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Perceiving and coping with threat: explaining East Asian perceptions toward China’s rise
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Perceiving and Coping with Threat:
Explaining East Asian Perceptions toward China’s Rise
A Dissertation presented
by
Ronan Tse-min Fu
to
The Faculty of the Graduate School
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
in the subject of
Political Science and International Relations
University of Southern California
Los Angeles, California
August 2019
ii
©2019 – RONAN TSE-MIN FU
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
iii
Thesis advisor: David C. Kang Author: Ronan Tse-min Fu
Perceiving and Coping with Threat:
Explaining East Asian Perceptions toward China’s Rise
ABSTRACT
This dissertation investigates how East Asian states assess the intentions of, and the threats posed
by, a rising China. I seek answers to questions such as these: Is a rising China perceived by East
Asian states as a serious threat? What causes the perception of threat toward China to vary and
through what mechanisms? When and how, if possible, can East Asian states’ fear of a rising China
be reduced to a modest level?
In answering these questions, I first offer a theoretically-guided and empirical falsifiable new
measure of threat perception. With this new measure, I show that, contrary to prominent existing
arguments in East Asian security, East Asian states do not perceive China as that big of a threat as
many pundits imagine they do. Second, I develop a new theory of regional threat perception to
account for this empirical puzzle. This new theory synthesizes the balance of threat theory and the
liberal argument of peace by trade and economic interdependence, spiced with a dose of political
psychology. I theorize that threat perception toward a rising power is a function of states’ perceived
level of revisionism of the rising power, which is determined by a sequence of two variables. First,
whether the rising state exercises restraint in its interaction with other countries, especially in the
area of sovereignty disputes. And second, whether economic assuring factors associated with the
rising power are present or absent. The first variable indicates whether the threat posed by the rising
power is vivid or not, thereby determining whether a rising power is likely to be securitized as a
military threat. The second variable determines whether the perceived threat can be downplayed by
economic assuring factors. I test my theory against the empirical cases of Taiwan and Japan, two
least-likely cases for my theory. I use election manifestos, congressional record, newspaper reports,
public speeches delivered by national leaders, official documents, as well as public surveys to
examine and process-trace how Taiwan and Japan perceive China’s rise since the end of the Cold
War. To further strengthen the validity of my finding, I use the strategic portfolios devised by these
two countries in response to China’s rise as data to triangulate.
The dissertation makes a handful of contributions. First, while existing literature oftentimes
measures threat perception tautologically or in an ad hoc manner, it develops a new measurement of
threat perception and offers practical guidelines on the conceptualization, operationalization, and
measurement of this construct. This measure enables us to put some sweeping claims regarding
threat perception under rigorous empirical scrutiny. Second, my theory is the first of its kind that
incorporates both cognitive and motivational influences on the formation of threat perception.
Third, utilizing a state’s behavior as a benchmark, my theory generates clear expectations about
whether a state might be considered as having aggressive intentions. It thus supplements the balance
of threat theory by operationalizing the notion of aggressive intentions ex ante. Finally, my research
further develops the liberal argument that economic interests influence states’ assessment of threat
by marrying it with the literature of pre-existing beliefs and motivated reasoning.
iv
Table of Contents
Abstract iii
Chapter 1: Introduction: Threat Perception and China’s Rise 1
Chapter 2: Threat Perception as a Construct: Conceptualization, Operationalization, and 15
Measurement
Chapter 3: A Psychological Theory of Regional Threat Perception 38
Chapter 4: Taiwan’s Threat Perception toward China: A Mixture of Security Challenge and 57
Enticing Economic Opportunities
Chapter 5: Explaining Japan’s Threat Perception of China: A Transition from Unlikely 102
Threat to Dormant Threat
Chapter 6: Conclusion 138
Appendix 147
Bibliography 154
v
For Louis
vi
Acknowledgments
This dissertation project would not have been possible without the help and support of a great
number of people and institutions.
I am indebted to my dissertation committee. David Kang has been an exemplary chair, providing
excellent feedback and unwavering support throughout the process. He encouraged me to pursue a
“big question” and emboldened me to challenge the conventional wisdom in the field. His imploring
me to better specify the “so what” of my dissertation has fundamentally shaped how I conduct my
research. I am blessed to have him as my “Shifu” and hone my research under his tutelage. Jacques
Hymans has been an incredibly supportive mentor and graciously allowed me to pepper him with
questions. His six-page-long comments on my dissertation have gone way beyond the call of duty
and substantially increased the clarity and sharpness of my argument and writing. His criticisms and
suggestions consistently cut to the core issues of theory and empirical testing and his intellectual
influence is throughout the dissertation. Morteza Dehghani generously agreed to be an external
member of my committee and has provided useful and constructive feedback on how to improve
the measurement of my dependent variable through automated text analysis.
I was fortunate to pursue my Ph.D. at USC. I would like to thank the following mentors for
unfailing support and guidance along the way: Erin Baggott Carter, Brett Carter, Andrew Coe,
Benjamin Graham, Christian Grose, Patrick James, Saori Katada, Steven Lamy, Daniel Lynch, and
Brian Rathbun. I am grateful to Veri Chavarin, Linda Cole, and Karen Tang for wonderful
administrative assistance. I have learnt a huge amount from my graduate student peers at USC,
including Jiun Bang, Chin-Hao Huang, Han-Hui Hsieh, Ellen Kim, Gloria Koo, Xinru Ma, Kyuri
Park, Pongkwan Sawasdipakdi, and Jihyun Shin. I want to thank in particular Brian Knafou, In
Young Min, and Yu-Ting Lin for countless hours of conversation on research, academia, and life.
vii
I have benefited from comments, criticisms, and advice from many people outside of USC, as
well. Stephen Biddle, Ja Ian Chong, Thomas Christensen, Alexandre Debs, Stacie Goddard, Evelyn
Goh, Charles Glaser, Iain Henry, Rieko Kage, Joshua Kertzer, Yuen Foong Khong, Tse-min Lin,
John Mearsheimer, Nuno Monteiro, Frances Yaping Wang, and Ketian Zhang all deserve thanks.
In addition to various institutions at USC, the Fulbright Foundation, the China Times Cultural
Foundation, the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange, and the Hsing
Tian Kong Culture and Education Development Foundation have all provided invaluable and
generous research funding support at various points.
My journey into international relations began as a graduate student in political science at the
National Taiwan University. Yu-Shan Wu served as a source of inspiration and wonderful guidance,
convincing me to leave Taiwan to go to the United States to start a doctorate. I would have never
thought of studying international relations as a career if not for him. I am grateful to him for lending
an ear and offering useful advice whenever I visited him at Academia Sinica. Simon Teng-chi Chang
and Chih-yu Shih were generous with their time and instilled in me a genuine appreciation of
research on international relations theory and Chinese foreign policy.
My family has been an important source of support. I thank my brothers Tse-Wen and Tse-Wei
for putting up with their nerdy older brother. My parents, Yuan-Ching Fu and Chueh-Ying Liu have
been unconditionally supportive of all of my decisions and I will forever be indebted for their love
and encouragement. I am also grateful to my parents-in-law, Chiao-Mu Liang and Pi-Chen Lai for
their belief in me.
Finally, my wife Louis Hsin-Hua Liang has been a constant source of love and joy since we met
in 2006. She has been my most ardent supporter, sounding board, and critic. She has helped me to
hone the argument of my research and provided me with more love and support than I can possibly
deserve. I dedicate this dissertation to her.
1
Chapter 1
Introduction:
Threat Perception and China’s Rise
A potential hegemon does not have to do much to generate fear among the other states in the system.
—John Mearsheimer
1
[Singaporeans] see China as an opportunity, not a threat. If we view China as a threat, we will be
immobilised by fear. But if we see it as an opportunity, we will come up with creative ideas to ride on
China’s growth.
—Goh Chok Tong, The second Prime Minster of Singapore
2
The rise of China is arguably the most consequential development of international politics in the
twenty-first century. Is a rising China perceived by East Asian states as a serious security threat? Is it
true that East Asian countries’ fear of China can never be reduced to a modest level?
Given China’s
rapidly increasing economic and military capabilities, large population, and autocratic regime type, it
stands to reason that China’s rise would instill increasing and insurmountable fear in its neighbors.
3
John Mearsheimer therefore confidently predicts, “Neither its [China’s] neighbors nor the United
States would stand idly by which China gained increasing increments of power. Instead, they would
seek to contain China…”
4
Concurring with Mearsheimer, Adam Liff and John Ikenberry also paint
1
John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, 1st ed. (New York: Norton, 2001), p. 345.
2
http://www.nas.gov.sg/archivesonline/speeches/view-html?filename=2002081805.htm
3
Kenneth N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley Pub. Co., 1979); John M. Owen,
Liberal Peace, Liberal War: American Politics and International Security (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1997); Denny
Roy, Return of the Dragon: Rising China and Regional Security (New York: Columbia University Press, 2013), p. 3.
4
Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, p. 4.
2
a pessimistic portrait of East Asian security. They postulate that East Asian states are engaging in
intensified security competition due to China’s rise. East Asia, therefore, is “racing toward tragedy.”
5
And yet in 2018, China was the largest trade partner of the United States and numerous East Asian
countries, including most of American allies or security partners in the region such as Japan, South
Korea, Australia, Singapore, and Taiwan.
6
An emerging literature also refutes or at least strongly
qualifies the claim that East Asia is experiencing an arms race or severe security dilemma due to
China’s rise.
7
Why such a discrepancy?
This dissertation investigates how East Asian states assess the intentions of, and the threats posed
by, a rising China. By developing a new measurement theory of threat perception and a
psychological theory of regional threat perception toward a rising power, I advance two central
arguments. First, contrary to prominent existing arguments in East Asian security, I argue that it is
grossly misleading to portray East Asian countries as constantly living in the mortal fear of China’s
rise. It is true that China’s rise poses a challenge for the region and has caused some alarm among
East Asian states when Beijing adopts abrasive and confrontational foreign policies. However, there
is little evidence that China’s neighboring countries regard it as an imminent menace to their
national security. More specifically, East Asian states do not perceive China as that big of a threat as
many pundits imagine they do.
8
Second, I demonstrate that this seemingly puzzling absence of
perceived imminent security threat toward China can be explained by the theoretical argument that a
5
Adam P. Liff and G. John Ikenberry, “Racing toward Tragedy?: China’s Rise, Military Competition in the Asia Pacific,
and the Security Dilemma,” International Security Vol. 39, No. 2 (2014), pp. 52-91.
6
United Nations International Trade Statistics Database, https://comtrade.un.org.
7
Ronan Tse-Min Fu, David James Gill, Eric Hundman, Adam P. Liff, and G. John Ikenberry, “Correspondence:
Looking for Asia’s Security Dilemma,” International Security Vol. 40, No. 2 (2015), pp. 181-186; David C. Kang, American
Grand Strategy and East Asian Security in the 21st Century (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017).
8
Ja Ian Chong and Todd H. Hall, “The Lessons of 1914 for East Asia Today: Missing the Trees for the Forest,”
International Security Vol. 39, No. 1 (2014), pp. 7-43.
3
rising power is unlikely to be seen as an active threat if it exercises restraint in its interaction with
other countries or certain economic assuring factors associated with the rising power are present.
Specifically, the active threat claim will be rendered implausible if the threat is not vivid or is diluted
in the presence of economic assuring factors. Ultimately, my research suggests that under certain
scope conditions, state’s fear of a rising power can possibly be reduced to a modest degree. Deep-
seated fear is not necessarily endemic to states, even in the face of a rising power.
9
So What?
The importance of this topic is pronounced. How East Asian states might view a rising China, to
a large extent, determines the trajectory of China’s ascent and the configure of security order in East
Asia. This dissertation therefore has significant implications for how scholars and decisionmakers
might think about the security dynamics in East Asia. By providing a testable and internally valid
framework for predicting the fluctuations of varying degrees of fear and the specific type of threat
perception a state might form toward a rising China, we can gain some analytical leverage about the
scope condition under which security competition in East Asia might be intensified due to China’s
emergence as a potential global superpower. For East Asian decisionmakers, devising optimal policy
responses toward China largely hinges on understanding how other states in the region might
perceive and respond to China’s ascendancy as this will shape the evolution of the regional security
order as a whole.
