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Status, security, and socialization: explaining change in China's compliance in international institutions

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Status, Security, and Socialization:
Explaining Change in China’s Compliance in International Institutions

Chin-Hao Huang
Political Science and International Relations Program
University of Southern California
August 2014
1
Table of Contents
Abstract ................................................................................................................................... 2
Chapter One: Introduction ................................................................................................... 3
Chapter Two: Theory .......................................................................................................... 11
Debating China’s Rise ................................................................................................................... 12
Status, Security, and Socialization ............................................................................................... 33
Chapter Three: Toward Greater Flexibility on Peacekeeping, Sovereignty, and
Intervention ........................................................................................................................... 60
Chapter Four: Cautious Compliance on Conventional Arms and Export Controls ..... 85
Chapter Five: Reluctant Restraint in the South China Sea ........................................... 114
Chapter Six: Conclusion .................................................................................................... 144
Bibliography ....................................................................................................................... 156

2
Abstract

My research considers why and how China complies with international norms in multilateral
security regimes and the scope conditions under which it is more or less likely to take on
self-constraining commitments. It builds upon and moves beyond the existing literature on
socialization processes by examining why status concerns are important motivations for
socialization dynamics. I identify three scope conditions under which Chinese decision-
makers’ exposure to global norms and engagement with foreign counterparts have evolved
and ranged from strategic adaptation to an understanding that cooperative, multilateral
security is a preferred source of state security, and they include: the quality of the
deliberations and observable social interactions at international and regional organizations
and at bilateral and multilateral fora; the context and novelty of the normative concept
discussed; and the degree to which international consensus, particularly among developed
and developing countries, is forged on a normative agenda. As a plausibility test, the theory
is assessed in three empirical case studies of China’s evolving behavior in such issue areas
of foreign and security policy as: (1) UN peacekeeping operations; (2) conventional arms
and export controls; and (3) sensitive negotiations over disputed territorial claims in the
South China Sea. The implications of my research are two-fold. First, I make a stronger
theoretical linkage between status concerns and socialization processes to explain variations
in Chinese foreign policy. I test the scope conditions for socialization that unpack the micro-
processes and causal pathways to determine how, why, and when decision-makers in status-
seeking states like China are more or less open to preference change. Refining this
theoretical argument articulates the contributions of my research for Chinese foreign policy
studies and international relations theory more broadly. And second, the analytical,
empirical, and policy lessons drawn from my research shed important insights into what has
worked in the past, what has not, and what is likely to work in the future in drawing China
closer to assuming the role of a responsible, major power in East Asia and in global politics.
3

Chapter One: Introduction
4
Introduction

The rise of China and what it means for the future of the international system is
arguably the single-most important, unanswered question in global politics. Students of
International Relations (IR) and Chinese politics generally agree with the observation that
China is now a critical and indispensable member of the international community and plays
an increasingly important role in global affairs, from climate change to non-proliferation,
and is at the epicenter of contentious debates on such issues as human rights, trade
liberalization, and global governance. In short, for better or worse, China has now “re-
emerged” on the international scene and it matters a great deal. That is perhaps where the
general agreement ends. What is less certain and divides the scholarly and policy debates on
the implications of China’s rise is whether or not its meteoric ascendance will be disruptive
or cooperative. The conventional wisdom in IR about rising powers is generally pessimistic.
For starters, the world’s second largest economy continues to pursue a double-digit growth
rate in its military modernization program. And, alluding to how rising powers have
behaved throughout history, the prediction holds that China is on course and determined to
challenge and reshape the global balance of power. In short, the imperatives of maximizing
its own security in an anarchical environment will compel China to pursue its national
interests at all costs, including but not limited to offensive uses of force—particularly when
relative power is in its favor—and treating other countries in the region and beyond in a
zero-sum international environment as potential adversaries.
This standard material structure claim of how great and rising powers behave,
however, is just that: an assumption. There is little to no reason why ideational variables are
inconsequential or secondary to a materialist explanation, unless realist IR theories can
5
somehow demonstrate that perceptions, social interactions, and world views of decision-
makers are truly epiphenomenal to a material structural account of state behavior. Exploring
and understanding the value, contributions, and significance of ideational variables then
become all the more important: ideational factors should be able to explain the full spectrum
and range of state behavior, including cooperative tendencies as well as the cases that
standard material-based realism claims to explain – realpolitik, conflictual behavior.
Ideational arguments may be less parsimonious but not necessarily less relevant. For
example, security dilemmas in high-tension issues and areas can polarize the behavior of
each side, thus confirming the other’s worst-case scenarios, assumptions, and attribution
errors, all of which contribute to worsening relations between the conflicting parties. Such
action-reaction dynamic can be understood as a learned or socialized behavior, reinforced by
experience and absorbed through exposure to key discourses. As an ideational argument,
security dilemmas hold out the prospects that decision-makers exposed to a different set of
social interactions could indeed be socialized in alternative understandings of achieving
security, ranging from cooperative, collective security mechanisms to zero-sum calculations
on the efficacies of offensive display of force. The key implication here is that foreign
policy behaviors can change, even if the anarchical material structure and its conflictual
ramifications persist and remain a constant.
This dissertation project seeks to extend the critical test of such ideational arguments,
providing a theory on status considerations and socialization processes with additional
empirical implications to see if they hold up vis-à-vis standard materialist realist claims. In
a nutshell, I challenge the conventional wisdom and pessimistic prognosis about rising
powers by exploring and asking the following research puzzle and question: why and how
does China comply with international norms in multilateral security regimes? In so doing, I
6
identify some of the initial scope conditions under which Chinese decision-makers are more
or less likely to take on such self-constraining commitments.
My theoretical argument on status and socialization finds that China’s attempt to be a
recognized great power does not necessarily disrupt the status quo, as balance of power
politics assumes. In fact, seeking social acceptance from its peers requires China to comply
with universally accepted norms, rather than rejecting and overturning them. In the past, the
sources of great powers’ status, influence, and authority were rooted in establishing vast and
expansive empires and colonies, achieved through military superiority and conquests.
Hence, great powers emulated and had a strong desire to replicate these accepted behaviors
associated with such historical markers of status. In the contemporary, post-colonial era,
however, the markers and reference point for status and legitimacy have fundamentally
changed. Unlike the great power status markers of the past, a major power today is expected
to take on norm-conforming behavior and to participate in institutions that help regulate,
maintain, and strengthen the free-flow of goods, ideas, and other aspects of global
governance. Responsibility of upholding the status quo and pro-social compliance behavior,
in other words, are the preferred and accepted markers of authority and legitimacy of today’s
global power, and not the exploitative and mercantilist behavior of ancient statecraft. In
other words, the historical narrative of such destructive and disruptive measures to
demonstrate status has largely been replaced by expectations of great powers to lead by
example, support global institutions and norms, and reject traditional unilateralism and
power politics.
The notion that status matters has become increasingly important in international
relations theory, yet in spite of this general agreement, there is a deeply embedded
preoccupation with conceptualizing status through the lens of military force and material
7
power capabilities. To be sure, while war is an important phenomenon in international
politics, the significance of material power interest has been over-emphasized. Status should
be variable and account for conflictual and cooperative foreign policy outcomes. So far,
however, the IR literature has largely focused on the conflictual outcomes of status-seeking
motivations. The field has been impoverished by its insulation from studies of status and
power beyond material power capabilities.
Drawing from Johan Galtung’s seminal works in the 1960s, for example, status is an
important social and relational concept because it cannot be achieved nor demanded in
isolation. Other scholars like Robert Dahl, Harold Lasswell, and Abraham Kaplan argue that
status does not always, or even generally, rely on material force. In fact, they find respect,
rectitude, affection and enlightenment as core values of status, power, and influence. As
David Lake puts it, “Pure coercive commands—of the form ‘do this, or die’— are not
authoritative. Authority relations must contain some measure of legitimacy... an obligation,
understood by both parties, for B to comply with the wishes of A.”
The sampling of the aforementioned literature will be explored in greater detail in the
subsequent chapter. For now, this introduction surveys and makes the case of how status can
and should be variable, particularly by looking more carefully at the non-military and
ideational conceptualization of status and power that is sorely lacking and under-theorized in
IR. It is thus all the more important to explore the theoretical linkage between status
concerns and socialization theory to better explain variations in China’s foreign policy.
Status concerns can lead to either increasing assertiveness or an understanding that
cooperative, multilateral security is a preferred source of state security. Spelling out the
scope conditions for socialization can unpack the micro-processes and causal pathways that
8
help determine how, why, and when decision-makers in status-seeking states like China are
more or less open to preference change.
With reference to social psychology and communications theory, the initial scope
conditions I have identified include the quality of the deliberations and observable social
interactions at international and regional organizations, as well as at bilateral and
multilateral fora; the context and novelty of the normative concept discussed; and the degree
to which international consensus, particularly among developed and developing countries, is
forged on a normative agenda. As a corollary to these three initial scope conditions (and I
hope to identify more), when one (or more) condition is not met and/or is weakly established
at best, I should then expect status-seeking states’ behavior to change and reflect
instrumental, cost-benefit assessments, which over time leads to a more confrontational,
conflictual, and realpolitik ideology.
This dissertation builds on a number of theoretical and empirical path-breaking
volumes on and other seminal contributions on Chinese politics. In particular, it seeks to
bridge the gap between IR theory and Chinese foreign and security policy in practice.
Samuel Kim and Alastair Iain Johnston’s contributions have been pioneering and
illuminating. Their works have shown how Chinese foreign policy has changed and evolved
from the 1980s through the early 2000s, particularly in international security arenas. Their
works serve as a model for innovative ways to combine theoretical rigor and detailed,
empirical tests to help make comprehensive, convincing, and most important, falsifiable
arguments.
Michel Oksenberg, Harold Jacobson, and Margaret Pearson have also done similar
outstanding work detailing changes in China’s participation in international economic and
financial institutions. Organizational and material incentives and disincentives are clearly
9
documented, and ideational factors such as reputation and image are also identified as
equally important imperatives for the deepening of China’s engagement in the intricacies of
the global financial web. Other works by leading China experts like Avery Goldstein, David
Shambaugh, Bates Gill, Michael Swaine, and Robert Sutter have all contributed countless
volumes illuminating clear motivations behind China’s grand strategy in its ever-changing
foreign policy.
This dissertation builds upon and moves beyond Johnston’s scholarship by
examining why status and identity are important motivations for socialization processes. It
begins by offering an overview of the extant literature and IR debates on China’s rise,
followed by a more detailed analysis of the theoretical concepts of status concerns and
socialization mechanisms. The scope conditions for compliance behavior will also be
introduced and identified. In Chapters 3 through 5, I carry out in-depth process-tracing and
content analysis of the discourses, debates, and social interactions among Chinese policy
elites and their foreign counterparts to determine how status concerns and socialization
processes help shape and influence the outcome of Chinese foreign policy in three respective
issue areas of international security: international peacekeeping operations, conventional
arms and export controls, and territorial negotiations in the South China Sea. Each empirical
chapter looks at how Chinese foreign policy consideration evolved and ranged from
increasing cooperation and cautious compliance to resistance, reluctance and degrees of
realpolitik tendencies. More broadly, each issue area explores why and how status concerns
served as a considerable constraint on Chinese foreign policy behavior and outcomes.
The concluding chapter will then briefly review the overall arguments made
throughout this dissertation, and assess the theoretical, empirical, and policy implications
and lessons drawn from this research that will shed important insights into Chinese foreign
10
and security policy, especially what has worked in the past, what has not, and what is likely
to work in the future in drawing China closer to assuming the role of a responsible, major
power.
Lastly, the completion of this dissertation project would not have been possible
without due acknowledgement for the many individuals who supported me in this
intellectual endeavor. I am deeply grateful to my dissertation committee here at USC. Dave
Kang, Pat James, and Mai’a Cross have each dedicated countless hours of mentorship and
professional advice. Over the years, Dave, Pat, and Mai’a have all pushed me to think
critically about the theoretical contributions and empirical implications of my scholarship
and how it makes a difference in the real world, and I am thankful for their commitment to
help me succeed and excel as a scholar. My committee should surely take the most credit for
the dissertation’s strengths; any remaining pitfalls and weaknesses are entirely my own. I
embarked upon this journey of academic pursuit with the encouragement of Bates Gill and
Bob Sutter, and thank them for sowing the seeds of my intellectual curiosity in the study of
IR of East Asia and Chinese politics. My peers and colleagues in the POIR program helped
me cross the finish line and kept the most grueling aspects of graduate school training fun
and light-hearted. I am privileged to have met some of the most brilliant minds and rising
stars in IR in my program. And, last but not least, I owe any shred of success that I have
made thus far in my academic career to my mom and dad, brother, sister-in-law, and
nephew. Their constant love and support make all the most challenging things possible.

11

Chapter Two: Theory

12
Theory Part I:

Debating China’s Rise

There has been a proliferation of scholarly and policy debates regarding the rise of
China and its implications for order and stability in the international system. In brief, what
is missing from these subsequent debates is a careful and nuanced understanding of how
China and its decision-makers view themselves and their position in the world, and the
recognition that Chinese views are deeply affected by and interact with ideas and
institutions. The debate on China’s rise thus continues with no clear consensus emerging as
of yet. The scholars and pundits who are concerned with issues of material power
capabilities see an inevitable balancing behavior and an impending rivalry between great
powers; others who focus on ideas, institutions, and culture are somewhat more measured
and cautiously optimistic about the prospects for continued cooperation. The region, as such,
is in flux with a degree of uncertainty as the rise of China and the future direction of its
foreign and security policy remains an unforeclosed debate.
In an attempt to grapple with this broad question of understanding China’s rise and
its implications for international security and stability, this dissertation project is motivated
to address two main questions: first, it seeks to better and more thoroughly understand why
and how status-seeking states like China comply with international norms; and second, it
will identify some initial scope conditions under which Chinese decision-makers are more or
less likely to take on such self-constraining commitments in China’s foreign and security
policy.
13
Since the mid-1990s, one of the most striking features of Chinese foreign policy is
its gradual acceptance of international norms and institutions, not its resistance to them.
1

Among the most recent and important manifestations of this trend has been the shift in
China’s policy regarding international peacekeeping operations, conventional arms and
export controls. To be sure, many concerns persist about the current and future direction of
China’s foreign policies, and how they contrast with the established and accepted norms,
values, and standards that underpin international society. Chinese decision-makers tend to
bear a fairly deeply ingrained realpolitik and confrontational worldview,
2
harboring a degree
of skepticism toward international institutions and norms and identifying them as Western
biases and excessive incursions into state sovereignty.
In the last 20 years, however, Chinese decision-makers’ increasing levels of
exchanges and social interactions with foreign counterparts and civil society actors on the
global stage have led to changing social structural contexts that have in turn influenced and
shaped Chinese leaders’ own identity and broadened their definition of national interests to
include image, reputation, and social status. Put simply, if self-image and identity are ever-
changing, then there is a case to be made that through sustained social interactions and
persuasions, the Chinese leadership can indeed be socialized out of (or back into)
perceptions of the world as a competition for power and influence in an anarchic
environment. A call to arms for social and political revolutions in the Third World and
dissemination of Maoist principles have been consistently de-emphasized in the last two

1
Shogo Suzuki, “Seeking ‘Legitimate’ Great Power Status in Post-Cold War International Society:
China’s and Japan’s Participation in UNPKO,” International Relations 22, no.1 (2008), pp. 45-63;
Alastair Iain Johnston and Robert Ross, eds., New Directions in the Study of China’s Foreign Policy
(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2006).
2
Tom Christensen, “Chinese Realpolitik,” Foreign Affairs 75, no. 5 (1996), p. 37.
14
decades. Instead, Chinese policymakers understand that there is greater stability when they
define national security priorities not in narrow, self-interested terms, but more broadly so as
to nurture and sustain the global system from which it has contributed to and gained so
many benefits.
In so doing, Chinese policy elites and decision-makers are adapting and learning that
legitimate, great power status comes with special rights and privileges, as well as managerial
responsibilities. Its attempt to be a recognized great power does not necessarily disrupt the
status quo, as traditional balance of power theorists argue. In fact, seeking social acceptance
from its peers in requires China to commit to and comply with established and universally
accepted norms, rather than rejecting and overturning them. This trend, however, is far from
a linear, predetermined path. Chinese foreign policy behavior reflects an aspiration to be
recognized as a great power, but its behavior has evolved and ranged from strategic
adaptation to an understanding that cooperative, multilateral security is a preferred source of
state security.
As such, in order to better understand these twists and turns and the nuances in
Chinese foreign policy behavior, the following overarching questions become the focal point
of our analysis for the remainder of this dissertation project: why does status serve as a key
source of motivation for norm-conforming behavior, especially from the once-skeptical
participant? And relatedly, if status matters and remains an important determining factor,
then the natural follow-up question is how China complies with international norms.
Before explaining how status concerns and socialization processes affect change in
China’s compliance behavior in its foreign policy and in international institutions, this next
section surveys the extant literature and some of the key arguments and debates in
15
international relations regarding China’s rise and its implications for the future of the
international system.

16
A Shifting Balance of Power

The broader realist paradigm posits that there are unchanging and determinative
realities about the international system that constrain state behavior. Because of the
anarchic environment, there is a constant struggle and confrontation among power-
maximizing concerned states. States with growing capabilities and military assets will thus
be more likely to expand their national self-interests with little to no regard for cooperation
or reliance on others for security. Notwithstanding the economic and political progress in
the region, a number of observers opine that the Asia-Pacific is a region bound with
increasing tensions, with confrontation and war imminent as a result of a shift in the regional
balance of power. A more powerful China is becoming increasingly assertive, with
territorial disputes among its East and Southeast Asian neighbors intensifying. Pundits and
scholars see the contestation between China’s rise and the region as one that is “ripe for
rivalry,” with an escalation in regional tensions comparable to the start of the Great War.
3

Aaron Friedberg, for example, has been consistently pessimistic about the dangers and
disruptions to order and stability that China’s rise portends. Friedberg (in)famously
proclaimed that Europe’s past is Asia’s future,
4
where China’s rise as a regional (and
potential global) hegemon will instill fear in its neighbors in the region and lead to an
intensifying security dilemma, resulting in containment strategies, a rampant rise in defense

3
Kenneth Waltz, “The Emerging Structure of International Politics,” International Security 18, no. 2
(Fall 1993); Richard K. Betts, “Wealth, Power, and Instability: East Asia and the United States after
the Cold War,” International Security 18, no. 3 (Winter 1993); Zbigniew Brzezinski and John
Mearsheimer, “Clash of the Titans,” Foreign Policy 146 (January 2005); Stephen Walt, “Bad News
for Balancing in Asia,” Foreign Policy December 3, 2012, available at:
http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/12/03/bad_news_for_balancing_in_east_asia.
4
Aaron Friedberg, “Ripe for Rivalry: Prospects for Peace in a Multipolar Asia,” International
Security 18, no. 3 (Winter 1993).
17
spending and military expenditure across the region, and direct military conflict.
5
In Contest
for Supremacy: China, America, and the Struggle for Mastery in Asia, Friedberg maintains
that geopolitical competition in the region will lead to the inevitable clash between the
dominant power– the United States – and the rising challenger – China.
6

A key element in such structural views of international politics then is this notion of
the balance of power. States, according to balance of power politics, have a propensity to
forge balancing behavior and attain security through balancing. For realists, hegemony
occurs when one state amasses so much power and material capability that it is able to
dominate over the rest of the world and put an end to a multi-state system. The balance of
power is an arrangement so that no state shall be in a position to have absolute domination
over other sovereign states. According to Waltz, there are two forms of balancing: (1)
external balancing includes the formation of alliances to counter-balance and block the
expansion of an aggressor and deter the rising power from any aggressive behavior; and (2)
internal balancing includes the internal, domestic mobilization of military power and build-
up of economic and industrial bases that translate into overall national power and strength.
From a structural realist vantage point, China’s rapid ascendancy in both economic
and military terms is a red flag and fast-emerging as a regional hegemon. Balancing
behavior is the only approach to confront China’s rise to help ensure that China does not
attain the status of a hegemon as that will put other state’s security in jeopardy. Realist
scholars point to the increasing military hostilities and the tendency by states in the region to
engage in both internal and external balancing through the build-up of their own domestic

5
Avery Goldstein, “First Things First: The Present (If Not Clear) Danger of Crisis Instability in
U.S.-China Relations,” International Security 37, no. 4 (Spring 2013); and John J. Mearsheimer,
“China’s Unpeaceful Rise,” Current History (2006).
6
Aaron Friedberg, Contest for Supremacy: China, America, and the Struggle for Mastery in Asia
(New York: Norton, 2010).
18
military capabilities while firming up the “hub-and-spoke” alliance system and partnership
with the United States to counter the Chinese threat.
7
These containment and balancing
strategies are all the more necessary, as states plan for the worst-case scenarios and
outcomes regarding the intentions of the imminent, rising hegemon, and hedge against the
possibility that intentions, however benign today, can change at any moment.
8
Such
observers tend to point to the annual double-digit growth rate of the Chinese military, the
People’s Liberation Army, as an unhidden indication that China is working toward building
up its weapons systems (whether they are for offensive or defensive purposes are irrelevant).
There is no hiding about the visible concerns regarding a security dilemma, increased
tension, and mistrust in the region as a result of China’s rapid ascendancy.
Interestingly, in The China Choice: Why America Should Share Power, Australian
scholar and diplomat Hugh White observes that neither China nor America “can hope to win
a competition for primacy outright, so both would be best served by playing for a
compromise.”
9
From an East Asian vantage point, White prescribes a unique set of security
arrangement and policy proposal that he termed a “Concert of Asia,” where Washington and
Beijing should treat each other as equals and demarcate two clear spheres of influence. The
strategic consideration behind White’s logic is that if a balancing coalition against China’s
rising power is impending, then it is quite possible that the Washington can retain a leading
role in the Asia-Pacific, with critical support from those around the region alarmed by

7
Robert Ross, “Assessing the China Threat,” The National Interest 81 (Fall 2005); Goldstein, “First
Things First: The Present (If Not Clear) Danger of Crisis Instability in U.S.-China Relations;” and
Mearsheimer, “China’s Unpeaceful Rise.”
8
Dale Copeland, “Economic Interdependence and War: A Theory of Trade Expectation,”
International Security 20, no. 4 (Spring 1996); and Michael Brown, Owen R. Cote Jr., Sean M.
Lynn-Jones, and Steven E. Miller, eds. The Rise of China (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2000).
9
Hugh White, The China Choice: Why America Should Share Power (Collingwood: Black, Inc.
2012).
19
China’s disruptive rise. White opines that “Asia’s strategic alignments over the next few
decades are going to be much more complicated than a simple ‘with us or against us.’….
(East Asian countries) will not sacrifice their interests in peace and stability, and good
relations with China, to support U.S. primacy unless that is the only way to avoid Chinese
domination.”
10
Echoing White’s analysis, Kang Choi agrees that this similar logic extends
to Northeast Asia. From the vantage point of Seoul, for example, Washington and Beijing
are indispensable partners, the former an important security guarantor and treaty ally while
the latter is arguably the most important trade partner.
11
Forcing regional countries to
choose one side or the other becomes problematic and may unduly complicate relations with
two strategic partners.
Other scholars in the realist tradition find China’s rise to be less alarming, although
there is a still a degree of apprehension about the future trajectory of China’s material power
capabilities. Stephen Walt, for example, has indicated that one of the most important factors
for determining whether or not China is a threat is to monitor and assess the Chinese
leadership’s intentions and infer whether or not they are security-seeking and a status quo
power.
12
Accordingly, cooperation under anarchy is still possible,
13
as long as there are no
revisionist leaders at the helm in China and that the PLA’s military capabilities and
intentions become less opaque and more transparent.
Structural realist arguments, unfortunately, cover only half the story and do not fully
explain the complexity and dynamic shifts in foreign policy behaviors and outcomes. The

10
Ibid.
11
Kang Choi, “A South Korean View on the US Rebalancing,” Global Asia 7, no. 4 (December
2012).
12
Stephen Walt, “Taming American Power,” Foreign Affairs (September 2005).
13
Charles Glaser, “Will China’s Rise Lead to War?” Foreign Affairs (March 2011).
20
realist paradigm as whole falls to consider that states and decision-makers, in spite of an
anarchic international environment, can be introduced to and socialized into cooperative
behavior and practices and survive quite well in the pursuit of collective security. These
variations seem to indicate that there are factors beyond material power at stake, such as
ideational variables and the role of cultural contingency of power and interests.
Realism also assumes that realpolitik impulses driving state behavior are innate not
learned. Equally problematic is its underlying assumption that states can only be
homogenized or socialized toward realpolitik norms of behavior, and that non-realpolitik
behavior (e.g., cooperative behavior) is by and large ruled out. As one of the case studies
for this dissertation will delve into more deeply, the variations in Chinese peacekeeping
behavior since the 1990s seem to indicate that China’s self-image and identity is changing,
as a result of increasing exposure to international norms through its decision-makers’
participation and social interactions with foreign counterparts at the UN. In brief, it has led
to a twenty-fold increase in troop commitments to the UN in the last two decades, the largest
contributor to international peacekeeping compared to other permanent members of the
Security Council, and this trend has sustained since the early 2000s. More recently, the
Chinese troops have expanded their role on the ground, carrying out important disaster relief
support and contribute toward disarmament and national reconciliation efforts in post-
conflict states, all of which point to a stronger understanding (beyond strategic adaptation)
of collective security measures and the growing importance of peacekeeping norms.
Chinese policymakers can thus be socialized into or out of perceptions of the world as
competition for power and influence in an anarchic environment.

