China And World Politics In Transition

This book analyzes China's transformative political power in today's world while simultaneously addressing global issues and the reformation of world institutions. China has become known as the world's first factory and trading power, but more knowledge on China's rise is necessary to understand the world of today and the future. The main question is where China's rise is headed and how this affects the increasingly connected world that faces problems that no state can effectively address on its own. This book analyzes both sides of the coin, that is, the problems of a world scale and the change of the world political order. China is among the major actors for global issues such as mitigating climate warming, controlling weapons of mass destruction, combating economic inequality and underdevelopment, and improving health for all. In the current setting of the new world order, all countries and especially world powers develop a general blueprint for the future, as cultural and material conditions of the present world are very different from the past. Under such conditions, China faces a review of its bilateral and regional strategies, as well as its position and actions in world institutions that have the mission of forming policy responses to issues of a global scale. This book, therefore, provides insight into China's view of world problems and the future world order. It is a must-read for everybody interested in a better understanding of China's role in today's world and the global power shift.

With more than one billion people, China represents both an ocean of economic opportunity and a frustrating backwater of continuing brutal political repression. What are the prospects for democratic evolution in a nation with one of the world's poorest human rights records? How have other nations responded to China since the recent, dramatic opening of its economic system-and how should they respond in the future? These are some of the most important questions confronting both the United States and the international community. On democracy, human rights, and the move to integrate China into the international economy; on Mao Zedong's regime and the reform since his death; and on the Taiwan experiment and Hong Kong's reintegration with China, Nathan offers an accessible introduction to the intricate web of contemporary Chinese politics and China's changing place in the global system.

This volume analyzes the extent of ongoing power shifts among the leading powers, exploring the portents for their future growth, and seeking indicators of their relative commitment to the existing international order.

China’s Challenges and International Order Transition introduces an integrated conceptual framework of “international order” categorized by three levels (power, rules, and norms) and three issue-areas (security, political, and economic). Each contributor engages one or more of these analytical dimensions to examine two questions: (1) Has China already challenged this dimension of international order? (2) How will China challenge this dimension of international order in the future? The contested views and perspectives in this volume suggest it is too simple to assume an inevitable conflict between China and the outside world. With different strategies to challenge or reform the many dimensions of international order, China’s role is not a one-way street. It is an interactive process in which the world may change China as much as China may change the world. The aim of the book is to broaden the debate beyond the “Thucydides Trap” perspective currently popular in the West. Rather than offering a single argument, this volume offers a platform for scholars, especially Chinese scholars vs. Western scholars, to exchange and debate their different views and perspectives on China and the potential transition of international order.

China's rapid and complex political and socioeconomic changes provide fertile ground for pioneering analysis, but they also present daunting theoretical and practical challenges. This reader takes up the challenge, offering the most comprehensive assessment of Chinese domestic politics available by bringing together the best recent scholarship in the field. The anthology focuses on the origin, content, and significance of the post-1989 phase of China's reform and opening to the world, commonly known in the PRC as "deep reform." This period has been unfolding in interaction with globalization, marketization, privatization, political institutionalization, as well as with financial and legal changes. Deep reform includes new policy initiatives that have penetrated political, legal, economic, and social sectors untouched by previous initiatives as reformers have been forced to deal with the consequences--intended and unintended--of earlier reforms. These carefully selected essays by leading scholars have been revised and updated for this text. In addition, a substantive introduction and conclusion place the articles in their broader context for readers new to the subject. With the successful transition of the leadership of the party, state, and military since 2002, the time is ripe for a comprehensive evaluation of China's deep reform as it enters a new stage. This timely reader will offer students, scholars, and policymakers invaluable insights into the dynamics of change in one of the world's emerging political and economic dynamos. Contributions by: Marc Blecher, Bruce J. Dickson, Lowell Dittmer, Joseph Fewsmith, Ting Gong, Baogang Guo, William Hurst, Cheng Li, Guoli Liu, Andrew J. Nathan, Kevin J. O'Brien, Veronica Pearson, Randall Peerenboom, Yingyi Qian, Tony Saich, Tianjian Shi, Edward S. Steinfeld, Shaoguang Wang, Lynn White, Yu-Shan Wu, and Guobin Yang

This book examines a wide range of governance reforms in the People's Republic of China, including administrative rationalization, divestiture of businesses operated by the military, and the building of anticorruption mechanisms, to analyze how China's leaders have reformed existing institutions and constructed new ones to cope with unruly markets, curb corrupt practices, and bring about a regulated economic order.

Assessments of China's importance on the world stage usually focus on a single dimension of China's increasing power, rather than on the multiple sources of China's rise, including its economic might and the continuing modernization of its military. This book offers multiple analytical perspectives—constructivist, liberal, neorealist—on the significance of the many dimensions of China's regional and global influence. Distinguished authors consider the likelihood of conflict and peaceful accommodation as China grows ever stronger. They look at the changing position of China "from the inside": How do Chinese policymakers evaluate the contemporary international order and what are the regional and global implications of that worldview? The authors also address the implications of China's increasing power for Chinese policymaking and for the foreign policies of Korea, Japan, and the United States.

Analysing the transformations that China has undertaken since 1989, Wang Hui argues that it features elements of the new global order as a whole in which considerations of economic growth and development have trumped every other concern, particularly democracy and social justice.