9
This claim runs counter to the conventional understanding of the effects of anarchy on states’ behavior. For example,
Henry Kissinger argues that the feeling of being threatened is “inherent in the nature of international relations based on
sovereign states.” See Henry Kissinger, A World Restored: Metternich, Castlereagh and the Problems of Peace, 1812-22 (Boston:
Houghton Mifflin, 1957), p. 2.
4
Recognizing that China’s rise is not perceived that big of a threat by neighboring countries is
especially important because in recent years, a sizable literature on this topic has unfortunately fallen
under the spell of the “China threat thesis” – the idea that China’s rise will inevitably unsettle East
Asia and that East Asian countries are petrified with fear.
10
Yet in fact, while managing the rise of
China has always been an important task for East Asian countries in the past and will possibly
remain so for years to come, this dissertation joins a growing literature to show that the China threat
thesis is profoundly exaggerated.
11
Countries in the region hardly see China as an active threat. It
perhaps explains why hedging and engagement, rather than balancing, seem to be the dominant
strategy employed by most countries in the region.
12
The flaws of the China threat thesis must be
pointed out because it encourages unnecessary and deleterious policies such as an American grand
strategy in the region that prioritizes military deployment and alliances. Indeed, if China is not likely
to be an active threat, utilizing costly high-intensity military measures to reassure allies and countries
10
Liff and Ikenberry, “Racing toward Tragedy?: China’s Rise, Military Competition in the Asia Pacific, and the Security
Dilemma,” pp. 52-91; John J. Mearsheimer, “Can China Rise Peacefully?,” The National Interest Vol. 25 (2014); Aaron L.
Friedberg, A Contest for Supremacy: China, America, and the Struggle for Mastery in Asia (New York: W. W. Norton & Co.,
2011); Denny Roy, “Hegemon on the Horizon? China’s Threat to East Asian Security,” International Security Vol. 19, No.
1 (1994), p. 168; Michael Pillsbury, The Hundred-Year Marathon: China’s Secret Strategy to Replace America as the Global
Superpower (New York: Henry Holt and Co., 2015).
11
Evelyn Goh, The Struggle for Order: Hegemony, Hierarchy, and Transition in Post-Cold War East Asia (Oxford, United
Kingdom: Oxford University Press, 2013); Steve Chan, Looking for Balance: China, the United States, and Power Balancing in
East Asia (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2012); Thomas J. Christensen, The China Challenge: Shaping the
Choices of a Rising Power, First edition. ed. (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2015); Feng Zhang, “Is Southeast Asia
Really Balancing against China?,” The Washington Quarterly Vol. 41, No. 3 (2018); Kang, American Grand Strategy and East
Asian Security in the 21st Century.
12
Goh, The Struggle for Order: Hegemony, Hierarchy, and Transition in Post-Cold War East Asia; Darren J. Lim and Zack
Cooper, “Reassessing Hedging: The Logic of Alignment in East Asia,” Security Studies Vol. 24, No. 4 (2015), pp. 696-727;
Cheng-Chwee Kuik, “How Do Weaker States Hedge? Unpacking ASEAN States’ Alignment Behavior Towards China,”
Journal of Contemporary China Vol. 25, No. 100 (2016), pp. 500-514; Alice D. Ba, “Beyond Dichotomous Choices:
Responses to Chinese Initiative in Southeast Asia,” in Hannes Ebert and Daniel Flemes, ed., Regional Powers and Contested
Leadership, (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018), pp. 187-227.
5
in the region is totally unwarranted. The general lesson herein is that one should not take the
occurrence of threat perception for granted. For example, it is groundless to assume that simply
because an external state is powerful, other states must fear it. Threat perception should not be
mechanically assumed to be an observable feature of the structural environment.
13
Before going on
to prescribe the policy that should be adopted, we should examine whether and which type of
perception of threat indeed exists. Perception of threat should be carefully measured and explained,
rather than assumed.
The Argument in Brief
I disaggregate the issue of how East Asian states perceive and cope with China’s rise into two
interrelated questions. First, do East Asian states feel seriously threatened by a rising China? Second,
what causes East Asian perceptions of threat toward China to vary and through what mechanisms? I
advance two theories to answer these two questions: answer these questions with a measurement
theory of threat perception, and a psychological theory of regional threat perception toward a rising
power.
A Measurement Theory of Threat Perception
The first step toward explaining the sources of and variation in threat perception is to measure
whether states are threatened and what their level of fear is rigorously. But how do we recognize a
threatened state when we see it? Perhaps because how states perceived and responded to Nazi
13
Rosella Cappella Zielinski, Benjamin O. Fordham, and Kaija E. Schilde, “What Goes up, Must Come Down? The
Asymmetric Effects of Economic Growth and International Threat on Military Spending,” Journal of Peace Research Vol.
54, No. 6 (2017), pp. 491-513.
6
Germany and the Soviet Union, two paradigmatic “threatening” states, are well-documented,
international relations theory has tended to assume that we can easily identify a “threatened” state
when we see one. But it is not always that obvious. In fact, as I demonstrate in Chapter 2, the
literature does not provide a uniform way of measuring threat perception and existing works
oftentimes measure this intangible construct tautologically or in an ad hoc manner. Without a
measurement theory of threat perception, as David Kang notes, “It is relatively easy to find
circumstantial evidence that could support virtually any assessment of any country.”
14
I stand up to this analytical challenge with a measurement theory of threat perception, providing
clear guidance for defining and measuring threat perception. In constructing this vital new measure
that is theory-driven and empirically falsifiable, I draw on the literatures of evolutionary biology,
social psychology, and international relations theory. Based on this measure, I argue that we should
examine the type of perception of threat a state possesses in that different types of perception of
threat lead to different strategic behavior. To this end, I develop a complete and discriminating
classification scheme for states’ perceptions of threat. I use four indicators to categorize different
types of perception of threat that a state holds toward an external state: (1) the perceived likelihood
that bilateral disputes will be resolved through force, (2) the perceived malignity and malleability of
an external state’s intentions, (3) the state’s general assessment of the security environment relating
to the external state, and (4) the assessment of whether cooperating with the external state is
exploitative or rewarding. Utilizing these four distinct and interrelated indicators, I distinguish
between perceptions of active threat, dormant threat, and unlikely threat. These perceptions of threat are
empirically observable, conceptually distinct, and collectively exhaustive. Ultimately, they each
14
David C. Kang, “Roundtable Review on American Grand Strategy and East Asian Security, Author’s Response,” H-Diplo
Vol. 10, No. 19 (2018), p. 14.
7
represents a different assessment regarding the likelihood that an external state will cause some
significant harm to other states with its military actions. This allows us to investigate the content of a
state’s perception toward an external state and capture differences among East Asian states’
perceptions of threat that are both theoretically paramount and relatively easy to observe.
The measure further suggests that we should examine the level of vigilance that a perceiving state
has toward an external state, particularly its military capabilities. This contention is based on
empirical patterns strongly supported by experimental evidence: perceived active threat leads to high
vigilance, whereas perceived dormant threat produces low vigilance. As such, the level of vigilance,
operationalized as the amount of attention a state paid to an external state, serves as an important
observable implication of the categorization I suggest above, which enables us to trace both the
baseline and overall trend of threat perception across time.
I also establish the theoretical linkage between threat perception and states’ choice of security
policies, serving as one more layer of triangulation. In brief, I hypothesize that states with a
perception of active threat are likely to have a strategic portfolio that predominantly relies on the
competitive element over the cooperative, whereas states with a perception of unlikely threat would
devise a strategic portfolio that prioritizes the cooperative element. States with a perception of
dormant threat are likely to formulate a strategic portfolio that incorporates both the competitive
and the cooperative elements.
A Psychological Theory of Regional Threat Perception
What propels East Asian states to be increasingly vigilant of China? What causes East Asian
states to form a specific kind of perception of threat over another? In fact, extant research has
identified some of the factors that might influence states’ threat assessment—including, among
8
others, capabilities, geography, regime type, ideology, and identity. While useful, none of the variable
identified by the existing literature sufficiently accounts for the variation in East Asian states’
perception toward China because they either overestimate East Asian countries’ propensity to view
China’s as an active threat or are hard to operationalize. I therefore offer a new theory to explain
why East Asian form the perception of threat as they do. This new theory synthesizes the balance of
threat theory and the liberal argument of peace by trade and economic interdependence, spiced with
a dose of political psychology. Specifically, I theorize that threat perception toward a rising power is
a function of states’ perceived level of revisionism of the rising power, which is determined by a
sequence of two variables: whether the rising power exercises restraint in its interaction with other
states, and whether economic assuring factors associated with the rising power are present or not.
With these two variables, my theory makes determinate predictions for how states might perceive a
rising state.
The first variable concerns whether the rising power adopts escalatory and coercive policies when
interacting with other countries, particularly in the realm of territorial disputes. It indicates whether
the threat posed by the rising power is vivid or not, thereby determining whether the rising power is
possibly to be securitized as a military threat. If the vivid information supporting the claim that the
rising power is potentially a security threat does not exist, states are likely to see the rising power as
an unlikely threat. In other words, the rising power does not harbor “aggressive intentions” in the
eyes of other states.
15
The second variable concerns whether certain economic assuring factors are present or not.
Essentially, they serve as threat-reducing stimuli or signs of benign intentions.
16
In today’s world,
15
Stephen M. Walt, The Origins of Alliances (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987), p. 25.
16
The claim I make here challenges the realist argument that signs of benign intentions are almost always discarded by
states. Brian C. Rathbun, “Uncertain About Uncertainty: Understanding the Multiple Meanings of a Crucial Concept in
9
many countries would agree that enhancing economic interests of the state should be the
overarching national objective. It is particularly so in the context of East Asia.
17
We therefore should
theorize how the existence of some economic assuring factors would affect states’ threat assessment
of the rising power. This dissertation considers two economic assuring factors: (1) if a rising power
provides economic benefits repeatedly to other states; and (2) if a rising state has become a trading
state that prioritizes economic development and mainly relies on manufactured goods and services
to generate wealth.
My theory highlights two mechanisms in which threat perception may be downplayed by such
factors. First, if a rising power continues to offer economic profits to other countries, actors who
highly value such economic relationships will likely to dilute the threat based on their interests and
are motivated to believe that the threat is not that serious. They would posit that with proper
accommodating policy, the rising power’s intentions are malleable toward benignity. Second, when a
rising power chooses to focus on promoting economic growth through trade and integration to the
global economy, observers in other states are likely to conclude that the rising power is unlikely to
resort to physical violence against other countries due to the expected high costs. At a minimum,
this rising power is unlikely to escalate unconditionally in interstate disputes. A rising power
essentially imposes a self-restraint device on itself when becoming a trading state.
International Relations Theory,” International Studies Quarterly Vol. 51, No. 3 (2007), p. 539. But it is congruent with
contingent realism, proposed by Charles Glaser and Andrew Kydd. On contingent realism, see Charles L. Glaser,
Rational Theory of International Politics: The Logic of Competition and Cooperation (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press,
2010); Andrew H. Kydd, Trust and Mistrust in International Relations (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2005).
17
Etel Solingen, Nuclear Logics: Contrasting Paths in East Asia and the Middle East (Princeton University Press, 2007); Steve
Chan, “An Odd Thing Happened on the Way to Balancing: East Asian States’ Reactions to China’s Rise,” International
Studies Review Vol. 12, No. 3 (2010), pp. 387-412.
10
When economic assuring factors do not come into being, a rising power that adopts escalatory
policies against other states is likely to be perceived as an active threat. But when these factors are at
work, a perception of dormant threat is more likely to be formed.
To sum up, my theoretical argument, in the simplest form, is that a rising state will be perceived
as an active security threat when (1) the rising power does not exercise restraint in its interaction
with other states; and (2) other states do not believe that they are likely to be the beneficiaries of the
rising power’s economic rise or that the rising power is a trading state.
Testing the Theory Empirically
To put the theory under empirical scrutiny, I use longitudinal case studies of two cases: Taiwan
and Japan. These cases are chosen because each represents a hard case for my theory, and because
the predictions of my theory are discrete and different from the predictions made by the alternative
explanations. In each case, I test the theory both on its own merits and against four alternative
explanations. The more Taiwan and Japan’s threat perception toward China is accurately explained
by my theory than its competitors, the more confidence we have in the theory.