21
Power Transition Theory

Power transition theory is an important systemic level theory that seeks to explain
shifts in power dynamics, differential rates of economic development as the key basis of
power assessment, and the transformation of the international order. IR theorists in this
tradition have used power transition theory as the basis of their analysis to explain the
stability and instability of bipolarity throughout the Cold War era, as well as the rise of U.S.
hegemony and superpower. Increasingly, the theory has been used to assess the rise of China
and its challenge to U.S. dominance and led order.
14

Developed by Organski, the theory counters structural realists’ balance of power
proposition, rejecting the view that power parity promotes peace while a preponderance of
power leads to war and that concentrations of power trigger counterbalancing forces,
coalitions, and alliances to restore a state of equilibrium in the international system.
15

Instead, Organski argues that power transition occurs with the inevitable rise and fall of
states, due in a large part to uneven economic productivity and growth rates, the state’s
capacity to extract resources, and changes in population. Organski determines that when a
rising power acquires at least 80 percent of the economic power of the dominant state, the
former is considered a credible challenger that could overthrow and undermine the dominant

14
A. F. K. Organski, World Politics (New York: Knopf, 1958); A. F. K. Organski and Jacek Kugler,
The War Ledger (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980); Robert Gilpin, “The Theory of
Hegemonic War,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 18 (1988), pp. 591-614; Ronald L. Tammen
et al., Power Transitions: Strategies for the 21
st
Century (New York: Chatham House, 2000).
15
Organski, World Politics; and Robert Gilpin, War and Change in World Politics (New York:
Cambridge University Press, 1981).
22
state’s position at the apex of the international system.
16
An important corollary to the
theory, however, is the extent to which the challenger is dissatisfied with the existing
arrangements – e.g., values, beliefs, norms, and institutions – in the international system.
Power transition theory maintains that the dominant state, its allies and other states in its
orbit are satisfied with and benefit from the existing set of rules, most of which are
established, maintained, and perpetuated by the very same states. A dissatisfied rising power
that has met or exceeded the critical economic threshold as a challenger becomes a more
visible threat – and thus triggering a transition in power – when it feels the existing
institutions and rules are unfair or does not accurately reflect its interests and expectations.
As such, the satisfaction and power parity are two of the key variables that determine
whether the power transition between the dominant state and the challenger would be
peaceful or warlike.
With regards to the rise of China, power transition theorists observe that parity
condition is inevitable, where based on current projections of China’s economic growth rate,
the state’s ability to extract resources from its society, and the population changes, China
will soon overtake the United States’ power preponderance. The key, determining variable
then is the extent to which China’s leaders is satisfied with the existing rules and
institutions, all of which are extensions and a legacy of the United States’ dominance in the
international system since the end of the second World War. As Tammen and others argue,
“the reconciliation of preferences, the attainment of satisfaction within the international
order, is the remedy.”
17

16
Organski and Kugler, The War Ledger; Jacek Kugler and Marina Arbetman, “Choosing Among
Measures of Power: A Review of the Empirical Record,” in Power in World Politics, ed. Richard J.
Stoll and Michael D. Ward (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1989), pp. 49-77.
17
Tammen et al., Power Transitions: Strategies for the 21
st
Century.
23
There are, however, several key issues in power transition theory when applied to the
U.S.-China power dynamic and to understanding the impact of China’s rise on the existing
international order and system. Consider, for example, how the theory falls short in
explaining the strategic and complex interaction between the dominant global power (the
United States) and a rising regional power (China).
18
Even though the theory predicts that
China will attain power parity in due course, it discounts the regional dynamics, particularly
the threat environment in East Asia and the region’s evolving views on counter-hegemonic
and balancing behavior that may impede or even prevent China from attaining such parity in
the first place. It is also not a foregone conclusion, as power transition proponents maintain,
that China’s rise will be able to develop the necessary power projection capabilities that
directly challenge the United States’ core interests on a global scale.
19
Its ability to
undermine and chip away at U.S. leadership may be confined to East and Southeast Asia,
but how or whether China’s rise will actually affect U.S. broader interests and power project
capabilities on a global scale is less certain or predictable.
The analogy of China’s rise has often been paired up with the rise of Germany in the
nineteenth century. There are, however, some clear distinctions that the theory does not
account for in the analogy. Germany in the late nineteenth century faced a starkly less stable
regional and international environment, with Russia looming at its backyard strong as the
key military threat, spurring Germany to engage in warlike behavior as it sought to overtake

18
Douglas Lemke, Regions of War and Peace (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2001).
19
Jonathan DiCicco and Jack S. Levy, “Power Shifts and Problem Shifts: The Evolution of the
Power Transition Research Program,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 43 (1999), pp. 675-704; David
Rapkin and William Thompson, “Power Transition, Challenge, and the (Re)Emergence of China,”
International Interactions 29 (2003), p. 325; Jack S. Levy, “Power Transition Theory and the Rise of
China,” in China’s Ascent: Power, Security, and the Future of International Politics, ed. Robert
Ross and Zhu Feng (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008), pp. 11-33; and John Vasquez, “When
are Power Transitions Dangerous? An Appraisal and Reformulation of Power Transition Theory,” in
Parity and War: Evaluations and Extensions of The War Ledger, ed. Jacek Kugler and Douglas
Lemke (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1996), pp. 35-56.
24
the dominant power at the time, the United Kingdom. China faces a different kind of
situation in East Asia and the threats posed by its regional neighbors are not as grave or of
similar magnitude as continental Europe in the nineteenth and twentieth century.
Perhaps, the more problematic issue that the theory grapples with is the argument
that the challenger always initiates the war prior to the point of the transition.
20
At that
moment, the rising power is still weaker and thus the probability of losing the war is higher.
Why then would a dissatisfied challenger be exposed to such risks and initiate the first
move, as the theory predicts and expects dissatisfied challenging states to do so. And,
likewise, the theory does not account for preventive war as a strategy for the dominant
power. In anticipation of a potential takeover, why would it not engage in preventive
measures while it still has superior capabilities to do so?
In short, the applications of power transition theory tends to focus on challenges to
the dominant power in the global system, while structural arguments of balance of power
theory are limited to the European continental and historical experience of strategic
interactions among competing powers, with the assumption that those patterns are
generalizable to other continents across time.
21
Both theories have shortcomings that do not
provide a comprehensive and dynamic framework to accurately capture, explain, and predict
the rise of China in East Asia and the world and its implications for U.S.-China relations and
order and stability in the international system more generally.

20
Jack S. Levy and William Thompson, “Hegemonic Threats and Great Power Balancing in Europe
1495-2000,” Security Studies 14 (2005), pp. 1-30.
21
William Wohlforth, et al., “Testing Balance of Power Theory in World History,” European
Journal of International Relations 13, no. 2 (2007), pp. 155-185; Jack S. Levy, “Balances and
Balancing: Concepts, Propositions, and Research Design,” in Realism and the Balancing of Power:
A New Debate, ed. John Vasquez and Colin Elman (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 2003), pp. 128-
153; and Annette Freyberg-Inan, Ewan Harrison, and Patrick James, eds., Rethinking Realism in
International Relations (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009).
25
Institutions, Ideas, and Identity

Liberal institutionalists, and most notably John Ikenberry, have posited that the
accumulation of power is irreversible and that such power transitions are bound to happen
throughout history.
22
It would be a matter of time before China “catches up” with the
United States, but Ikenberry is less worried that the power transition will be a disruptive one
primarily because the international financial and security architecture (e.g., the World Bank,
International Monetary Fund, the Bretton Woods system, the United Nations, the
Association of Southeast Asian Nations, etc.) are all essentially created, initiated, and
nurtured over time by the United States. And, even if the United States’ power waxes and
wanes in the years to come, these international institutions remain deeply entrenched in a set
of norms, values, and standards that, for better or worse, are no longer simply U.S. or
Western ideological beliefs but increasingly universal and widely accepted by democratizing
and other developed economies alike.
23
China may develop the material power and
economic indicators to overtake the United States, but it is not necessarily dissatisfied with
the existing international security and financial arrangements.
24
After all, it has gained and
benefitted from being part of the system; overturning it and replacing the existing liberal
international economic order will require the Chinese leadership to offer a competing and
more attractive developmental model. More challenging, China would also need the “buy-
in” and support of the majority of the other states in the international system.

22
G. John Ikenberry, “The Rise of China and the Future of the West: Can the Liberal System
Survivie?” Foreign Affairs (January 2008).
23
Ibid.
24
Avery Goldstein, “Power Transitions, Institutions, and China’s Rise in East Asia: Theoretical
Expectations and Evidence,” The Journal of Strategic Studies 30, no. 4-5 (2007), pp. 639-682.
26
Scholars focusing on unipolarity find that American hegemony contributes to
stability in the contemporary world, particularly with its contributions toward public goods
to help maintain and leadership capabilities to help regulate global governance and the free
flow of trade and commerce.
25
Christopher Layne, however, finds that the unipolar moment
is transitory, with new challengers on the horizon and destabilizing consequences later on.
26

China’s rise, as such, could be a major outlier and has a strong potential to be a disruptive
force to the maintenance of the international system.
Embedded in the broader paradigm of institutions is the argument that continued
engagement with China will lead to deeper and more complex interdependence.
27
The
increasing number of business, economic, and trade activities and engagement with China
will prevent the Chinese from pursuing conflict. Likewise, encouraging Chinese
participation in the plethora of international institutions will also improve bilateral and
multilateral engagement and reduce mistrust and uncertainty. Democratic liberalism also
assumes that the spread of Western, democratic norms and values will enable Chinese
decision-makers to see other counterparts as strategic partners as opposed to enemies.
William Overholt, for example, observes that increasing economic interdependence and
interactions among East Asian countries and is cognizant of the importance of perceptions in
forming grand strategies. Overholt argues “Asia’s future will not be determined by the
ricocheting of Newtonian bowling balls…we had a half-century with one assumption (Japan

25
Barry Posen, “Command of the Commons: The Military Foundation of U.S. Hegemony,”
International Security 28, no. 1 (Summer 2003), pp. 5-46; and Stephen G. Brooks and William
Wohlforth, World out of Balance: International Relations and the Challenge of American Primacy
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008).
26
Christopher Layne, “The Unipolar Illusion Revisited: The Coming End of the United States’
Unipolar Moment," International Security 31, no. 2 (Fall 2006), pp. 7-41.
27
Bruce Russett and John Oneal, Triangulating peace: Democracy, Interdependence, and
International Organizations (New York: Norton, 2001); Robert Keohane and Joseph Nye, Power
and Interdependence (London: Longman, 2001).
27
inherently evil, China virtuous) and a half-century with the opposite assumption. How do we
know whether the geopolitical architecture of Asia is evolving in ways that render obsolete
some of the key assumptions and institutions of the Cold War era?”
28
Overholt’s core
argument is that the domestic basis of legitimacy for ruling elites across East Asia has
shifted from a security- and military-focused legitimacy to an economic- and performance-
based legitimacy. Overholt thus sees a region in which increasingly powerful incentives for
spurring and maintaining economic growth and development will help reduce rivalries in the
region.
29

Liberal arguments assume that cooperation is possible under anarchy, but trade and
continued economic interdependence could also lead to less sanguine outcomes. Dale
Copeland, for example, finds that war and a confrontational relationship with China’s rise
may still be possible.
30
For one, China’s rapid economic growth means that it may soon
gain the material power and economic wherewithal to augment its power. China is already
competing with the United States and other powers for scarce and valuable resources. It
could thus begin to pushback more strongly and gain the necessary strength to defend its
national interests more aggressively. Likewise, conflict and confrontation may become
more attractive as a policy option for the Chinese if its leadership expects a severance or
downgrade of the importance of bilateral economic ties with the United States further down
the road.
A constructivist ontology, on the other hand, emphasizes social and interactive
relations between states, looking especially at the role of culture, ideas, and institutions in

28
William Overholt, Asia, America, and the Transformation of Geopolitics (Cambridge University
Press, 2008), pp. 9-10.
29
See Etel Solingen, “Pax Asiatica Versus Bella Levantina: The Foundations of War and Peace in
East Asia and the Middle East,” American Political Science Review 101, no. 4 (2007), pp. 757-780.
30
Copeland, “Economic Interdependence and War: A Theory of Trade Expectation.”
28
managing inter-state relations. The constructivist literature on China’s rise has thus been
more varied, with more emphasis on such non-material factors as culture, identity, history,
and ideas. On the more pessimistic side, Daniel Lynch sees that Chinese decision-makers
tend to see the liberal international order as deeply biased and Western/Euro-centric.
31
They
reject the universalism of such Western norms and values as political and social rights.
Rather than increasing assimilation, Lynch argues that China’s own historical baggage and
cultural identity, as well as their skepticism of Western values in general will lead it to
reject, or at least systematically undermine, the liberal order. Likewise, Callahan argues that
China’s domestic discourse on its future role can be inferred from historical and cultural
factors.
32
China’s national identity draws from a turbulent past and the leadership tends to
emphasize the “century of humiliation” under Western imperialism from the late 1800s to
the 1900s as a fundamental attribute of its image and identity. This pessimism lingers on to
the modern day period and is an important narrative, according to Callahan. The continued
manipulation and emphasis of these historical narratives will have substantive, and largely
negative impact on China’s rise and its future policy trajectory.
On the other hand, Johnston has argued in a number of publications that China is less
a threat than commonly perceived. For example, Johnston wrote in 2012 that, “As for the
predictions of balance-of-power theory, many East Asia IR specialists also reject this
structural take on the region. Most East Asian states are not seen as balancing against
China.”
33
Most notably, in Social States: China in International Institutions, he argued that

31
Daniel Lynch, “Envisioning China’s Political Future: Elite Responses to Democracy as a Global
Constitutive Norm,” International Studies Quarterly 51 (2007), pp. 701-722.
32
William Callahan, “Chinese Visions of World Order: Post-Hegemonic or a New Hegemony?”
International Studies Review 10, no. 4 (2008), pp. 749-761.
33
Alastair Iain Johnston, “What (If Anything) Does East Asia Tell Us About International Relations
Theory?” Annual Review of Political Science 15 (2012); Amitav Acharya, “The Emerging Regional
29
China is increasingly a status quo power and has limited aims, is learning to work within
international institutions, and shows very little evidence of attempting to create its own,
alternative, world order.
34
He challenges the notion that Chinese strategic culture, drawn
from historical analysis, is consistent across time; rather, it changes and as a socialization
argument, it held out the prospects that decision-makers exposed to other security
environments could be socialized and incentivized in alternative understandings and
narratives of how to best achieve security (e.g., through tributary arrangements, treaties,
cooperative security measures, etc.) Recently, Johnston questioned whether China was
newly assertive, as has been commonly argued, concluding that the “new assertiveness
meme underestimates the degree of assertiveness in certain policies in the past, and
overestimates the amount of change in China’s diplomacy in 2010 and after.”
35

Likewise, David Kang’s historical approach provides a starkly different reading on
China’s past behavior, countering structural realists’ claims on balancing behavior in inter-
state relations.
36
The hierarchical relationship China forged from the 1300-1900s was
centered on Confucian values, culture, identity, and ideology. Unlike the European historical
experience, this hierarchical regional order in East Asia, with China at the center, was
surprisingly stable. Accommodation, rather than balancing, was the norm governing inter-
state relations between China, Japan, Korea, and Vietnam. This hierarchical model worked

Architecture of World Politics,” World Politics 59, no. 4 (2007); and Evelyn Goh, “Great Powers
and Hierarchical Order in Southeast Asia,” International Security 32, no. 3 (Winter 2007).
34
Alastair Iain Johnston, Social States: China in International Institutions, 1980-2000 (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 2008).
35
Alastair Iain Johnston, “How New and Assertive Is China’s New Assertiveness?” International
Security 37, no. 4 (Spring 2013), p. 7.
36
David Kang, East Asia Before the West: Five Centuries of Trade and Tribute (New York:
Columbia University Press, 2012); and David Kang, “Getting Asia Wrong: The Need for New
Analytical Frameworks,” International Security 27, no. 4 (Spring 2003), pp. 57-85. See also, Evelyn
Goh, “Great Powers and Hierarchical Order in Southeast Asia: Analyzing Regional Security
Strategies,” International Security 32, no. 3 (Winter 2008), pp. 113-157.
30
because of a strong sense of Confucian cultural admiration and acceptance of the tributary
system, provided that the Chinese did not meddle with the internal affairs of the smaller
states. This unique model of formal hierarchy and informal equality provides a sound
rebuttal to the conventional wisdom that rivalry, competition, and balance of power politics
are universal norms that govern state behavior.
It is important to note though that China’s historical past might not be replicated to
the present situation or even to explain the future direction of China’s rise. Its ability to
regain the position as a regional hegemon rests largely on its ability to demonstrate cultural
legitimacy and authority as it once did. In China Rising and East Asia Before the West,
Kang finds that states today are not actively balancing against China, as Friedberg would
claim, but they are not ready to accept China as the regional hegemon either. Much of its
intentions remain opaque and its political, moral, and cultural currency to reclaim the
leadership position in East Asia remains an elusive goal, for now.
Echoing Kang’s core argument, David Lake’s Hierarchy in International Relations
finds that hierarchical bargaining is a relatively understudied phenomenon in international
politics. Lake points to a number of examples in which states have delegated, through
contracting, core state functions. Great powers provide an array of public goods for the
subordinate, most important security. The subordinate in turn, makes commitments with
regard to not only policies, such as bandwagoning with rather than balancing against the
dominant power, but also authority structures. The most dramatic examples are cases where
states have entirely contracted out the provision of international security. In the 19th
century these entities would have been termed protectorates. In the contemporary
environment states that rely on others for the provision of their external security enjoy full
international legal sovereignty and recognition. Examples include Micronesia and the
31
Marshall Islands which have formally contracted with the United States for the provision of
security.
Interestingly, Lake’s concept of great power states and hierarchy, however, remains
a contractual relationship, one that builds on strategic calculations and cost-benefit calculus
by both the dominant state and the weaker state. For Lake, hierarchy can be attributed to a
material-rationalist perspective. The dominant state provides certain goods and assurances
such as security guarantees while the smaller state enters into a state of compliance and
alliance with the dominant state.
Institutions, in the game theoretic analysis and microeconomic assumptions, serve as
important information-gathering venues that help filter preferences and alter cost-benefit
calculations that lead to different types of policy outcomes.
37
These explanations, to a
certain degree, account for China’s varying positions on major international security issues,
but they tend to downplay or even ignore the social origins, content, and construction of
state preferences. Where exactly do these preferences come from and how do decision-
makers capitalize on them in policy debates? The absence of a careful process-tracing
exercise in which state preferences change provides a half-baked assessment of how and
why decision-makers might change their policy preferences and behavior. Modeling
conducted thoroughly a rational choice analysis operates from the assumption that
preferences and interests are relatively fixed and thus do not account for the full effects of
social interactions that take place within international security institutions. The duration,
frequency, and the quality of iterated contacts, closed-door meetings, social influence,

37
Andrew Moravcsik, “Taking Preferences Seriously: A Liberal Theory of International Politics,”
International Organization 51, no. 4 (1997).
32
cajoling, and persuasion that take place at the official and unofficial levels affect the outlook
of decision-makers.

33
Theory Part II:
Status, Security, and Socialization

Why Status Matters for Rising Powers?

The notion that status matters has become increasingly widespread in international
relations theory, yet in spite of this general agreement, there are significant gaps and
limitations in our understanding on how and why status drives changes in foreign policy
behavior.
38

Status can be defined as an individual’s standing in the hierarchy of a group based on
such criteria as prestige, honor, and deference.
39
In recent years, some of the most
promising works on the role of status in international politics draws from social identity
theory (SIT).
40
Deborah Larson’s work on status seekers, for example, explores how social
groups, according to SIT, strive to achieve a positively distinctive identity. Where a group’s

38
See, for example, Michael Wallace, “Power, Status, and International War,” Journal of Peace
Research 1 (1971), pp. 23-35; Robert Gilpin, War and Change in World Politics (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1981); Baldev R. Nayar and T.V. Paul, India in the World Order:
Searching for Major-Power Status (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); William
Wohlforth and David Kang, “Hypotheses on Status Competition,” paper presented at the Annual
Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Toronto, Canada, September 2009; and
Thomas Volgy, Renato Corbetta, Keith A. Grant, and Ryan G. Baird, Major Powers and the Quest
for Status in International Politics: Global and Regional Perspectives (New York: Palgrave
MacMillan, 2010).
39
A definition of status can be found, for example, in William Wohlforth, “Unipolarity, Status
Competition, and Great-Power War,” World Politics 61, no. 1 (2009); and Johnston, Social States:
China in International Relations, 1980-2000, p. 82.
40
For some of the more important and seminal findings on social identity theory and its application
in IR, see Henri Tajfel and John C. Turner, “An Integrative Theory of Intergroup Conflict,” in
William G. Austin and Stephen Worchel, eds., The Social Psychology of Intergroup Relations
(Monterey: Burnham, 1986); Jonathan Mercer, “Anarchy and Identity,” International Organization
49, no. 2 (Spring 1995); and Deborah Larson and Alexei Shevchenko, “Status Seekers: Chinese and
Russian Responses to U.S. Primacy,” International Security 34, no. 4 (Spring 2010).
34
identity is no longer favorable, Larson identifies a number of alternative pathways and grand
strategies that include social mobility (emulating the values and practices of the established
powers to attain integration into the elite clubs); competition (supplanting the dominant
actor); and social creativity (seeking a more favorable position on a different ranking system
while highlighting the state’s differences from the established, dominant actors). Each of
these strategies, however, is an ideal type and how small social groups and settings of
observed individual behavior can be transplanted to explain entire grand strategies of a
country at large carry inherent extrapolation problems, an issue that continues to undergird
the problem of applying SIT to the field of IR.
41
Grand strategies are difficult to pigeon-
hole into one of the three pathways; they are usually implemented over a long period of time
– over decades for some countries – and may contain of a mixture of the three different
pathways.
While Larson’s work has broadened to apply to rising regional powers beyond China
and Russia (e.g., Brazil, India, and Turkey), her analysis falls short in addressing the scope
conditions and micro-processes under which cooperation and/or conflict among established
powers and rising powers might occur. As such, falsifying Larson’s hypotheses and
propositions become a perennial challenge, raising the same critique that observers have
with power transition theory: if improvements in the lower-status group’s position come at
the expense of the dominant group, and if status is relative, then why don’t established
powers see their challengers as a threat and taken on pre-emptive measures? Why would
they accept or tolerate “social creativity,” the predominant course of action rising powers
choose in their foreign policies, as benign as such a grand strategy may be?

41
Jacques E.C. Hymans, “Applying Social Identity Theory to the Study of International Politics: A
Caution and an Agenda,” paper presented at the Annual Convention of the International Studies
Association, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, March 2002.
35
Recent research has thus shifted focus and looked at how status deficits and
dissatisfaction are significantly associated with an increased propensity for conflict and war
initiation.
42
Drawing from sociology, Galtung’s research in 1964 finds that conflict often
arose from “status inconsistency,” which he explains as the difference between status that
was attributed by the international community -- “ascribed status” -- and status that was
actually deserved -- “achieved status.”
43
Subsequent research has operationalized ascribed
status with diplomatic representation, indexing and compiling the number and rank of
diplomatic representatives sent from one country to another.
44
Achieved status, or what
countries would feel they deserved was proxied through measurement of their military and
industrial capacity. The greater the discrepancy between ascribed and achieved status the
higher the likelihood for status inconsistency, a major source of frustration and
dissatisfaction with one’s social standing.
Dafoe, Renshon, and Huth find that “if there is one feature of reputations and status
that scholars are in agreement upon, it is that leaders, policy elites, and national populations
are often concerned, even obsessed with their status and reputation.”
45
Scholars in this line
of research agree on an important observation: a correlation behavior between status
dissatisfaction and conflict initiation. Kagan’s research, for example, finds that prestige
politics is an important source of major inter-state conflicts.
46
Prestige is often seen by
leaders as a critical interest, and one worth waging war to preserve. Likewise, Wohlforth
finds that when great powers compete for primacy in a multipolar system, such “status

42
Jonathan Renshon, “Status Deficits and War,” unpublished paper, 2013.
43
Johan Galtung, “A Structural Theory of Aggression,” Journal of Peace Research 1, no. 2 (1964).
44
J. David Singer and Melvin Small, “The Composition and Status Ordering of the International
System: 1815-1940,” World Politics 18, no. 2 (1966).
45
Allan Dafoe, Jonathan Renshon, and Paul Huth, unpublished paper, 2013.
46
Donald Kagan, On the Origins of War and the Preservation of Peace (New York: Random House,
1995).
36
conflict” often leads to balancing behavior against the rising power and hence military
conflict and war unfold.
47
Finally, Lebow’s codings of major wars since the signing of the
Treaty of Westphalia in 1648 indicate that desire for greater standing accounts for over half
of all international conflict. Volgy and Mayhall sums up such correlation behavior between
status dissatisfaction and war as follows:
“...countries may diverge on a number of status dimensions which are
considered salient for decision makers. For example, a country may
rank relatively high on economic and/or military capabilities (e.g.,
achieved status) but may be accorded little prestige (e.g., ascribed
status) by the international community. Under such conditions...it is
plausible that a nation’s decision makers would evidence a strong desire
to change the status quo, and failing to do so, to engage in conflict
and violence.”
48

The most puzzling aspect of the aforementioned research, however, is the deeply
embedded preoccupation with conceptualizing status and power through the lens of military
force and material capabilities. Scholars of international politics through the ages have
placed a high premium on military power.
49
This is demonstrated and reinforced by
references to the centrality of force to international politics, to conceptualize power as the
capacity to wage war, to force as the ultimate form of power.
50
More broadly, the study of

47
Wolhforth, “Unipolarity, Status Competition, and Great-Power War.”
48
Thomas Volgy and Stacey Mayhall, “Status Inconsistency and International War: Exploring the
Effects of Systemic Change,” International Studies Quarterly 39, no. 1 (1995).
49
See, for example, Jack S. Levy, War in the Modern Great Power System (Lexington: University
Press of Kentucky, 1983); Robert Art and Kenneth Waltz, The Use of Force: Military Power and
International Politics (New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 1971); Harold Sprout and Margaret
Sprout, Foundations of National Power (Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1945); and Robert
Osgood and Robert Tucker, Force, Order, and Justice (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press,
1967).
50
Ray Cline, World Power Assessment: A Calculus of Strategic Drift (Boulder: Westview Press,
1975); Robert Gilpin, U.S. Power and Multinational Corporation (New York: Basic Books, 1975);
37
international security has been crystallized as the “study of the threat, use, and control of
military force.”
51

Consider, for example, Tom Volgy and his colleagues’ analysis and differentiation
between types of status. Status inconsistency occurs when major power status attribution in
not in synch with the material capabilities of the state in question. “Underachievers” are
states that lack the status proportional to its capabilities and behavior, while “overachievers”
have more status attributed to them than their actual material capabilities would warrant.
They find that underachievers, given their “muscular portfolios but unmatched status
attribution will seek to resolve uncertainty around their status by competing more
aggressively than overachievers to create larger roles and more status for themselves in
global affairs.” Overachievers, on the other hand, fearing the exposure of their innate
weakness and capabilities below their attributed statues would be less engaged abroad and
more reclusive in global affairs. Meanwhile, status consistent powers, given their material
strength and capabilities, are more likely to venture into military conflicts with greater
confidence and interest, given their expectations of success and lower risks of failure. Using
the militarized interstate dispute (MID) dataset from 1950-2001, they find the data to be
tentatively consistent with their hypotheses on status and power.
These initial findings are based on an overarching assumption that links status with
military force. They assume status-seeking states’ foreign policy goals are uni-directional,
and that such unitary state actors, operating under an international anarchic structure, are
determined to accrue material power capabilities at all costs. This should be a matter of

and Robert Art, “American Foreign Policy and the Fungibility of Force,” Security Studies 5, no. 4
(1996).
51
Stephen Walt, “The Renaissance of Security Studies,” International Studies Quarterly 35, no. 2
(1991).
38
empirical study, not assumption. Is it not equally plausible an argument that status-seeking
states, whether they are overachievers or underachievers, might reverse their bellicose
and/or isolationist tendencies and exercise self-restraint and become more active supporters
of international norms and expectations consistent with “legitimate great power status” that
such states so eagerly seek to attain? Likewise, status consistent major powers’ unilateral
tendencies to use force and coercion could conceivably over time undermine their own
credibility, legitimacy, and authority in the eyes of their peers.
In short, while war is an important phenomenon in the field of international relations,
the significance of military force has been over-emphasized. Status should be variable and
explain both cooperative and conflictual foreign policy behavior. So far, however, the IR
literature has largely focused on the conflictual outcomes of status. In fact, the role of non-
military forms of power has been underestimated, and the field of international relations has
been impoverished by its insulation from studies of power in other forms. Lasswell and
Kaplan, for example, argue that power does not always, or even generally, rely on violence
and that “political phenomena are only obscured by the pseudo-simplification attained with
any unitary conception of power as always and everywhere the same.”
52
In sum, even as
status concerns have become increasingly widespread in international relations theory, its
application has been largely driven by the field’s preoccupation with military aggression as
the central form of power.

