international order'. In the South China Sea, Beijing is haunted by the legacy of its strong geopolitically driven support for an expansive law of the sea regime in the 1970s. Strategic considerations also drove Australia's belated embrace of international legal processes in the Timor Sea in 2016. Before that, successive Australian governments had been as keen to pursue national maritime interests through bilateral negotiations as their Chinese counterparts. Australia's shift was enabled by pro-Timor domestic public opinion and a confluence of geographic and commercial circumstances not present in the South China Sea. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China and Japan are among the world's top space powers, with significant technical competence in both conventional and 'newspace' capabilities. Since the early 1990s, each country has also taken a keen interest in shaping the governance of outer space activities. But they have done so in remarkably different ways, calling into question Asian states' supposed preferences for soft and informal institutions. Japan has led the Asia-Pacific Regional Space Agency Forum, involving both state and nonstate participants, which is guided by a set of principles. China has opted for a high-profile formal intergovernmental design, the Asia-Pacific Space Cooperation Organization, with a Convention and all the trappings of a formal organizational structure. This article assesses the activities of China and Japan in the new space race, discusses how and why the design of their space governance differs, and reflects on prospects for competition and cooperation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many scholars have examined how the United States should respond to a rising non-democratic China. Contrary to the well-debated hard power domain, little attention has been devoted to China's soft power. This study is arguably the first to systematically investigate the US response to the establishment of Confucius Institutes—China's global initiative to expand soft power. We argue that the US decision to establish Confucius Institutes is influenced by both macro- and micro-level variables. At the macro-level, as suggested by the power transition theory, the United States is more likely to accommodate Confucius Institutes when China shows a higher level of satisfaction with the United States. At the micro-level, US universities and state governments host Confucius Institutes due to budget saving and community engaging. Our analysis sheds light on how the United States makes trade-offs when confronting China's expanded soft power, and it provides yet another prominent example of money buying influence in international relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article empirically examines various factors affecting the formation of China's bilateral investment treaties (BITs) since 1978. Using a panel data analysis, this article finds that domestic and foreign relationship as well as foreign country and global factors, help explain the signing of BITs. Specifically, China's trade openness and economic growth, foreign countries' level of democracy, and socialization are positively related to the signing of BITs, while foreign economic growth and the distance between two countries are negatively related to the signing of BITs. Generally, this article finds that China signs BITs mainly to attract foreign capital, signaling to foreign investors that it protects their rights in China. Meanwhile, China has been less likely to sign BITs with countries with which it enjoys favorable bargaining position. As this article finds, China is more likely to sign BITs with democratic countries, suggesting that global spread of democracy spread globalization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent studies revisit the debate over whether tourism promotes peace via intergroup contacts. In this article, we examine the case of China-Taiwan confrontation and argue that the increase of Chinese tourists visiting Taiwan contributes to peace across the Taiwan Strait. Specifically, the touristic experiences and interactions with Taiwanese improve Chinese people's understanding of Taiwan, fostering a patient and peaceful attitude toward the prospect of cross-Strait relations. With the survey data collected during July and September 2013, we find that Chinese people who were visiting Taiwan for the first time were less likely to support a rapid pace to the unification between China and Taiwan or unification by force than those who had never visited Taiwan. Additionally, the attitude is stronger among independent tourists than those who came in escorted tour groups. Our findings suggest that contacts between tourists and locals are effective in alleviating political tension across the Taiwan Strait. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper evaluates the extent to which China adapted its Africa policy to external criticism and expectations. It is found that policy modifications mainly occurred when long-term interests were at risk, with regard to issues of limited importance and non-binding initiatives. The article departs from the vast literature on adaptation and tests this concept on several aspects of Chinas engagement in Africa. This approach not only allows us to revise the PRCs changing Africa policy but also permits to contribute to the debate whether China is a status quo or revisionist power. In this regard, it turns out that Chinas ostensible compliance with the demands of other actors is designed to give leeway to its revisionist aspirations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's economy and its military capabilities have grown significantly in the last three decades, yet Southeast Asian countries responded differently to China's foreign policy. This article examines China's assurance and reassurance strategy toward Malaysia and the Philippines in the South China Sea territorial disputes. It points outs the 'assurance and entrapment' strategy that China and its neighbors deployed toward each other. China deploys different foreign discourses toward these two countries to address their concerns, and these countries also positively respond to Chinese rhetoric. However, when China was more assertive during 2010–13, they applied rhetorical strategies to constrain China's foreign behavior. Specifically, both Malaysia and the Philippines set up different traps to gauge China's intentions and highlight the inconsistency between China's previous commitment on the peaceful rise and its recent assertiveness. The comparative analysis shows how they employ legitimation strategy in the territorial disputes. It concludes with policy implications for US–China relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chinese government representatives and scholars have attempted to ameliorate fears about China’s rise by portraying China as a new and friendlier kind of great power. It is claimed that this represents a new way of relating which transcends problematic Western understandings of Self–Other relations and their tendency to slip into domination and enmity. This article takes such claims as a point of departure, and analyses them with focus on the explicit discussions of friendship in international relations theory. Paying attention to current Chinese thinking which emphasizes guanxi relationships, friendship can contribute to the development of genuinely relational international relations thinking and move beyond a focus on ossified forms of friendship and enmity centred on the anxious self. The vantage point of friendship suggests a way out of the dangers of theorizing Self in contrast to Other, and reopens the possibility to conceptualize Self with Other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The theoretical challenges for international relations (IR) posed by China’s rise cannot be adequately addressed at a mere theoretical level. Predicated on a Cartesian/Newtonian ontology that assumes a mechanistic world made up of discrete, self-contained parts (e.g. sovereign nation-states), mainstream IR theories offer limited understanding of China’s rise. In this article, I propose an alternative, holographic relational ontology. Drawing upon recent IR scholarship on relational ontology and holographic ideas in quantum physics as well as traditional Asian thoughts, this ‘new’ ontology posits that the world exists fundamentally as holographic relations, in which a part is a microcosmic reflection of its larger whole(s). As a part of various wholes in global politics, ‘China’ is thus never an entity in and of itself, but holographic reflections of them. Its rise is best understood as a phenomenon of holographic transition, in which characteristics of those larger wholes are being enfolded into what is known as ‘China’. Thus, both the ‘China’ challenges and ‘China’ opportunities, rather than some inherently ‘Chinese’ properties, are products of China’s holographic relations. This ontology has broader conceptual and methodological as well as policy implications for IR in East Asia and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the technical cooperation between the League of Nations and China from its origin in 1928 to 1934. By consulting Japanese documents, it analyses why even Japanese diplomats who were usually regarded as internationalists came to be strongly opposed to this. The founding fathers of the League did not envisage cooperation between the League and China, so there were no well-considered rules nor structures for such works. Technical cooperation developed through personal initiatives; moreover, Dr Ludwik Rajchman on the League side did not limit his activities to his expertise and came to be involved in power politics. On the other hand, East Asia was the region where the old imperial order firmly remained and Japan wanted to maintain it. Britain, the mainstay of the League of Nations, was also an empire that still had large interests in the region, so that it clearly understood the causes of Japan's reaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A large body of research suggests mass publics are capable of thinking coherently about international relations. We extend this body of research to show that domain relevant postures -- in our case, more abstract beliefs about foreign policy -- are related to how tough of a line representative samples of US and UK respondents want their governments to take toward China. More specifically, we utilize a unique comparative survey of American and British foreign policy attitudes to show broad support for toughness toward China. Beliefs about the use of the military and attitudes regarding globalization help explain preferences for tough economic and military policies toward China. In the two countries, the relationship between general foreign policy outlooks and the positions citizens take is robust to the addition of a general mediator that controls for the general affect those surveyed have toward China. Finally, the strength of the relationship between these abstract postures and specific preferences for a China policy are different across the countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What explains China's deployment to UN peacekeeping operations? Material factors are necessary but insufficient to explain China's calculus; identity is a key causal variable also. China is the only permanent UN Security Council member to claim dual identities as a great power and a Global South state in regards to peacekeeping and is therefore receptive to social influence from its respective peer groups. I apply competing explanations for deployment against the critical case of China's 2007 commitment to the UN-African Union Hybrid Mission in Darfur, a leastlikely case for identity-based explanations. I use extensive interviews of Chinese and UN foreign policy elites, participant observation at the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations, and written sources to reconstruct the case. The article concludes with reflections on rising powers and peacekeeping, and the implications on the scope conditions for identity as a variable in Chinese foreign policy and China's intervention behavior more broadly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study employs offensive realism to provide a baseline for assessing Beijing's strategic choices in dealing with regional neighbors. In theory, when an ascending power is not yet capable of dominating its home region, it would strive foremost to prevent external powers from extending their influence in its vicinity. To attain that goal, it will likely adopt a carrots-and-sticks strategy, by rewarding some neighbors and punishing others according to their readiness to accommodate its ascendance and keep a cautious distance from external powers. Empirically, China's management of territorial disputes from the 1950s onward is quite consistent with these theoretical expectations. Viewed in this light, restraint and assertiveness are not inversely related in Chinese foreign policy behavior. Rather, they are two sides of the same coin and serve the same overriding purpose of countering adversarial (especially US) influences in China's neighborhood. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is always a time gap between the decision for war and its implementation. I exploit this time gap to study how the signaling of resolve changes after the decision for war is made, based on the wars that China fought since 1949. I study the series of signals that China sent after it had made its decisions for war in Korea (1950), India (1962) and Vietnam (1979), and compare them with the signals sent just before the decisions were made. I find patterns in Chinese prewar signaling that reflect how strategic incentives for the signaling of resolve change before and after the decision for war. The study generates theoretical expectations on discontinuities in signaling behavior upon the decision for war - an unexplored research area with direct policy implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite extensive economic ties and political engagement throughout Asia and sizable investment in some of the region's most vulnerable regimes, China has yet to develop a stable of devoted client states. This article argues that both strategic and normative factors militate against China's cultivation of strong patron-client pacts. The article then uses the case of Cambodia to illustrate these arguments, analyzing how that partnership has developed and its important limitations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article draws on Michael Barnett and Raymond Duvall's power typology to examine Chinese power in Sino-Mongolia and Sino-North Korean relations. Using compulsory, institutional, productive, and structural power to frame these bilateral relations, this article looks at the means by which China obtains power and how it utilizes power in relation to Mongolia and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. This article also examines Mongolian and North Korean perceptions and responses to Chinese power. Concurrently, the article considers the Barnett/Duvall model's applicability to China's relations with other periphery developing states. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article examines China's and Taiwan's humanitarian assistance to Haiti, as well as the extent to which China and Taiwan – as non-Development Assistance Committee (DAC) donors – adhered to the DAC-established humanitarian assistance architecture. It argues that China's and Taiwan's emergency aid was comparable with the DAC donorship in terms of its declaratory commitment to altruism and the pursuit of strategic objectives. Both Beijing and Taipei considered cross-Strait relations and domestic and international public opinion when strategizing emergency aid. The primacy of politics determined a divided China's modalities of aid, funding levels, and institutional framework. The article concludes that strategic considerations – including cross-Strait politics, a suspension of cross-Strait diplomatic rivalry notwithstanding – are at least as significant as altruism in driving China's and Taiwan's humanitarian assistance. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Assessments of how international actors are responding to China's rise typically focus on rival great powers or on China's Asian neighbors. In these cases, relative power, geographic proximity, and regional institutions have conditioned relationships with China. The relationship of China with the developing world has mainly been defined by power asymmetry and the appeal of the Chinese governance model to authoritarian regimes. Largely absent from this discussion is an understanding of how Western middle power democracies are responding to China's rise. This article compares how Canada and Australia – two Western democratic states with prominent middle power foreign policy traditions – are responding to the rise of China. The two case studies are similar in many respects: both are resource-based economies with a track record of bilateral and institutional engagement in the Asia-Pacific, and both are key US allies. These similarities allow differences in the Canadian and Australian responses to China's rise to be isolated in the political, economic, and strategic realms. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This study sets out to analyze strategic relations of two major donors – the United States and China – in delivering food aid to North Korea in the 1990s. By reviewing the historical evolution of US–China strategic relations in line with food aid and adopting a game model to verify historical findings, it addresses two significant observations. First, the North Korean food aid dynamics were constructed and crystallized by donors' strategic interactions, rather than humanitarian intention to save the famine-stricken North Korea. Both donors first took into account strategic interests in aid dynamics, and then utilized food aid as a strategic instrument for their own purposes. Second, any multilateral cooperation for delivering food aid to North Korea dooms to failure, despite the potential of aid coordination among donor states. Donors' competition for the primacy in the region of Northeast Asia hampered policy coordination for institutionalizing aid networks. It is concluded that the two donors were bound to strategize food aid as a logical outgrowth of their own interests in the wake of North Korea's humanitarian disasters. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

What impact does ideology have on American attitudes and policy preferences toward China? Based on two large N surveys, we first utilize exploratory factor analysis to uncover six distinct American ideological dimensions and two distinct dimensions of attitudes toward China that distinguish between its government and its people. We then utilize structural equation modeling to explore how attitudes toward the Chinese people (i.e. prejudice) and attitudes toward the Chinese government differentially mediate relationships between ideological beliefs, on the one hand, and Americans' China policy preferences, on the other. Results suggest both direct and indirect effects of ideology on policy preferences, with the latter effects being differentially mediated by prejudice and attitudes toward the Chinese government. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

International relations (IR) studies in China have developed considerably over the past three decades. The field is now well established with 49 degree-granting institutions, as well as a series of ‘think tanks’ that produce policy-related analyses of international issues. Recent survey research of publication trends in the field reveals a significant new diversity of research subject areas, with an increased emphasis on topics associated with Western ‘liberal’ IR theory and international political economy, while at the same time revealing a tenacity of ‘realist’ topics such as major power relations. While the quantitative dimensions of the field have grown dramatically – institutions, faculty, publications – the overall quality of research remains very uneven across China and generally weak when compared internationally. This article surveys the historical development of the field, summarizes the current state of the field, and identifies challenges and opportunities for future development. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article argues that in the post-Cold War strategic transition in East Asia, ASEAN has helped to create a minimalist normative bargain among the great powers in the region. The regional norms propagated through the ‘ASEAN way’, emphasizing sovereignty, non-intervention, consensus, inclusion, and informality were extremely important in the initial stages of bringing the great powers – especially China and the United States – to the table in the immediate post-Cold War period. During this time, ASEAN helped to institutionalize power relations legitimizing the role of the great powers as well as the ‘voice’ of smaller states in regional security management. But the process of institutionalizing great power relations contains further steps, and what ASEAN has achieved is well short of the kind of sustained cooperation on the part of the great powers that is so necessary to the creation of a new stable regional society of states. Moreover, ASEAN has provided the great powers with a minimalist normative position from which to resist the more difficult processes of negotiating common understanding on key strategic norms. At the same time, ASEAN's model of ‘comfortable’ regionalism allows the great powers to treat regional institutions as instruments of so-called ‘soft’ balancing, more than as sites for negotiating and institutionalizing regional ‘rules of the game’ that would contribute to a sustainable modus vivendi among the great powers. As such, ASEAN's role is limited in, and limiting of, the great power bargain that must underpin the negotiation of the new regional order. This is a task that the regional great powers (the United States, China, and Japan) must themselves undertake. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]