The two alternative hypotheses draw from important strands of international relations theory.
The first alternative explanation is offered by the capabilities model, which is endorsed by structural
realism and offensive realists in particular.
18
The capabilities model argues that states’ threat
perception is a function of the opposing state’s capabilities. The stronger the opposing state is, the
higher other states’ level of fear is. According to this view, states will always stay alert to a rising
18
John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, Updated ed. (New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 2014); Waltz,
Theory of International Politics.
11
power given that its rise is rapidly rewriting the existing balance of power. In other words, the
amount of attention states paid to the rising power will be constantly high. States would view a rising
power as an imminent threat because power preponderance is likely to give rise to aggressive
intentions. The second alternative explanation is proposed by the democratic peace theory.
According to democratic peace theorists, democracies generally do not have particularized trust vis-
à-vis autocracies and find it relatively easy to securitize autocratic states as a menace to their national
security.
19
On this view, constant high level of vigilance is expected for democratic states when
dealing with a rising autocratic state, particularly when it clearly violates liberal-democratic norms.
Such wariness propels democratic state to view a rising autocratic state as an active threat.
The tests I conducted in the two empirical chapters proceed in three steps. First, I outline the
theoretical predictions derived from the three contending theories. Second, I investigate whether the
level of vigilance and the type of threat perception and I observe in different phases are congruent
with my theoretical expectations. I also briefly investigate whether the strategic portfolios devised by
Taiwanese and Japanese national leaders are consistent with the theory’s predictions. In essence, I
examine whether the covariational pattern between variables specified by these three different
theories and how Taiwan and Japan perceived and coped with China over time fit the predictions
made by the theories. Through process-tracing, I pay special attention to evidence that supports or
disapproves the casual mechanisms implied by the theory.
In each case, I argue that my theory outperforms the two alternative hypotheses. Through in-
depth process tracing and the procedure of congruence test, I illustrate that both Taiwan and Japan
do not see China as an active threat, despite Taipei’s conflicting sovereignty claims with Beijing in
19
Jarrod Hayes, Constructing National Security: U.S. Relations with India and China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2013).
12
the former case and Tokyo’s growing security concern in the East China Sea in the latter case. China
has always been a major or perhaps the only security concern for Taiwan in different phases, despite
with varying degrees. The security concern is particular salient during the 1995-1996 Taiwan Strait
crisis and in 1999, when Taiwanese president Lee Teng-hui’s “two-state theory” triggered a series of
the People’s Liberation Army’s targeted military exercises. But the case of Taiwan shows how
China’s reform and opening-up policy and the economic interdependence across the Taiwan Strait
transformed a perception of active threat into a perception of dormant threat. In the case of Japan,
China was perceived as an unlikely threat in the early 1990s. China’s escalatory policies against
Taiwan in 1996, large-scale anti-Japanese demonstrations, as well as increasingly confrontational
stance in the East China Sea fueled Tokyo’s security concern. However, this security concern does
not further escalate into a perception of active threat because the belief that China is unlikely to rock
the boat because Beijing prioritizes economic development is still deep-rooted in Japan and some
politicians and large business groups put significant effort into diluting the threat. Taiwan and Japan
present two tough nuts for economic assuring factors to crack. The fact that these factors are at
work demonstrates the important role they play in states’ threat assessment.
Using legislative election manifestos, congressional record, and newspaper reports as data, I
quantitatively demonstrate that the amount of attention paid to China’s military power spiked in
Taiwan and Japan when China adopted escalatory policies or does not show willingness to self-
restrain its power. There is no clear association between how much attention Taiwan and Japan paid
to Chinese military power and China’s growth of capabilities, its autocratic regime type, or the
absence of shared identity.
The strategic portfolios devised by Taipei and Tokyo in response to China’s rise further
validate my theory. Contrary to the four alternative explanations’ expectation that these two
13
countries ought to formulate a strategic portfolio that predominately focuses on weakening China’s
power, both countries, for the most part, employed an integrated strategy that combines competitive
and cooperative policies across different administrations.
The Structure of the Dissertation
The body of the dissertation develops the measure of threat perception and theory in more detail
and then test the theory’s observable implications using the two qualitative case studies.
In Chapter 2, I offer a measurement theory of threat perception. The theory provides practical
guidelines on the conceptualization, operationalization, and measurement of this theoretical
construct. Chapter 3 introduces a psychological theory of regional threat perception toward a rising
power, and the alternative theories against which my theory will be tested: the capabilities model, the
democratic peace theory, the construction of threat model, and the balance of threat theory. It then
lays out and justifies the empirical strategy employed to evaluate the validity and usefulness of these
five competing theses.
Chapter 4 and 5 offer stern empirical tests of my theory through in-depth case study analysis.
Chapter 4 examines the case of Taiwan, and Chapter 5 examines the Japanese case. Taiwan and
Japan are widely reputed to be two cases where perceived active China threat is easy to detect. It
reflects a conventional understanding of how the future of East Asian security might unfold against
the backdrop of China’s rise. As I show in these chapters, however, even these two countries do not
view China as an active threat. The conventional wisdom gets Taiwan and Japan, the two most-likely
cases for the thesis, wrong.
14
Finally, Chapter 6 concludes with a discussion on implications of the dissertation for theory and
policy, as well as avenues for future research.
15
Chapter 2
Threat Perception as a Construct:
Conceptualization, Operationalization, and Measurement
Threat perception is a commonly-used element in international relations theory and security
studies. Scholars widely used it to explain many empirical puzzles, such as whether states will go
nuclear
20
,and how rivalries endured or ended, thereby thwarting or facilitating interstate cooperation
and conciliation.
21
But how do we recognize a threatened state when we see it? Precisely because
threat perception is not directly observable, international relations theory has ended up in a
paradoxical position, where we often explain behavior and outcomes in international politics by
pointing to variation in actors’ levels of threat perception, we have trouble measuring this variation
itself. In short, we lack a measurement theory of threat perception. This lacuna makes the task of
evaluating the empirical reality of any particular region extremely difficult and poses a serious
problem to the discipline of international relations as a whole.
A useful measurement theory of any particular construct must provide clear guidelines for the
conceptualization, operationalization, and “the process of linking abstract concepts to empirical
indicants” of the concept.
22
In this chapter I seek to develop a measurement theory of threat
perception that meets these criteria.
20
Alexandre Debs and Nuno P. Monteiro, Nuclear Politics: The Strategic Causes of Proliferation (New York: Cambridge
University Press, 2017).
21
Karen A. Rasler, William R. Thompson, and Sumit Ganguly, How Rivalries End (Philadelphia: University of
Pennsylvania Press, 2013).
22
John Gerring, Social Science Methodology: A Unified Framework, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), p.
156; Robert Adcock and David Collier, “Measurement Validity: A Shared Standard for Qualitative and Quantitative
Research,” The American Political Science Review Vol. 95, No. 3 (2001), pp. 529-546.
16
I conceptualize threat perception as an assessment a state makes concerning the possibility of
significant loss due to the military actions taken by an external state. To distinguish unthreatened
states from threatened states, I argue that we have to first differentiate among different types of
perception of threat. Different types of perception of threat must be distinguished as they facilitate
different foreign policy behavior. To this end, I construct a new typology of perceptions of threat.
This classification scheme is furnished with clear observable implications, rending it empirically
replicable and practically useful. Importantly, I refrain from inferring threat perception from the
strategic behavior we use it to explain so that I measure the construct in a way that is not
tautological. In addition, we should examine the level of vigilance a state has vis-à-vis the main
source of threat, in the context of this dissertation, a rising power. By developing this vital new
measure of perceptions of threat, this dissertation fills an important void in the international
relations literature.
The rest of the chapter is organized as follows. The second part deals with the conceptualization
and definition of threat perception. The third part reviews existing measures of threat perception
and points out some common analytical problems in the literature. The fourth part develops an
approach to measuring threat perception, connecting a new typology of perceptions of threat and
the level of vigilance with the measurement of this theoretical construct. The last part establishes the
association between different perceptions of threat and various strategic portfolio possibly devised
by states in response to a rising power, which provides an auxiliary dimension for the measure.
Defining Threat Perception
To study threat perception, it requires us to understand threat as a “psychological concept” rather
than a strategy that a state can use to punish other states. Threat, in this sense, is not a “deliberate
undertaking” but an interpretation or anticipation of a “passive outcome.” Existing
17
conceptualizations of threat perception are mostly built upon this premise. Threat perception is not
an automatic process in which the presence of a stimulus will automatically lead to the emergence of
perceived threat. Rather, it is a process of “information assimilation and belief formation.”
Table 2.1 A Selection of Definitions of Threat Perception in the IR Theoretical Literature
23
23
Though by no means exhaustive, these definitions are a good representation of how threat perception is
conceptualized in the IR theoretical literature. J. David Singer, “Threat-Perception and the Armament-Tension
Dilemma,” Journal of Conflict Resolution Vol. 2, No. 1 (1958), p. 94; Dean G. Pruitt, “Definition of the Situation as a
Determinant of International Action,” in Herbert C. Kelman, ed., International Behavior: A Social-Psychological Analysis,
(New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1965), p. 395; David A. Baldwin, “Thinking About Threats,” The Journal of
Conflict Resolution Vol. 15, No. 1 (1971), p. 72; Klaus Knorr, “Threat Perception,” in Klaus Knorr, ed., Historical
Dimensions of National Security Problems, (Lawrence, Kansas: Allen Press, 1976), p. 78; Raymond Cohen, Threat Perception in
International Crisis (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1979), p. 4; Randall L. Schweller, Unanswered Threats: Political
Constraints on the Balance of Power (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University, 2006), p. 38; David L. Rousseau and Rocio
Garcia-Retamero, “Identity, Power, and Threat Perception: A Cross-National Experimental Study,” The Journal of Conflict
Resolution Vol. 51, No. 5 (2007), p. 745.
Author Definition of threat perception
Singer (1958) “Each body of policy-makers assumes that the other entertains aggressive
designs…[and] that such designs will be pursued by physical and direct means
if estimated gains seem to outweigh estimated losses.”
Pruitt (1965) “The belief that the future behavior of another nation is likely to frustrate the
attainment of a specific goal.”
Baldwin (1971) “the anticipation of harm”
Knorr (1976) “[the anticipation]—with some degree of probability—[of] the loss of
something of value, such as territory and population, restriction or loss of
sovereignty, economic assets, and political constitution.”
Cohen (1979) “An anticipation on the part of an observer, the decisionmaker, of impending
harm—usually of a military, strategic, or economic kind—to the state.”
Schweller (2006) “An anticipation on the part of a decisionmaker of impending harm of a
military kind to the state.”
18
As Table 2.1 indicates, scholars generally assign two attributes to the concept of threat
perception. First, threat perception is, depending on the unit of analysis on which scholars mainly
focus, essentially a belief held, or an assessment made by decisionmakers or states. Threat
perception necessarily involves, in Dean Pruitt’s words, “a more or less ‘piecing together’ of
evidence.” Second, this assessment concerns the possibility of loss or harm due to the actions of
another state. While the expectation of an impending harm may be stemmed from military,
economic, cultural or symbolic concerns, scholars of international security usually concentrate on
the dimensions of perceived security or military threat.
For the purpose of this dissertation, I define State A’s threat perception toward State B as “the
expected likelihood that State B will take some military actions to cause significant harm to State A.”
The harm caused by State B’s military actions, at minimum, leads to casualty substantive loss of
some values under its control, at maximum, results in the conquest of State A or the death of State
A as a sovereign state. This definition assumes that threat perception is essentially an inference that a
state has to draw with regard to the likelihood that its national security will be jeopardized due to an
opposing state’s military actions. It is true that an opposing state could cause indefinite degrees of
harm and every possible scenario could be assigned with a different likelihood of actualization,
therefore in theory we could have an anticipation with different estimated probabilities of any harm.
Entertaining both aspects simultaneously in the definition will simply make our analysis intractable.
Because our focus is on rising power that by definition possesses some offensive military capability,
which means that a substantive harm could be expected should the rising power choose to resort to
brutal forces.