A Relational Approach toward Status and Power Analysis

52
Harold Laswell and Abraham Kaplan, Power and Society: A Framework for Political Inquiry
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1950).
39

Recall earlier that status is defined as an individual’s standing in the hierarchy of a
group, where status is an inherently relational concept. Authority is perhaps the most
important type of status. Authority is understood as rightful rule, where the commands of
the dominant actor are obeyed by subordinate actors because they are seen as natural or
legitimate in terms of a prevailing set of beliefs learnt through political socialization.
53

Legitimacy represents the other side of the coin of authority: located within the perception
of those who interact with authority, legitimacy is belief that some leadership, norm, or
institution should and ought to be obeyed. If power is legitimated through means other than
brute force and material power capabilities, then inter-state relations and dynamics become
all the more interesting and expansive. Some states will express a natural willingness to
defer to their peers that they deem as legitimate great powers, and the respect and status that
these latter category of states command are achieved through non-coercive means.
54

Power is traditionally conceived and understood in IR as the ability to shape the
gains and losses of others either by threatening or using coercion to deter undesired
behavior, but the use of coercive power is costly and highly inefficient, requiring a large
expenditure of material resources to obtain and achieve modest and limited amounts of
influence over others. As David Lake argues, “Pure coercive commands—of the form ‘do
this, or die’— are not authoritative. Authority relations must contain some measure of
legitimacy... an obligation, understood by both parties, for B to comply with the wishes of

53
David Bell, Power, Influence, and Authority (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1975).
54
For a more detailed analysis and explanation, see Ian Hurd, “Legitimacy and Authority in
International Politics,” International Organization 53, no. 2 (1999) and Ian Hurd, After Anarchy:
Legitimacy and Power in the United Nations Security Council (Princeton: Princeton University Press
2008).
40
A.”
55
States negotiate their relative statuses, and their respective roles. Lebow calls status
hierarchies “honor systems,” arguing that “honor is inseparable from hierarchy...the higher
the status, the greater the honor and privileges, but also the more demanding the role and its
rules.” Status, authority and legitimacy are all social because actors grant each other these
things – they are inherently relations; none can be achieved in isolation nor demanded.
Like status, a relational analysis of power broadens the concept to include non-
material bases of power. In other words, ideas and cultural contexts play a significant role
in constituting power. Lasswell and Kaplan find that respect, rectitude, affection and
enlightenment as base values of power and influence, and Dahl, in his seminal work on
power and modern political analysis, cites social standing and the right to make laws as
political power resources.
56
In other words, influence is not wielded merely through the
possession and use of coercive power. Authorities who seek to lead groups find it difficult,
uncertain, and costly to shape behavior through the exertion of material-based power
capabilities. Instead, legitimacy is a different form of power and social influence that is a
“generalized perception or assumption that the actions of an authority are desirable, proper,
or appropriate within some socially constructed system of norms, values, beliefs, and
definitions.”
57

A key part of the concept of legitimacy and status then is the understanding and
belief that some decision made or rule created by these hierarchical authorities of status is
valid, is entitled to be obeyed by virtue of who made the decision. Legitimacy’s social

55
David Lake, “The New Sovereignty in International Relations,” International Studies Review 5
(2003), pp. 303-23, 304; also see David Lake, Hierarchy in International Relations (Ithaca: Cornell
University Press, 2009).
56
Lasswell and Kaplan, Power and Society: A Framework for Political Inquiry, p. 87; and Robert
Dahl, Modern Political Analysis (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1963).
57
Mark Suchman, “Managing Legitimacy: Strategic and Institutional Approaches,” Academic
Management Review 20 (1995), p. 574.
41
influence is induced by feelings of “should,” “ought to,” and “has a right to,” all of which
appeal to and derive from a internalized norm or value.
58
As Morris Zelditch observes,
people can be influenced by others, particularly those with status and legitimacy, because
they believe that the decision made and rules implemented are deemed and accepted to be
right, proper, and ought to be followed.
59
Subordinate or smaller states “relate to the more
powerful as moral agents as well as self-interested actors; they are cooperative and obedient
on grounds of legitimacy as well as reasons of prudence and advantage.”
60

In other words, when a smaller state accepts a rule or decision because it perceives it
as legitimate, that dynamic and process take on the quality of being authoritative over the
subordinate actor. It demonstrates an important facet of power discussed here thus far that
has often been understated in IR: it is power, legitimacy, and authority in a relational and
broader sense, and not simply the coercive material power capabilities of the bully. Peter
Blau explains the key distinction between coercive power and legitimacy, explaining that
“resort to either positive incentives or coercive measures by a person in order to influence
others is prima facie evidence that he does not have authority over them … We speak of
authority, therefore, if the willing unconditional compliance of a group of people rests upon
their shared beliefs that it is legitimate for the superior … to impose his will upon them and
that it is illegitimate for them to refuse obedience.”
61

58
John French and Bertram Raven, “The Bases of Social Power,” in Studies of Social Power, ed.
Dorwin Cartwright (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 1959), pp. 150-167.

59
Morris Zelditch, “Processes of Legitimation: Recent Developments and New Direction,” Social
Psychology Quarterly 64 (2001), pp. 4-17.
60
David Beetham, The Legitimation of Power (Atlantic Highlands: Humanities, 1991), p. 27.
61
Peter Blau, “Critical Remarks on Weber’s Theory of Authority,” American Political Science
Review 57, no. 2 (1963), p. 307.
42
Bringing these relational concepts of power, legitimacy, and status together, Hedley
Bull identifies “legitimate great powers” as states that are recognized by other peers to have
certain privileges, rights, and obligations that play a determining role in affecting peace and
security of the international system.
62
More important, in exchange for being provided with
these special rights, great powers are expected to “uphold the core norms of international
society and play an active part in reinforcing them.”
63
The consent bestowed upon great
powers by smaller states provide a sense of legitimacy, and to maintain their privileges,
great powers are expected to act with a degree of moderation and caution, meaning that
great powers are expected to be status quo powers that do not attempt to radically change the
balance of power or seek to overturn the established norms and institutions at the expense of
other members. Similarly, Gerry Simpson sums up legitimate great powers as:
a powerful elite of states whose superior status is recognized by minor
powers as a political fact giving rise to the existence of certain
constitutional privileges, rights, and duties and whose relations with each
other are defined by adherence to a rough principle of sovereign
equality.
64

Absent from this analysis of legitimate great power status, however, is its application
in practice in international politics with concrete empirical cases. The concept of great
powers has been clearly explained, particularly their rights, privileges, and obligations, but it

62
Hedley Bull, The Anarchical Society: A Study of Order in World Politics (Basingstoke:
MacMillan, 1995), p. 196.
63
Ibid.
64
Gerry Simpson, Great Powers and Outlaw States: Unequal Sovereigns in the International Legal
Order (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), p. 68.
43
is difficult to objectively define when and how a state has been provided with social
treatment by other legitimate great powers as having made it to the club of elites. The
process and the mechanism for becoming great power remain surprisingly under-theorized.
Moreover, it remains unclear what outcomes or foreign policy behavior constitute as
those deemed worthy of a legitimate great power. Some states, in their attempts to join the
club of elites can simply play the politics of prestige, as Hans Morgenthau sees it, and put on
a façade of impressing their peers. In other words, they may be very adept at playing
“recognition games.” Other times, decision-makers may change their foreign policy
behavior that reflects an internalization of international norms, such that traditional
understanding of national interests is broadened and modified by a more cosmopolitan and
globalist perspective.

Theorizing Socialization Processes

If the concern for status is a key motivating factor, then the natural follow-up
question is how status-seeking states like China comply with international norms in
multilateral security regimes. This will be discussed in the context of socialization theory.
At its core, socialization theory explains why decision-makers may be moved to
cooperate and abide by widely accepted international norms when doing so is not in their
material power or economic interests. Change and variation in foreign policy behavior can
be attributed to the way in which decision-makers think about the balance between state
44
sovereignty and international cooperation.
65
The process of socialization and constructivist
ontology hold that continuous social interaction between states and international institutions
can, over time, lead to changing social structural contexts that in turn influence and shape
states’ identity and interest.
66
Preferences and state behavior can thus change and vary—
from disengagement to cooperative—and depends largely on the normative social context
and the strategic culture to which the state is socialized to achieve security.
67
Such
normative concepts as collective security, the responsibility to protect, and arms control are
entering (albeit slowly) the Chinese foreign policy calculus. This socialization process,
however, is incomplete. With China becoming more confident and assertive of late, and with
increasing tensions and a confrontational security environment in the Asia-Pacific region,
whether its normative behavior will reverse into one that tracks more closely to realpolitik
ideology is still unclear and remains an unforeclosed debate.
The application of socialization theory
68
into international relations has over the
years progressed by moving toward greater and more rigorous theory development,
addressing when, why, and how social construction matters, and more clearly specifying the
actors and mechanisms bringing about changes in policymakers’ behavior and foreign policy

65
Alexander Wendt and Daniel Friedheim, “Hierarchy under Anarchy: Informal Empire and the East
German State,” International Organization 49, no. 4 (1995), pp. 689-721.
66
Ronald Jepperson, Alexander Wendt, and Peter Katzenstein, “Norms, Identity and Culture in
National Security,” in The Culture of National Security, ed. Peter Katzenstein (New York: Columbia
University Press, 1996), pp. 33-75.
67
G. John Ikenberry and Charles Kupchan, “Socialization and Hegemonic Power,” International
Organization 44, no.3 (1990), pp. 283–315.
68
Socialization, drawing from linguistics, social psychology, and sociology, can be defined as the
universal processes of induction into, acceptance, and adoption of the norms, values, and behaviors
practiced by the ongoing system. See, for example, Sheldon Stryker and Anne Statham, “Symbolic
Interaction and Role Theory,” in Handbook of Social Psychology, ed. Gardner Lindzey and Elliot
Aronson (New York: Random House, 1985).
45
outcomes.
69
Jeffrey Checkel has extended the socialization argument through two important
contributions. First, he addresses some of the key issues that have been sorely lacking in the
first wave of socialization and constructivist literature.
70
These earlier studies fall short in
drawing more directly the causal pathways linking European institutions to preference and
identity change among the new and prospective members of the European integration
project.
71
There has also been a tendency to view norm diffusion through the “teaching”
experience, and less so with the interactive role of agency or the role of policymakers on the
recipient end—the socializee. Relatedly, the process-tracing of how norms are transmitted,
processed, and internalized by the socializee have often been surprisingly missing or under-
theorized. As a result, some of these earlier studies posit that preference change is a
function of time, whereby the longer agents reside in a particular institutional setting, the
more likely it is that there will be a shift in their normative and policy preference. In fact,
Checkel rightly points out that it is the quality of the contact—whether hectoring,
deliberation, or hard-headed bargaining—and not simply its length that plays the central role
in promoting change. Checkel thus refines the socialization theory by focusing on the
qualitative nature of social interactions between the socializer and socializee.

69
For its application in international relations, see, for example, Thomas Risse and Kathryn Sikkink,
“The Socialization of International Human Rights Norms into Domestic Practices: Introduction,” in
The Power of Human Rights: International Norms and Domestic Change, eds. Thomas Risse, Steve
C. Ropp, and Kathryn Sikkink (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), pp. 1-38; Andrew
Moravcsik, “Taking Preferences Seriously: A Liberal Theory of International Politics,” International
Organization 51, no. 4 (1997); Jeffrey Checkel, “Why Comply? Social Learning and European
Identity Change,” International Organization 55, no. 3 (2001), pp. 553-588.
70
Thomas Risse and Kathryn Sikkink, “The Socialization of International Human Rights Norms into
Domestic Practices: Introduction,” in The Power of Human Rights: International Norms and
Domestic Change, eds. Thomas Risse, Steve C. Ropp, and Kathryn Sikkink (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1999), pp. 1-38.
71
Jeffrey Checkel, “Going Native In Europe?: Theorizing Social Interaction in European
Institutions,” Comparative Political Studies 36 (2003), pp. 209-231.
46
Second, and perhaps equally important, Checkel develops the scope conditions for
socialization to occur.
72
If agents within international institutions are the trigger points, then
the mechanisms for inducting the socializee—policymakers—into the norms and rules of the
community/institution would vary from cost-benefit calculation (no socialization) to role
playing (limited socialization) to normative persuasion (strong socialization). The conditions
for (un)successful socialization depends on three critical elements: the institutional design
and setting of the social interaction; the properties of the socializee; and the properties of the
socializer. The scope conditions are of significant importance as they help determine the
degree to which the two-way socialization process unfolds and leads to changes in the
socializee’s behavior and their effects on foreign policy outcomes.
Notwithstanding Checkel’s excellent theoretical contributions, he falls short in
addressing the importance of the “mutually constitutive” process—the interplay between
normative structures and institutions and agency. His scope conditions tend to focus on
social interaction that are largely linear and uni-directional, looking only at preference and
identity change in the receiving end of the spectrum. Checkel is right to rebalance, bringing
agency back into the equation to explain specifically how norms connect with agents, but the
social or relational ontology that is the operating assumption here does not take into account
how the persuader’s own preferences are also redefined as a result of this interactive process
of engagement with the persuadee/socializee.
More problematic for the field is that socialization theory has yet to systematically
applied or tested in regional contexts other than Europe.
73
A few exceptions are worth

72
Jeffrey Checkel, “Why Comply? Social Learning and European Identity Change,” International
Organization 55, no. 3 (2001), pp. 553-588.
73
Jeffrey Lewis, “The Janus Face of Brussels: Socialization and Everyday Decision Making in the
European Union,” in International Institutions and Socialization in Europe, ed. Jeffrey Checkel
47
noting in recent scholarship with regards to testing socialization theory in the East Asian
context. To date, Amitav Acharya has been articulating the importance of norm
localization, the role of regional epistemic communities, and socialization dynamics through
the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Using ASEAN as an example,
Acharya posits that framing and grafting are equally important concepts in understanding
how foreign, Western norms are introduced and received in a regional context.
74
The
micro-process that Acharya is most interested in is how local norm entrepreneurs or
epistemic communities are able to frame a new norm that is more acceptable to existing
regional norms. The process of reconstituting an outside norm so that it becomes more
congruent with a pre-existing local normative order is a complex process, but one which can
be traced through the role of Southeast Asian diplomats and policymakers, which inevitably
become more significant than external (Western) norm entrepreneurs.
Iain Johnston has also been one of the pioneering theorists in extending and applying
Checkel’s socialization arguments to another important region, the East Asian context. In
Social States: China in International Institutions, Johnston looks at the three different types
of socialization behavior in the Chinese case: mimicking (on the nuclear and chemical arms
control and disarmament norms); social influence (on the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban
Treaty, CTBT); and persuasion (on multilateralism and the importance of ASEAN). In each
of these cases, Johnston provides a snapshot account of where each type of socialization
behavior is played out. An alternative approach would be to track how Chinese behavior

(New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 137-170; Alexandra Gheciu, “Security Institutions
as Agents of Socialization?: NATO and the ‘New Europe,’” in International Institutions and
Socialization in Europe, ed. Jeffrey Checkel (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007), pp.
171-210.
74
Amitav Acharya, “How Ideas Spread: Whose Norms Matter? Norm Localization and Institutional
Change in Asian Regionalism,” International Organization 58, no. 2 (2004), pp. 239-275.
48
and position on nuclear disarmament norms actually evolved from pure mimicking (strategic
calculation) to social influence to argumentative persuasion, where Chinese policymakers
have now put forward a no first-use policy on nuclear weapons and are supporting the global
zero, nuclear disarmament agenda. Nonetheless, Johnston provides a very detailed account
of process tracing to see how Chinese foreign policy behavior in each of these issue areas
has changed as a result of socialization.
Most important, Johnston’s argument elevates constructivism’s socialization theory
to a level that challenges structural realism, the established IR paradigm. In many ways, this
is a far more ambitious agenda than previous authors working on socialization theory.
China is considered a relatively newcomer and novice in contemporary international
institutions. Looking at the scope conditions for socialization laid out by Checkel, China
does have a fairly deeply ingrained realpolitik worldview among its foreign policy elites.
But precisely so, China is thus considered a hard case for non-realpolitik socialization and
would go a long way in further confirming the analytical value of status-seeking states and
socialization theory, specifically in pointing to the shortcomings of neorealist arguments and
focusing instead on the importance of other variables in explaining both cooperative and
confrontational behavior in foreign policy as well as enduring normative shifts and changes
in policies.
75
As Alexander Wendt puts it, anarchy is what states make of it. The process of
socialization and constructivist ontology thus hold that continuous social interaction

75
For similar arguments, also see G. John Ikenberry and Charles Kupchan, “Socialization and
Hegemonic Power,” International Organization 44, no.3 (1990), pp. 83–315; Ronald Jepperson,
Alexander Wendt and Peter Katzenstein, “Norms, Identity and Culture in National Security,” Peter
Katzenstein (ed.), The Culture of National Security (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996),
pp. 33–75.
49
between states and international institutions can, over time, lead to changing social structural
contexts that in turn influence and shape states’ identity and interest.

Status as a Goal, Socialization as a Process

Recall earlier the arguments put forward regarding status and legitimacy. States’
aspirations to attain higher status in international society cannot be realized through sheer
use of brute force and/or military capabilities. Nor can they unilaterally challenge the status
quo to demonstrate and demand their rightful place in the community of states. The
acquiescence of lesser powers to defer to legitimate great powers comes with expectations
that the latter category of states will uphold the core norms of international society, play an
active part in reinforcing them, and are bestowed with special rights and managerial duties
to do so. Hence, unlike influence based on the authority’s possession of power or resources,
the influence is motivated by deference, shared values, and expectations of each party’s role
in the relationship. This results in greater stability in international society, where status-
seeking states end up reinforcing the accepted social structures, norms, and values that
govern international society.
Martha Finnemore finds that group conformity and doing what is socially
appropriate are key motivations in human behavior.
76
These incentives for pro-normative
behavior derive from social influence through a combination of social rewards and
punishments. Evidence of social rewards or back-patting include status, a sense of
belonging, and conformity with role expectations. On the other hand, social opprobrium

76
Martha Finnemore, “Norms, Culture, and World Politics: Insights from Sociology’s
Institutionalism,” International Organization 50, no. 2 (1996), pp. 325-327.
50
includes naming-and-shaming, exclusion, and loss of status. Conforming with an “in-group”
identity thus embed a strong degree of social pressure and incentive for compliant behavior.
But, it is questionable the degree to which the actor has a “buy-in” or fully subscribes to,
believes, and internalizes the beliefs and values of the social group to which it seeks to
belong. According to Betz, Skowronski, and Ostrom, normative social influence can be best
summed up as such: “I believe the answer is X, but others said Y, and I don’t want to rock
the boat, so I’ll say Y.”
77

Concerns over social opprobrium serves an important consideration for group
conformity. According to Oran Young puts it, “policy makers, like private individuals are
sensitive to the social opprobrium that accompanies violations of widely accepted behavioral
prescriptions. They are, in short, motivated by a desire to avoid the sense of shame or social
disgrace that commonly befalls those who break widely accepted rules.”
78
Status concerns
and maximization are thus not necessarily altruistic. In fact, it reflects the actor’s pursuit to
maximize social recognition and rewards and to minimize public shaming and sanctions
bestowed by the group.
Over time, these social interactions and influence can lead to greater acceptance and
closer adherence to the values, beliefs, and norms that the group espouses. Conformity,
compliance, and cooperation occur not simply because of social costs and benefits for doing
so. The changes in the actor’s preference are far deeper and more substantive, often resulting
from persuasion and the quality of contact and engagement among actors in the group or
institution. The process of argumentation, persuasion, and learning play key roles, whereby

77
Andrew Betz, John Skowronski, and Thomas Ostrom, “Shared Realities: Social Influence and
Stimulus Memory,” Social Cognition 14, no. 2 (1996), pp. 113-140.
78
Oran Young, “The Effectiveness of International Institutions: Hard Cases and Critical Variables,”
in James Rosenau and Ernst-Otto Czempiel, eds., Governance without Government: Order and
Change in World Politics (Cambrdige: Cambridge University Press, 1992), pp. 160-194.
51
attitudinal changes on a particular issue occurs without coercion. Perloff describes such
normative suasion as “an activity or process in which a communicator attempts to induce a
change in the belief, attitude, or behavior of another person...through the transmission of a
message in a context in which the persuadee has some degree of free choice.”
79

Persuasion thus reflects a deeper level of socialization toward normative compliance
than social influence. It is a process of convincing another actor through principled
argument and debate. Status concerns can also serve as a powerful motivation for counter-
realpolitik socialization and preference change. In the realm of international politics,
decision-makers can decide to take on self-constraining commitments and be persuaded to
take on foreign policy actions in the absence of material power gains, benefits, or coercion.
For example, one of the clearest indications and highest thresholds for normative learning
and preference change occurs when states adopt cooperative security tendencies over zero-
sum strategies, when they assess threats as situational--attributed less to the fixed nature of
an adversary than to some changeable condition for mutual interaction--and when violence
or the use of force is considered counter-productive. In other words, the fundamental
evaluation and outlook on the strategic environment is malleable and results from intensive
social interactions, dialogue, and communication among concerned actors and parties about
the benefits of cooperative security and multilateral efforts to reduce tensions,
misperception, and incentives for the use of force.
The process, mechanism, and scope conditions under which this quest for status
motivates states to comply with international norms remain largely under-theorized. What is
the social process under which status-seeking states’ preferences change? How does

79
Richard Perloff, The Dynamics of Persuasion (Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1993), p.
14.
52
deliberation, engagement, and social interactions that expose rule-driven behavior take
place, particularly in the absence of overt coercion? Socialization theory thus becomes a
useful tool to help map out the cause mechanism underlying such social interactions--
processes that reflect preference change as a result of principled argument and debate.
Building on this linkage between status and socialization, this dissertation research
proposes three key scope conditions for when status-seeking states should be more open to
preference change and inclined to comply with international norms:

1. Compliance behavior is most likely when the interactive process of socialization—
normative persuasion—occurs where the status-seeking state is in a novel and/or
uncertain environment and are thus motivated to analyze, absorb, and process new
information and concepts.
2. The more interactive and less uni-directional (e.g., lecturing) the social interaction
and deliberative process, the more likely compliance behavior from status-seeking
states becomes.
3. Collective persuasion and socialization will be more effective in convincing the
status-seeking state to conform to a norm-based behavior when there is clear
consensus among developing and developed states on a particular normative issue.

As a corollary to these three scope conditions, when one or more tests are not met
and/or are weakly established at best, we should then expect status-seeking states’ behavior
to alter and reflect a more cost-benefit, rational choice calculus, which over time could lead
to a more realpolitik ideology.
53
With these scope conditions in place, how might we account for and test the degree of
norm-based cooperative behavior in Chinese foreign policy positions on such issue areas as
peacekeeping, conventional arms and export controls, and sensitive negotiations on
territorial conflict? In other words, how do we know if the outcomes and behavioral change
are strategic adaptation or learning behavior/socialization? The dependent variable is
change in Chinese foreign policy outcomes, with constructive change of foreign policy
outcome of its status-seeking behavior defined as follows:
§ joining or engaging in negotiations leading to agreements on issues on which China
had previously voiced strong and clear opposition;
§ voting patterns or policy statements supporting international treaties or an emerging
consensus on a normative issue on global security;
§ the development of domestic epistemic communities, and the establishment of
transnational linkages with external specialist communities that help shape and
reconstitute Chinese foreign policy goals and outcomes.

What should be observed then is a change in identity of Chinese policy elites and
relatedly a change in Chinese foreign policy in the areas of UN peacekeeping, conventional
arms control, and conflict management in the South China Sea that hues more closely to
international and regional norms that underpin international society. One way to better and
more concretely assess the effects of successful socialization would then be to identify
instances where there was an absence of Chinese foreign policy that clashed with the
broader values and accepted norms of international society. A careful process-tracing
approach will help ensure that these changes in identity and behavior are not just
coincidences or pursued on the grounds of national self-interest. This would help indicate
54
that there is a normative shift in Chinese foreign policy and identity beyond a cost-benefit
calculus.

Research Methodology

The dissertation research includes tracing and documenting the interactive,
programmatic activities, dialogue, and exchanges between policymakers in important
international institutions such as the UN and ASEAN and Chinese policymakers based in
Beijing and tracing the micro-processes in which Chinese policymakers have learned,
accepted, and internalized the normative agenda.
To minimize selection biases, I triangulate the data collection and sources.
80
First,
research interviews with policymakers in Beijing were conducted to gauge the process in
which official Chinese policy and discourse on peacekeeping, conventional arms control,
and territorial conflicts in the South China Sea are evolving. The research interviews with
Chinese policy elites captured both temporal and inter-subjective concerns. On the temporal
dimension, I interviewed and re-interviewed the same individual and two different points in
time – panel samples for research interviews – as time permits. This provides a degree of
validity and consistency in the interviewee accounts.
On the inter-subjective dimension, I asked interviewees to step outside their
traditional thinking and past experiences and to characterize and rank-order their social
interaction context with foreign counterparts in international security institutions in the

80
For more on the triangulation of qualitative data and sources, see Colin Elman, “Explaining
Typologies in Qualitative Studies of International Politics,” International Organization 59, no. 2
(2005), pp. 293-326.
55
following ways: coercion, strategic adaptation, or persuasion. My research background on
Chinese foreign and security policy issues developed over the years with frequent short-
term, month-long visits to conduct research interviews with Chinese policymakers. A
combination of both on-the-record and off-the-record discussions (in English and/or
Chinese) will also result in a more conducive environment in which the discussions and
exchanges can take place openly. Basing my work on primary research in Chinese language
sources, as well as on-the-ground research and interviews with officials and experts in
China, this fieldwork generated and produced an in-depth set of findings to better
understand the effects of socialization on key individuals or small groups of state agents—
policymakers, diplomats, analysts, and policy specialists—that shape, influence, and
formulate important foreign policy decisions.
Second, interviewing foreign officials and representatives of the UN and ASEAN
member states based in Beijing further mapped out the levels of interaction between Chinese
policymakers and their foreign counterparts, and helped ascertain the socialization efforts at
hand as well as the socializing institutions’ perspectives on relations with China. This
helped reinforce and validate the research interviews with Chinese decision-makers and
policy elites.
And third, I carried out a qualitative content analysis of major media and IR-oriented
journal publications, mining through the relevant primary and secondary literature, data,
peer-reviewed scholarly articles, and policy statements in English and Chinese on China’s
evolving approach to each of the three cases in its interactions with international institutions
to better understand and assess the reasons, conditions, and processes behind the changes
and variations in Chinese foreign policy. The texts that were analyzed focus on
representational writings. The inclusion of both provides a more comprehensive assessment
56
of changes in Chinese foreign policy outcome. Representational texts include op-eds,
scholarly writings, internal documents, and other similar writings by leading Chinese
decision-makers and policy elites and represent the personal thoughts on foreign policy
paradigms of the author of the text.
81
Identifying and analyzing the emergent Chinese
scholarly literature, as well as the formal Chinese documents and policies, communication
papers, and joint statements will break significant new ground for studies of this kind, and
will greatly benefit from the findings of this dissertation fieldwork.
Interviewing foreign officials and policy elites and carrying out a qualitative content
analysis should help address the issue of investigator bias and provide me with the basis of
engaging and accounting for disconfirming evidence and report meticulously on any
elements in the textual analysis and research interviews that might be inconsistent with the
expected findings.
A comparative analysis of Chinese foreign policy in three key case studies—(1)
peacekeeping operations; (2) conventional arms control; and (3) territorial negotiations in
the South China Sea—is used to test the five scope conditions for socialization theory
identified above. Since the number of cases explored here is to too small to carry out
statistical analysis, it is best to use the small-N method, or what Alexander George calls the
controlled comparison method.
82
According to Gary King, Robert Keohane, and Sidney
Verba, controlled comparison starts with formation and testing of general hypotheses in

81
On content analysis, see Ole Holsti, Content Analysis for the Social Sciences and Humanities
(Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1969); Hsiu-Fang Hsieh and Sarah Shannon, “Three Approaches to
Qualitative Content Analysis,” Qualitative Health Research 15 (2005), pp. 1277-1288; and Klaus
Krippendorff, Content Analysis: An Introduction to its Methodology (Beverly Hills: Sage, 1980).

