Not Congruent But Quite Complementary

This book aims to provide for a path-breaking cross-regional comparison of the capabilities and readiness of Asia-Pacific countries to contribute to peace support missions, with an eye to identifying emerging trends and policy implications.

Despite its impressive size and population, economic vitality, and drive to upgrade its military, China remains a vulnerable nation surrounded by powerful rivals and potential foes. Understanding China's foreign policy means fully appreciating these geostrategic challenges, which persist even as the country gains increasing influence over its neighbors. Andrew J. Nathan and Andrew Scobell analyze China's security concerns on four fronts: at home, with its immediate neighbors, in surrounding regional systems, and in the world beyond Asia. By illuminating the issues driving Chinese policy, they offer a new perspective on the country's rise and a strategy for balancing Chinese and American interests in Asia. Though rooted in the present, Nathan and Scobell's study makes ample use of the past, reaching back into history to illuminate the people and institutions shaping Chinese strategy today. They also examine Chinese views of the United States; explain why China is so concerned about Japan; and uncover China's interests in such problematic countries as North Korea, Iran, and the Sudan. The authors probe recent troubles in Tibet and Xinjiang and explore their links to forces beyond China's borders. They consider the tactics deployed by mainland China and Taiwan, as Taiwan seeks to maintain autonomy in the face of Chinese advances toward unification. They evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of China's three main power resources—economic power, military power, and soft power. The authors conclude with recommendations for the United States as it seeks to manage China's rise. Chinese policymakers understand that their nation's prosperity, stability, and security depend on cooperation with the United States. If handled wisely, the authors believe, relations between the two countries can produce mutually beneficial outcomes for both Asia and the world.

An emerging star in the field of US-China policy pairs leading scholars from both the US and China in dialogues about the most crucial elements of the relationship.

China's expanding economic and military power, and the US response to the challenge of China's rise are shaping international relations in the twenty-first century. A breakdown in this relationship could bring about a situation reminiscent of the Cold War. Lyle Goldstein argues that while conflict is not predetermined, there are worrying signs that the relationship is becoming an increasingly chilly and dangerous rivalry. The main purposes of this book are to analyze the trajectory of the relationship, to examine both US views and Chinese views of the other, and to propose concrete steps to reverse a perilous deterioration in the relationship. He examines key flash points or difficult issues in the US-China relationship in depth, such as Taiwan, the Korean Peninsula, Japan, economic issues, and climate change, to name a few. A unique feature of the book is that Goldstein's language skills allowed him to incorporate Chinese military and diplomatic publications to a degree that few in the West have been able to in the past. Goldstein is under no illusions that compromise is easy, but he calls for both the US and China to take steps to seek an accommodation of interests in the Pacific and globally to avoid a dangerous strategic rivalry.

Examining the past, current, and potential future roles of the Communist Party in governing China The Chinese Communist Party and its polices touch nearly every aspect of life in China and dominate some. An often-quoted current phrase—one with roots in the era of Mao Zedong—says “the Party leads all.” Under the leadership of Xi Jinping, the Party determines much of what is permitted and prohibited in the country’s social, economic, and political activity, as well as China’s increasingly consequential foreign relations. Even so, the Communist Party always has faced limits on what it can control, and it may encounter new obstacles ahead. This book addresses important questions about the current and future roles of the party: Has Xi’s tenure brought a qualitative increase in the pursuit, or achievement, of party control? How is party rule shaped and exercised by internal party dynamics, the party’s control over the state, society, economy, foreign affairs, government institutions and rules, and ideology? How serious are the threats to party strength and success posed by Xi’s approach to power, corruption in the party’s ranks, a rapidly changing society, a fraught international environment, or a possibly overly ambitious agenda for party control? Leading scholars examine these questions from several disciplinary perspectives, each focusing on a key area of the party and its efforts to lead, control, or influence the world around it. This book offers the most comprehensive and up-to-date assessment of the party’s roles in China’s economy, government, civil society, legal system, military affairs, and foreign policy. It does so at a critical moment, with the full contours of the Xi Jinping era in China becoming more evident and as the CCP reaches its 100th anniversary and nears three-quarters of a century in power. It will be essential reading for all scholars, students, and policy-makers interested in contemporary China.

The crisis is an outgrowth of the colonial period which had strained and eventually torn the social fabrics of the region. French colonial policies regarding education, administration, an economics had contributed to a competitive and divisive atmosphere. Now, Mali suffers from widespread ethnic separatism. The socialist regime of newly-indepenent Mali failed to reconcile the alienated communities of the northern regions. The peoples of the south, too, were dissatisfied with their oppressive government–something which deepend the young country’s political crisis. This environment produced the so-called “Tuareg rebellion”. The fierce clashes in the early stages of the rebellion and the drought in Mali’s northern regions led to massive migrations of Tuaregs to neighbouring countries. Changes in the regional environment in the 1990s brought new dimensions to the crisis. The Algerian Civil War, the end to the war in Afghanistan, and the Libyan embargo precipitated the spread of terrorism, trafficking, the drug trade, and cross-border criminal networks. Collectively, these phenomena created a new constellation of power in northern Mali. The international economic crisis and the developments known as the “Arab Spring”, along with shifting geo-strategic dynamics in the Indian and Pacific Oceans, have pushed Africa into an arena for international disputes and rivalries. Mali has been one of the foremost countries to be affected. Transformations at the global level have pressured most governments to defend their traditional interests. Some powers, in contrast, have been scanning for openings and opportunities in the weaknesses of others. BRICS have thus managed to emerge as new powers on the African continent traditionally dominated by France, the U.K., and to a lesser extent, the U.S.

This book presents an interdisciplinary examination of cross-Taiwan Strait relations and the complex dynamics at play in the region. Since the election of Ma Ying-jeou as Taiwan’s president in 2008, the relationship across the Taiwan Strait—long viewed as one of Asia’s most volatile potential flashpoints—has experienced a remarkable détente. Whether the relationship has been truly transformed, however, remains an open question and the Taiwan Strait remains a central regional and global security issue. A return to turbulence in the Taiwan Strait could also add a new dimension of instability in the already tense maritime disputes in the East and South China Seas. While the relationship across the Taiwan Strait remains critically important, it is also changing rapidly, and the chapters in this volume present new thinking to help make sense of complex cross-Strait dynamics. Specifically, these essays explore different security and/or globalization dimensions of China-Taiwan ties as well as the globalization-security linkages that have emerged. As the balance of power in Asia shifts dramatically, several chapters in this volume explore how traditional security forces are evolving. At the same time, there are new dynamics emerging as a consequence of globalization forces, such as the tremendous economic and social integration across the Taiwan Strait, and several chapters in this volume consider some of these new problems. Finally, several chapters consider the often under-researched dynamics associated with the globalization/security interface such as cyber threats, transnational criminal networks and the security spill-over impact of production globalization. This book will of much interest to students of Chinese Politics, Asian Security, globalisation, diplomacy and International Relations.