Because threat does not speak for itself and the formation of threat perception is fundamentally a
subjective process, decisionmakers or the public might overestimate or underestimate the actual
19
level of existing security threat due to their limited cognitive abilities or motivated biases.
24
It is
important to note that we are dealing with states’ expected likelihood of a serious harm caused by an
opposing state’s military actions, the accuracy of their estimation is beyond the scope condition of this
dissertation.
25
Whether observers in a state perceive an external state as a menace to their national
security involves a descriptive analysis of threat perception, whereas the accuracy of their perception
demands a prescriptive analysis of threat perception. These two types of analysis should not be
conflated.
Analytical Pitfalls of Existing Measures of Threat Perception
How should we operationalize and measure threat perception? While scholars can arrive at a
consensus regarding the conceptualization of threat perception, there is no such thing as a uniform
way of the operationalization of this theoretical construct. Due to its perceptual and intangible
nature, measuring threat perception poses a serious challenge to international relations scholars. This
is perhaps why some scholars avoid measuring threat perception directly even if this concept serves
as a critical element in their statements. For example, John Mearsheimer maintains that “China’s
neighbors are…certain to fear its rise…, and they will…do whatever they can to prevent it from
achieving regional hegemony. Indeed, there is already substantial evidence that countries like India,
Japan, and Russia, as well as smaller powers like Singapore, South Korea, and Vietnam, are worried
about China’s ascendancy and are looking for ways to contain it.”
26
Unfortunately, Mearsheimer’s
claim is not backed up by substantial evidence, whether in the paper where the quotation draws
24
Oftentimes we can only detect threat misperception based on hindsight. For this argument, see Robert Jervis, Perception
and Misperception in International Politics, 2 ed. (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2017).
25
A seminal work on this subject is Philip E. Tetlock, Expert Political Judgment: How Good Is It? How Can We Know?
(Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2005).
26
Mearsheimer, “Can China Rise Peacefully?,” p. 5.
20
from or the newly added chapter on China’s rise in the updated version of Tragedy of Great Power
Politics.
27
He simply assumes that China will for sure be perceived as an imminent or rising threat due
to its rapidly growing economic and military capabilities and the uncertainty regarding its intentions.
In short, he did not really measure East Asian states’ level of fear of China.
Even if scholars do take the effort to measure threat perception, there are three analytical
problems that often plague scholarly analysis on threat perception. In what follows, I will discuss
each one of them in turn.
Pitfall 1: Detecting Threat Perception by Unsystematically Looking for Some Words
Some scholars assume that the concept of threat perception is so straightforward that a clear
definition is even not necessary. They believe that they can easily “reconstruct” the level of threat
perception of decisionmakers by consulting primary and secondary sources.
28
A typical empirical
strategy these scholars utilize is to examine whether key words such as “threat,” “hostility,”
“danger,” and “concern” were used by decisionmakers in their characterization of the surrounding
external environment or an external state. The presence of these key words indicates the existence of
threat perception, whereas the absence of these key words would indicate the absence of perceived
threat.
Adam Liff is an untiring advocate of the China threat thesis that I mentioned in Chapter 1. Liff
provides perhaps the most comprehensive analysis of perceived China threat in East Asia among
27
Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics.
28
Mark L. Haas, The Ideological Origins of Great Power Politics, 1789-1989 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005), p. 584;
Zoltán I. Buzas, “The Color of Threat: Race, Threat Perception, and the Demise of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance (1902-
1923),” Security Studies Vol. 22, No. 4 (2013).
21
works endorsing the China threat thesis.
29
But as I shall show below, there is a serious analytical
issue embedded in his measurement of East Asian perceptions of threat against China: he overly
relies on the mentioning of some words to infer the existence of heightened threat perception
toward China.
The empirical strategy that Liff uses to examine the existence of perceived threat is to see if
China was referred as a threat in decisionmakers’ public statements or official documents. For
example, he claims that Australia perceives China as a threat because Malcolm Turnbull referred the
rise of China as one of the greatest threats to global security during an interview in 2015.
30
At first
glance, this appears to be strong evidence that Canberra already perceives China as an imminent
threat. However, this quotation was taken out of context to a certain extent. What Turnbull actually
said was that “what we [Asia-Pacific countries] need to ensure is that the rise of China [is] conducted
in a manner that does not disturb the security and the relative harmony of the region upon which
China’s prosperity depends. Now - now, that requires careful diplomacy, it requires balancing.”
31
In
other words, while Turnbull believes that the rise of China could potentially disturb East Asia if not
handled with proper policies, it does not follow that he already perceived China as a threat or he
believes that China’s intentions are entirely nonmalleable. Indeed, even if perceived threat does exist,
it is imperative to further examine whether the observer believes that an external state’s malign
intention is malleable toward benignity or not. A belief that the external state’s is implacably hostile
usually implies higher level of threat perception, whereas one with relatively optimistic assessment
29
Adam P. Liff, “Whither the Balancers? The Case for a Methodological Reset,” Security Studies Vol. 25, No. 3 (2016), pp.
420-459.
30
Ibid., p. 451.
31
John Garnaur, “Malcolm Turnbull Changes Direction on Foreign Policy: China Trumps the Islamic State Death Cult,”
The South Morning Herald, September 24, 2015.
22
regarding the malleability of the external’s intentions indicates lower level of perceived threat. This
dimension, however, is usually omitted from the existing analysis of threat perception.
32
Interestingly and strikingly, Turnbull noted in a 2018 interview that, “A threat, technically, is a
combination of capability and intent. China has enormous capability of course, it’s growing as the
country becomes more prosperous and economically stronger. But we do not see any hostile intent
from China.”
33
Based on Liff’s approach, it appears that Canberra does not view Beijing as a threat
anymore, despite China’s growing assertiveness in the South China Sea and its policy toward
Australia remaining largely the same. How is it possible? The example of Turnbull shows how
unreliable and misguided our assessment of the empirical reality of a particular state’s perception can
be if we only concentrate on finding certain words in an unsystematic manner. Unfortunately, this is
exactly what Liff did in his analysis of East Asian threat perception toward China: he carefully
looked for the mentioning of some words and use this as strong evidence to support the China
threat thesis. While I am not suggesting that one should avoid using this type of evidence, measuring
threat perception mainly by unsystematically searching for the presence or absence of some specific
words is problematic.
There is no denying that the use or non-use of these words perhaps reveals very different
assessments regarding the nature of interaction with an external state. Measuring threat perception
by the mere presence of this list of words is less problematic if scholars could provide a clear
criterion and identify the key words they will be examining ex ante. Existing works, unfortunately,
32
David M. Edelstein, “Managing Uncertainty: Beliefs About Intentions and the Rise of Great Powers,” Security Studies
Vol. 12, No. 1 (2002), pp. 1-40.
33
David Crowe, “Malcolm Turnbull Says China Does Not Present A ‘Threat’ To Australia,” The South Morning Herald,
February 22, 2018.
23
usually select these key words in an ad hoc manner.
34
We need a theory to tell us what to look for.
Without the guidance from a theory, the exercise of looking for some seemingly informative words
to detect threat perception is doomed to measurement errors or the fallacy of cherry-picking.
Pitfall 2: Inferring Threat Perception from the Strategic Behavior Induced by It
A second common analytical problem concerning measuring threat perception is to infer
perceived threat from the strategic behavior possibly induced by it. For example, we might assume
that because East Asian states did not balance against China, they must not fear China. How do we
know if they fear China or not? We know it for they did not increase their military expenditures
substantively, which is an important element of balancing.
35
This is circular reasoning because we are
inferring threat perception from the outcome we use it to explain. Stephen Walt makes it clear that
this problem should be scrupulously avoided when he advises on how to test his theory of alliance
formation. Walt writes, “we cannot use the existence of an alliance as evidence that a threat existed,
and then use that same alliance as ‘evidence’ that external threats cause states to seek an ally.”
36
He
then suggests that one should use other policy responses, such as military spending, to detect the
existence of an external threat.
While Walt’s suggestion can address the issue of tautology, we still need to be careful about
inferring threat perception solely from policy responses in that threat perception is oftentimes not
the only plausible or the most powerful cause of that observed policy response. There is simply a
34
Kai He, “Undermining Adversaries: Unipolarity, Threat Perception, and Negative Balancing Strategies after the Cold
War,” Security Studies Vol. 21, No. 2 (2012), pp. 154-191.
35
Chan, Looking for Balance: China, the United States, and Power Balancing in East Asia; Kang, American Grand Strategy and East
Asian Security in the 21st Century.
36
Stephen M. Walt, “Testing Theories of Alliance Formation: The Case of Southwest Asia,” International Organization Vol.
42, No. 2 (1988), p. 283.
24
plethora of potential confounds. Military spending, for example, has been demonstrated to be
possibly affected by other structural factors besides threat perception, such as national economic
condition and regime type, just to name a few.
37
This problem cannot be completely solved even if
scholars use some innovative alternative behavioral indicators, such as the sending of costly signals.
38
To deal with the problem of potential confounds, it may be helpful to simply use policy choices as
auxiliary evidence alongside with the verbal statements of the observers.
39
Pitfall 3: Conflating Threat Perception with Different Constructs
Given that threat perception is notoriously hard to measure, some scholars rely on some
seemingly related concepts to measure it. For example, Matthew Linley and his colleagues use the
positive and negative assessment of China’s influence as a proxy for threat perception.
40
Favorable
or unfavorable views toward a certain country is another popular alternative.
41
The underlying
assumption of these works is that these alternative constructs can capture whether individuals fear
an external state and therefore they are good measures of threat perception. To be sure, these
constructs reveal orientations and basic attitudes of people toward an external state. However, these
37
Aynur Alptekin and Paul Levine, “Military Expenditure and Economic Growth: A Meta-Analysis,” European Journal of
Political Economy Vol. 28, No. 4 (2012), pp. 636-650; Vincenzo Bove and Jennifer Brauner, “The Demand for Military
Expenditure in Authoritarian Regimes,” Defence and Peace Economics Vol. 27, No. 5 (2016), pp. 609-625.
38
Kang, American Grand Strategy and East Asian Security in the 21st Century.
39
This is the strategy employed by Rick Herrmann. See Richard K. Herrmann, Perceptions and Behavior in Soviet Foreign
Policy (Pittsburgh, Pa.: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1985).
40
Matthew Linley, James Reilly, and Benjamin E. Goldsmith, “Who’s Afraid of the Dragon? Asian Mass Publics’
Perceptions of China’s Influence,” Japanese Journal of Political Science Vol. 13, No. 4 (2012), pp. 501-523.
41
Min-hua Huang and Yun-han Chu, “The Sway of Geopolitics, Economic Interdependence and Cultural Identity: Why
Are Some Asians More Favorable toward China’s Rise Than Others?,” Journal of Contemporary China Vol. 24, No. 93
(2015), pp. 421-441; David C. Kang, China Rising: Peace, Power, and Order in East Asia (New York: Columbia University
Press, 2007), p. 68.
25
measures should not be seen as definitive evidence that threat perception exists or not for two
reasons. First, it is not clear what attribute of the external state gives rise to the positive or negative
sentiments toward the external state. It may be that respondents make the inference based on
dimensions that have nothing to do with the aspects of security or military dynamics. Second, even
if respondents do view the external state negatively, it does not necessarily mean that they will
therefore consider the external state as a security threat. The unfavorable assessment may be
stemmed from factors that completely unrelated to the concern over the military threat posed by the
external state.
42
Having discussed some common problems regarding existing measures of threat perception, the
next step is to develop a robust measure of threat perception.
Toward a New Measure of Threat Perception
I argue that a good measure of threat perception should possess the following properties. First,
given that threat perception is not easy to detect, a measure of threat perception must be
constructed under the guidance of a theory with clear and well-specified observable implications.
Ideally, these observable implications should enable us to identify the existence of threat perception
even if states do not express it explicitly that they feel threatened. Second, given that threat
perception potentially encompasses a range of conceptually distinct phenomena that might result in
different strategic orientations and behavior, a typology that categorizes different types of perception
of threat is greatly needed. Third, it would be ideal if the measure provides with us a quantitative
42
For example, while some European countries may have negative feelings toward the United States or negative
assessment of American influence in the region, they generally do not view the United States as a military threat.
Giacomo Chiozza, Anti-Americanism and the American World Order (Baltimore, Md: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009).