82
Alexander George and Andrew Bennett, Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social
Sciences (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2005), and Jack S. Levy, “Case Studies: Types, Designs, and
Logics of Inference,” Conflict Management and Peace Science 25, no. 1 (2008), pp. 1-18.
57
rigorous terms.
83
In this dissertation project, the questions of how and why Chinese
policymakers’ understanding of the normative issue at hand changes and evolves are
explored. Analysis of each case study involves a common focus that should help the
theoretical development of socialization theory. More important, the three cases selected
here bear a high threshold for deep and strong degrees of socialization, as they are highly
normative agendas and considered to be sensitive foreign policy and security issues that
challenge the core principles in Chinese external relations, namely non-interference in other
states’ internal affairs and state sovereignty. Applying the scope conditions for socialization
as laid out in the hypotheses toward each of the three “difficult cases” is challenging but
desirable from a social scientific point of view to determine socialization theory’s validity
and explanatory power.

Conclusion

Chinese decision-makers’ increasing interactions with their counterparts in
international security institutions and exposure to international norms in the last two decades
have led to largely positive changes and self-constraining commitments in Chinese foreign
policy, particularly in the areas of peacekeeping operations, conventional arms control, and
participation in multilateral security organizations. These enduring interactions and

83
Gary King, Robert O. Keohane, and Sidney Verba, Designing Social Inquiry: Scientific
Inference in Qualitative Research (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994).

58
exposures to international norms and practices have all lead to changing social structural
contexts that have in turn influenced and shaped Chinese policy elites’ identities and
broadened their definition of national interests to include image, reputation, and social status
– factors that are perhaps more important than material and economic power. Rather than
posing a threat to the international order, it can be argued that China’s determination to seek
legitimate great power status can be best demonstrated by its commitments and actions that
uphold (rather than overturn) existing and established norms, particularly when many of
these norms are accepted and internalized by a majority of the developing and developed
countries.
Structural realism’s version of socialization only provides one part of the puzzle,
focusing mainly on states’ tendency to pursue balance of power politics in a state of
perpetual anarchy and uncertainty. But, states can also be socialized into cooperative
behavior and move beyond balancing, zero-sum and relative power considerations. Put
simply, if self-image and identity is ever-changing, then states can be socialized into or out
of perceptions of the world as competition for power and influence in an anarchic
environment. Balancing and rivalry is not a hardwired, iron-clad law that governs state
behavior; as such, the prospects for constructive socialization is very much a possibility, and
a valuable contribution to the field would need to examine more closely and identify the
scope conditions and the micro-processes under which such norm-conforming socialization
behavior might take place and when it might not work.
Chinese decision-makers understand that there is greater peace and stability when
they define national security priorities not in narrow, self-interested terms, but more broadly
so as to nurture and sustain the global system from which it has gained so many benefits.
To be sure, the trend of a cooperative and self-restraining foreign policy behavior is far from
59
a linear, predetermined path, yet the broader trajectory seems to indicate that Chinese
decision-makers are adapting, learning, and taking actions, albeit incrementally, at a regional
and global level that are more convergent and consistent with established norms, regional
expectations, and the mandates of international institutions.

60

Chapter Three: Toward Greater Flexibility on Peacekeeping,
Sovereignty, and Intervention

61
Peacekeeping, Sovereignty, and Intervention

In this section, I trace and elaborate the process under which Chinese decision-
makers’ socialization, exposure to global norms, and engagement with foreign counterparts
in the UN and the African Union have evolved and ranged from strategic adaptation to an
understanding that cooperative, multilateral security is a preferred source of state security,
particularly in UN peacekeeping operations in Africa.
China’s evolving role in UN peacekeeping activities demonstrates just how far its
foreign policy in this regard has shifted and changed in a relatively short period of time.
Throughout the 1970s and much of the 1980s, the first two decades after it joined the UN in
1971, China viewed UN peacekeeping missions with a degree of skepticism, maintained a
low profile and refrained from taking any substantive actions in the Security Council debates
on peacekeeping.
84
The cautious approach reflects a traditional understanding and
interpretation of positive international law, an important norm that has underpinned the
development of the modern international system. Inter-state relations were primarily
governed by the view that each sovereign government has the right and authority to rule
within its own territory as it deems fit and without interference from external actors. The
normative sanctity of state sovereignty is also enshrined in the UN Charter, which prohibits
the use of military force except in self-defense or when authorized by the Security Council
to address certain threats to international peace and security. China upheld the inviolable
principle of state sovereignty and often questioned the necessity of external interventionism

84
See Samuel Kim, “China’s International Organization Behavior,” in Thomas Robinson and David
Shambaugh (eds.), Chinese Foreign Policy: Theory and Practice (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1995), pp. 420–22; Yin He, “China’s Changing Policy on UN Peacekeeping Operations,”
Stockholm: Institute for Security and Development Policy, 2007.
62
in areas of conflict, even if a particular operation was sanctioned by the Security Council
and was operating under the auspices of international peacekeeping forces. China’s caution
has in no small part been colored by its earlier experiences and encounters, particularly
during the 1950–53 Korean War where the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) fought UN
forces under the US-led Command. It thus harbors concerns about the nature and legitimacy
of such interventionist operations, particularly those that are Western-led.
85

Towards the late 1980s, however, China’s position on international affairs and on
peacekeeping operations began to shift towards one of greater interest and participation. In
1988, it became a member of the UN Special Committee on Peacekeeping Operations (also
known as C34), paving the way for increased engagement in multilateral peacekeeping
activities. As one senior Chinese official put it at the time, all states should lend “powerful
support” to peacekeeping, setting a new tone for Chinese pronouncements in support of the
UN peacekeeping regime. A year later, it deployed 20 military observers to the UN
Transition Assistance Group (UNTAG) to help monitor elections in Namibia. This was
followed by the deployment of five military observers to the UN Truce Supervision
Organization (UNTSO) in the Middle East. The most significant break with past practices
came with the decision to deploy 400 engineering troops and 49 military observers to the
UN Transitional Authority in Cambodia (UNTAC) in 1992. In spite of its relative
underdeveloped power projection capability at the time, Chinese peacekeepers were largely
deployed on factors beyond realist assumptions. Chinese decision-makers were more

85
Chin-Hao Huang, “Principles and Praxis in Chinese Peacekeeping,” International Peacekeeping
18, no. 3 (2011), pp. 259–272.
63
concerned with its image and reputation, particularly after the Tiananmen crisis in 1989, and
sought regional confirmation of its status as a peaceful neighbor.
86

Since the early- to mid-1990s, China’s interest in peacekeeping activities began to
steadily expand, and can be attributed in a large part to its increasing engagement and
socialization in international institutions. The more active participation in the UN came
when there were growing debates on how the international community should reconcile the
imperatives of global stability and justice and strike the right balance between state
sovereignty and human rights concerns. A normative consensus emerged from the debates
that there is political and moral (albeit not legal) currency for the international community to
take exceptional measures at times of need in addressing human rights concerns, especially
when the state does not fulfill its responsibility to protect its citizens.
87
Although China was
a relatively new- and late-comer to these debates, the issue gained much traction within
China as well, with a number of international law scholars and foreign policy elites pointing
to the changing nature of peacekeeping and the circumstances that warrant a more flexible
interpretation and understanding of the normative principle of sovereignty.
88

In October 1998, at a conference commemorating the 50
th
anniversary of the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the former Chinese Foreign Minister Qian Qichen
indicated there was a global recognition of the “universality of human rights” and all nations

86
See Alastair Iain Johnston and Robert Ross (eds.), New Directions in the Study of China’s Foreign
Policy (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2006); David C. Kang, China Rising: Peace, Power,
and Order in East Asia (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007); and Bates Gill, Rising Star:
China’s New Security Diplomacy (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2007).
87
Taylor Seybolt, Humanitarian Military Intervention: The Conditions for Success and Failure
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007). See also, Gareth Evans, “Responding to Atrocities: The
New Geopolitics of Intervention,” SIPRI Yearbook 2012 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012).
88
Allen Carlson, “China’s Approach to Sovereignty and Intervention,” in Alastair Iain Johnston and
Robert Ross (eds.), New Directions in the Study of China’s Foreign Policy (Stanford: Stanford
University Press, 2006), pp. 217–41.
64
“observe the same international norms on human rights.”
89
Moreover, Qian added: “We all
recognize that no country’s human rights situation is perfect, and that all countries are
confronted with a weighty task of further promoting and protecting human rights.” This
important acknowledgement underlines the emergence and growing relevance of human
rights values in the Chinese foreign policy lexicon.
Of particular interest is the Zhongguo Faxue [Chinese Legal Studies] journal, which
has featured an increasing number of articles discussing state obligations to its citizens and
that a failure to uphold these responsibilities warrants the international community to
intervene to protect individuals. Other similar journals such as Xibu Faxue Pinglun [Western
Law Review]; Fazhi yu Shehui [Legal System and Society]; and Wuda Guojifa Pinglun
[International Law Review of Wuhan University] have also argued that human rights are
moral issues increasingly shaped by the ‘international community’ and that all states have a
right to monitor these concerns.
90
Allen Carlson’s research has led him to conclude that an
increasing number of Chinese researchers, scholars, experts and policymakers have adopted
more flexible views of sovereignty and intervention.
91
More important, Carlson finds that
some of these policy elites have also gained important access to key policymakers and top
leaders within the Chinese foreign and security policy apparatus and that they were shaping

89
“Qian Qichen Urges Further Promotion of International Human Rights,” Xinhua News (Beijing),
20 October 2008 [trans. by BBC Monitoring Service, International Reports].
90
See Yan Haiyan, ‘Baohu de Zheren Jiesi’ (An Analysis on the Responsibility to Protect), Xibu
Faxue Pinglun (Western Law Review), no. 1, 2010, pp. 125-129; Xu Guojin, ‘Guojia lüxing guoji
renquan yiwu de xiandu’ (The Limits on State Performance of Human Rights Obligations),
Zhongguo faxue (Chinese Legal Studies of Law), no. 2, (1992), pp. 13-20; Zeng Lingliang, ‘Lun
lengzhan hou shidai de guojia zhuquan’ (A Discussion of State Sovereignty in the Post-Cold War
Era), Zhongguo faxue (Chinese Legal Studies), no. 1 (1998), pp. 109-20.
91
See Liu Jie, Renquan yu Guojia Zhuquan (Human Rights and State Sovereignty) (Shanghai:
Shanghai Renmin Chubanshe, 2004); Cheng Shuaihua, ‘Guojia zhuquan yu guoji renquan de ruogan
wenti’ (Issues Involving International Human Rights and State Sovereignty), Ouzhou (Europe), no. 1
(2000): 32–35; Shi Yinhong, ‘Lun ershi shiji guoji guifan tixi’ (A Discussion of the System of
International Norms in the Twentieth Century), Guoji luntan (International Forum), no. 6, (2000),
pp. 8–10.
65
and influencing the foreign policy discourse on peacekeeping.
92
In 2005, for example, the
former President Hu Jintao announced that China would endorse a “comprehensive strategy
featuring prevention, peace restoration, peacekeeping and post-conflict reconstruction.”
93

Understanding the increasing complexity and evolving nature of peacekeeping, Hu further
noted: “[i]n areas emerging from conflict, ensuring the rule of law and justice should
become an integral part of the overall effort to achieve peace and stability, protecting the
fundamental interests of local populations and serving the overall interests of social
stability.”
94

It is perhaps too early to gauge the degree to which China has internalized and
accepted these global norms. However, with the atrocious human rights violations in
Rwanda in 1994 in the background of many of these debates, and with a growing number of
states, particularly developing countries, adhering to and upholding this declaratory norm,
Chinese official policy and rhetoric with regards to sovereignty, intervention and
peacekeeping have reflected this trend and become more flexible. China increasingly
understands the value and importance of aligning its national interests with these emerging
global conventions, because active participation in peacekeeping also helps to burnish
China’s image, standing and reputation. More importantly, China does not want to be seen
as a global outlier and wants to be recognized as a contributor to, or at least not an inhibitor
of, global stability.

92
Allen Carlson, Unifying China, Integrating with the World: Securing Chinese Sovereignty in the
Reform Era (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2005).
93
UN doc., S/PV.5261, 14 September 2005.
94
UN doc., S/PV.5225, 12 July 2005.
66
Africa’s Influence on China’s Peacekeeping

China’s stronger commitment toward UN peacekeeping can be seen in its increasing
levels of interactions with African leaders. Four-fifths of China’s total contributions are
currently based in Africa, and specifically South Sudan, Côte d’Ivoire, Liberia, the
Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), and Western Sahara. Since 2000, the two sides have
agreed to hold a major summit – the Forum on China and Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) –
every three years. With each successive FOCAC summitry, the substantive content,
deliberations, and action plan on peace and security issues have taken a turn with a sharper
focus on African leaders’ concerns and priorities. This need-based approach reflects African
leaders’ emphasis on developing a more comprehensive and balanced partnership, and
identifies the key areas where China can play a contributing role. The fourth FOCAC
meeting, which was held in Sharm-el-Sheikh, Egypt, in November 2009, was attended by
former Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and a delegation of more than 50 Chinese officials,
including half a dozen ministers. The Chinese leadership took exceptional effort to
demonstrate its political commitment to see that the summit was a success.
95

The major document that came out of the event, the FOCAC Sharm-el-Sheikh
Action Plan (2010-2012), laid out broad plans for cooperation in a wide array of areas.
96

Among some of the key highlights focusing on deepening political and security cooperation
include: increasing the number of high-level visits between the two sides to increase mutual
trust and understanding; establishing a regularized China-African Union (AU) Strategic

95
See, for example: ‘The Fourth Ministerial Conference’, Forum on China and Africa Cooperation, 8
November, 2009, available at http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/zflt/eng/dsjbzjhy/.
96
‘FOCAC Sharm-el-Sheikh Action Plan 2010-2012’, Forum on China and Africa Cooperation, 8
November, 2009, available at http://www.fmprc.gov.cn/zflt/eng/dsjbzjhy/hywj/t626387.htm.
67
Dialogue Mechanism as a formal channel for greater political consultation; and China’s
support for increasing African voice and representation in the Security Council. The
establishment of the Strategic Dialogue Mechanism was critical in regularizing and
institutionalizing a platform for joint discussion on security issues. This effort further
complements the multilateral process at the UN where Chinese and African foreign
ministers jointly decided to launch a political consultation mechanism at the UN
headquarters in September 2007 to ensure a more calibrated approach in addressing regional
security issues. Such mechanisms have increased regular exchanges, opening the door to
greater consultation on areas of convergence and divergence. More important, these
interactive processes have introduced Chinese foreign policymakers to regional and global
norms that are pertinent to bringing peace and stability to Africa. China is thus identifying
more closely with the developing world, particularly in Africa as it seeks external
confirmation of its status as a responsible, major power.
More recently, the fifth FOCAC meeting in Beijing in July 2012 spelled out more
specifically the context and areas in which China-Africa cooperation would take place.
Under the newly announced “Initiative on China-Africa Cooperative Partnership for Peace
and Security”,
97
for example, the 2013-2015 action plan calls for Beijing to contribute more
financial, technical, and capacity-building support to the AU for its peacekeeping operations
in the continent.
98
Closer policy coordination on preventive diplomacy would also be
strengthened between the two sides. Additionally, the next three years would also expand
the quality of contact through increased personnel exchanges and training on peacekeeping,

97
‘The Fifth Ministerial Conference of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation Beijing Action Plan
2013-2015’, Forum on China-Africa Cooperation,23 July, 2012, available at
http://www.focac.org/eng/ltda/dwjbzjjhys/hywj/t954620.htm
98
Ibid.
68
conflict prevention and management, as well as post-conflict reconstruction and
development.
As both a permanent member of the Security Council and a developing country,
China’s growing participation in peacekeeping in Africa also lends important credibility to
UN missions in the continent, many of which have robust mandates allowing them to use
force. Senior AU and UN officials believe that China’s participation in peacekeeping
operations in sensitive areas such as Darfur, South Sudan, and the DRC all help to temper
the host governments’ suspicions that the missions are really Western-led military
interventions.
99

Seeking Legitimate Great Power Status in Africa and Beyond

China’s expanding participation and evolving role in UN peacekeeping activities in
Africa and globally also helps to project a positive and constructive side to its rising
prominence and power on the global stage. The Chinese leadership is acutely aware that
several countries are still uncertain about the PLA’s military capabilities and intentions and
that a rising China would pursue a more assertive, aggressive and potentially disruptive
foreign policy. Hence, concerned with its image and global reputation, it is understood in
Beijing that China needs to be more responsive to international expectations, minimize
tensions and conflict, and make tangible contributions to international peace and security.
Peacekeeping has thus become an important priority, and helps to put into action the call by
senior Chinese officials for the country to demonstrate its “peaceful development” and

99
Interviews with AU and UN officials, Addis Ababa and New York, 2010 and 2013.
69
commitment to a “harmonious world.”
100
Its increased peacekeeping activity provides an
opportunity to display a more positive side of the PLA’s military capabilities, reassuring
neighbors about its peaceful intentions, and at the same time signaling that China is further
integrating into the international community and acting as a responsible power.
101

As China becomes increasingly engaged and socialized within the international
peacekeeping regime, a widening array of voices within the Chinese academy and
policymaking realms are also calling for Chinese foreign and security policy to be defined
beyond material power interests. An editorial in the widely-read Chinese Communist Party
domestic and foreign affairs journal, Liaowang, pointed out:
Compared with past practices, China’s diplomacy has indeed displayed a
new face. If China’s diplomacy before the 1980s stressed safeguarding of
national security and its emphasis from the 1980s to early this century is on
the creation of excellent environment for economic development, then the
focus at present is to take a more active part in international affairs and
play a role that a responsible power should on the basis of satisfying the
security and development interests.
102

At the 2007 Munich Conference on Security Policy, former Chinese Vice Foreign
Minister Zhang Yesui explained that China’s increasing involvement in UN peacekeeping
missions reflected China’s commitment to global security given the country’s important role

100
“Hu Jintao Says China Pursues Peaceful Development,” People’s Daily (Beijing, 3 Sept. 2005
[trans. by BBC Monitoring Service, International Reports].
101
Jing-Dong Yuan, “Multilateral Intervention and State Sovereignty: Chinese Views on UN
Peacekeeping Operations,” Political Science 49, no. 2 (1998), pp. 275–95.
102
“PRC’s new diplomacy stress on more active international role,” Liaowang (Beijing), 11 July
2005 [trans. by World News Connection].
70
within the international system and the fact that its security and development are closely
linked to that of the rest of the world.
103
There is a growing recognition that as China’s
international role evolves and expands, its interests will likewise become more global in
nature. Its national security is thus becoming intrinsically linked to a stable and peaceful
international environment, and this in turn is an important factor in China taking a more
cooperative stance and supportive role in UN peacekeeping operations.
In Africa, the Chinese government is increasingly willing to have its peacekeepers
undertake more assignments in difficult terrains. Its peacekeeping presence in the UN
Mission in Liberia (UNMIL), for example, is responsible for the timely and efficient
transport of personnel and critical supplies such as fuel and water around the country. The
unit has proved reliable even though it frequently has to travel through unstable areas and
despite the country having only roughly 1,000 kilometers of paved roads. Chinese
peacekeeping contingents are also responding to requests from local and national
governments to help in infrastructure development projects such as building hospitals and
paved roads, thus helping to improve local perceptions of the mission. In the DRC, Chinese
engineering units have been tasked to take on such projects as repairing vital infrastructural
linkages to Kaumu Airport and the Ruzizi power plant in the volatile South Kivu province,
and constructing helipads, container grounds at Kavumu, and training sites and facilities for
the DRC’s armed and police forces.

Practical Considerations for China’s Globalizing Security Forces

103
John Hill, “China Bolsters Peacekeeping Commitment,” Jane’s Defence Weekly, 14 February
2007.
71

More broadly, peacekeeping, anti-piracy missions, rescue-and-relief operations,
counterterrorism exercises, and post-conflict reconstruction have all become major
components of China’s increasingly complex and dynamic international and foreign policy
strategy.
104
These activities are broadly defined as non-traditional security issues, and their
growing importance parallel the PLA’s interest in mobilizing its resources and preparing for
Military Operations Other Than War (MOOTW) both at home and abroad. This reflects
former President Hu Jintao’s call for the security forces to more adequately perform and
engage in MOOTW as part of the PLA’s “new historic mission.”
105
Doing so would help
safeguard national interests as well as contribute to regional and global peace, security and
development. In May 2009, the PLA General Staff Department announced that it would
strengthen the PLA’s emergency response system and rapid deployment capacity to respond
to the various MOOTW, including peacekeeping activities.
106
In June 2009 the Central
Military Commission, the PLA, and five of the seven military area commands met in Beijing
to strengthen and improve the PLA’s peacekeeping role, discussing ways to streamline the
selection, organization, training and rotation of Chinese peacekeepers.
107
The deployment of Chinese troops abroad to take part in international peacekeeping
missions carries inherent practical benefits for the Chinese security forces. Training and
operating alongside other troop contributing countries’ forces provides an invaluable

104
Zhongying Pang, “China’s Changing Attitude to UN Peacekeeping,” International Peacekeeping
12, no. 1 (2005), pp. 87–104.
105
James Mulvenon, “Chairman Hu and the PLA’s ‘New Historic Missions,’” China Leadership
Monitor 27 (2009), pp. 1–11; Cynthia Watson, “The Chinese Armed Forces and Non-Traditional
Missions: A Growing Tool of Statecraft,” China Brief 9, no. 4, (2009), pp. 9–12.
106
“PLA Constructs MOOTW Arms Force System,” People’s Liberation Army Daily (Beijing), 14
May 2009 [trans. by BBC Monitoring Service, International Reports].
107
“PLA Peacekeeping Work Conference Held in Beijing,” People’s Liberation Army Daily, 26 June
2009, [trans. by BBC Monitoring Service, International Reports].
72
experience that will allow the Chinese troops to improve their responsiveness, riot control
capabilities, coordination of emergency command systems and ability to carry out MOOTW
more effectively. Over time, participation in peacekeeping missions abroad will also help to
modernize and professionalize the security forces. For example, a sustained effort to deploy
troops in Africa has meant that PLA forces are gaining greater operational knowledge of
different operating environments, an advantage that few counterparts in other countries
have. According to Philip Rogers, it also provides them with “more knowledge about
logistics, ports of debarkation, lines of communication, lines of operation, operational
intelligence, local ‘atmospherics’ and modus operandi and means of sustaining forces in
Africa over prolonged periods.”
108
All these measures allow the Chinese security forces to
display its professionalism and operational competence on the one hand, while also
demonstrating its growing deterrent capability on the other.
China’s evolving approach towards UN peacekeeping is thus supported by a
combination of factors. Through increasing socialization and interaction with the
international community, China has become more willing to accept global norms and to
contribute to peace and stability. At the same time, participation in peacekeeping also allows
China to professionalize its armed forces, to test its power projection capabilities through
MOOTW, and to help attain its aspirations in becoming a major global power. In light of the
constructivist ontology, socialization process has broadly integrated China more closely in
the UN peacekeeping regime and increasingly exposed it to related global norms. At the
same time, it should be noted that the socialization process remains incomplete. The degree
to which China has internalized these norms remains an unforeclosed debate, as will be seen

108
Philip Rogers, “China and UN Peacekeeping Operations in Africa,” Naval War College Review
60, no. 2 (2007), p. 89.
73
in the following section discussing the limitations to Chinese contributions to peacekeeping,
as well as its resistance and obstructive behavior at times, especially in Africa. In particular,
the episodic reversals in Chinese normative behavior tend to occur when China displays a
more confident and assertive self-image, complemented with strained relations abroad, that
tracks closely with Realpolitik ideology. The next section assesses the activities,
contributions and limitations of Chinese peacekeeping behavior in Africa recent years.

China’s Balancing Act on Peacekeeping, Sovereignty, and Intervention

As the China-Africa relationship deepens, China’s expanding military, political and
economic ties in Africa will need to be managed to complement China’s contributions to
peacekeeping in Africa. UN officials report some frustration at their lack of access to details
of extensive bilateral military ties between China and African countries where their
peacekeepers are also deployed (such as the DRC, Liberia and Sudan).
109
It is therefore
unclear whether those arrangements complement China’s peacekeeping activities and UN
efforts to provide greater security and stability in Africa. Since 2008 UN officials have been
exploring with the Chinese Mission ways of supporting security sector reform and issues
related to disarmament, demobilization and reintegration of ex-combatants in African states.
The Chinese delegation has reportedly not been obstructive; but nor has it taken any major
initiatives in this regard.
110

109
Interviews with UN officials, Kinshasa and New York, 2009, 2012, and 2013.
110
Ibid.
74
Likewise, as China’s diplomatic and business interests deepen in Africa, crafting
appropriate policies to balance them is likely to become more complicated. The goodwill
earned by Chinese peacekeeping contingents repairing roads, improving state infrastructure
and offering medical assistance could be undermined by other bilateral activities of the
Chinese government, state-owned companies, entrepreneurs and émigrés across the
continent. As African states emerge from protracted internal conflicts, China wants to be
recognized as a partner in African development. The challenge then will be to improve
oversight and coordination to ensure that bilateral military engagements and a widening
array of commercial links in the continent not only complement the Chinese peacekeeping
presence, but also contribute to development and stability in Africa.
The problem of sovereignty, peacekeeping, and intervention becomes particularly
acute for China’s broader security and foreign policy in Africa and beyond. When
confronted with important questions related to foreign policy and international security,
Chinese policymakers tend to take on a case-by-case approach. As such, although rhetoric
and government policies seem to have supported UN peacekeeping, traditional ideas about
state sovereignty persist. There are instances when China has supported intervention on
humanitarian grounds, including in East Timor in 1999, though a non-UN force led by
Australia. China also contributed a civilian police contingent to support the subsequent UN
mission. In 2003, in response to growing instability in the DRC and Liberia, the former
Chinese Ambassador to the UN, Zhang Yishan, argued that the UN should intervene in such
conflict areas earlier, faster and more forcefully.
111
A similar view was expressed by some
observers reflecting on the tragedy that unfolded in Rwanda as well.
112

111
“China Takes on Major Peacekeeping Role,” Jane’s Intelligence Review, 1 November 2003.
112
Gill and Huang, China’s Expanding Role in Peacekeeping.
75

Continued Concerns over State Sovereignty

Traditionally, China has objected to authorizing or extending the mandates of UN
peacekeeping missions in countries that recognized Taiwan. In January 1997, China vetoed
a proposed mission to Guatemala until the Guatemalan government gave assurances that it
would no longer support a General Assembly vote on admitting Taiwan to the UN. The
Verification Mission in Guatemala (MINUGUA) could then proceed.
113
In 1999, China
vetoed the continuation of the UN Preventive Deployment in Macedonia (UNPREDEP) two
weeks after suspending diplomatic ties with the country over its recognition of Taiwan,
bringing an end to that experiment in conflict prevention. Some Chinese peacekeeping
specialists later acknowledged that this was a difficult lesson for China and that the
government should have considered Macedonia’s interests more than its own national
interests.
114

In 1999, at the height of the crisis in the Balkans, China was adamantly opposed to
authorizing a peacekeeping force for Kosovo. Chinese opposition was in a large part
accentuated with the US-led NATO air raids mistakenly hit the Chinese embassy in
Belgrade. Chinese objections turned to indignant outrage as the Chinese general public as

113
“Security Council Authorizes Deployment of UN Military Observers to Verify Implementation of
Cease-Fire Agreement in Guatemala,” press release, UN Department of Public Information, 20
January 1997 (available at www.un.org/News/Press/docs/1997/19970120.sc6314.html); International
Security and Institutions Research Group, Vetoed Draft Resolutions in the UN Security Council
1946–2009, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, London, Aug. 2009.
114
Pang 2005.
76
well as the regime insisted that the NATO bombing was deliberate and intended to contain
China.
115

In the case of Haiti, notwithstanding the lack of full diplomatic relations with
Beijing, China supported the UN from 2004 to 2010 with deployments of Formed Police
Units (FPUs). However, China apparently used the threat of curtailing the mission to warn
Haiti against any high-profile diplomatic exchanges in support of Taiwan. Some observers
contend that Haiti’s continued recognition of Taiwan was a reason for the withdrawal in
2010, while others have indicated that China was uncomfortable with the overwhelming US
civilian and military presence following the earthquake.
116
The Haiti case indicates that there
are still gaps in and limitations to China’s overall commitment to peacekeeping. As in
Kosovo, the resurgence of Realpolitik ideology seemed to have trumped the broader
underlying trend of more active engagement and participation in peacekeeping operations.

