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State Preferences and International Institutions: Boolean Analysis of China's Use of Force and South China Sea Territorial Disputes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 March 2016

Teh-yi Huang
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Thanks to supercharged economic growth, coupled with abundant physical and human capital, as well as political clout as a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, China is a rising great power on the world stage. Whereas the former China under its closed, mysterious, and communist ideology was characterized as a threat to Asian and world peace during the Cold War years, today, ironically, a more open and internationally engaged China again triggers the “China threat” rhetoric. Despite China's constant assurance of peaceable foreign policy intentions and claims that it will “never seek hegemony,” skeptics rebuke these as a mere smokescreen that covers an enormous forward thrust, evidenced, for example, by the expansionist moves toward islets in the South China Sea. On the one hand, whether aggressive moves qualified China as a threat is still debated. On the other hand, whether provocative actions would escalate into large-scale militarized conflicts that jeopardize regional stability constitutes the immediate concern.

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Journal of East Asian Studies , Volume 4 , Issue 2 , August 2004 , pp. 227 - 262
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Copyright © East Asia Institute 

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References

Notes

The author thanks two anonymous reviewers and Professors Joseph Grieco and Robert Keohane for their constructive comments. The author is especially grateful to Professor Edward W. Hsu for his invaluable inspiration and assistance in the technical aspects of this study.Google Scholar

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