26
scale so that we can have a baseline for temporal comparison. Finally, this measure should allow us
to measure threat perception in a way that is not tautological.
The task I take up in this section is to develop a new measure of threat perception that satisfy all
these criteria. It should help us avoid the pitfalls that I highlight above. Ultimately, my goal is to
construct a measure that provides a rigorous and systematic way to assess whether countries are
afraid and what their level of fear is.
Three Types of Perception of Threat
Recall that I define perception of threat as an inference a state makes concerning the likelihood
of significant loss due to an external state’s military actions. In theory, there can be infinite possible
degrees of threatening level of an external state, ranging from totally unthreatening to entirely
threatening based on different estimated likelihood of the external state’s use of military force. To
simply the matter, developing a typology of perceptions of threat will be conceptually and
heuristically useful.
43
In generating a typology of states’ perceptions of threat, we have to take care that the
classification scheme captures the important characteristics that separate different types of
perceptions of threat from one another. I conceptualize perception of threat as an assessment
composed of a set of internally coherent beliefs regarding the threatening nature of an external state.
Depending on the inference that a state makes, perception of threat can take different forms. I
43
Besides the assessment of likelihood that an external state might inflict some harm, the magnitude of harm that the
external state can possibly cause is another important aspect in threat assessment. This aspect, however, is less important
for our purpose here. It is because a rising power must already possess some or even formidable offensive capabilities,
so the consequence is guaranteed to be detrimental should the rising power decide to put its military power to use. What
really matters is whether this scenario is probable or not. As such, in the context of facing a rising power, threat
assessment is mainly determined by the dimension of likelihood, rather than magnitude.
27
distinguish between three analytically distinct perceptions of threat: perception of active threat, perception of
dormant threat, and perception of unlikely threat. They represent important and analytically distinct
assessments with regard to state interaction and are composed on different sets of beliefs.
I derive the set of internally coherent beliefs associated with these three types of perceptions of
threat from the theoretical discussion on interstate reconciliation as well as the spiral and deterrence
models. Alexander George divides interstate relationships into three categories of peace: precarious
peace, conditional peace, and stable peace, which are clearly differentiated by different expectations
of war and conflict resolution.
44
Robert Jervis’ seminal discussion on the deterrence and the spiral
models also demonstrates different characterizations of the nature of external environment,
assessment of the opposing state’s intentions, and desirability of interstate cooperation.
45
The ideal-
typical models presented in these literatures are premised on different framings and expectations of
bilateral relationships, which essentially represent the full spectrum of different assessments
regarding the threatening level or nature of an external state. They are thus extremely useful for our
typology-generating exercise. As threat perception is theorized here as an assessment composed of a
set of internally coherent beliefs, I conceptually distinguish perception of threat and the strategic
behavior induced by it.
46
Perceptions of threat are thus understood as different “motivational
44
Alexander L. George, “Forward ” in Arie M. Kacowicz, ed., Stable Peace among Nations, (Lanham, Maryland: Rowman &
Littlefield Publisher, 2000), pp. xii-xiii.
45
Robert Jervis, Perception and Misperception in International Politics (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1976), ch. 3.
46
While some might take issue with my conceptualization, I argue that it is defensible because perception, as Janice
Gross Stein notes, is “the basis for understanding, learning, and knowing and the motivation for action,” suggesting that
perception of threat and the action triggered by it are analytically separable. See Janice Gross Stein, “Threat Perception
in International Relations,” in Leonie Huddy, David O. Sears, and Jack S. Levy, ed., The Oxford Handbook of Political
Psychology, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), p. 365.
28
antecedents” that precede security policies.
47
It helps us to avoid the second pitfall that I discuss in
previous section.
Drawing on the works by Alexander George and Robert Jervis, I use four indicators to categorize
different types of perception of threat that a state holds toward an external state: (1) the state’s
expectation of how bilateral disputes with the external state might be solved; (2) the type and
malleability of the intention the state believes that the external state possesses; (3) the state’s general
assessment of the security environment relating to the external state; and (4) the state’s evaluation of
the consequences of cooperating with the external state. Taken together, these indicators represent a
belief system, composed of four coherent interrelated beliefs, which provides the foundation for
discriminating different types of threat perception.
One might argue that it is possible that these four indicators may take on different values, thereby
making the task of assigning a particular case to a specific category difficult due to internal
inconsistency. However, from a theoretical perspective, it is hard to imagine that the beliefs derived
from these four indicators would point to complete different directions. For example, it is not
conceivable that a state can simultaneously believe that an external state is extremely likely to use
force against it to settle territorial disputes, has malign intentions that are not malleable toward
benignity, and yet the bilateral strategic environment relating to the external state is entirely amiable
or that cooperating with the external state unconditionally is entirely desirable. That being said, if we
ever encounter this problem in the actual case studies, we will use the state’s expectation of how
bilateral disputes will be solved as the most decisive indicator because the other three indicators can
be seen as corollaries of this indicator and observers are more likely to give unambiguous assessment
regarding this dimension.
47
Zeev Maoz, National Choices and International Processes (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), p. 86.
29
Perception of active Threat
A perception of active threat is defined as an assessment that an external state is very likely to use
military actions to cause significant harm, thereby putting the survival of, or something of value
possessed by the perceiving state in danger. It usually forms in a situation where an external state is
believed to pose an imminent security challenge that must be immediately contained.
This perception is composed of four interrelated beliefs: First, bilateral disputes vis-à-vis the
external state are likely to be solved by military force. Put differently, disputes are likely to escalate to
militarized conflicts or even war; Second, the external state is implacably hostile, implying that the
external state is likely to be portrayed as harboring expansionist or malign intentions that are not
malleable toward benignity; Third, the security environment relating to the external state is dire and
zero-sum in nature; Fourth, cooperating with the external state will only invite exploitation.
Cooperative or accommodative policies such as deepening economic ties with the external state or
reassurance will be strongly opposed.
Perception of unlikely threat
The second type of threat perception is perception of unlikely threat. It is conceptualized as an
assessment that an external state is very unlikely to cause harm to the perceiving state. In other
words, the perceived likelihood of the external state using military force is extremely low. This
category corresponds with George’s conception of stable peace.
A perception of unlikely threat also consists of four internally coherent beliefs. First, bilateral
disputes are not conceivable to be solved through force. The state is confident that disputes are
almost impossible to escalate to militarized conflicts. Second, the external state is believed to harbor
benign intentions. The state is likely to have particularized trust toward the external state. The state
generally believes that its survival is extremely unlikely to be jeopardized even if its fate is in the
30
hands of the external state. Third, the security environment relating to the external state is believed
to be amicably stable. The state holding this belief is unlikely to fear that a change in relative power
vis-à-vis the external state will lead to grave implications. Fourth, cooperating with the external state
is believed to be rewarding and thus highly desirable.
Perception of dormant threat
A perception of dormant threat is an assessment that an external state is somewhat likely to cause
harm to an opposing state by its military actions. If we think of perceptions of active threat and
unlikely threat as two belief systems that represent the most pessimistic and optimistic assessments
of the likelihood of the materialization of threat, a perception of dormant threat falls somewhere in
between.
Like the other two perceptions of threat, perception of dormant threat also contains four core
beliefs: First, while the possibility that bilateral disputes with the external state may be solved
through force cannot be ruled out, the probability is not particularly high; Second, the external state
may or may not have malign or expansionist intentions. Even as if it does, its intentions are believed
to be somewhat malleable toward benignity; Third, the bilateral security environment vis-à-vis the
external state as neither precarious nor completely amicable. In other words, there exists some risks
embedded in the external environment and yet these risks will not necessarily lead to loss of
something of value. Finally, cooperating with the external state is conditionally rewarding. It means
that the state might pursue cooperation with caution or adopting cooperative and defensive policies
simultaneously.
The three perceptions of threat are mutually exclusive. It is because by construction, an observer
is impossible to possess different types of perception of threat at the same time (e.g., believing that
an external state is an active threat and a dormant threat simultaneously). Moreover, although the
31
three perceptions of threat may have minor variations within them, we are still able to assign a state’s
perception of threat to one of these three categories. The three perceptions of threat are collectively
exhaustive because they generally encompass the entire range of possible assessments of the
likelihood that an external state will put one’s nation-state’s survival in danger
.
48
Taken together, I
argue that the three types of perception of threat I develop here are mutually exclusive and
empirically exhaustive.
Table 2.2 takes stock and summarizes the definitions of different types of perception of threat
and the criteria used for coding them. With clear and profound observable implications, my measure
of threat perception is empirically useful and falsifiable. It is more likely to detect the type of
perceptions of threat held by a state than existing measures. While the measure I develop here also
requires us to look for some key words, my measure is less problematic than extant ones because I
have laid out the criteria ex ante and these key words are used to gauge whether a specific belief
actually exists rather than cited out of context. Another virtue of this measure is that it measures
threat perception in a way that is not tautological given that I conceptually separate perception of
threat and the policy responses induced by it.
Table 2.2 Summary of Three Ideal Typical Perceptions of Threat
Ideal typical
perceptions of
threat
Definition Observable implications
Perception of
active threat
An assessment that an
external state is very likely to
take military actions to cause
significant harm
• Bilateral disputes are likely to be solved
through force
• The external state harbors malign
intentions that are not malleable
48
Given that international system is anarchic and almost all state actors have offensive capabilities to a certain extent, it
is not empirically useful and theoretically meaningful to discuss a perception of no threat. And more importantly, a
perception of no threat can simply be seen as a special case of the perception of unlikely threat.
32
• The security environment relating to the
external state is dire and zero-sum in
nature
• Cooperation with the external state
invites exploitation
Perception of
dormant
threat
An assessment that an
external state is somewhat likely
to take military actions to
cause significant harm
• Bilateral disputes are not highly likely to
be solved through force and yet the
possibility cannot be ruled out
• The external state might harbor malign
intentions that are somewhat malleable
• The security environment relating to the
external state is neither precarious nor
completely amicable
• Cooperation with the external state is
conditionally rewarding
Perception of
unlikely threat
An assessment that an
external state is very unlikely to
take military actions to cause
significant harm
• Bilateral disputes are not conceivable to
be solved through force
• The external state harbors benign
intentions
• The security environment relating to the
external state is amicably stable
• Cooperation with the external state is
rewarding
Observable Manifestation of the Classification Scheme: Level of Vigilance
The classification scheme of threat perception I develop above leads to a quantifiable observable
implication: a perceived active threat, which is likely to put other states’ survival at risk or at least
inflict serious harm, commands constant high level of attention. A perceived non-active threat, on
the other hand, does not lead to similar behavioral tendency. Put differently, perception of active
threat produces high vigilance, whereas perception of unlikely threat gives rise to low vigilance, and
perception of dormant threat is in between. This empirical expectation based on scientifically-
proven facts rather than assumptions.
33
The psychologists Carl Stroh and Hans Eysenck note, “Because of the vast number of stimuli
which are impinging on the sense organs at any given time, it is impossible to attend to all the
aspects of the many stimuli with the same degree of awareness. Out perception must, therefore, be
selective; some stimuli must be given more attention than others.”
49
In order to meet the challenge
of information or stimuli explosion, humans have developed the ability to draw attention only to
important stimuli in the environment. To achieve this, humans make a distinction between active
threat and non-active threat. When confronted with a threatening stimulus, people typically devote
increased attentional resources to that stimulus.
50
Active threat represents an imminent danger that is
likely to imperil the survival of one’s group. It compels humans to stay alert and pay continued
attention to the source of the active threat. In short, the detection of active threat leads to vigilance.
By contrast, when not dealing with an active security threat of any sort, the acquired attention
becomes significantly lower as the psychological mechanism of vigilance will not be triggered.
51
This
pattern has been identified by numerous experiments conducted in evolutionary biology and
psychology.
52
Therefore, perceived active threat posed by an external state is manifested, I argue, in constant
vigilance of the external state, particularly concerning the external state’s military capabilities if one’s
49
Carl M. Stroh and Hans J. Eysenck, Vigilance: The Problem of Sustained Attention (Oxford, New York: Pergamon Press,
1971), p. 1.