Darfur and Libya as a Test Case for Greater Chinese Flexibility?

Perhaps, most important, Beijing’s position on the Darfur question, however,
provides a prominent example of constructive engagement where China has yielded to
widespread regional and international pressure. Responding in a large part to mounting
criticism of its relations with the Sudanese government, in 2006 China began exerting

115
Gill 2009.
116
Interviews with Chinese scholars and officials, Beijing, 2010 and 2013; “Analysis: UN Refocuses
Haiti Mission,” United Press International, 16 Feb. 2007.
77
pressure on Sudan to follow allow UN and AU peacekeepers into Darfur.
117
In November
2006, with the humanitarian situation worsening, the former Chinese Ambassador to the
UN, Wang Guangya, was widely credited in gaining Sudanese acceptance of the UN/AU
hybrid peacekeeping force of 20,000 troops in Darfur. Subsequently, China also became the
first permanent member of the UN Security Council to commit and deploy more than 300
troops there and was widely applauded by African leaders.
118
In February 2007, President
Hu Jintao visited Sudan and met President Omar al-Bashir. The visit drew widespread
criticism internationally, particularly from the United States, since China was seen as
abetting alleged genocidal acts committed in Darfur. However, Hu reportedly intervened to
press al-Bashir to abide by international commitments.
119
While this could be interpreted as
mere rhetoric, that is about as close as a Chinese leader has come to publicly warning and
chiding a foreign leader. What the senior-level leadership says on these sensitive issues is
important because it reflects in a large part its changing behavior and understanding of
peacekeeping and non-interventionism. Its quest to play a leadership position in the
developing world, particularly in Africa, means that it needs to be more attuned and
attentive to African public opinion and concerns. As seen here with its peacekeeping
contributions to Darfur, ideational factors thus altered China’s foreign policy calculus and its
own identity and interests so that they are more consistent, or at least not at odds, with
regional and global norms.

117
Dan Large, “China’s Sudan engagement: changing Northern and Southern political trajectories in
peace and war,” The China Quarterly 199 (September 2009), pp. 610-626; Chin-Hao Huang, “US–
China Relations and Darfur,” Fordham International Law Journal 31, no. 4 (2008), pp. 827–42.
118
Edward Cody, “China Given Credit for Darfur Role,” Washington Post, 13 January 2007
(available at www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2007/01/12/AR2007011201924.html).
119
Ibid.
78
More recently, in the wake of the political demonstrations and uprisings in North
Africa and the Middle East, China’s approach has been cautious, and its policy demonstrated
a degree of flexibility as well as limitations on compromising the principle of sovereignty
and interventionism. There were economic interests at stake, with more than 30,000 Chinese
citizens and 75 Chinese firms in Libya. China also relies on Libyan oil for roughly three
percent of its domestic energy consumption. But more important, the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs was carefully assessing and monitoring the Libyan situation at every turn. As
expected, it initially voiced support for the Gaddafi regime as China’s overall concern was
the political stability and unity of Libya as a whole. As developments unfolded and when it
became apparent that the rebel forces gained increasing legitimacy and support throughout
Libya and the international community, China and the National Transitional Council began
to open up communication channels. With divergent views between the AU and the Arab
League on how to best manage the conflict in Libya, China preferred a multilateral,
diplomatic approach that would bring the major stakeholders to the negotiation table.
According to interviews with senior Chinese officials monitoring the Libyan situation,
Beijing’s primary concern throughout the Libyan case was what it saw as the excessive
involvement and the especially prominent role the North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(NATO) played from the inception of the Libyan crisis. Given the historic sensitivity in
NATO-China relations during the Kosovo crisis of 1998-1999 and the subsequent US
bombing, under NATO’s purview, of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade, China had
misgivings and serious concerns about NATO’s expanding role in interventions into
Northern Africa. The historical analogy dictated Chinese officials to take a critical stance on
79
the Libyan situation as it associated NATO’s involvement with malign intent and belligerent
hegemony.
120

The Libyan case provides a mixed picture at best on where China stands on
humanitarian intervention and sovereignty. It supported the UN Security Council Resolution
1970 (2011), placing arms embargo on Libya, a freezing of Libyan funds and assets, and
referral to the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigate crimes against humanity. At
the same time, it was also wary to what it perceived as excessive NATO involvement in
Libya. These developments point to the fact that China is in a steep learning curve in
managing and responding to calls for humanitarian interventions. China’s traditional defense
of the notion of sovereignty will not always necessarily stand in the way of achieving its
overall national security interests. In particular, at times of need to support intervention,
especially where there is consensus among the relevant parties at stake to do so, China tends
to be supportive.

Implications of Case Study Findings

What then can be said about China’s future engagement in international
peacekeeping operations in Africa? First, there will certainly be constraints going forward.
China will most likely be cautious and selective, indicating that its stance on peacekeeping,
sovereignty, and intervention does not follow a linear, pre-determined path. And second, it is
increasingly clear that China’s political, economic, security interests in Africa are complex
and variegated. Where China has decided to uphold global norms or is perceived to be

120
Gill 2009.
80
constrained by certain normative structures, there are instances of a more cooperative
behavior on China’s part. However, there are limitations in each of these cases. One could
argue that on such important issues as peacekeeping support, development assistance,
human rights, and arms sales, China can and should do more to live up to international
expectations and adhere more closely to international norms. Given China’s emerging role
in the international community and its increasingly socialized behavior, it has yet to
consistently demonstrate how far and for what purposes a rising China will exert its
influence in the conduct of international affairs. Moreover, whether these changes in its
normative behavior will reverse is still unclear.
The socialization process is thus continuously at work as China deepens its
engagement in Africa in the coming years. Over the last decade, for example, China’s
engagement with international institutions, particularly those in the developing South like
the AU, has exposed it to normative values concerning human rights and conflict resolution
that are gaining traction and being factored into its foreign policy discourse. It is still at an
early stage to determine how far China has accepted these norms; what is clear, however, is
that China’s options will be shaped and influenced by measures taken by other actors,
particularly Africa (as well as other developing states) and Western actors. When there has
been broad international consensus regarding a specific intervention, as most recently seen
in Darfur, China has tended to lend its support, rather than be viewed as obstructionist.
These measures thus alter China’s foreign policy calculus so that, for example, concerns
about preserving state sovereignty has been moderated in certain instances, and this is
evidenced in changes to China’s definitions of interest or by linking its interests to image,
reputation, and status.
81
However, the epistemic community currently addressing peacekeeping remains small
in China. There are few practitioners and scholars who have relevant expertise. There is
growing awareness, however, that peacekeeping is fast emerging as an important issue, and
more is likely to be done on the semi- and non-governmental levels, to help build and
expand this epistemic community. Regularized international delegation visits and exchanges
can foster this process. There are precedents in other areas such as arms control and non-
proliferation, pandemics, and international trade where increasing interaction with external
actors have over time sustained a more cooperative relationship with China where the latter
begins to value multilateralism in achieving state security.
121

In spite of these uncertainties, China, African leaders, as well as key members of the
international community should consider policy options aimed at reinforcing some of the
encouraging developments related to China’s involvement in African peacekeeping and
security affairs. The expansion of China’s engagement in peacekeeping has important
implications for African partners. As discussed earlier, the FOCAC summitry in recent years
has opened the door for enhanced dialogue and exchanges on peace and security issues in
Africa. China has pledged to provide more assistance and to enhance cooperation with the
AU and other regional organizations in the continent in the prevention, management, and
resolution of regional conflicts in Africa. The fifth FOCAC meeting in July 2012 indicated
strong and clear potential to increase China-African cooperation on peacekeeping affairs.
There is also potential to strengthen African peacekeeping and peace building capacities by
means of greater bilateral cooperation between China and AU member states. The AU and
individual African countries can take several measures to sustain the constructive

121
Quansheng Zhao, “Policymaking Processes of Chinese Foreign Policy: The Role of Policy
Communities and Think Tanks,” in Shaun Breslin (ed.), A Handbook of Chinese International
Relations (London: Routledge, 2010), pp. 22–34.
82
socialization process and help deepen this trend. Collectively, the AU member states can
encourage the Chinese government to establish a formal interagency working group or
similar mechanism to better promote and coordinate China’s approach to peacekeeping and
security affairs in Africa. This would help urge Beijing to devote additional financial and
human resources to the Ministry of Defense Office of Peacekeeping Affairs, the PLA
General Staff Department, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Public Security,
peacekeeping training facilities and other relevant entities in order to expand and enhance
China’s contribution toward building the AU and its member states’ capacity in
peacekeeping activities.
Likewise, key African countries such as South Africa, Nigeria, Rwanda, Kenya, and
Ethiopia with robust and active roles in AU troop deployments should solicit greater
Chinese support for the AU Mission in Somalia, the African Standby Force and the
Continental Early Warning System. Personnel training, troop contributions, and financial
support are all important assets China can provide. The provision of other force enablers
such as light helicopters, ground transport, armored personnel carriers, and mine-clearing
and sweeping technology could also help strengthen African troop contributing countries,
however African states and the AU have yet to systematically enlist greater Chinese support
towards AU missions and/or the Standby Force. The AU, to date, still relies largely on its
traditional donors and partners, such as the European Union and the United States, for
support. As Africa expands its interactions with other regional partners in Asia and the
Middle East, China will become an important actor and can also make important
contributions toward peacekeeping in Africa.
On the political level, African states and the AU could also request to have more
targeted and smaller workshops alongside the FOCAC summit on peace and security issues.
83
Such a dialogue would involve the PLA, the Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs and other relevant Chinese entities in more exchanges, dialogues, and joint
exercises and simulations with Western and African counterparts aimed at strengthening
Chinese understanding of the evolving security situation in the various conflict regions in
Africa.
There is also much room for increasing two-way exchanges and field research at the
non-official and/or semi-official level between Chinese and African universities, think-
tanks, and defense academies to carry out joint policy research and recommendations
concerning China’s future contributions to peacekeeping, security, and development issues
in Africa. This would help strengthen and deepen the level of Chinese scholarly and policy
understanding of contemporary Africa, particularly in the areas of grass-roots elections,
public health, and other civil society activity related to good governance, accountability, and
transparency and their linkages to security and development across the continent. Such an
interactive process would promote further debates and discussions among Chinese policy
elites about its future role and contributions in security, particularly in the context of
peacekeeping, in Africa. China has quickly realized that Africa will become an important
stage where its image as a responsible global actor is forged. As such, increasing such
interactions will help provide an important context for continued Chinese involvement in
peacekeeping that will help shape outcomes in Africa that are beneficial for greater peace
and stability in the continent.

Preliminary Conclusion and Implications for IR Theory

84
By looking at status seeking states and socialization theory, this project puts forward
a theoretical framework of analysis on the question of what type of great power China might
be. Speculation on the future direction of China’s rise can be more firmly grounded in
empirically-sound IR theories to help us understand how aspiring great power states behave.
In the case of China’s evolving approach to UN peacekeeping in Africa and beyond,
China’s attempts to identify more closely with the developing world, particularly in Africa
where it is becoming increasingly active, along with its quest to seek external confirmation
of its status as a legitimate great power are increasingly important considerations behind its
willingness to accept cooperative security and to uphold the established global norms and
institutions that help contribute to regional and international peace and stability. Its status
concerns and aspirations to seek legitimacy as a responsible stakeholder in international
affairs are important ideational factors behind the socialization process. In short, these non-
material forces and considerations extend beyond instrumental and cost-benefit assessments
to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the important changes and variations in
Chinese foreign policy.

85

Chapter Four: Cautious Compliance on Conventional Arms and
Export Controls

86
Conventional Arms and Export Controls

With regards to the broader non-proliferation realm, China has dramatically reduced
its weapons of mass destruction (WMD)-related exports since the mid-1990s as the scope,
frequency and technical content of China’s WMD-related exports have narrowed and
declined. China has cut off of most of its sensitive exports to Iran (nuclear
cooperation/cruise missile exports) and introduced and implemented domestic export control
systems and regulations which cover nuclear-, chemical/bio-, missile- related weapons. It
has signed on to and adhered to nearly every major international arms control treaty
(Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty, Chemical
Weapons Convention) and became member of major supply-side denial cartels such as
Zangger Committee, Nuclear Suppliers Group, and Australia Group. China has been a
cooperative partner in the Container Security Initiative (CSI), an international effort led by
the United States to prevent the shipment of dangerous materials, especially nuclear-related
devices. Specialists on Chinese foreign and security policy and IR theorists have attributed
these changes to growing Chinese acceptance (rather than resistance) to global nuclear non-
proliferation norms.
122

On conventional arms transfers, small arms and light weapons (SALW), as well as
the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), the Chinese government has always been relatively more
cautious. China was the sixth largest producer/exporter of conventional arms (excluding
exports of dual-use goods, which may be diverted to military aims) between 1999 and 2006.

122
Alastair Iain Johnston, “Learning versus Adaptation: Explaining Change in Chinese Arms Control
Policy in the 1980s and 1990s,” China Journal 35, 1996, pp. 27-61.
87
The security concern here is that China’s record of arms transfers to conflict regions and
fragile states, including Sudan and Zimbabwe, remains poor and opaque.
More critical, the decision-making structure remains problematic, and Chinese
interlocutors acknowledge the need for making the process less opaque and somewhat more
accountable.
123
The PLA, particularly the General Armaments Department and the General
Staff Department, retains a strong and influential role, but since late 2004, the process of
reviewing and authorizing arms deals has broadened to include other agencies such as the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of State Security, the Customs
Administration, and the State Administration for Science, Technology and Industry for
National Defense (SASTIND), as well as a growing number of think-tanks experts and
Chinese policy elites and public intellectuals. This inter-agency, diversified mechanism is
led by SASTIND and serves as the primary agency responsible for conventional arms—
reviewing and issuing of licenses. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has become more wary
of deals that might bear reputational costs for the government, and routinely provides
political risk assessments of recipient countries. In recent years, there have been more
instances of disagreements on how to best proceed with a number of major conventional
arms deals.
It is for precisely these reasons that the EU, through the office of Annalisa Gianella,
the Personal Representative on Non-Proliferation of the EU’s High Representative for
Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, has been enlisting the support of European civil society
actors such as Saferworld–the primary socializing agents—to help deepen and expand

123
Research interviews in Beijing, China, conducted from March, 2012; June 2012; January 2013;
and May 2013.
88
dialogue on effective conventional arms transfers regime with Chinese policy elites.
124
This
has been a relatively recent development. Over the last two years, the range of activities, the
levels of engagement, as well as the scope of the substantive dialogue with Chinese
counterparts on both the official and non-governmental circles have seen measurable
progress and impact. The EU and civil society representatives understand that shaping and
transforming Beijing’s rhetoric and growing openness into tangible improvements in arms
transfer control policy and practice, including the ATT, will take time. As such, it is critical
to open up a channel of communication between EU actors and China—including key
government agencies, defense industries, Communist Party officials, as well as the emerging
non-profit sector and scholarly community in universities and other think tank research
institutes—to help shape and engage Chinese thinking at an early stage of this debate, and
that this dialogue is sustained with meaningful and substantive outcomes. Over time, this
will help to bring China towards a position of more limited resistance, as the ATT process
moves towards the critical textual negotiations and eventual passage, and in the long term
towards full and effective compliance.
In 2009 when the EU first launched a sustained effort to engage Chinese
counterparts, there was no substantive internal discourse and very limited knowledge among
the Chinese policy community of conventional arms control issues and processes. While
progress will ultimately depend on greater political will in Beijing, it is also true that the
Chinese decision-makers’ understanding of the implications of its international
commitments and of the potential benefits of particular policy changes is often lacking. In
short, the EU, primarily in working with such organizations as Saferworld, the International

124
Research interviews in Beijing, China, conducted from March, 2012; June 2012; January 2013;
and May 2013.
89
Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), and the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office
(FCO), have introduced unprecedented opportunities in China for education and debate on
conventional arms controls, whereby a much more well-informed realm of decision-makers,
policy elites and experts now have a stronger capacity to engage in this field within China
and abroad.
Where then have we seen the EU-China socialization process in effect, and how has
this contributed to shaping Chinese policy elites toward greater conformity in the broader
conventional arms control norms? The next section of this chapter continues with a detailed
process-tracing approach to help illuminate China’s status concerns and the scope conditions
for socialization processes as the impetus for change in its decision-making process
regarding conventional arms and export controls issues.

Constructive Engagement on Small Arms and Light Weapons

In 2009, the EU decided to begin its engagement with Chinese policy elites by
inviting and hosting a Chinese delegation for a study visit to London. The delegation of
Chinese experts included officials, policy elites, and experts on conventional arms transfers
issues. The China Arms Control and Disarmament Association (CACDA), a think tank that
has close affiliations and networks with the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, was the
primary contact in liaising with the EU and Saferworld, its civil society partner in London
for the project, and in organizing the visit from the Chinese side. There were officials from
the Ministry of National Defense, defense industry representative, and think-tank experts
from CACDA as well as the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations
90
(CICIR), one of China’s largest and most prominent think-tanks with institutional
affiliations to the Ministry of State Security.
According to the Chinese interlocutors, the delegation visit was an important first-
step in forging positive relations with European partners on the conventional arms control
agenda.
125
More important, on the substantive issue, it provided an opportunity for the
Chinese delegation to meet with export licensing officials from the British FCO, Ministry of
Defense, Members of Parliament, Department for International Development, British private
defense industries, as well as with experts in the non-governmental and think-tank circles.
The Chinese delegation gained a more thorough understanding of the British government’s
approach to conventional arms transfer and export control mechanisms. Particularly, the
delegation was most keen to learn the levels of interaction between the defense industry and
the various British government agencies and the need to strike a balance between the
defense industry’s revenue and profit-seeking priorities and the government’s priorities with
conventional arms trade that respect such international norms as protecting human rights and
promoting democratic and good governance in recipient countries. This is a perennial
challenge, even for many Western governments, and the Chinese delegation members that
took part in this visit came away with more insightful and nuanced understanding of the
negotiation processes that bring in the relevant key stakeholders (both private and public
sectors), and the type of effective export control and licensing procedures.
More important, it showed how compromises can be crafted as well. Since the
British government already has imposed stringent national export controls and licensing
procedures on conventional arms, these measures had the effect of disadvantaging British

125
Research interviews in Beijing, China, conducted from March, 2012; June 2012; January 2013;
and May 2013.
91
defense industries vis-à-vis other competitors. Hence, the arms industry had an incentive to
work with the government and other relevant agencies to help extend export control
measures to other countries to ensure that all competitors are on level playing field. This
visit thus provided a first-hand opportunity for the Chinese delegation to learn and raise
questions about the government and defense industries’ transparency and accountability
issues, the role of the Parliament, and the effective role scholarly communities and think-
tank circles can play in providing data, information, and policy input.
After providing some initial exposure to the conventional arms control debate in the
European context, the EU strategy was then to move forward to its next phase by engaging
Chinese interlocutors even more directly by help co-organize a training workshop in
Shanghai in late fall of 2009. The Tongji University’s School of Political Science and
International Relations served as the local host and partner in organizing a training
workshop with policy elites, including academics, think-tank scholars, and experts who have
former military experience and/or strong connections with the official policy-making realm.
As discussed earlier, prior to the EU’s decision to begin engaging China on conventional
arms control issues in China in 2009, the policy debate and awareness of conventional arms
and the ATT more broadly in China were thin and largely under-developed. To the extent
that Chinese experts were informed about arms control and non-proliferation norms, they
were mostly focused on nuclear, chemical, biological, and missile-related weapons and
export control mechanisms. Conventional arms issues remain far more sensitive in both
official and unofficial dialogue and discussion.
It was thus important to convene a small, closed-door workshop with some of the
more nuanced policy elites with a degree of expertise and understanding of the relevance
and importance of the arms control and non-proliferation norms more broadly, to provide
92
them with a more thorough and comprehensive understanding of conventional arms transfers
and their linkages to human rights and international humanitarian law. The workshop also
served as an invaluable opportunity to get the Chinese policy elites up to speed with the
content of the ATT.
The purpose here was to help forge an emerging network of Chinese scholars,
experts and influential foreign policy actors on conventional arms control norms and
regimes. Their theoretical and practical roles are instrumental and serve an important
purpose. These policy elites already have shared causal beliefs, which are derived from
their analysis of practices leading or contributing to addressing the broader non-proliferation
problem. In introducing a relatively understudied and new norm such as conventional arms
control and ATT, it is important to engage these Chinese policy elites, as they would help
elucidate the multiple linkages between possible policy actions and desired outcomes. A
number of recent studies have shown that an increasing number of Chinese researchers,
scholars, experts and policymakers are gaining important access to key policymakers and
top leaders within the Chinese foreign and security policy apparatus, and they were
increasingly active and important in shaping and influencing Chinese foreign policy
discourse.
126

Shortly after the workshop, the EU decided to put together some resources to help
establish a library at Tongji University’s School of Political Science and International
Relations, and an online resource database has also been created within the web portal of the

126
See Allen Carlson, “China’s Approach to Sovereignty and Intervention,” in Alastair Iain Johnston
and Robert Ross (eds), New Directions in the Study of China’s Foreign Policy, Stanford, CA:
Stanford University Press, 2006, pp.217–41; and Quansheng Zhao, “Policymaking Processes of
Chinese Foreign Policy: The Role of Policy Communities and Think Tanks,” in Shaun Breslin (ed.),
A Handbook of Chinese International Relations, London: Routledge, 2010, pp.22–34.
93
University.
127
Together, the library and the online website serve as a one-stop shop and go-
to site for Chinese researchers and decision-makers who are interested in the issue of ATT,
conventional arms transfers, SALW, and other related documents, treaties, and reports on
arms control and non-proliferation. To this author’s knowledge, it is the first of its kind in
China and will break significant new ground for Chinese policy elites to conduct in-depth
research and analysis on conventional arms control issues with some of the most important
primary and secondary sources. A majority of the links and reports posted on the website
are in English, but there has been a systematic effort to translate these documents into
Chinese as well. Translating these materials will provide resource information and points of
reference for discussion with officials, industry representatives, and other experts. They will
also provide a longer-term source of information for universities and think tanks. The
International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Beijing is also engaged in a similar line
of work but their angle and interest anchors more heavily in the human rights and
international humanitarian law issues on SALW. Because these sources are all available
online, it vastly improves their dissemination and accessibility. The establishment of such
online portals is helping to enrich the Chinese academics, scholars, experts, and other policy
elites in their ongoing and future research and policy work on conventional arms control.
In the summer of 2010, the EU and the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office
(FCO) commissioned Saferworld to convene a closed-door, off-the-record, two-day
conference in Beijing on China-Africa security relations. The conference had participants
from the official, university, think-tank, and non-governmental sectors. In addition to
Chinese, European, and U.S. participants, there were also African policy elites at the

127
Research interviews in Beijing, China, conducted from March 14-19, 2012.
94
conference. African voices and representation are often missing in recent debates about
China’s expanding role in the continent, and thus the organizers identified key actors from
Africa, including scholars, security experts, researchers and former ambassadors to take part
and represent some of the concerns emanating from the continent about China’s impact on
peace and security in the region. Specifically, such issue areas were discussed and debated
at great length: humanitarian interventions, the responsibility to protect, the impact illicit
trade in SALW is having on security sector reform (SSR) and disarmament, demobilization,
and reintegration (DDR) efforts in both conflict areas and fragile states in Africa.
The significance and socialization impact of this conference can be assessed in two
ways.
128
First, when Beijing is criticized for its indifference to human rights issues in
Africa, Chinese officials tend to deflect these external criticisms, labeling them as Western
biases against China and the developing world. In this conference, however, the Chinese
policy elites received a first-hand account of the security concerns and priorities from their
African partners. In many ways, this helped to shift the dynamics and tone of the debate,
and allowed the Chinese policy elites to better understand some of the most pressing
concerns on the ground in the continent, as reflected by the African participants at the
conference. A needs-based approach toward assisting African governments, regional
institutions, and civil society sector is critically needed, and there was a general consensus
for pragmatic collaboration between China and the African Union, as well as between
China, the EU, and African partners.
Second, on the official, track-one dialogue between Chinese and African leaders
under the Forum on China and Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) meetings and summitries,

128
Research interviews in Beijing, China, conducted from March, 2012; June 2012; January 2013;
and May 2013.
95
there has been very limited focus on security and military-to-military collaboration. In the
2009 FOCAC meeting in Sharm-el-Sheikh, Egypt, Chinese and African leaders agreed in
their joint statement that China will continue to support conflict resolution efforts in Africa,
to tackle piracy problems off the Gulf of Aden, and to support the African Union’s capacity
in peacekeeping operations, providing financial and material support. The language in the
official text of the joint statement was devoid of concrete details about future prospects for
improving and expanding security relations. To date, the only symbolic development that
has occurred on the security front since the 2009 FOCAC meeting was a meeting at the
African Union headquarters between a visiting Chinese Ministry of National Defense
delegation and AU officials in late 2010. A memorandum of understanding was struck
where the Chinese pledged to continue providing financial and material support to AU-led
peacekeeping operations, particularly in Somalia.
Through this sustained interactive dialogue between Chinese, European, and African
experts and officials, Chinese interlocutors are beginning to realize that the call for
conventional arms control is not only an EU/Western-led agenda but actually a norm and
concern that African policy elites are equally if not more concerned as well, particularly on
the controversy regarding the proliferation of SALW and the degree to which they affect
peace and stability in Africa. The EU’s attempt here to link the normative agenda with a
specific regional focus where China has developed stronger interests in recent years is
commendable as it carves out some pragmatic policy prospects where Beijing can
contribute.
129
The Chinese government increasingly realizes that it is in their broader
national interest to take some measured actions to protect its image and reputation abroad, to

129
Research interviews in Beijing, China, conducted from March, 2012; June 2012; January 2013;
and May 2013.
96
respond to African and EU concerns, and in this process, lend a stronger degree of support
to the ATT negotiations and the conventional arms control regime. According to senior
Chinese officials, they are now considering such issues as the impact of conventional arms
transfers on conflict regions in Africa, sharing information on national, regional, and
international initiatives to tackle the illicit trade in SALW, and identifying best practices
with regards to import, export, and in-transit controls.
Most recently, the EU’s attempts to more systematically engage Chinese policy elites
have resulted in a further degree of successful socialization. In February 2011, the EU
helped convene a conference that brought together some of the most relevant stakeholders
on the conventional arms control agenda in China. To date, this is one of the very few
successful endeavors where a foreign institution was able to organize a conference that had
several Chinese officials from a multitude of government agencies represented on the table
and contributing to the dialogue. The aim of this conference again was to help foster a
small, closed-door environment where conversations and debates could take place in a two-
way street. The foreign participants from the government and non-governmental, think-tank
sectors (e.g., representatives from EU member states and conventional arms control
scholars) were able to bring their expertise and more comprehensive knowledge of the latest
developments on the ATT. This was particularly useful for the Chinese participants to get
up to speed with the latest dynamics on the treaty negotiations. It was also a particularly
insightful occasion for the Chinese participants, which included customs officials who deal
with licensing and export control procedures, experts advising the various government
agencies on conventional arms transfers issues, to share their insights on the internal
dynamics within the Chinese decision-making realm on conventional arms export control
mechanisms.
97
The conference was thus a rare opportunity to better identify “who’s who” in the
official Chinese decision-making mechanism on conventional arms issues, to seek
clarifications on each side’s position on the ATT, and to help forge a stronger network and
connection between European institutions and the Chinese government. It was a relatively
small, working-level meeting, and such private settings tend to be more conducive to
productive dialogue and outcomes. This is critical, as the EU, together with civil society
actors like Saferworld, have developed quite open ties and built a strong foundational
relationship with various policy elites around the periphery of the decision-making circles in
China. To get a more prominent audience with the relevant government officials (e.g., from
the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the State Administration for Science, Technology and
Industry for National Defense (SASTIND), the Ministry of National Defense, the General
Customs Department, etc.) is thus an important step forward in the normative suasion
process. To be sure, effecting change in Chinese policy does not occur over night; it takes
substantive and constructive engagements to build the rapport and to help shape and
influence Chinese officials’ thinking over time, especially at the more senior and strategic
levels in the government.
Within weeks after this conference, it was encouraging to hear that the Chinese
delegation at the conclusion of the ATT PrepCom meeting in New York put forward an
official statement that included acknowledgements about the importance of human rights
and international humanitarian law as factors in reviewing conventional arms transactions.
130

There are some interesting developments that can be gleaned from this development. This is
the first, subtle departure from Beijing’s traditional position in neatly quarantining human

130
See official Chinese statement on the UN Arms Trade Treaty PrepCom negotiations in New York
in February 2011 at: http://www.un.org/disarmament/convarms/ATTPrepCom/Statements.html
98
rights and arms sales issues. To be sure, Beijing has yet to give a full endorsement on the
conventional arms regime and there are still political hurdles along the way, but it is an
important step in the right direction. It does indicate that there are internal debates brewing
within the decision-making circles about how China should approach and respond to the
passage of the ATT. It is thus particularly important for the EU and other socializing actors
operating at the forefront of this issue in China to be able to continue their programmatic
activities and to provide authoritative and persuasive sources of analysis and insights on the
importance of ratifying the ATT for Chinese policy elites at this critical juncture. A better
and well-informed policy elite and epistemic community can make significant impact on
improving China’s domestic enforcement record on conventional arms export controls and
international compliance.

