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This article argues, through a case study of the evolving impact of the Xinjiang and Uyghur issue, that the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) ethnic minorities have been a significant factor in Beijing’s foreign relations throughout its history. Since the end of the Cold War in particular, China’s approach to the Xinjiang and Uyghur issue has played an important role in undergirding domestic stability and shaping its relations with Central Asia. More broadly, the case of Xinjiang and the Uyghur suggests that the nature and scale of the challenge posed by any one ethnic minority in the context of the PRC’s foreign policy has largely been a function of the interplay of five major factors: the historical relationship between the ethnic group and the Chinese state; the geographic concentration of an ethnic minority; the degree of acculturation to the dominant Han society; external great power support; and mobilised diasporas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 2016 presidential election demonstrated the rise of a “restraint constituency” in American politics that openly questions Washington's bipartisan post-Cold War pursuit of a grand strategy of primacy or liberal hegemony. This constituency has been animated by the return of the Jacksonian tradition of American foreign policy, most notably in the candidacy of Donald Trump, which directly questions the benefits of alliance relationships as well as U.S. underwriting of an open global economic system. It also stresses the need for the United States to act unilaterally in defense of its core foreign policy interests. The resurgence of the Jacksonian tradition will make it difficult for the next President to reestablish a foreign policy consensus and combat perceptions of American decline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article argues that China's approach to Afghanistan since the end of the Cold War has been shaped by the desire both for security in Xinjiang and for geopolitical advantage in Central Asia. While Beijing's Xinjiang calculus was ascendant from 1991 to 2001, since 2001 a broader geopolitical calculus has emerged. This latter factor has been encapsulated in President Xi Jinping's 'One Belt, One Road' strategy, which, at its core, is an outgrowth of Beijing's decades-long agenda to integrate Xinjiang and utilise this region's unique geopolitical position to facilitate a Chinacentric Eurasian geo-economic system. While China's Xinjiang calculus determines that it shares an interest with the USA in combating radical Islamism in Afghanistan (and Central Asia more broadly), the geopolitical calculus of the 'One Belt, One Road' strategy points to a fundamental incompatibility between US and Chinese interests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's Eurasian frontiers have emerged as a major factor in Beijing's foreign policy through President Xi Jinping's “One Belt, One Road” strategy. The article argues that this strategy has been given impetus by the shifting geopolitical landscape in Central Asia resulting from the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, Russia's relative decline, and Beijing's quest for stability in its restive province of Xinjiang. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This conversation among the editors of ARIEL and Timothy Clark addresses his 2012 essay, "Derangements of Scale," published in Telemorphosis: Theory in the Era of Climate Change. In his essay, Clark suggests that scale effects play an important role in contemporary global politics and climate change, and he proposes a new, larger scale of literary study commensurate with an awareness of these issues. The editors discuss the implications of Clark's essay for postcolonial studies, the merits of his proposed method of literary interpretation, and the ramifications of his discussion of human agency. Clark takes up all of these issues in his response to the editors' conversation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]