50
Dirk Wentura, Klaus Rothermund, and Peter Bak, “Automatic Vigilance: The Attention-Grabbing Power of
Approach and Avoidance-Related Social Information,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology Vol. 78, No. 6 (2000), pp.
1024-1037.
51
Vanessa LoBue, David H. Rakison, and Judy S. DeLoache, “Threat Perception across the Life Span: Evidence for
Multiple Converging Pathways,” Current Directions in Psychological Science Vol. 19, No. 6 (2010), pp. 375-379.
52
David Eilam, Rony Izhar, and Joel Mort, “Threat Detection: Behavioral Practices in Animals and Humans,”
Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews Vol. 35, No. 4 (2011), pp. 999-1006; Karl C. Klauer, “Affective Priming: Findings
and Theories,” in Jochen Musch and Karl C. Klauer, ed., The Psychology of Evaluation: Affective Processes in Cognition and
Emotion, (Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, 2003), pp. 7-50.
34
focus is on security and military threats. Conversely, when an external state is not viewed as an
imminent danger, the amount of attention paid to it will be significantly lower. When systematic data
are available, we can use this dimension of threat perception as a quantitative scale to trace the
baseline and overall change of threat perception. In other words, incorporating this empirical
implication into our measure of threat perception makes a temporal analysis or comparison possible.
Auxiliary Dimension: Strategic Portfolios Devised by the Perceiving State
People who insist that security policy choices are always more informative than rhetoric or
expression of preference and feelings may take issue with my measure because it mainly captures the
latter but not the former. They perhaps would extol and strongly prefer a measure of threat
perception that heavily prioritizes or even solely focuses on behavioral patterns in the realm of
security affairs as data. This is grossly wrong because besides threat perception, the actual security
strategies employed by states usually depend on other factors that must be treated exogenously on a
contingent basis. It is thus more appropriate to theorize threat perception as a motivational or
perceptual milieu which “limits” but not “determines” strategic choices.
53
A better way to
incorporate the element of security policy choices into the measure of threat perception, therefore, is
to use the strategies states adopt in response to an external state to triangulate, but conceptually
separate then from the theoretical construct. This is a “methodological bet” I make to keep the
measure clean and shy away from tautology. In what follows, I will demonstrate how to make use of
states’ security policy choices as data to provide an additional test validation test for the measure.
IR scholars have identified numerous strategies that states can adopt in response to a rising
power. For example, Paul Schroeder argues that buck-passing, free riding, bandwagoning, hiding,
53
Maoz, “National Choices and International Processes,” p. 86.
35
uniting, and transcending are strategies at states’ disposal to obtain security.
54
Randall Schweller
offers a different menu of options, which contains six basic policy options: preventive war,
balancing, bandwagoning, binding, engagement, and buck-passing.
55
These strategies cover almost
the full spectrum of how states response to emerging powers based on different ways of resource
allocation. While some scholars tend to treat these strategies as mutually exclusive, it is clear that
states can adopt multiple strategies simultaneously.
56
As such, instead of examining whether states
employ a specific type of strategy at a given point in time, it may be more fruitful to focus on the
“strategic portfolios” that states devise when dealing with a rising state.
Charles Glaser and David Edelstein have demonstrated that we can categorize security strategies
based on the spectrum of competition and cooperation. Some strategies are “competitive” because
the fundamental goal is to weaken the relative power or impede the growth of the rising state. Some
strategies are “cooperative” in that they either offer substantial gains or signal good intentions to the
rising state.
57
Table 2.3 provides a list of competitive and cooperative strategies that are widely
discussed in the theoretical literature. States can certainly adopt competitive and cooperative
strategies simultaneously, nonetheless, they have to decide how to prioritize or balance different
elements of their strategic portfolios.
54
Paul Schroeder, “Historical Reality Vs. Neo-Realist Theory,” International Security Vol. 19, No. 1 (1994), pp. 108-148.
55
Randall L. Schweller, “Rise of Great Powers: History and Theory,” in Alastair I. Johnston and Robert S. Ross, ed.,
Engaging China: The Management of an Emerging Power, (New York: Routledge, 1999), pp. 1-31.
56
Ibid., pp. 17-18. The emergence of the literature on hedging is perhaps a clear reflection of this basic observation. On
this emerging literature, see Goh, The Struggle for Order: Hegemony, Hierarchy, and Transition in Post-Cold War East Asia; Lim
and Cooper, “Reassessing Hedging: The Logic of Alignment in East Asia,” pp. 696-727; Kuik, “How Do Weaker States
Hedge? Unpacking ASEAN States’ Alignment Behavior Towards China,” pp. 500-514; Ba, “Beyond Dichotomous
Choices: Responses to Chinese Initiative in Southeast Asia,” pp. 187-227.
57
Glaser, Rational Theory of International Politics: The Logic of Competition and Cooperation; David M. Edelstein, Over the Horizon:
Time, Uncertainty, and the Rise of Great Powers (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2017).
36
Table 2.3 A list of competitive and cooperative strategies
58
Competitive Cooperative
Preventive war
Containment
Rollback
Large-scale military build-up
Militarily align with another power
Display of military force
Mobilization of military force
Economic sanction
Make threats or demands
Militarily align with the external state
Military drawdown
Demobilize military forces
Intelligence sharing
Engagement
Give economic aid
Facilitate economic exchange
Institutionalize bilateral dialogues
Engage in negotiations
What strategic portfolios are likely to arise out of the cauldron of different perceptions of threat?
The relationship between threat perception and strategies has been established by some important
works. The basic finding is that the higher the level of perceived severity or danger of the external
environment, the higher the probability a state will invest in competitive strategies.
59
Following this
line of reasoning, I argue that states with a perception of active threat are likely to have a strategic
portfolio that predominantly relies on the competitive element over the cooperative element in
order to make the threat of military retaliation credible or prevent the balance of power from further
shifting in the rising power’s favor.
60
The sense of tragic foreboding hanging over a state’s
assessment of the strategic interaction via-s-vis the external state is likely to justify a strategic
58
I consult the following works to compile the list: Miranda Priebe, “Fear and Frustration: Rising State Perceptions of
Threats and Opportunities,” (Ph.D. dissertation., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2015); Edelstein, Over the
Horizon: Time, Uncertainty, and the Rise of Great Powers; Shiping Tang, A Theory of Security Strategies for Our Time: Defensive
Realism (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010).
59
Waltz, Theory of International Politics; Walt, The Origins of Alliances; Vipin Narang, Nuclear Strategy in the Modern Era: Regional
Powers and International Conflict (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2014); James D. Fearon, “Signaling Foreign Policy
Interests: Tying Hands Versus Sinking Costs,” The Journal of Conflict Resolution Vol. 41, No. 1 (1997), pp. 68-90.
60
In general, a strategic portfolio that mainly concentrates on the competitive element is usually costlier than the ones
that prioritizes cooperative policies. It is because the competitive portion in a strategic portfolio is usually furnished with
large-scale military investment, which almost always requires more resources than cooperative strategies, such as
diplomatic engagement.
37
portfolio that prioritizes the competitive element. By contrast, those with a perception of unlikely
threat are likely to formulate a strategic portfolio that prioritizes the cooperative portion over the
competitive portion to communicate a state’s benign intentions. In between these two extremes,
states with a perception of dormant threat are likely to devise a strategic portfolio that emphasizes
both the competitive and the cooperative elements. The crux of the theoretical argument here is that
different types of perception of threat will affect which type of strategic portfolio toward a rising
power the perceiving state finds attractive.
38
Chapter 3
A Psychological Theory of Regional Threat Perception
In this chapter I seek to develop a theory on the causes of regional threat perception toward a
rising power. Essentially, this theory explains what causes the perception of threat toward a rising
power to form and vary, and through what mechanisms. It is important to be clear about the criteria
that a useful theory of how regional states perceive a rising power would have to meet. First, the
theory should specify the scope conditions under which states would possess certain type of
perception of threat vis-à-vis a rising power. Second, the theory should make clear predictions for
the amount of attention states would pay to a rising power given a constellation of relevant variables.
That is, the theory tells us when a state’s level of vigilance against a rising power increases or
decreases. Third, the theory should clearly stipulate the intervening casual mechanisms implied by
the theory. The theoretical propositions I lay out in this chapter constitute a theory that satisfies
these criteria.
In brief, my theory advances three overarching arguments. The first point is that a state’s level of
vigilance of a rising power, measured in the amount of attention a state paid to the rising power, and
the rising power’s military capabilities in particular, is strongly correlated with the rising power’s
strategic behavior toward other states. The second point is that states will not view a rising power as
an active security threat if it does not employ escalatory or coercive policies against other states or
certain economic assuring factors associated with the rising power are present. The third point
concerns the causal mechanisms. The theory suggests that it is imperative to examine whether
perceived threat becomes vivid due to the rising power’s strategic behavior and whether perceived
threat can be diluted by the presence of economic assuring signals, particularly motivated reasoning
triggered by the economic benefits offered by the rising power.
39
The chapter is organized as follows. The second part presents the theory, connecting a sequence
of two variables relating to states’ interaction with a rising power with the dependent variable, that
is, their threat perception toward the rising power. The third part reviews some alternative
explanations. The last part delineates the empirical strategy employed to test my theory against the
empirical record and alternative hypotheses.
Toward a Psychological Theory of Regional Threat Perception
Prominent psychologist Richard S. Lazarus has suggested that threat perception involves an
appraisal process and this process is largely determined by the “threat stimulus configuration,” by
which he means the configuration of threat-related informational cues.
61
Importantly, states utilize
these threat-related informational cues to discriminate threatening states from less threatening states.
As Charles Glaser suggests, states use “information variables” to distinguish between different types
of states.
62
States inevitably have higher threat perception toward an external state if states believe
that they are dealing with a greedy state rather than a security-seeking state who may be secure or
insecure.
63
A greedy state is inherently more dangerous than an insecure state because of its high
level of revisionism. It is almost impossible to reassure a greedy state as its aggressive or
expansionist intentions are simply unmalleable.
Of course, another important factor to determine how dangerous or threatening a state is
concerns its capabilities.
64
Simply put, states are unlikely to feel threatened by a state with no
offensive capabilities, even if it is extremely greedy. However, this would not be an issue for us
61
Richard S. Lazarus, Psychological Stress and the Coping Process (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1966), p. 44.
62
Glaser, Rational Theory of International Politics: The Logic of Competition and Cooperation, pp. 81-85.
63
A greedy state is conceptually synonymous to a revisionist power, or in Hans Morgenthau’s terms, an imperial state.
64
Singer, “Threat-Perception and the Armament-Tension Dilemma,” pp. 90-105.
40
because by and large, states would not be coined as rising powers if they do not have some offensive
military capability. In particular, China is a potential rising superpower by almost all accounts, so it
does not make sense to assume that China would lack the capability to cause substantive harm to
other states by its military muscles.
I theorize that threat perception toward a rising power is a function of states’ perceived level of
revisionism of the rising power, which is determined by a sequence of two variables: whether the
rising power exercises restraint in its interaction with other states, and whether economic assuring
factors associated with the rising power are present or absent. These two variables define the
strategic and economic circumstances states face regarding their interaction with the rising power.
Different strategic and economic parameters will lead to different expectations of a rising power’s
level of revisionism. Using this framework, my theory generates ex ante predictions for how a rising
power will be perceived by other states.
Variable 1: The Rising Power’s Strategic Behavior
The first variable is whether the rising power exercises restraint in its interaction with other
states. Specifically, it concerns whether the rising power adopts escalatory and coercive policies
when interacting with other countries, particularly in the realm of territorial disputes. This variable
comes first because it indicates the absence or presence of vivid information that renders the active
threat claim against the rising power implausible or plausible. In other words, this variable affects
whether the threat posed by the rising power is vivid or not, thereby determining whether the rising
power is possibly to be securitized as a military threat and the amount of attention a state would pay
to the rising power. But how exactly does vividness affect states’ threat assessment?
41
Yaacov Vertzberger writes, “Decisionmakers are not…able to pay attention to all sources of
information available to them and then decided what is relevant. Attention is a scarce resource and is
therefore selective.”
65
Vertzberger further notes that “Attention allocation is affected by the
properties of the stimulus or its vividness…In general, the more extreme or dramatic the content of
information, the less likely it is to go unobserved.”