Deepening China-EU-Africa Dialogue and Cooperation on Small Arms and Light
Weapons and Conventional Arms and Export Controls

Pursuant to the passage and adoption of EU Council’s Resolution 2012/121/CFSP
the European Union helped establish a Expert Working Group (EWG) in June 2012 as one
of the first key activities of a multi-year, trilateral engagement project on conventional arms
control. The purpose of the EU Council’s decision was to promote greater trilateral dialogue
among an epistemic community of scholars, experts, and decision-makers in China, the
Europe, and Africa. The EWG includes nine members, with three of the leading experts and
scholar-practitioners drawn from the EU, China, and Africa. Over the course of the project
duration, the EWG has met at least on five occasions to jump-start and help promote
99
dialogue on the issues and challenges associated with conventional arms. Since 2012, the
discussions among the EWG members have been frank, conversational, and informative, all
with the goal of increasing mutual understanding of each sides’ positions, concerns, and
priorities when it comes to addressing the threats of the illicit trade of small arms and light
weapons (SALW). This is a notable achievement on several fronts and is an unprecedented
model for forthright exchanges among some of the leading experts from all three sides on
such a sensitive issue area for international security.
From the Chinese perspective, it is a rare opportunity for its EWG members to learn
and contribute to the ongoing debate and discussion on SALW, especially as the drafting
and passage of the UN Arms Trade Treaty was undergoing intense negotiations. At the same
time, and especially since 2012, the Chinese government’s expanding political, economic,
and security relations with Africa was also seeing a developmental take-off and gaining
increasing traction among external observers. Owing to its longstanding, official policy of
state sovereignty and non-interference, Beijing has frequently maintained the legitimate
right of states to engage in arms transfers and transactions without undue restrictions. Its
initial perception of the ATT was thus skeptical and the support was lackluster at best. The
dialogue was thus all the more timely as the EWG discussions helped allay concerns and
misperceptions about the ATT. More important, it was a rare opportunity for Chinese
colleagues to hear and see first-hand their African partners provide concrete examples of
how the illicit trade and circulation of SALW is having a destabilizing effect on conflict
prevention and management in some of the most unstable parts of sub-Saharan Africa,
particularly in the Horn and the Eastern region of the continent (e.g., Kenya, South Sudan,
and Uganda). Moreover, the tone of these discussions were not aimed to be critical, nor
100
were they meant to be a finger-pointing exercise.
131
Instead, reviewing and discussing the
factual observations and challenges provided stronger common grounds for all three sides to
begin identifying ways to work together more effectively and address the problems of
SALW at hand.
Over the last two years, the EWG members have served as the bedrock foundation
for the dialogue process promoted by the EU Council decision, maintaining an active role in
bringing together other civil society actors, experts, practitioners, and experts in the field of
conventional arms control issues. Given their expansive networks both within and outside
the government circles, the EWG members have helped bridge the gap between the research
and policy communities on the ATT and SALW, ensuring that the project outputs and
activities are effectively transmitted to the official track and governments in China, Africa,
and the European Union.

Workshops, Seminars, and Outreach Activities

Over the last two years, for example, the EWG carried out a dozen consultations,
workshops, and seminars with the goal of contributing to the UN Program of Action on
SALW, the UN ATT process, and deepening trilateral dialogue on conventional arms issues
that has heretofore been absent and sorely missing.
A seminar held in Kampala, Uganda in April 2013, for example, brought together the
EWG with the various stakeholders in Uganda, including officials and representatives from
the Uganda National Focal Point on SALW, the Uganda Police Force, the armed forces, and
civil society actors. It was an important learning experience for members of the EWG to

131
Research interviews in Beijing, China, conducted from June 2013; March 2014; and May 2014.
101
acknowledge and understand more thoroughly the problem of SALW in the country and for
the dialogue process to begin identifying ways in which the EU and China can help meet
Uganda’s specific needs and requests for assistance to help curb the debilitating effects of
illicit SALW.
Similarly, the EWG convened two meetings in July 2013 and in May 2014 in
Nairobi to discuss with a wide array of SALW experts, specialists, and practitioners in
Kenya to bring a sharper focus to support and help implement the Nairobi Protocol for the
Prevention, Control, and Reduction of SALW in Eastern Africa. The Regional Centre on
Small Arms in the Great Lakes Region, the Horn of Africa and Bordering States (RECSA)
was identified as a pivotal regional body that can play a greater role in assistance with the
UN Program of Action on SALW in this region. In fact, one of the key EWG activities
borne out of this initiative was to forge greater dialogue and policy coordination between
Beijing-based African diplomats, the RECSA Director and Chinese authorities. In a
consultation meeting held in March 2014, for example, a working group entitled the
“Caucus of RECSA Member States’ Ambassadors in China” was established, with the
appointment of the Ambassador of the United Republic of Tanzania in Beijing as RECSA’s
diplomatic point-of-contact in China. This would help sustain and elevate the agenda of
SALW in Eastern Africa more prominently with Chinese colleagues during other official
channels of communication like the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC)
Ministerial Meetings.
To support and complement the efforts of the drafting and passage of the UN ATT,
the EWG also held a number of workshops to facilitate the negotiation and ratification
process. A meeting held in May 2013, for example, drew key experts and specialists from
Chinese think tanks, the military and security establishments, the defense industry, as well
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as officials from the EU and Africa. It should be noted that while the Chinese delegation
ultimately cast an abstention vote during the UN General Assembly vote on the treaty, a
number of Chinese experts, including those in the EWG, noted that in the last two years, the
level of understanding about the treaty’s content and scope has dramatically increased and
improved. No longer seen as an intrusive and restrictive treaty, specialists familiar with the
ongoing, internal discussions within the Chinese decision-making circles indicate and
acknowledge that it is in China’s interest to be part of the treaty and that China’s ascension
to become a signatory state of the treaty should be imminent. While it may be hard to
determine whether this shift in thinking is a direct result of the active engagement on EU’s
part, Chinese interlocutors opine that the EWG and its engagement activities in China have
all raised greater awareness of the importance of regulating SALW exports and facilitated
the much-needed engagement process of introducing Chinese colleagues to the significance
of the ATT.
132

Field Research

In addition to the workshops and seminars, the most beneficial outputs of the EU-
sponsored dialogue process were a series of field visits (notably to South Sudan and
Somalia) for experts, decision-makers, and practitioners in China, in particular, to
understand and see specific examples of the threats posed by SALW, uncontrolled
proliferation and dissemination of conventional arms in conflict areas. In Eastern Africa, for
example, a number of conflicts have been fought over the last decade, largely with infantry-
type weapons and other small arms or light weapons. The illicit circulation of such

132
Research interviews in Beijing, China, conducted from March 2014 and May 2014.
103
conventional arms contributes to rapid and violent shifts of political regimes, instability and
humanitarian crises in the region. Consider, for example, some of the devastating impact of
SALW in Africa, where six of the eleven currently most intense armed conflicts (per death
rate) are fought in the continent, particularly in Central African Republic, Nigeria, Somalia,
South Sudan and Sudan.
133
The 2014 data from the UN High Commissioner for Refugees
(UNHCR) estimates that there are nearly 3.5 million refugees under dire need of basic
humanitarian assistance and 5.4 million internally displaced persons in Africa.
134

During the research visit to South Sudan, for example, members of the EWG had an
opportunity to engage in a series of in-depth discussion with officials and representatives of
the Ministry of Interior, the Bureau for Community Security and Small Arms Control
(BCSSAC), the national police force, the South Sudanese Legislative Assembly’s
Committee on Security and Public Order, among other government agencies. Equally
important, the delegation also met with key members of the civil society groups in South
Sudan, including the South Sudan Action Network on Small Arms (SSANSA). The dialogue
and exchanges provided the EWG members with a first-hand observation of the inadequate
safety standards and the lack of secure management of the stockpiles of arms and
ammunition. They also saw the recirculation of illicit SALW by the local population and the
armed opposition groups, all of which was contributing to devastating effects on peace,
stability, and order in South Sudan.
The EWG also worked with and commissioned researchers with the Conflict
Armament Research (CAR) to carry out an in-depth assessment on stockpile management
and storage facilities of arms and ammunition in Mogadishu, Somalia. The sites included

133
“2014 UNHCR Country Operations Profile: Africa,” UN High Commissioner for Refugees,
accessed April 19, 2014, http://www.unhcr.org/pages/4a02d7fd6.html.
134
Ibid.
104
stores under the authority of the police, the National Intelligence and Security Agency
(NISA), and the Somali National Army (SNA). The assessment found safety and security
concerns at all locations inspected, including newly built facilities, highlighting the urgent
need for building, amongst others, a new ammunition storage facility.
These research visits underscored, with reference to specific cases and with critical
local expert input, the nature of the problem of illicit conventional weapons proliferation and
its impact on African societies, especially in fragile states. The pairing of Chinese, EU and
African experts in these visits proved valuable, not only from an information-sharing
perspective, but also assisted the EWG members in agreeing common positions on the most
serious aspects of the problem—and potential solutions to it. Looking ahead, further EU
engagement in the next steps of this trilateral dialogue will continue to prioritize further
EWG field visits, notably to countries, such as South Sudan, where the impact of unchecked
weapons proliferation is even more apparent today than during the previous visits.
135

Public Statements

The EWG has also been engaged in disseminating its works and activities to the
policy community and the general public. It issued, for example, public statements in
support of the UN ATT’s passage and adoption, urging the international community to sign
and ratify the treaty as urgently as possible.
136
The statements reflect strong consensus
among the EWG members, and having a high-profile panel of experts on SALW and

135
Research interviews in Beijing, China, conducted from March 2014 and May 2014.
136
“Where National Interest and Global Responsibility Align in Robust Arms Trade Treaty,” Global
Times, accessed March 18, 2013, http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/768727.shtml; and “Turning
Words Into Action: The Arms Trade Treaty Deserves the World’s Full Support,” Global Times,
accessed October 16, 2013, http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/818094.shtml.
105
international security issues such a rare endorsement of the ATT carry symbolic and
substantive weight to the treaty’s negotiation and eventual passage. Most important, the
statements include EWG members representing both developing and developed states from
three different continents, adding a critical layer of legitimacy and urgency to the call for the
treaty’s adoption.

Establishment of Joint Africa-EU-China Research Center on Conventional Arms
The Research Center was established to support joint research and analysis by
members of the EWG as well as experts and practitioners from the European Union, China,
and Africa. The Center, based at CACDA, provides a wide range of relevant materials and
resources in English and Chinese related to SALW and the ATT process. The same
materials and resources are also made accessible electronically through a website that acts as
the public outreach of the EWG.
The establishment of a Research Center is part and parcel of the EU’s broader and
long-term goal of advocacy work on conventional arms issues in China. The purpose,
rationale, and implications for establishing such a center should not be underestimated. Prior
to the EU’s activities in China in 2009, the Chinese policy debate and awareness of
conventional arms control issues in Africa and the ATT more broadly were thin and largely
under-developed. To the extent that Chinese experts were informed about arms control and
non-proliferation norms, they were mostly focused on nuclear, chemical, biological, and
missile-related weapons and export control mechanisms. Conventional arms issues remain
far more sensitive in both official and unofficial dialogue and discussion.
It was thus important to establish early on in the project an accessible, authoritative,
and fact-based Resource Center that serves as an information clearinghouse on SALW
106
issues. The analyses and reports available at the center provide interested scholars, officials,
and the general public more broadly with a more thorough and comprehensive
understanding of conventional arms transfers and their linkages to conflict sensitivity issues,
human rights, and international humanitarian law.
More broadly, the EU-sponsored dialogue process effectively helped build a small
but budding epistemic community of scholars, experts and influential foreign policy elites in
China on conventional arms control norms and regimes. The theoretical and practical roles
of such communities have two primary purposes. First, these policy elites already have
shared causal beliefs, which are derived from their analysis of practices leading or
contributing to addressing the broader illicit arms trade problem and which then serve the
bases for elucidating the multiple linkages between possible policy actions and desired
outcomes. Second, in introducing a relatively understudied and new normative concept such
as conventional arms control and the ATT process to Chinese decision-makers, it is critical
to gain leverage and support from these local policy elites. While the initiative to introduce
and spread new norms can be undertaken either by local or foreign norm entrepreneurs and
governments, the diffusion strategies that include and gauge local sensitivities and support,
particularly among policy elites, are more likely to succeed that those who seek to supplant
the latter. In other words, the need to monitor and regulate conventional arms transfers is a
relatively novel and foreign concept for Beijing and as such can only be incrementally
introduced and transplanted over time. The process of reconstituting an external norm so
that it becomes more congruent with a preexisting local normative order and national
interests is a complex and sensitive process, but one which can be traced through the
important contributions of local epistemic community and policy elites.

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Implications and Lessons Learned: China’s Evolving Foreign Policy

The application of socialization theory offers valuable analytic lessons for scholars
and practitioners with an interest in Chinese foreign and security policy. It is clearly in the
interests of the international community, particularly the European Union, its member states,
as well as civil society and non-governmental actors, to deepen and sustain the encouraging
trends Chinese officials have taken with regards to supporting a global treaty and regime on
conventional arms control, while moderating and hopefully changing their residual
reluctance and cautiousness in a more positive direction. An effective strategy thus needs to
respond to China’s emergence in a way that assures regional and global stability and
increasingly integrates the country as a partner, or at least not an outlier, in achieving a safer
and more secure world free from illicit trade of SALW and other conventional arms. To
uphold and sustain these important norms and to have an effective global conventional arms
regime, key stakeholders in the international community (be it the EU or civil society actors
like Saferworld) should continue to strengthen measures which encourage China to become
a more responsible actor in international affairs. In doing so, however, external observers
should be cognizant of the constraints on such international influence, but not allow that to
become an excuse for inaction.
Going forward, several key points are worth keeping in mind, particularly when
occasional frustrations are bound to occur in engaging with Chinese counterparts. First,
where an international consensus on a particular issue is clear, Beijing has tended to become
more supportive of or acquiesce to it, rather than being an active opponent and spoiler. By
and large, Beijing does not wish to be seen as an outlier on critical global and regional issues
108
as it is increasingly concerned with its image, status, reputation—factors that are at times far
more important and critical than material power or economic priorities. Hence, a critical
part of gaining China’s cooperation as supportive actor behind the conventional arms control
regime will continue to depend in the future on such key actors as the EU and global civil
society to forge broader international (including the United States) support to shape and
influence Chinese policies in a positive direction. This approach has worked well on such
questions as non-proliferation in the nuclear and chemical weapons realm, multilateral
security mechanisms, and other confidence- and security-building measures, and
counterterrorism.
Second, there is also a need to understand that Beijing’s choices to take more
positive measures on conventional arms control will first and foremost derive from its own
realization that it is in Chinese interests to do so. Hence, an effective socialization strategy
must make a convincing case that China’s commitment to becoming a more responsible
stakeholder is not only in the interests of international society, but is equally or even more so
in China’s interests. This appears to be China’s understanding as it recognizes the value of
multilateral security and confidence-building measures, where it conforms to regional and
global norms and takes measured steps to convince others and demonstrate its beliefs of
supportive and constructive intentions. To be sure, on conventional arms transfers, SALW,
and the ATT, there remains plenty of work ahead to convince the Chinese to ratify this
global agenda, most probably so because committing to the arms control regime means that
it will be expected to in some way shape or form support and promote a degree of
democratic governance and human rights. Moreover, there are conservative and nationalist
voices at home that have strong ties with and interests to shield the Chinese defense
industries and will continue to harbor skeptical views of such restrictive arms control regime
109
and norm as the ATT. How Chinese decision-makers balance and reconcile these
conflicting interests is thus critical and merits continued observation and sustained
engagement with a broadening range of Chinese policy elites on conventional arms control
issues.
And third, there remains a degree of cautious optimism for greater Chinese support
on the ATT and its eventual ratification of the treaty. Much of this can be gleaned from the
domestic decision-making dynamics within China on conventional arms transfers. As
discussed earlier, the decision-making structure remains problematic. In recent years, there
have been more instances of internal disagreements on how to best proceed with a number
of major conventional arms deals. When such a stalemate occurs, the case is sent up the
hierarchical chain and the Central Military Commission and the State Council have the final
say. Interestingly, the military does not necessarily win the debate at the end of the day; as
in the “ship of shame” incident with Zimbabwe in 2008, for example, the final decision was
to rescind and cancel the deal.
137

The broader takeaway from this last observation then is that the Chinese decision-
makers are pragmatic; they know when to pull the plug on problematic arms deals and when
to deflect international criticisms. As such, at this early and uncertain stage of the debate,
the decision-making process seems to approach arms deals on a case-by-case basis. The
observation that the conservative and militarist arm of the decision-making circles does not
necessarily always win at the end of the day, and the fact that the Chinese position on
conventional arms transfers is far from being set in stone in one direction or another bears a
degree of good news for external observers.

137
For a more comprehensive account of this development, see: Samuel Spiegel and Philippe le
Billon, “China’s Weapons Trade: From Ships of Shame to the Ethics of Global Resistance,”
International Affairs 85, no. 2, 2009.
110
External actors seeking to influence and persuade the policymaking process should
continue to support research, engage, and recognize what has worked in the past in the
broader non-proliferation and arms control regimes, what has not, and what is likely to work
in the future in drawing China closer to assuming even more the role of a responsible
stakeholder in global affairs. It will undoubtedly require a greater openness on the
international community’s part to recognize, appreciate, and, where necessary and possible,
make changes that are more receptive to developing countries’ as well as Chinese concerns
and interests.

Conclusion

Applying socialization theory to China’s position on conventional arms control and
the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) provides a more comprehensive and thorough context to
understand the nuances and process behind China’s changing normative behavior. The
scope and conditions under which China’s evolving policy takes place can be assessed
through three stages. First, the interactive process of socialization is most effective when
Chinese policy elites are in a novel and uncertain environment and are motivated to analyze
and process new information. Unlike the broader nuclear non-proliferation norms,
conventional arms control and ATT are unfamiliar and relatively new issues in international
security for Chinese decision-makers. The EU, through its office of non-proliferation and
arms control, has thus seized upon this opportunity and worked with European inter-
governmental organizations like the International Committee of the Red Cross, civil society
actors like Saferworld, and other EU member states like the British Foreign and
Commonwealth Office to help introduce and explain the normative content of and emerging
111
debates on conventional arms control regime to Chinese government officials and arms
control experts.
Second, Chinese policy elites are increasingly eager to learn and absorb these
normative debates as China seeks to achieve a “legitimate” great power status in the
international community. These sustained dialogues with EU counterparts have allowed
Chinese policy elites to better understand how and where China can contribute to the
ongoing discussions on the Arms Trade Treaty. As discussed in the China-EU-Africa track
1.5/semi-official security dialogue that the EU helped convene in the summer of 2010,
Chinese policy elites are beginning to understand some of the most pressing security
challenges in Africa—according to the African participants, the proliferation of small arms
and light weapons and other conventional weaponry, most of which originated in China,
have exacerbated regional conflicts. Chinese participants recognize the problems of a
business-as-usual approach when it comes to conventional arms deals, and the outcome of
such a dialogue has helped identified ways in which pragmatic collaboration between the
Chinese government and the African Union, as well as between China, the EU, and African
partners can be forged to help support the Arms Trade Treaty and calls for greater vigilance
in conventional arms transactions.
And third, the need to monitor and regulate conventional arms transfers is a
relatively novel and foreign concept for Beijing and as such can only be incrementally
introduced and diffused over time. The more interactive the process, the more likely
socialization will be successful. As discussed above, most of these dialogues and
discussions since 2009 took place under closed-door, less politicized and more insulated,
private settings that were deemed to be more conducive for frank and interactive exchanges.
112
Socialization theory also helps extend the debate and builds bridges with structural
realism as well as rational choice theory in the IR field. The process of socialization and
constructivist ontology posit that continuous social interaction between policy elites of the
socialized state and agents of the socializing international institutions can, over time, lead to
changing social contexts that in turn influence and shape states’ identity and interest.
Structural realism’s version of socialization only provides one part of the puzzle, focusing
mainly on states’ tendency to pursue balance of power politics in a state of perpetual
anarchy and uncertainty. But, states can also be socialized into cooperative behavior and
move beyond balancing, zero-sum and relative power considerations. Put simply, if self-
image and identity is ever-changing, then states can be socialized into or out of perceptions
of the world as competition for power and influence in an anarchic environment.
Socialization theory also builds upon rational choice arguments. China’s attempts to
identify more closely with the developing world, particularly in Africa where it is becoming
increasingly active, and to seek external confirmation of its status as a responsible, major
power are increasingly been important considerations behind the socialization process and
more active engagement in conventional arms control. Such concepts as human rights and
international humanitarian law are entering (albeit gradually) the Chinese foreign policy
decision-making process. In other words, there are factors beyond crude cost-benefit
calculus that matter as well. The process-tracing approach discussed in this chapter
indicates that through the EU-China socialization mechanism, China’s evolving position on
the ATT and conventional arms control have been incremental but more importantly
sustained over the last two years because of normative shifts and considerations.
The next step for the socialization agenda is to apply the proposed scope conditions
to other “hard cases” regarding Chinese policy elites’ socialization behavior in even more
113
normative and sensitive security issues as negotiations over territorial disputes. The
research design will follow the same procedure as the present study and would help move
forward the application of status concerns and socialization processes, especially beyond the
European context. The “hard cases” will continue to be a challenging end for socialization
theory, which would be desirable from a social scientific point of view.

114

Chapter Five: Reluctant Restraint in the South China Sea
115
Reluctant Restraint in the South China Sea

In recent years, and especially since 2009, the South China Sea has emerged as one
of the most important security flash points in East Asia. The South China Sea bears a
number of critical security and economic interests for littoral states in the region, including
but not limited to claims to exclusive rights to develop and exploit maritime and energy
resources, freedom of navigation on the high seas, and the defense of sovereignty to
demonstrate and enforce maritime rights in the regional waters. All of these factors – largely
material-based interests – have led pundits and analysts to quickly declare the South China
Sea as a sea bed of confrontation and a “new theater of conflict” in global politics.
138
Yet,
despite the South China Sea’s increasing importance, it is not entirely clear whether conflict
and cooperation is inevitable. In particular, the variation of China’s negotiation behavior in
the South China Sea have received little sustained analysis. There are many descriptions of
the latest developments in the South China Sea, but these largely journalistic accounts do not
explain how and why China’s behavior has ranged from reluctant restraint to assertiveness.
In this chapter, I assess two theories of international relations – status and
socialization – as possible explanations for changes and variations foreign policy behavior.
Chinese decision-makers supported and participated in regional multilateralism and
cooperative diplomacy in the mid-1990s to early 2000s even though there were limited
material power gains. In spite of this remarkable embracement of multilateralism, Chinese
decision-makers maintained reservations about institutionalizing a closely-knit and
expansive regional security community. I argue the regional security mechanism for
normative suasion that can counter China’s realpolitik concerns have always been

138
Robert Kaplan, “The South China is the Future of Conflict,” Foreign Policy (September 2011).
116
insufficient and may be weaker than commonly presumed. The deepening divisions and the
lack of clear consensus within ASEAN compound the challenge of influencing China to
moderate Beijing’s longstanding, baseline principle and understanding of state sovereignty
on the South China Sea.
Given the heightened strategic importance of the South China Sea to U.S. and
regional interests in the Asia-Pacific region, and given the dearth of theoretically cogent and
convincing argument explaining and assessing variations in Chinese preferences in the
South China Sea, this chapter addresses how status concerns can lead to varying degrees of
socialization in foreign policy behavior. The theoretical, empirical, and policy lessons drawn
from this research shed important insights into what has worked in the past, what has not,
and what is likely to work in the future in drawing China closer to assuming the role of a
responsible, major power in the South China Sea.