66
As Engene Borgida and Richard Nisbett
suggest, all individuals are likely to give information that is more vivid and salient greater weight
than less vivid information, in regardless of their psychological traits.
67
In the context of
encountering a rising power, insight leads to the theoretical expectation that vivid threatening
information is more likely to affect states’ threat assessment of a rising power than stimuli that are
not vivid.
68
But what can be considered as a vivid threatening stimulus? What is not?
I theorize that a rising power’s escalatory behavior in territorial disputes, coercive policies against
other countries, and targeted military deployment serve as the kind of threatening stimulus that is
vivid enough to give rise to vigilance because they are extreme, dramatic, and sensorially proximate
to the notion of security threat. This vivid threatening stimulus is likely to be observed by most
people, even if these individuals do not have the same psychological traits or similar pre-existing
about how the world works. For example, dovish individuals are generally more trusting, they
therefore may ignore some information that might may be relevant for threat assessment but not
65
Yaacov Vertzberger, The World in Their Minds: Information Processing, Cognition, and Perception in Foreign Policy Decisionmaking
(Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1990), p. 53.
66
Ibid., pp. 56-57.
67
Richard E. Nisbett and Lee Ross, Human Inference: Strategies and Shortcomings of Social Judgment (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.:
Prentice-Hall, INC., 1980), pp. 132-133.
68
Keren Yarhi-Milo also employs the concept vividness in her work. But her argument is mainly about how vivid
information leaders gathered from face-to-face personal meetings affects their assessment of an adversary’s intentions.
Keren Yarhi-Milo, Knowing the Adversary: Leaders, Intelligence, and Assessment of Intentions in International Relations (Princeton,
New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2014).
42
vivid. They are, however, unlikely to fail to notice the existence of a vivid threatening. In more
general terms, when a rising power does not exercise restraint, the active threat claim against it will
be more likely to be considered plausible. Conversely, when a rising power does exercise restraint
such as adopting cooperative strategies in territorial disputes, then the likelihood for the rising power
to be securitized by other states as a security threat will be significantly lower because the vivid
information that substantiates an active threat claim against is absent.
69
That is, a rising power is
likely to be perceived as an unlikely threat under this condition. My argument demonstrates how a
cognitive factor can affect the formation of perception of threat and also provides a solid
psychological foundation for why perceived active threat is generally easy to detect in societies that
have been “subject to repeated attack and military pressure,”
70
whereas individuals in an
environment where militarized conflict is absent for years are unlikely to be highly vigilant of other
states or the external environment in general.
71
In a way, my argument demonstrates how to
operationalize the variable of “aggressive intentions” laid out by Stephen Walt’s balance of threat
theory.
72
While theoretically convincing, the major problem associated with Walt’s theory is that it is
hard to apply.
Andrew Kydd has also demonstrated how a state’s decision to escalate existing territorial disputes
territorial conflicts or unilaterally change the status quo in its favor by non-cooperative means, for
example, is likely to be a signal of malign intentions. He argues that states use a rising power’s
69
M. Taylor Fravel, “International Relations Theory and China’s Rise: Assessing China’s Potential for Territorial
Expansion,” International Studies Review Vol. 12, No. 4 (2010), pp. 505-532.
70
Knorr, “Threat Perception,” p. 98.
71
For example, when a rising power has a consolidated democratic regime and is not inclined to invest in military
capabilities. Robert Jervis, “Perceiving and Coping with Threat,” in Robert Jervis, Richard Ned Lebow, and Janice Gross
Stein, ed., Psychology and Deterrence, (Baltimore, Maryland: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1985), p. 22.
72
Walt, The Origins of Alliances.
43
behavior to assess its expected utilities of cooperation and defection, thereby making an inference
on the rising power’s type. While we have reached at similar conclusions, it is important to note that
the mechanism Kydd offers is based on a pure rationalist framework, whereas mine is a
psychological one.
73
Many prominent variables proposed by IR theorists such as autocratic regime type and increasing
overall capabilities simply are not vivid enough to substantiate the active threat claim. With the
declining of war, autocracies are not necessarily more belligerent than their democratic
counterparts.
74
And a state’s growing national capabilities can also mean burgeoning opportunities
for neighboring countries.
75
While a rising power’s truculent behavior in territorial disputes, coercive
policies, and targeted military deployment do not necessarily imply the outbreak of militarized
conflict or war, they nonetheless, are more dramatic and sensorially closer to the occurrence of such
events than baseline information such as regime type and capabilities.
76
Variable 2: Presence or Absence of Economic Assuring Factors
But even if the rising power does cause security concern because of its strategic behavior, it is
important to also consider how other states might entertain threat-reducing stimuli or signs of
73
Andrew Kydd, “Sheep in Sheep’s Clothing: Why Security Seekers Do Not Fight Each Other,” Security Studies Vol. 7,
No. 1 (1997), pp. 139-142.
74
Jessica L. P. Weeks, “Strongmen and Straw Men: Authoritarian Regimes and the Initiation of International Conflict,”
American Political Science Review Vol. 106, No. 2 (2012), pp. 326-347.
75
Kang, China Rising: Peace, Power, and Order in East Asia.
76
Karen E. Jacowitz and Daniel Kahneman, “Measures of Anchoring in Estimation Tasks,” Personality and Social
Psychology Bulletin Vol. 21, No. 11 (1995), pp. 1161-1166; Vertzberger, The World in Their Minds: Information Processing,
Cognition, and Perception in Foreign Policy Decisionmaking, p. 57.
44
benign intentions.
77
Particularly, in East Asia where many states have arrived at a consensus that
enhancing economic interests of the state should be the overarching national objective, we must
theorize how the existence of some economic assuring factors would affect states’ threat assessment
of the rising power.
78
This is why I incorporate this variable into my theoretical framework. Adding
this variable will allow us to make more determinant predictions of states’ perceptions of threat
toward a rising power.
In fact, there is a well-established liberal interdependence theoretical literature that sketches out
how economic assuring factors affect states’ cost-benefit calculation of interstate conflict, thereby
reducing the likelihood of conflict initiation and escalation.
79
While lower likelihood of conflict
initiation and escalation certainly leads to lower threat perception, how economic factors such as
economic interdependence affect states’ threat assessment through this causal pathway is
undertheorized.
80
In what follows, I will delineate how certain economic assuring factors influence
states’ threat assessment by specifying the psychological mechanisms
77
The claim I make here challenges the realist argument that signs of benign intentions are almost always discarded by
states. Rathbun, “Uncertain About Uncertainty: Understanding the Multiple Meanings of a Crucial Concept in
International Relations Theory,” p. 539. But it is, however, congruent with contingent realism, proposed by Charles
Glaser and Andrew Kydd. On contingent realism, see Glaser, Rational Theory of International Politics: The Logic of Competition
and Cooperation; Kydd, Trust and Mistrust in International Relations.
78
Solingen, Nuclear Logics: Contrasting Paths in East Asia and the Middle East; Chan, “An Odd Thing Happened on the Way
to Balancing: East Asian States’ Reactions to China’s Rise,” pp. 387-412; Benjamin Goldsmith, “Peace by Trade,” in Elin
Bjarnegård and Joakim Kreutz, ed., Debating the East Asian Peace: What It Is. How It Came About. Will It Last?, (Copenhagen
NIAS Press, 2017), pp. 13-35.
79
Robert O. Keohane and Joseph S. Nye, Power and Interdependence: World Politics in Transition (Boston: Little, Brown,
1977); Stephen G. Brooks, Producing Security: Multinational Corporations, Globalization, and the Changing Calculus of Conflict,
Princeton Studies in International History and Politics (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2005).
80
One exception is Katja B. Kleinberg and Benjamin O. Fordham, “The Domestic Politics of Trade and Conflict,”
International Studies Quarterly Vol. 57, No. 3 (2013), pp. 605-619.
45
As a threat-reducing stimulus, economic assuring factors can take two forms: (1) if a rising power
provides economic benefits repeatedly to other states; and (2) if a rising state is considered to be a
trading state that prioritizes economic development and does not rely on territorial expansion to
generate wealth. My theory offers two mechanisms in which threat perception may be downplayed
by these factors.
First, if a rising power continues to offer economic profits to other countries, individuals,
political elites, business groups, or institutions who have benefited from, desire to be the
beneficiaries of, or believe in the importance of such economic relationships will likely to dilute the
threat based on their interests and are motivated to believe that the threat is not that serious. As
Robert Jervis suggests, desirability (monetary incentives in particular) will likely color individuals’
perceptions and assessment of the likelihood of relevant events.
81
Indeed, numerous experiments in
social psychology have shown that desirability affects the subjective assignment of probability to a
future event.
82
For actors who are eager to secure the economic benefits from a rising power for
various reasons and interests, they are likely to believe that the rising power’s intentions are
malleable as long as appropriate policies are employed to accommodate it.
83
For example, they
would prefer peaceful settlement of disputes, confidence building measures, and arms limitation
agreements to reduce hostilities so that their can ensure the economic interests associated with the
rising power will more likely to be enhanced or remain intact.
84
This suggests that the higher the
81
Jervis, Perception and Misperception in International Politics, p. lxxx.
82
Dan M. Kahan, “The Politically Motivated Reasoning Paradigm, Part 1: What Politically Motivated Reasoning Is and
How to Measure It,” in Robert A. Scott and Stephen Michael Kosslyn, ed., Emerging Trends in the Social and Behavioral
Sciences, (Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley & Sons, 2016), pp. 3-4.
83
Paul A. Papayoanou, “Economic Interdependence and the Balance of Power,” International Studies Quarterly Vol. 41,
No. 1 (1997), pp. 113-140.
84
Steven E. Lobell, The Challenge of Hegemony: Grand Strategy, Trade, and Domestic Politics (Ann Arbor: The University of
Michigan Press, 2003), pp. 22-23.
46
level of export dependence a state has vis-à-vis a rising power, the more likely there will be actors
within the state diluting the threat from the rising power based on their self-interests and
preferences.
Second, when a rising power chooses to focus on promoting economic growth through trade and
integration to the global economy, observers in other states are likely to conclude that, the rising
power is less likely to resort to physical violence against other countries due to expected high costs.
Or at least the magnitude and the intensity will be limited to a modest level. In other words, this
mechanism is activated if a rising power is believed to be a “trading state.”
85
A trading state is
incentivized to maintain a stable external environment for its continued growth. It is especially so if
the national leaders’ legitimacy hinges on the state’s economic performance.
86
In a way, a rising
power imposes a self-restraint device on itself when it chooses to become a trading state. This
mechanism will work if an observer believes in the causal argument that a trading state is generally
less belligerent. If, however, observers have a strong prior that the legitimacy of national leaders of a
rising power does not primarily stem from enhancing economic growth, then even if the rising
power has become a trading state, these observers will not give this factor too much weight in their
threat assessment of the rising power. In other words, this mechanism will not work if an observer
has a pre-existing theory that runs counter to the trading state thesis.
The preceding discussion leads us to the following three expectations, First, absent threatening vivid
information substantiated by a rising power’s aggressive behavior, states are likely to view the rising
power as an unlikely threat. Second, the mixture of security concern triggered by the rising power’s
85
Richard N. Rosecrance, The Rise of the Trading State: Commerce and Conquest in the Modern World (New York: Basic Books,
1986).
86
Stein Tønnesson, “Peace by Development,” in Elin Bjarnegård and Joakim Kreutz, ed., Debating the East Asian Peace:
What It Is. How It Came About. Will It Last?, (Copenhagen: NIAS Press, 2017), pp. 55-77.
47
abrasive behavior and economic assuring factors associated with it is will give rise to a perception of
dormant threat. Third, absent these economic assuring factors, a rising power that adopts escalatory
policies against other states is likely to be viewed as an active security threat. To sum up, my
theoretical argument, stripped to its barest essence, is that a rising state will be perceived as an active
security threat only if two conditions are both met: first, the rising power does not exercise restraint
in its interaction with other states; and second, other states do not believe that the rising power is a
trading state and that they are unlikely to be the beneficiaries of the rising power’s economic
prowess. As Robert Jervis puts it, “As they seek to judge whether others are a threat, statesmen are
subject to both motivated and unmotivated biases…These biases arise because the problem of
dealing with complex and ambiguous information leads people to adopt shortcuts to rationality that
simplify perceptions in order to make more manageable the task of making sense out of
environments.”