Social Influence as a Source of China’s Reluctant Restraint

The notion that status matters has become increasingly important in international
relations theory. In spite of this general agreement, there is a deeply embedded
preoccupation with conceptualizing status through the lens of military force and material
power capabilities. While war is an important phenomenon in international politics, the
significance of material power interest has been over-emphasized. As discussed, rising
powers’ aspirations to attain higher status in international society cannot be realized through
sheer use of brute force and/or military capabilities. Nor can they unilaterally challenge the
status quo to demonstrate and demand their rightful place in the community of states. The
117
acquiescence of lesser powers to defer to legitimate great powers comes with expectations
that the latter category of states will uphold the core norms of international society, play an
active part in reinforcing them, and are bestowed with special rights and managerial duties
to do so. Hence, unlike influence based on the authority’s possession of power or resources,
the influence is motivated by deference, shared values, and expectations of each party’s role
in the relationship. This results in greater stability in international society, where status-
seeking states end up reinforcing the accepted social structures, norms, and values that
govern international society.
The common understanding of what constitutes as major power status in
international relations today is markedly different than in the past. Historically, major power
identity is often associated with military assertiveness and expansive empires, as seen in the
colonial era.
139
But in contemporary international politics, major powers are often seen as
those leading and upholding international institutions that contribute to stable interstate
relations and global governance. In a stark contrast to major powers of the past, major
powers today are thus expected to socialize into pro-normative, status quo behavior. The
majority of states in the international system today reject archaic, colonial-era interpretations
and models of exploitative empires and power inequalities.
140
This provides an important
rationale for states seeking legitimacy, authority, and status today to modify unilateral and
militarist behaviors, and to more actively participate in and support regional and
international institutions instead.
In short, the field has been impoverished by its insulation from studies of status
beyond material power capabilities. Status maximization can in fact elicit different kinds of

139
Abram Chayes and Antonia Chayes, The New Sovereignty: Compliance with International
Regulatory Agreements (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1996), p. 230.
140
Ibid.
118
socialization and cooperative behavior from states in their foreign policy. For instance,
social identity theory has advanced our understanding that an actor’s desire to burnish its
standing and reputation and to gain acceptance and inclusion in social institutions can be an
important source of cooperative behavior. Confirming the work of sociologists and
organizational theorists, Martha Finnemore finds that group conformity and doing what is
socially appropriate are key motivations in human behavior.
141
These incentives for pro-
normative behavior derive from social influence through a combination of social rewards
and punishments. Evidence of social rewards or back-patting include status, a sense of
belonging, and conformity with role expectations. On the other hand, social opprobrium
includes naming-and-shaming, exclusion, and loss of status.
Conforming with an “in-group” identity thus embed a strong degree of social
pressure and incentive for compliant behavior. But, it is questionable the degree to which the
actor has a “buy-in” or fully subscribes to, believes, and internalizes the beliefs and values
of the social group to which it seeks to belong. According to Betz, Skowronski, and Ostrom,
normative social influence can be best summed up as such: “I believe the answer is X, but
others said Y, and I don’t want to rock the boat, so I’ll say Y.”
142

Social opprobrium serves an important consideration for group conformity. As Oran
Young puts it, “policy makers, like private individuals are sensitive to the social opprobrium
that accompanies violations of widely accepted behavioral prescriptions. They are, in short,
motivated by a desire to avoid the sense of shame or social disgrace that commonly befalls

141
Martha Finnemore, “Norms, Culture, and World Politics: Insights from Sociology’s
Institutionalism,” International Organization 50, no. 2 (1996), pp. 325-327.
142
Andrew Betz, John Skowronski, and Thomas Ostrom, “Shared Realities: Social Influence and
Stimulus Memory,” Social Cognition 14, no. 2 (1996), pp. 113-140.
119
those who break widely accepted rules.”
143
Status concerns and maximization are thus not
necessarily altruistic. In fact, it reflects the actor’s pursuit to maximize social recognition
and rewards and to minimize public shaming and sanctions bestowed by the group.
Over time, these social interactions and influence can lead to greater acceptance and
closer adherence to the values, beliefs, and norms that the group espouses. Conformity,
compliance, and cooperation occur not simply because of social costs and benefits for doing
so. The changes in the actor’s preference are far deeper and more substantive, often resulting
from persuasion and the quality of contact and engagement among actors in the group or
institution. The process of argumentation, persuasion, and learning play key roles, whereby
attitudinal changes on a particular issue occurs without coercion. Perloff describes such
normative suasion as “an activity or process in which a communicator attempts to induce a
change in the belief, attitude, or behavior of another person...through the transmission of a
message in a context in which the persuadee has some degree of free choice.”
144

Persuasion thus reflects a deeper level of socialization toward normative compliance
than social influence. It is a process of convincing another actor through principled
argument and debate. Status concerns can also serve as a powerful motivation for counter-
realpolitik socialization and preference change. In the realm of international politics,
decision-makers can decide to take on self-constraining commitments and be persuaded to
take on foreign policy actions in the absence of material power gains, benefits, or coercion.
For example, one of the clearest indications and highest thresholds for normative learning
and preference change occurs when states adopt cooperative security tendencies over zero-

143
Oran Young, “The Effectiveness of International Institutions: Hard Cases and Critical Variables,”
in James Rosenau and Ernst-Otto Czempiel, eds., Governance without Government: Order and
Change in World Politics (Cambrdige: Cambridge University Press, 1992), pp. 160-194.
144
Richard Perloff, The Dynamics of Persuasion (Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1993), p.
14.
120
sum strategies, when they assess threats as situational--attributed less to the fixed nature of
an adversary than to some changeable condition for mutual interaction--and when violence
or the use of force is considered counter-productive. In other words, the fundamental
evaluation and outlook on the strategic environment is malleable and results from intensive
social interactions, dialogue, and communication among concerned actors and parties about
the benefits of cooperative security and multilateral efforts to reduce tensions,
misperception, and incentives for the use of force.
Having briefly discussed the theoretical dimensions of status concerns and
socialization behavior, the next task is to try to empirically test and confirm whether the
changes in Chinese foreign policy outlook regarding the South China Sea reflect social
influence or normative suasion. The findings bear important theoretical, empirical, and
policy implications. If the oft-touted Chinese embracement of cooperative diplomacy in the
late-1990s through early 2000s indicated a clear paradigmatic shift toward cooperative,
multilateral security as a preferred source of state security, then the tensions in the South
China Sea of late point to a regression in Chinese behavior toward more visible realpolitik
tendencies. On the other hand, the observation that China has become more assertive of late
in the South China Sea becomes less convincing (or at least needs more nuance) if China’s
baseline policy toward state sovereignty had always remained more or less consistent. In
other words, if assertiveness implies new and unilateral actions to alter the status quo in a
dispute, it is not entirely clear that China has become more assertive in the South China Sea
maritime disputes.

ASEAN Regional Forum, ASEAN, and China’s Foreign Policy Shift
121

The establishment of the ASEAN Regional Forum in July 1994 pinned high hopes
that a security dialogue modeled after the European OSCE would improve and expand
regional security and cohesiveness. Membership in the ARF has since expanded to 23
members, including all major countries across East Asia, South Asia, and the wider Asia-
Pacific realm. The ARF’s principal meeting is the annual foreign ministers’ dialogue and a
senior official summitry. The ten Southeast Asian countries in ASEAN constitute the core of
the ARF. As such, the ARF operates in the “ASEAN Way,” which emphasizes consultation
and consensus for the purpose of creating a security agenda that includes the broadest
common denominator for all participants. The regional organization’s priorities are to
develop confidence and security building measures, preventive diplomacy mechanisms, and
conflict resolution arrangements. These three priorities would be addressed in sequential
order, and since 1994, the ARF remains focused on developing a set of regional confidence
building measures. The lack of consensus has thus far prevented the organization from
developing the last two phases to any meaningful or substantive degree.
China arguably is one of the key actors in the multilateral forum that seeks to keep
the ARF’s mandate narrow and focused on confidence building measures. Senior Chinese
officials have emphasized the ARF to evolve slowly expressed concern about the
organization to transform too rapidly into an institutionalized security architecture and
community.
145
According to former Chinese vice premier and foreign minister Qian Qichen,
regional security institutions should focus on the lowest common denominator issues and
approach. He added:

145
Wu Peng, “A Treatise on China’s Security Concept for the Asia-Pacific Region and
Devleopment,” World Economy and Politics 5 (1999), pp. 12-16.
122

“The Asia-Pacific nations have different historical traditions,
cutltureal origins, political systems, religious beliefs, and even value
systems and development levels. Naturally they have different
views and proposals on the security situation and cooperation…We
should fully consider the above historical and, at the same time,
current characteristics of this region…Only if it is based on the
common interests and needs of all members, can the [ARF] forum
succeed in promoting healthy development in this region…Different
values and norms could be best overcome by strengthening bilateral
relations with other states and by rigidly observing the principle of
equality in all negotiations.”
146

Chinese analysts also consistently voiced discomfort with the organization becoming
directly involved with regional conflicts.
147
Instead, they view the organization’s purpose to
be one that forges consensus among regional states before liaising with other multilateral
institutions like the United Nations to help manage local and regional crises.
148
More
specifically, Chinese officials were worried that sensitive security issues like Taiwan and the
South China Sea disputes would become a part of the multilateral discussions. They were

146
Qian Qichen, “China’s Position on Asia-Pacific Security,” Beijing Review, August 8, 1994, p. 21-
22.
147
Yan Xuetong, “China’s Security after the Cold War,” Contemporary International Relations 3,
no. 5 (1993), pp. 1-16.
148
Ding Kuison, “ASEAN Regional Forum: Its Role in Asia-Pacific Security Cooperation,”
Contemporary International Relations 8, no. 7 (1998), pp. 14-27.
123
equally alarmed at the prospect that powerful states, especially the United States, would
dominate the security agenda and shape it to China’s detriment.
In spite of its skepticism of the purpose of the regional security architecture, Chinese
officials understood that nonparticipation and being conspicuously left out in multilateral
security mechanisms was riskier than involvement, however selective and carefully
considered.
149
Its interest in multilateralism evolved albeit gradually and limited to the
confines of the core principle in Chinese foreign policy—non-interference and respect for
state sovereignty. Chinese officials, concerned with the reputational risks and social costs of
being an obstacle in multilateral security mechanisms, took a number of steps in the late
1990s to early 2000s to initiate new security arrangements outside of the ARF structure,
which by and large was an organization China had little role in creating in the first place and
where it was relegated to a more junior status compared to the United States. Beijing thus
sought to achieve greater political and diplomatic advantage and clout with its Southeast
Asian neighbors by establishing parallel forums and China-ASEAN-focused security
dialogues and mechanisms as a way to forge an alternative approach to Asia-Pacific security
mechanisms and to generate a subtle opposition to U.S.-led alliances and security
arrangements in the region. This served as an important consideration and motivation for
Beijing to engage with its Southeast Asian partners more closely in the late 1990s and early
2000s.
Most significantly, China and ASEAN entered into an agreement in November 2002
with the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea. The purpose of the
joint agreement was to reduce the potential for tension and conflict in the disputed areas in

149
Banning Garrett and Bonnie Glaser, “Multilateral Security in the Asia-Pacific Region and its
Impact on Chinese Interests: Views from Beijing,” Contemporary Southeast Asia 16, no. 1 (1994),
pp. 14-34.
124
the South China Sea, and it committed all claimant states to resolve the territorial and
jurisdictional disputes through peaceful means without resorting to the threat or use of force.
The agreement also encouraged all parties to “exercise self-restraint in the conduct of
activities that would complicate or escalate disputes and affect peace and stability.”
Subsequently, the claimant states agreed to establish a consultation mechanism to address
the disputed claims, to provide voluntary notice of military exercises in the South China Sea,
and to collaborate on joint research in marine science, environmental protection, disaster
relief and search and rescue operations. The agreement was an important initiative and
marked the first time that China indicated its openness to manage the disputes on a
multilateral basis.
The following year in October 2003, China acceded to the ASEAN Treaty of Amity
and Cooperation in Southeast Asia. The treaty urges China, along with other signatory
states, to “refrain from the threat or use of force…and at all times settle such disputes among
themselves through friendly negotiations.” The treaty also urges China to “foster
cooperation in the furtherance of the cause of peace, harmony, and stability in the region,”
and to “not in any manner or form participate in any activity which shall constitute a threat
to the political and economic stability, sovereignty, or territorial integrity” of the other
parties in the region.
By signing on to the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea
and the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, Chinese decision-makers were keen to establish a
strategic partnership with its Southeast Asian neighbors and a greater leadership role vis-à-
vis Japan and the United States in the region. The diplomatic initiatives may have allayed
near-term concerns about China’s long-term ambitions, but it does not mean that China has
abandoned its views on the importance of realpolitik interest in great power relations. It was
125
not clear that a fundamental paradigmatic shift in Chinese foreign policy emerged during
this time period, in spite of its greater flexibility and interest in regional security
mechanisms. In other words, because the Declaration was a non-binding agreement, Chinese
decision-makers did not really concede to an accommodationist policy. In fact, as Johnston
and Evans observe, “institutions merely obstruct non-cooperative behavior, but do not
change the interests motivating the behavior.”
150
Instead, realpolitik interests remain a strong
consideration during this time period in Chinese foreign policy. As Rosemary Foot
summarizes, “What this campaign against bilateral alliances [in the late 1990s to early
2000s] suggests is that the intrinsic worth of the multilateral security approach has yet to be
accepted at the highest levels in Beijing and is primarily valued for tis possible contribution
to the weakening of U.S. ties with its Asian allies. The hope is that such weakening will lead
to a reduction in the American presence in the region.”
151

The oft-touted Chinese embracement of cooperative diplomacy in the late-1990s to
early 2000s reflects reluctant restraint, with social influence and opprobrium from its
Southeast Asian neighbors as an important consideration for group conformity. Status
concerns and maximization are thus not necessarily altruistic. As discussed, Beijing was
keen to maximize social recognition and rewards and to minimize public shaming and
sanctions bestowed by the increasing number of security mechanisms in the region. It
expressed strong reservations about the security agendas that would curb traditional state
sovereignty and prerogatives and limited discussions on conflict resolution and mediation in
such multilateral fora as the ARF and ASEAN. It supported and signed on to such important

150
Alastair Iain Johnston and Paul Evans, “China’s Engagement with Multilateral Security
Institutions,” in Alastair Iain Johnston and Robert Ross, eds., Engaging China: The Management of
an Emerging Power (New York: Routledge, 1999), p. 237.
151
Rosemary Foot, “China in the ASEAN Regional Forum: Organizational Processes and Domestic
Modes of Thought,” Asian Survey 38, no. 5 (1998), pp. 425-440.
126
initiatives regarding peace and security in Southeast Asia as the Treaty of Amity and
Cooperation and the Declaration on the Code of Conduct in the South China Sea. Given the
unanimity and strong level of consensus among Southeast Asian countries that signing these
initiatives – with lofty but non-binding clauses that lack substantive, enforcement measures
– would be key to avoid public shaming and win group recognition, Chinese policies on
such sensitive territorial and security issues shifted largely as a result of social influence.
As such, the observation that China has become more assertive of late in the South
China Sea becomes less convincing (or at least needs more nuance), given that China’s
baseline policy toward state sovereignty had always remained more or less consistent since
the late 1990s through early 2000s. In other words, if assertiveness implies new and
unilateral actions to alter the status quo in a dispute, it is not entirely clear that China has
become more assertive in the South China Sea maritime disputes.

Reluctant Restraint and a Continuation of China’s Baseline Principle on the South China
Sea

An increasing number of analysts see the growing tensions in the South China Sea as
evidence of China’s assertiveness and hegemonic ambitions in the region. As discussed,
however, it is not actually clear that China has become more assertive. Most important,
China has not altered or expanded the content of either its sovereignty claims or maritime
rights claims in the South China Sea; in fact, upon closer analysis, its defense of the
historical claims in the South China Sea remain ambiguous and lack consistency. In fact,
what we see and observe today reflects a consistent approach by Chinese decision-makers to
127
apply and extend Beijing’s baseline principle and policy on the South China Sea from the
late 1990s. To be sure, China now possesses greater military capabilities, and likewise,
other claimant states in the region, especially the Philippines and Vietnam, have also
asserted their claims more actively. These developments, in turn, have led Chinese decision-
makers to view its actions as responding to the assertiveness of other states that challenge
Chinese claims. Security dilemmas, as such, in high-tension areas like the South China Sea
polarize the behavior of each side, thus confirming the other’s worst-case assumptions and
attribution errors and exacerbating tensions in the region.
China’s “nine-dash line” map of its claims in the South China Sea was included in a
note verbale submitted to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf
(CLCS) in 2009.
152
The map, however, was not officially defined and the observation that
the lines were dashed marks, as opposed to solid lines, indicate an “indefinite or uncertain
boundary.”
153
The lines remain undefined today and lacks any official geographical
coordinates and lacks any precision for enforcement or implementation to verify its
territorial or maritime claims in the South China Sea. This renders the map to retain only
illustrative value but serve little to no probative purpose in advancing China’s actual claims.
Its ambiguous position on the map thus raises several questions of whether such vagueness
is an indicator for subtle flexibility and preference to set aside competing sensitive territorial
claims for practical cooperation in the South China Sea.
Consider, for example, the basis for China’s claims in the South China Sea. Its
“nine-dash” line map is largely based on “historical rights,” but it has yet to clarify whether
these claims encompass the maritime and territorial claims or just the latter. If the nine-dash

152
Zhiguo Gao and Bing Bing Jia, “The Nine-Dash Line in the South China Sea: History, Status, and
Implications,” American Society of International Law 107, no. 1 (January 2013), pp. 98-124.
153
Ibid.
128
lines are meant to include all maritime coasts surrounding the insular features in the South
China Sea, the claim would be expansive and encompass all territory – physical land mass
and the adjacent waters – in the South China Sea. Doing so, however, contradicts the
meaning and concept of historic waters, a special category pertaining to waters close to the
coastline of the claimant state. Claiming all of the waters situated hundreds of nautical miles
away from China’s coasts would be more than a stretch. Chinese legal experts on
international law acknowledge the inherent contradictions and the lack of legal justification
of “historical claims.” While Chinese explorers and fishermen have enjoyed navigation and
fishing rights in the South China Sea for centuries, these historical privileges and access in
the past do not translate neatly into establishing China’s rights and sovereignty in present-
day waters. And, as such, it has chosen to leave the geographical scope of its claims vague
and ambiguous with subtle indication that its preference is to avoid having to clarify such
legal boundaries and focus instead on joint development in the South China Sea.
154

Legal precedents in international law also indicate that historical maps should only
be used with caution, especially in deciding matters of sovereignty. The geographical
accuracy, the cartographer’s sources of information and coordinates, and whether the map
had been commissioned by a government involved in the dispute all contribute to the legal
and probative value of the map. In 2011, China followed-up its submission of claims to the
UN with an additional official note verbale, reaffirming its basic claim to the South China
Sea but dropped any reference to the “nine-dash” line map. Legal scholars have indicated
that this could be interpreted as a subtle indication that Chinese decision-makers may have
dropped any reliance on asserting claims via the map, taking note of its poor probative value
of China’s claim. Moreover, the lack of any official endorsement by China on the

154
Research interviews in Beijing, China, conducted from March 2014 and May 2014.
129
international level before 2009 weakens and undermines any potential attempt to rely on the
map. The understated position of the map’s ambiguity and the nine-dash line is that China’s
claims in the South China Sea may be more confined and less ambitious than what most
observers perceive; instead, it reflects a more moderate position where Beijing’s claim is
limited to some of the islands, reefs, and their adjacent waters entitled under the UN
Convention of the Law of the Seas and the 200-mile Exclusive Economic Zone.
Relatedly, in 2010, it was reported that China had labeled the South China Sea as a
“core interest,” on par with sensitive territorial issues like Tibet, Xinjiang, and Taiwan. Yet,
to date, no senior Chinese leader has ever publicly described the South China Sea as a core
interest, although it may have been discussed in one or more private meetings between U.S.
and Chinese officials.
155
An official report in Xinhua in 2011 indicated that China “has
indisputable sovereignty over the (South China) sea’s islands and surrounding waters, which
is part of China’s core interests.”
156
In this context, the article to territorial sovereignty over
the islands and the related 12-nautical-mile territorial seas (maritime space over which states
exercise sovereignty), not to the South China Sea as a whole, furthering the point on the
limitations of its nine-dash line claims.
China’s approach to enforcing its claims in the South China Sea has largely relied on
the Coast Guard and other civilian agencies, rather than relying on the People’s Liberation
Army Navy forces. The Bureau of Fisheries Administration has increased the number of
fleets in the South China Sea and Coast Guard patrols in the high seas have increased as
well. But, to date, Beijing remains wary of deploying naval assets to defend its territorial
claims and to date no shooting battle has occurred between China and the claimant states,

155
Michael Swaine, “China’s Assertive Behavior – Part One: On ‘Core Interests,’” China
Leadership Monitor 34 (Winter 2011).
156
Ibid.
130
unlike in the late 1980s and early 1990s where it used armed forced to resolve the competing
claims in the South China Sea on its own terms.
Internally, a number of recent changes occurred to shape the decision-making
processes with regards to the South China Sea. The establishment of a Central Leading
Small Group on the Protection of Maritime Interests in 2012 drew senior officials from the
State Oceanic Administration (SOA), Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA), Ministry of Public
Security (MPS), Ministry of Agriculture (MOA), and the PLA Navy. Most notably, a
majority of the officials in the working group represent civilian agencies and interests and
serve as a counterweight to armed and naval forces in the decision-making process. At the
National People’s Congress in March 2012, Chinese officials also formalized plans to
restructure China’s main maritime law enforcement agencies. In particular, four of the major
maritime law enforcement forces (e.g., SOA maritime surveillance forces; MPS coast guard
forces; MOA fishery enforcement forces, and custom administration’s maritime anti-
smuggling police) will be merged as part of SOA with operations supervised by MPS.
Relying on these civilian agencies appears to be a deliberate choice and suggests that China
has sought to limit the potential for escalation through how it chooses to assert and enforce
its claims to maritime rights. An explicit shift to using naval assets – and replacing them
with civilian and other law enforcement agencies – against fishermen and armed forces from
other claimant states in the South China Sea would point to greater Chinese assertiveness.
The recent escalation of tension in the South China Sea, for example, is a case in
point. The Scarborough Shoal is a group of tiny rocks and reefs roughly 120 miles west of
the Philippines’ Subic Bay. In April 2012, a Philippine Navy surveillance plane detected
Chinese fishing vessels in the Scarborough Reef engaging in illegal fishing and poaching of
protected corals, endangered clams, and sharks. Officials in the Philippines quickly
131
deployed its naval vessels to arrest and detain the Chinese fishermen. The Chinese maritime
surveillance ships nearby were informed of the arrest and protested the Philippines’
deployment of naval vessels for the interdiction and law enforcement operation, accusing
Manila for militarizing the dispute. The Chinese government then quickly responded with
Coast Guard and maritime ships to prevent the Philippine authorities from detaining the
Chinese fishermen, spurring off a tense ten week stand-off between the two sides. Chinese
maritime vessels cast a wide rope barrier at the mouth of the reef, trapping some Filipino
fishermen in the area and then prevented their re-entry once they were permitted to exit. In
June, the Philippines withdrew its naval forces from the Scarborough Shoal, effectively
conceding the reefs to Chinese patrol and control.
The incident sparked regional concerns about China’s territorial ambitions in the
South China Sea, but its actions also reflected a degree of restraint. It was careful not to
deploy military assets to the Scarborough Shoal, using its coast guard and maritime
surveillance vessels to square off with the Philippine naval forces. In an interview with the
press in June 2012, the Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the People’s Liberation Army
Ma Xiaotian condemned the use of force and reiterated that the PLA would not deploy its
naval assets as a first resort to resolve the territorial disputes with the Philippines. Ma added
that diplomacy remains the best and preferred method to resolve the issue. The comments,
coming directly from the inner-core of China’s military establishment, were in pointed
contrast to other retired PLA officers who have previously called for the use of force to
demonstrate China’s resolve and enforce the territorial claims.
157
A number of Southeast
Asia countries also shared China’s concern that the Philippines’ decision to detain the

157
Taylor Fravel, “The PLA and the South China Sea,” The Diplomat, June 17, 2012,
http://thediplomat.com/china-power/pla-and-the-south-china-sea/.
132
Chinese fishermen with naval vessels instigated the standoff in the first place. Law
enforcement activities in the South China Sea have largely been dealt with regional coast
guard or other civilian maritime surveillance ships. The deployment of military assets
aggravated the situation unnecessarily, and ASEAN was reluctant to back one of its own
members for overplaying its hand in the Scarborough Shoal incident.
A number of influential military strategists have also concurred with the need for
more robust civilian forces and agencies to help patrol the maritime borders in the South
China Sea. In “Notes on Maritime Security Strategy in the New Period in the New Century,”
for example, a notable article published in China’s most prestigious military journal, 中国军
事科学 [China Military Science] argues, “to safeguard the EEZ, it is not usual to employ
military forces. If military forces are employed, they will often expand the scope of the
incident, causing the situation to become more and more complicated … To resolve such
problems, many countries have coast guards.”
158
Moreover, the piece is quite emphatic in
stating that negotiation has been and will remain China’s approach to maritime territorial
disputes, asserting that “Since the founding of the new China, under the direction of Mao …
Deng … Jiang … and Hu … the Chinese government has used the foreign policy
instruments of ‘negotiations, declarations of differences, and adopting measures to build
trust’ … which has yielded obvious successes … resolving to a large extent the problems of
maritime rivalry and preventing hidden dangers.”
159
The article, published in such a high
profile journal on a topic of great sensitivity, reflects the emerging consensus in China’s
senior military leadership circle.

158
Sun Jingping, “Notes on Maritime Security Strategy in the New Period in the New Century,”
China Military Science (June 2008), pp. 77-79.
159
Ibid.
133
Concern among the region about growing tensions in the South China Sea produced
an agreement between China and ASEAN in July 2011 on guidelines for implementing the
2002 Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea (DoC). Notwithstanding
the fact the guidelines so far lack substance, they were intended to decrease tensions and
prevent any further escalation. When combined with other recent developments, the
guidelines suggest that China may have started to moderate the manner in which it asserts
and exercises the maritime rights it claims.
The guidelines are symbolically important and reflect how social influence from the
region can pressure Beijing to take on a more moderated behavior. Both sides had been
discussing the guidelines for several years, but they disagreed over whether the guidelines
would state explicitly that ASEAN would follow its standard practice of meeting as a group
before holding talks with China. Within ASEAN, Vietnam insisted the inclusion of this
provision in the guidelines. In late June 2011, a breakthrough occurred when Vietnam’s
deputy foreign minister Ho Xuan Son traveled to Beijing as a special enjoy. According to a
statement released following his visit, China and Vietnam agreed to accelerate bilateral
negotiations over maritime issues and to “boost the implementation of the (DoC) … so that
substantial progress will be achieved soon.”
160
Subsequently, Vietnam reportedly dropped
its insistence that such language be included in the guidelines, and China agreed that
ASEAN would continue its practice of meeting as a group before meeting with China. The
diplomatic breakthrough over the guidelines allowed all sides to demonstrate their
commitment to limiting the escalation of tensions.
Top Chinese leaders have subsequently reaffirmed that China’s approach to the
disputes in the South China Sea should remain based on Deng Xiaoping’s guideline of

160
“Guidelines Agreed with ASEAN on Sea Disputes,” China Daily, July 21, 2011.
134
“sovereignty is ours, set aside disputes, pursue joint development.” Shortly after the July
2011 meeting of the ARF, for example, a high-profile and authoritative collection of essays
and thoughts by senior officials affirming Deng’s guiding principles on the South China Sea
was publicly released, providing key insights into subtle but important signs of moderation a
further effort to reduce tensions.
A number of analyses published in China have also been advocating for continuing
China’s moderate and non-confrontational stance, and also to work with ASEAN partners
for a measured resolution to the South China Sea conflict. For example, such views are
evident in an analysis with the title “On the ‘Seeking Joint Development’ Issue in the South
China Sea,” published in in the official journal, 海洋开发与管理 [Ocean Development and
Management] of the State Oceanic Administration. The expert suggests, “a policy of ‘joint
development’ will help to realize our major objective in the South Sea, and will thus have
major significance for our country’s social and economic development.” In a surprisingly
candid appraisal of the current situation prevailing in the South China Sea, the author notes:
“As China’s comprehensive national strength has increased along with its military
capabilities and its requirements for energy resources, so ASEAN states’ anxiety about a
China threat has been increasing by the day since independently they have no prospect to
balance against China. … [They have taken steps] to unite together in order to cope with
China …[But China] has openly stated that it will not be the first to resort to the use of force
in the South Sea dispute.” This observation is significant in that it concedes that Beijing
needs to heed ASEAN’s anxieties and work collaboratively especially when there is a
regional consensus to do so.
135
Most notably, China’s turn in Southeast Asia toward moderation was part of broader
evaluation of China’s policies toward the countries and organizations along its periphery. A
high-level, closed-door two-day meeting on this subject in late October 2013—the first such
meeting known to specialists—was attended by all seven members of the party’s standing
committee.
161
After the meeting closed, Xinhua news agency reported on a speech delivered
by Xi Jinping, though the full deliberations of the meeting remained unavailable.
Subsequent official media and experts noted the problems China faced along its eastern
periphery, suggesting that the new tack toward Southeast Asia is designed to ease the
problems in the South China Sea, especially through working with ASEAN members to
come up with a binding set of rules and regulations concerning the South China Sea.
Negotiations on the Code of Conduct signal China’s preference to set aside the sovereignty
question and instead focus on ways to manage and jointly develop and govern the global
commons in the South China Sea.
To be sure, ASEAN leaders are monitoring and concerned about China’s actions and
intentions. K. Shanmugan, the Foreign Minister of Singapore, for example indicated quite
clearly that “we [ASEAN] want to see a code of conduct created; we want to see this
resolved peacefully through the Law of the Sea, through arbitration, through any other
means, but not direct confrontation and aggressive action.” Other recent ASEAN statements
on the South China Sea also point to the observation that regional leaders are working
toward greater consensus and pushing forward with greater multilateral efforts to dissuade
China from future provocations in the South China Sea and to persuade it to commit to and
comply with regional norms. The ASEAN foreign ministers, for example, are working
closely with strong support and endorsement of their counterparts from the United States,

161
Research interviews in Beijing, China, conducted in March 2014.
136
Japan, India, Korea, Australia, and others during the ASEAN Regional Forum in Myanmar
in August 2014. ASEAN’s collective political bargaining power will be further enhanced at
the East Asia Summit in November, where the leaders of the United States, Japan, and India,
among others, will most likely provide much-needed political and diplomatic support for the
regional organization. ASEAN’s ability to manage and reduce tension in the South China
Sea will gain leverage and become more significant with strong backing from other
stakeholders in the Asia-Pacific region, all of which should further persuade Chinese
decision-makers to take a more cooperative outlook on the South China Sea conflict.
In short, China has not been as assertive in this dispute as many observers contend.
China has not changed either the content or the scope its claims, although ambiguity
continues to surround the meaning of the nine-dashed line and its territorial claims. Overall,
China has generally responded to perceived challenges to its long-held claims and has
chosen to do so through its civil maritime law enforcement agencies rather than its military
forces.
Alternative Explanation: China’s Bargaining Power and Territorial Disputes

It would be useful to assess what China’s foreign policy behavior would like under
different scenarios, as explained by alternative theoretical frameworks that see increasing
and new assertiveness in China’s position in territorial disputes in the South China Sea. This
will help provide an illustrative first cut or plausibility test for the application of my
argument on status and socialization theory, and in particular how and why social influence
continues to restrain China’s position in the South China Sea. Doing so helps fit with Jeffrey
137
Legro’s call that those studying the normative effects on foreign policy outcome spend more
time making “explicitly relative assessment of alternative explanations for same events.”
162

Taylor Fravel has argued that changes in the state’s relative bargaining position can
influence its willingness to compromise, delay, or use force.
163
As a state’s bargaining
power or position in a dispute declines relative to a potential adversary, it may be more
willing to use force in order to achieve and secure its claims, a preventive move to deny
contested land to its opponent. Fravel identifies a state’s bargaining power to include its
ability to project military power over the entire disputed territory, as well as the amount of
contested area that it currently occupies. As such, when a state assesses that an adversary is
strengthening its bargaining position and material power capabilities, doing nothing
becomes more costly and threatening. This prompts the state to use force to halt or even
reverse its decline. Conversely, as its bargaining position and power improve, it may be
more willing to delay or seek accommodation, knowing that a position of strength is likely
to result in a favorable outcome or settlement.
Fravel’s theoretical explanation would expect that as China builds up and
modernizes its military capabilities, its leadership will feel more confident about resolving
the disputes and claims on its terms. China’s calculations and bargaining position, however,
could change if there are improved security ties between the other claimant states and the
United States. Feeling threatened, China might view the containment approach in the region
as a justification for the use of force as a preventive measure. Additionally, Fravel notes
that two additional factors could accelerate the likelihood of warlike behavior. One would be

162
Jeffrey Legro, “Which Norms Matter? Revisiting the ‘Failure’ of Internationalism,” International
Organization 51, no. 1 (1997), p. 58.
163
M. Taylor Fravel, Strong Border, Secure Nation: Cooperation and Conflict in China’s Territorial
Disputes (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008).
138
the sudden discovery of substantial deposits of natural resources such as oil and gas in the
contested seabed of the South China Sea. And, second, “a much stronger China may decide
to use force because, put simply, it can.”
164

Fravel’s research on China’s territorial disputes in contemporary history is both
theoretically informative and empirically important, but it is also problematic in explaining
China’s policy in managing maritime disputes that currently exist in East Asia. First, there is
an issue with Fravel’s measurement of bargaining power with material power capabilities.
China’s military power is undeniably increasing and has been for the last two decades. This
trend in the growth rate, however, is a constant and becomes increasingly difficult to falsify
in a social scientific perspective. To make a convincing (and falsifiable) causal argument,
any change in the explanatory variable has to occur prior to a change in the variable to be
explained. As such, any change in the key explanatory factors had to have been acute prior
to China’s current bargaining position.
Rather than focusing on military expenditure and power projection capabilities, it
may be helpful to unpack the qualitative measure and significance behind China’s military
power projection – specifically whether or not there are fundamental shifts in its leadership’s
assessment of the distribution of power in the international system that is causing concern or
alarm for the Chinese leadership. Doing so would presumably allow us to understand and
better identify where the leadership stands in terms of their bargaining position and their
power assessment relative to other potential adversaries.
While China’s military is expanding and modernizing, it is unclear that the
leadership has accepted the claim that there is a fundamental and clear shift in the

164
M. Taylor Fravel, “China’s Strategy in the South China Sea,” Contemporary Southeast Asia 33,
no. 3 (2011), pp. 292-319.
139
distribution of power in the international system that would give China new avenues to exert
its interests from a stronger and more confident position. Senior advisors to the top
leadership like Cui Liru maintains that the broad contours and goals of China’s foreign and
security policy still reflects the core principles that Deng Xiaoping espoused: creating and
maintaining a peaceful international, external environment for national development.
165
This
would include stable and peaceful relations with not only the United States, but also with
other countries in China’s periphery. It is thus very unlikely to challenge the existing
international order.
Elsewhere, the Chinese State Councillor Dai Bingguo, an influential scholar-
practitioner in the Chinese foreign policy-making apparatus, has also echoed similar
thinking, reaffirming Deng’s foreign policy guidelines to avoid conflictual relations with
China’s neighbors and instead pursue a path of “peaceful development.”
166
These
commentaries and axioms carry symbolic and substantive weight, providing an important
glimpse into the latest thinking, consensus, and future direction of Chinese foreign policy.
They reflect the vision of China’s status, power, and identity that are forged by its top
leaders. No senior leadership member has publicly repudiated or challenged these core
axioms and guidelines for China’s foreign policy.
These internal developments and thinking among foreign policy elites indicate that
China’s baseline foreign policy has not seen a fundamental shift; rather than a position of
strength and confidence, as Fravel would argue, China’s position remains cautious and is
focused on pursuing friendly relations with the United States as well as its neighbors in the

165
Cui Liru, “Sino-U.S. Relations in the New Era: Seek the Way to Coexistence,” Strategy and
Management 3, no. 4 (2010), pp. 66-67.
166
Dai Bingguo, “Adhere to the Path of Peaceful Development,” December 7, 2010,
http://www.chinanews.com/gn/2010/12-7/2704984.shtml.
140
Asia-Pacific region. Alienating its neighbors would create a hostile external environment
that would not be conducive to China’s path to development. As discussed, recent actions in
the South China Sea seem to indicate China’s willingness to engage in multilateral
escalation control mechanisms, especially with ASEAN. It has also refrained from using
force or from displaying its military and naval assets to coerce, threaten, or intimidate its
neighbors in the South China Sea.

Preliminary Conclusion

The oft-touted Chinese embracement of cooperative diplomacy in the late-1990s to
early 2000s reflects reluctant restraint, with social influence and opprobrium from its
Southeast Asian neighbors as an important consideration for group conformity. Status
concerns and maximization are thus not necessarily altruistic. As discussed, Beijing was
keen to maximize social recognition and rewards and to minimize public shaming and
sanctions bestowed by the increasing number of security mechanisms in the region. The
observation that China has become more assertive of late in the South China Sea becomes
less convincing (or at least needs more nuance), given that China’s baseline policy toward
state sovereignty had always remained more or less consistent since the late 1990s through
early 2000s. In other words, if assertiveness implies new and unilateral actions to alter the
status quo in a dispute, it is not entirely clear that China has become more assertive in the
South China Sea maritime disputes.
Recall the standard material structure claim of how China would behave in the South
China Sea: the imperatives of maximizing and defending China’s security in the high seas
would compel decision-makers to pursue Beijing’s national interests at all costs, including
141
but not limited to offensive uses of force, particularly when relative power is in China’s
favor in the South China Sea, and punishing such adversaries as Vietnam and the
Philippines with sanctions and other similar measures. The observation that war and conflict
has not been the obvious response of first resort indicate that ideational factors are important
to understanding China’s reluctant restraint in the South China Sea.
As a socialization argument, the security dilemma in such high-tension issues and
areas as the South China Sea has polarized the behavior of China, Vietnam, and the
Philippines, thus confirming each other’s worst-case scenarios, assumptions, and attribution
errors, and contributing to worsening relations between the conflicting parties. Such action-
reaction dynamic can be understood as a learned behavior, reinforced by experience.
Understood in this light, security dilemmas likewise hold out the prospects that decision-
makers exposed to a different set of social interactions could be socialized in alternative
understandings of achieving security, with the key implication being that foreign policy
behaviors can change, even if the anarchical material structure and its conflictual
ramifications persist and remain a constant.
Consider, for example, the Chinese ambassador in Manila’s recent remarks, which
added to regional angst about China possibly establishing an air defense identification zone
(ADIZ) over the South China Sea similar to its zone over the East China Sea; she responded
to local media querying about a possible zone in the South China Sea that it was “within
China’s right as to where and when to set up a new air identification zone.” The media
queries followed the announcement by the Chinese defense spokesman in explaining the
new zone in November 2013 that “China will establish other air defense zones at the right
time after necessary preparations are completed.”
142
Specialists, however, agree that the ambassador’s off-the-cuff remarks were ill-timed
and reflects poor policy coordination with Beijing. Concerns about the possibility of a
similar policy announcement in the South China Sea seem remote at this point. The uneven
roll-out of the ADIZ in the East China Sea indicates that while Beijing is maintaining the
rhetoric and keeping up appearances of an aspiring first-rate power, it lacks the capability to
enforce the stated policy of its ADIZ. Formally, China requires the submission of all flight
plans, including those transiting, its airspace, but countries have subsequently ignored this
and Beijing has yet to retaliate. It reflects more though of China’s intention to mimic what
Japan’s ADIZ in the East China Sea, symbolically challenging Tokyo’s administrative
control, and establishing symmetry in staking a clearer claim over the Senkaku/Diaoyu
Islands.
Social influence, as discussed, can restrain Chinese assertiveness, especially when
ASEAN, including both claimant and non-claimant states, are united and have a strong
consensus on managing the territorial disputes in the South China Sea. The Declaration on
the Code of Conduct and the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation signed by China and ASEAN
earlier on have constraining effects; even when the South China Sea remains historically an
important territorial issue for Chinese decision-makers, the concerns over social
opprobrium, reputation, and image prevented conflict from flaring. More recently, the
regional body is working (again) to forge a set of agreements – a Code of Conduct – on the
South China Sea, and getting key non-claimant states such as Brunei, Indonesia, Thailand,
and Singapore on board to support the binding resolution would be critical. As
demonstrated in the past, the norms of consensus, trust, reciprocity, and compromise, pushed
through ASEAN as a collective, multilateral entity can have a strong effect on ensuring the
continuation of China’s baseline policy of cautious restraint on the South China Sea.
143

144

Chapter Six: Conclusion

145
In an attempt to grapple with this broad question of understanding China’s rise and
its implications for international security and stability, this dissertation project has been
largely motivated to address two inter-related research questions: first, why and how do
status-seeking states like China comply with international norms? And second, what are the
scope conditions under which Chinese decision-makers are more or less likely to take on
such self-constraining commitments in China’s foreign and security policy.
I challenge the conventional notion that rising, status-seeking powers are disruptive
to order and stability in the international system for a number of reasons. Recall earlier that
status is defined as an individual’s standing in the hierarchy of a group, where status is an
inherently relational concept. Authority is perhaps the most important type of status.
Authority is understood as rightful rule, where the commands of the dominant actor are
obeyed by subordinate actors because they are seen as natural or legitimate in terms of a
prevailing set of beliefs learnt through political socialization. Legitimacy represents the
other side of the coin of authority: located within the perception of those who interact with
authority, legitimacy is belief that some leadership, norm, or institution should and ought to
be obeyed. A key part of the concept of legitimacy and status then is the understanding and
belief that some decision made or rule created by these hierarchical authorities of status is
valid, is entitled to be obeyed by virtue of who made the decision. Legitimacy’s social
influence is induced by feelings of “should,” “ought to,” and “has a right to,” all of which
appeal to and derive from an internalized norm or value. People can be influenced by
others, particularly those with status and legitimacy, because they believe that the decision
made and rules implemented are deemed and accepted to be right, proper, and ought to be
followed. Subordinate or smaller states relate to the more powerful as moral agents as well
146
as self-interested actors; they are cooperative and obedient on grounds of legitimacy as well
as reasons of prudence and advantage.
In other words, when a smaller state accepts a rule or decision because it perceives it
as legitimate, that dynamic and process take on the quality of being authoritative over the
subordinate actor. It demonstrates an important facet of power discussed here thus far that
has often been understated in IR: it is power, legitimacy, and authority in a relational and
broader sense, and not simply the coercive material power capabilities of the bully. The key
distinction between coercive power and legitimacy is that the former resorts to forceful
measures in order to influence others; that practice in of itself undermines and indicates a
lack of authority.
And like status, a relational analysis of power broadens the concept to include non-
material bases of power. In other words, ideas and cultural contexts play a significant role
in constituting power. Such notions and social interactions as respect, rectitude, affection
and enlightenment are equally important base values of power and influence. Elsewhere in
the contemporary political analysis literature, social standing and the right to make laws as
political power resources.
Bringing these two relational concepts together, “legitimate great powers” are thus
identified as states that are recognized by other peers to have certain privileges, rights, and
obligations that play a determining role in affecting peace and security of the international
system. More important, in exchange for being provided with these special rights, great
powers are expected to uphold the core norms of international society and play an active part
in reinforcing them. The consent bestowed upon great powers by smaller states provide a
sense of legitimacy, and to maintain their privileges, great powers are expected to act with a
147
degree of moderation and caution, meaning that great powers are expected to be status quo
powers that do not attempt to radically change the balance of power or seek to overturn the
established norms and institutions at the expense of other members.
My theoretical thus finds that China’s attempt to be a recognized great power does
not necessarily disrupt the status quo, as balance of power politics assumes. In fact, seeking
social acceptance from its peers requires China to comply with universally accepted norms,
rather than rejecting and overturning them. In the past, the sources of great powers’ status,
influence, and authority were rooted in establishing vast empires, colonies, and military
superiority and conquests. As such, great powers emulated and had a strong desire to
replicate these accepted behaviors associated with such historical markers of status. In the
contemporary, post-colonial era, however, the markers and reference point for status and
legitimacy have changed. Unlike the great powers of the past, a major power today is
expected to take on norm-conforming behavior and to participate in institutions that help
regulate, maintain, and strengthen the free-flow of goods, ideas, and other aspects of global
governance. Responsibility of upholding the status quo and pro-social compliance behavior,
in other words, are markers of authority and legitimacy of today’s global power, and not the
exploitative and mercantilist behavior of historical statecraft. In sum, the outdated narrative
of such destructive and disruptive measures to demonstrate status has largely been replaced
by expectations of great powers to lead by example, support global institutions and norms,
and reject traditional unilateralism and power politics.
If the concern for status is a key motivating factor, then the natural follow-up
question is how status-seeking states like China comply with international norms in
multilateral security regimes. At its core, socialization theory explains why decision-makers
may be moved to cooperate and abide by widely accepted international norms when doing
148
so is not in their material power or economic interests. Change and variation in foreign
policy behavior can be attributed to the way in which decision-makers think about the
balance between state sovereignty and international cooperation. The process of
socialization and constructivist ontology hold that continuous social interaction between
states and international institutions can, over time, lead to changing social structural contexts
that in turn influence and shape states’ identity and interest. Preferences and state behavior
can thus change and vary—from disengagement to cooperative—and depends largely on the
normative social context and the strategic culture to which the state is socialized to achieve
security.
Where then have we seen greater degrees of flexibility in Chinese foreign and
security policy, and how do they reflect status concerns and socialization processes? In the
case of China’s evolving approach to UN peacekeeping in Africa and beyond, China’s
attempts to identify more closely with the developing world, particularly in Africa where it
is becoming increasingly active, along with its quest to seek external confirmation of its
status as a legitimate great power are increasingly important considerations behind its
willingness to accept cooperative security and to uphold the established global norms and
institutions that help contribute to regional and international peace and stability. Its status
concerns and aspirations to seek legitimacy as a responsible stakeholder in international
affairs are important ideational factors behind the socialization process. In short, these non-
material forces and considerations extend beyond instrumental and cost-benefit assessments
to provide a more holistic and comprehensive understanding of the important changes and
variations in Chinese foreign policy.
Applying status and socialization theories to China’s position on conventional arms
control and the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) provide a more comprehensive and thorough
149
context to understand the nuances and process behind China’s changing normative behavior.
The scope and conditions under which China’s evolving policy takes place can be assessed
through several key stages. First, the interactive process of socialization is most effective
when Chinese policy elites are in a novel and uncertain environment and are motivated to
analyze and process new information. Unlike the broader nuclear non-proliferation norms,
conventional arms control and ATT are unfamiliar and relatively new issues in international
security for Chinese decision-makers. The EU, through its office of non-proliferation and
arms control, has thus seized upon this opportunity and worked with European inter-
governmental organizations like the International Committee of the Red Cross, civil society
actors like Saferworld, and other EU member states like the British Foreign and
Commonwealth Office to help introduce and explain the normative content of and emerging
debates on conventional arms control regime to Chinese government officials and arms
control experts.
Relatedly, Chinese policy elites are increasingly eager to learn and absorb these
normative debates as China seeks to achieve a “legitimate” great power status in the
international community. These sustained dialogues with EU counterparts have allowed
Chinese policy elites to better understand how and where China can contribute to the
ongoing discussions on the Arms Trade Treaty. As discussed in the China-EU-Africa track
1.5/semi-official security dialogue that the EU helped convene in recent years, Chinese
policy elites are beginning to understand some of the most pressing security challenges in
Africa—according to the African participants, the proliferation of small arms and light
weapons and other conventional weaponry, most of which originated in China, have
exacerbated regional conflicts. Chinese participants recognize the problems of a business-
as-usual approach when it comes to conventional arms deals, and the outcome of such a
150
dialogue has helped identified ways in which pragmatic collaboration between the Chinese
government and the African Union, as well as between China, the EU, and African partners
can be forged to help support the Arms Trade Treaty and calls for greater vigilance in
conventional arms transactions.
And third, the need to monitor and regulate conventional arms transfers is a
relatively novel and foreign concept for Beijing and as such can only be incrementally
introduced and diffused over time. The more interactive the process, the more likely
socialization will be successful. As discussed in the case study, most of these dialogues and
discussions since 2009 took place under closed-door, less politicized and more insulated,
private settings that were deemed to be more conducive for frank and interactive exchanges.
Understanding conflict and cooperation in the South China Sea is perhaps the “hard
case” in testing the validity and consistency of my theoretical arguments on status concerns
and socialization processes. While most analyses seem to find Chinese actions and policies
reflecting increasing signs of assertiveness and hence a greater likelihood of China’s rise to
be disruptive and confrontation, potentially leading to an all-out war in the Asia-Pacific, I
find that the South China Sea case points to reluctant restraint in Chinese foreign policy
behavior. In a nutshell, the oft-touted Chinese embracement of cooperative diplomacy in the
late-1990s to early 2000s reflects reluctant restraint, with social influence and opprobrium
from its Southeast Asian neighbors as an important consideration for group conformity.
Status concerns and maximization are thus not necessarily altruistic. As discussed, Beijing
was keen to maximize social recognition and rewards and to minimize public shaming and
sanctions bestowed by the increasing number of security mechanisms in the region. The
observation that China has become more assertive of late in the South China Sea becomes
less convincing (or at least needs more nuance), given that China’s baseline policy toward
151
state sovereignty had always remained more or less consistent since the late 1990s through
early 2000s. In other words, if assertiveness implies new and unilateral actions to alter the
status quo in a dispute, it is not entirely clear that China has become more assertive in the
South China Sea maritime disputes.
As a socialization argument, the security dilemma in such high-tension issues and
areas as the South China Sea has polarized the behavior of China, Vietnam, and the
Philippines, thus confirming each other’s worst-case scenarios, assumptions, and attribution
errors, and contributing to worsening relations between the conflicting parties. Such action-
reaction dynamic can be understood as a learned behavior, reinforced by experience.
Understood in this light, security dilemmas likewise hold out the prospects that decision-
makers exposed to a different set of social interactions could be socialized in alternative
understandings of achieving security, with the key implication being that foreign policy
behaviors can change, even if the anarchical material structure and its conflictual
ramifications persist and remain a constant.
Social influence, as discussed, can help restrain Chinese assertiveness, especially
when ASEAN, including both claimant and non-claimant states, are united and have a strong
consensus on managing the territorial disputes in the South China Sea. The Declaration on
the Code of Conduct and the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation signed by China and ASEAN
earlier on have constraining effects; even when the South China Sea remains historically an
important territorial issue for Chinese decision-makers, the concerns over social
opprobrium, reputation, and image prevented conflict from flaring. More recently, the
regional body is working (again) to forge a set of agreements – a Code of Conduct – on the
South China Sea, and getting key non-claimant states such as Brunei, Indonesia, Thailand,
and Singapore on board to support the binding resolution would be critical. As
152
demonstrated in the past, the norms of consensus, trust, reciprocity, and compromise, pushed
through ASEAN as a collective, multilateral entity can have a strong effect on ensuring the
continuation of China’s baseline policy of cautious restraint on the South China Sea.
In short, Chapters 3 through 5 provide an in-depth process-tracing and content
analysis of the discourses, debates, and social interactions among Chinese policy elites and
their foreign counterparts to determine how status concerns and socialization processes help
shape and influence the outcome of Chinese foreign policy in three respective issue areas of
international security: international peacekeeping operations, conventional arms and export
controls, and territorial negotiations in the South China Sea. Each empirical chapter looks at
how Chinese foreign policy consideration evolved and ranged from increasing cooperation
and cautious compliance to resistance, reluctance and degrees of realpolitik tendencies.
More broadly, each issue area explores why and how status concerns served as a
considerable constraint on Chinese foreign policy behavior and outcomes.
What then can be said about the implications and lessons learned from this research
that could shed some important insights into Chinese foreign and security policy and IR
theory more broadly? The identification of some of the scope conditions for socialization
behavior and normative compliance indicate what has worked in the past, what has not, and
what is likely to work in the future in drawing China closer to assuming the role of a
responsible, major power is an critical place to begin. “Engaging China” seems to be an
important policy priority for the United States and other governments in the region, but less
has been discussed on how to actually engage China effectively to ensure a cooperative
relationship and greater compliance on China’s part to uphold the norms and rules governing
international society.
153
In other words, what are the processes, mechanisms, and scope conditions under
which this quest for status motivates China to comply with international norms? How does
deliberation and social interactions that expose rule-driven behavior take place, particularly
in the absence of overt coercion? As discussed, three initial scope conditions have been
identified for status-seeking states’ normative compliance behavior. First, compliance
behavior is most likely when the interactive process of socialization—normative
persuasion—occurs where the status-seeking state is in a novel and/or uncertain
environment and are thus motivated to analyze, absorb, and process new information and
concepts. Second, the more interactive and less uni-directional (e.g., lecturing) the social
interaction and deliberative process, the more likely compliance behavior from status-
seeking states becomes. And, third, collective persuasion and socialization will be more
effective in convincing the status-seeking state to conform to a norm-based behavior when
there is clear consensus among developing and developed states on a particular normative
issue.
As a corollary to these three scope conditions, when one or more of these conditions
are not met and/or are weakly established at best, we should then expect status-seeking
states’ behavior to alter and reflect a more cost-benefit, rational choice calculus, which over
time could lead to a more realpolitik ideology. This is perhaps clearest in the South China
Sea case study and China’s evolving foreign policy position on the ongoing sensitive
negotiations over the territorial disputes in the region.
More broadly, this dissertation presents a first cut and plausibility test at
understanding why status-seeking, rising great powers may be motivated to comply and
cooperate. The standard, all too familiar material structure claim of how great and rising
powers behave is but an assumption and need not be the default explanation when we reflect
154
on how great powers behave. There is little to no reason why ideational variables are
inconsequential or secondary to a materialist explanation, unless realists can somehow
demonstrate that perceptions, social interactions, and world views of decision-makers are
truly epiphenomenal to a material structural account of state behavior. Exploring and
understanding the value, contributions, and significance of ideational variables then become
all the more important: ideational factors should be able to explain the full spectrum and
range of state behavior, including cooperative tendencies as well as the cases that standard
material-based realism claims to explain – realpolitik, conflictual behavior.
Rising great powers that care about their status, authority, and legitimacy can thus be
socialized into cooperative behavior and move beyond balancing, zero-sum and relative
power considerations. In other words, if self-image and identity is ever-changing, then
states can be socialized into or out of perceptions of the world as competition for power and
influence in an anarchic environment. Balancing and rivalry is not a hardwired, iron-clad
law that governs state behavior; as such, the prospects for constructive socialization is very
much a possibility, and a valuable contribution to the field would need to examine more
closely and identify the scope conditions and the micro-processes under which such norm-
conforming socialization behavior might take place and when it might not work.
And lastly, Chinese decision-makers understand that there is greater peace and
stability when they define national security priorities not in narrow, self-interested terms, but
more broadly so as to nurture and sustain the global system from which it has gained so
many benefits. To be sure, the trend of a cooperative and self-restraining foreign policy
behavior is far from a linear, predetermined path, yet the broader trajectory seems to indicate
that Chinese decision-makers are adapting, learning, and taking actions, albeit
155
incrementally, at a regional and global level that are more convergent and consistent with
established norms, regional expectations, and the mandates of international institutions.

156
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Abstract (if available)

Abstract My research considers why and how China complies with international norms in multilateral security regimes and the scope conditions under which it is more or less likely to take on self‐constraining commitments. It builds upon and moves beyond the existing literature on socialization processes by examining why status concerns are important motivations for socialization dynamics. I identify three scope conditions under which Chinese decision‐makers’ exposure to global norms and engagement with foreign counterparts have evolved and ranged from strategic adaptation to an understanding that cooperative, multilateral security is a preferred source of state security, and they include: the quality of the deliberations and observable social interactions at international and regional organizations and at bilateral and multilateral fora

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Asset Metadata

Creator Huang, Chin-Hao (author)

Core Title Status, security, and socialization: explaining change in China's compliance in international institutions

School College of Letters, Arts and Sciences

Degree Doctor of Philosophy

Degree Program Politics and International Relations

Publication Date 07/09/2014

Defense Date 06/03/2014

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag China,East Asia,foreign and security policy,International Relations,OAI-PMH Harvest,socialization processes,status

Format application/pdf (imt)

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Kang, David (committee chair), Cross, Mai'a (committee member), James, Patrick (committee member)

Creator Email chinhao.huang@gmail.com,chinhaoh@usc.edu

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c3-433848

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Legacy Identifier etd-HuangChinH-2638.pdf

Dmrecord 433848

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Rights Huang, Chin-Hao

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Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the a...

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