87
By utilizing a sequence of two variables with psychologically-motivated
mechanisms, my theory incorporates the influences of cognitive and motivational factors and is the
first one of its kind in the literature of international relations theory.
The last task here is to explicitly specify the scope condition within which a theory works. I do
not expect my theory to work particularly well when it is applied to a region where states accept no
risk of security concern or are not convinced by the trading state thesis. But my theory should excel
in the following conditions: (1) economic growth and integration to the global economy are believed
to be an important source of legitimacy for national leaders. For this condition, East Asia, the
empirical focus of this dissertation, certainly obtains.
88
(2) security is not scarce in the region. This
87
Jervis, “Perceiving and Coping with Threat,” p. 18.
88
Solingen, Nuclear Logics: Contrasting Paths in East Asia and the Middle East, pp. 42-43.
48
condition is featured by the fact that there are no repeated militarized conflicts or ensured by the
existence of an external ally serving as the role of system maintainer.
Alternative Explanations
In the last section, I construct a psychological theory of regional threat perception. Importantly,
the theory must be put under empirical scrutiny. To further evaluate the validity and usefulness of
my theory, it is useful to have a test that pits my theory against other plausible explanations. This
enables us to elucidate the strengths and weaknesses of the theory.
Given that the capabilities model and the democratic peace theory and have achieved widespread
currency in the study of strategic interaction among states, and importantly, their theoretical
predictions are different from those made by my propositions these two theories will serve as two
alternative explanations tested against my theory.
The Capabilities Model
The core capabilities model hypothesis is that states determine whether an external state is a
threat based on an estimation of its capabilities. But how do states evaluate an external state’s
capabilities? The capabilities model maintains that states mainly focus on an opposing state’s military
power, particularly offensive capabilities. A strong version of this theoretical argument would even
predict that states will fear other countries who are militarily weak at the moment but with large
populations and rapidly growing economies because they have the great potential to “translate their
wealth into military might.”
89
Two distinct mechanisms are articulated by proponents of this model.
First, a state’s capabilities significantly shape its intentions. It is almost an empirical law that rising
89
Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, pp. 45-46.
49
states will always become expansionist powers.
90
When the balance of power is shifting in a rising
power’s favor, the aggrandizement of capabilities will inevitably give rise to a change and redefinition
of national interests as well as aggressive revisionist intentions. Simply put, a rising power will seek
expansion at other countries’ expenses. The rise of a state is thus inherently dangerous for other
states because the possibility of being the prey of international aggression becomes significantly
higher. Therefore, the stronger a rising power grows, the more dangerous it becomes. How
threatening a state could be is essentially a function of how powerful it is.
Second, given that states can never be certain about other countries’ intentions in that intentions
are not resistant to change, and because the stakes of miscalculation other states’ intentions in an
anarchic international system are extremely high, states must “assume the worst” about other states’
intentions.
91
In other words, states do not even try to distinguish between security seekers and
aggressive powers. As John Mearsheimer succinctly puts it, “when a state survey its environment to
determine which states pose a threat to its survival, it focuses mainly on the offensive capabilities of
potential rivals, not their intentions.”
92
Indeed, offensive capabilities can easily impose a tangible
threat to other states because of its potential to create serious and perhaps unbearable harm.
Continued buildup military forces will naturally contribute to increasingly alarmist inferences about
the rising power’s intentions. As such, states’ level of fear of a rising power will rapidly increase if the
rising power is significantly strengthening its military capabilities. Richardson’s classic arms-race
model and Nordhaus et al.’s security environment model concur with this claim and postulate that
an opponent’s growing military expenditures can make the external environment more severe and
90
Fareed Zakaria, From Wealth to Power: The Unusual Origins of America’s World Role (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University
Press, 1998); Hans J. Morgenthau, Politics among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace, 5th ed. (New York: Knopf, 1978).
91
Shiping Tang, “Fear in International Politics: Two Positions,” International Studies Review Vol. 10, No. 3 (2008), pp. 451-
471; Stephen G. Brooks, “Dueling Realisms,” International Organization Vol. 51, No. 3 (1997), pp. 445-477.
92
Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, p. 45.
50
generate high level of threat perception.
93
That is perhaps the reason why Klaus Knorr concludes
that, “Threat perception…is strategically easy when societies are prepared to see a threat in any state
whose military strength is either great or growing relative to their own, even when that state exhibits
no present indication of hostile intent.”
94
An important implication of the capabilities model explanation is that an external state’s intention
is fundamentally epiphenomenal to its capabilities and therefore will not be taken seriously in states’
threat assessment regarding the external state.
95
While some indicators may suggest the
unthreatening nature of a rising power, proponents of the capabilities model would argue that these
indicators are ephemeral and unreliable. It is because these indicators will either succumb to the
effect of growing capabilities or can be easily manipulated by the rising power. When facing a rising
power, states will remain vigilant at all times. The danger that a rising power poses simply cannot be
taken lightly. Based on the preceding analysis, the hypotheses generated by this alternative
explanation are therefore that:
Hcap 1.1: States will constantly pay high attention to a rising power, particularly its military
capabilities.
Hcap 1.2: The amount of attention that states pay to a rising state significantly increases as its
power (military capabilities in particular) continues to grow.
Hcap 2: States will perceive a rising state as an active security threat.
93
Lewis F. Richardson, Arms and Insecurity: A Mathematical Study of the Causes and Origins of War (Pittsburgh: Boxwood
Press, 1960); William Nordhaus, John R. Oneal, and Bruce Russett, “The Effects of the International Security
Environment on National Military Expenditures: A Multicountry Study,” International Organization Vol. 66, No. 3 (2012),
pp. 491-513.
94
Knorr, “Threat Perception,” p. 99.
95
Sebastian Rosato, “The Inscrutable Intentions of Great Powers,” International Security Vol. 39, No. 3 (2015), pp. 48-88.
51
Hcap 3: States will devise a strategic portfolio that predominantly focuses on competitive
policies to cope with a rising state.
My theory generates the same prediction as the capabilities model explanation in the event that a
rising power exercises no restraint and offers no economic assuring signals. Both theories would
predict the emergence of a perception of active threat. However, if a rising state does not adopt
escalatory or coercive policies against other states or economic assuring factors regarding the rising
state do exist, my theory departs from the capabilities model by predicting that the active threat
claim against the rising state will be rendered implausible and therefore cannot sustain.
Democratic Peace Theory
According to democratic peace theorists, the nature of a country’s domestic institutions is an
importance source for threat assessment. They argue that decisionmakers in liberal democracies
understand the intentions of foreign liberal democracies, and that those intentions are always pacific
toward fellow liberal democracies. The implication is that democracies draw inferences about
whether a country is a threat or not by looking into the country’s regime type.
But why is it the case that democracies are unlikely to be perceived as threat whereas autocracies
are generally considered as untrustworthy and threatening? Existing literature has delineated several
distinct casual pathways. First, institutional checks and balances in democratic regimes act as a
powerful constraint on the ability of the elite to adopt a major shift in its foreign policies, especially
if this involves the initiation of aggressive war. Such power-checking mechanisms are generally
absent in autocracies.
96
Second, because the citizens in democracies can vote leaders out of office if
96
James Lee Ray, Democracy and International Conflict : An Evaluation of the Democratic Peace Proposition (Columbia, S.C.:
University of South Carolina Press, 1995).
52
they adopt unpopular policies, democracies can more credibly communicating their intentions to
other states. The existence of such “audience costs” rooted in domestic political institutions makes it
easier for others to infer the intentions of democracies than non-democracies.
97
This claim also
garners some support from experimental research.
98
From the perspective of the selectorate theory,
autocracies are more likely to take greater risks and enter into conflict than their democratic
counterparts because the size of the winning coalition autocratic leaders must secure in order to stay
in power is significantly smaller than leaders in democratic settings.
99
These two mechanisms
represent an institutional explanation of the democratic peace.
Other democratic peace theorists focus instead on mechanisms with normative or ideational
features. First, democracies are more peaceful in general owing to the democratic norms that
emphasize non-violent means of conflict resolution.
100
Second, democracies cannot securitize other
democracies as threats, because their own domestic audiences refute such characterizations. As
Jarrod Hayes writes, “In the case of an external state that is not a democracy, democratic identity can
facilitate the creation of a condition of security by empowering the claim of an existential threat. In
97
James D. Fearon, “Domestic Political Audiences and the Escalation of International Disputes,” American Political
Science Review Vol. 88, No. 3 (1994), pp. 577-595.
98
Michael R. Tomz and Jessica L. P. Weeks, “Public Opinion and the Democratic Peace,” American Political Science Review
Vol. 107, No. 4 (2013), pp. 849-865.
99
Bruce Bueno de Mesquita, James D. Morrow, Randolph M. Siverson, and Alastair Smith, “An Institutional
Explanation of the Democratic Peace,” American Political Science Review Vol. 93, No. 4 (1999), pp. 791-807; Bruce Bueno
de Mesquita, Alastair Smith, Randolph M. Siverson, and James D. Morrow, The Logic of Political Survival (Cambridge,
Mass.: MIT Press, 2003).
100
Bruce M. Russett, Grasping the Democratic Peace: Principles for a Post-Cold War World (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University
Press, 1993); Thomas Risse-Kappen, “Democratic Peace — Warlike Democracies? A Social Constructivist
Interpretation of the Liberal Argument,” European Journal of International Relations Vol. 1, No. 4 (1995), pp. 491-517; David
L. Rousseau, Christopher Gelpi, Dan Reiter, and Paul K. Huth, “Assessing the Dyadic Nature of the Democratic Peace,
1918-88,” American Political Science Review Vol. 90, No. 3 (1996), pp. 512-533. For a critique, see Stephen L. Quackenbush
and Michael Rudy, “Evaluating the Monadic Democratic Peace,” Conflict Management and Peace Science Vol. 26, No. 3
(2009), pp. 268-285.
53
the case of an external democracy, the opposite dynamic occurs.”
101
Third, Mark Haas argues that
the further the ideological distance difference between states, the more likely for states to infer
malign intentions from it and perceive each other as a threat. Conversely, closer ideological ideal
points are more likely to lead to benign assessment of intentions. For this reason, democracies are
likely to view autocracies as threats as the ideological distance between them is large and their
ideological difference is too stark to be reconciled.
102
Taken all mechanisms together, democratic peace theory suggests that democracies tend to view
autocracies as inherently untrustworthy and threatening and does not “assume the worst” when
interacting with fellow democracies.
103
Democracies’ military capabilities do not necessarily pose a
threat, whereas increase of military power of autocratic countries is absolutely alarming. In short,
autocracies can easily be securitized as a threat that requires continued attention. Barbara Farnham
further notes that this securitization process is likely to be activated if a state observes that an
external state is violating certain democratic norms.
104
The discussion here leads to the following
hypotheses:
Hdem 1.1: If a rising power is an autocracy, other democratic states will constantly pay high
attention to the rising power, particularly its military capabilities.
Hdem 1.2: If a rising power clearly violates liberal-democratic norms, other democratic states
will significantly increase their attention on the rising power, particularly its military
capabilities.
Hdem 2: States will perceive an autocratic rising state as an active security threat.
101
Hayes, Constructing National Security: U.S. Relations with India and China, pp. 1-2.
102
Haas, The Ideological Origins of Great Power Politics, 1789-1989.
103
Owen, Liberal Peace, Liberal War: American Politics and International Security.
104
Barbara Farnham, “The Theory of Democratic Peace and Threat Perception,” International Studies Quarterly Vol. 47,
No. 3 (2003), pp. 395-415.
54
Hdem 3: States will devise a strategic portfolio that predominantly focuses on competitive
policies to cope with an autocratic rising state.
The theoretical discussion above is summarized in Table 3.1.
Table 3.1 Summary of contending theories
(Variables the
theory points
to→)
(Theory ↓)
Greater
capabilities→
higher threat
perception
Autocratic
regime type
→ higher threat
perception
Offensive
intentions
→ higher threat
perception
Absence of
economic assuring
factors
→ higher threat
perception
Balance of
capabilities
(Mearsheimer)
X
Balance of
regime type
(Owen)
X
Balance of
threat plus
economic
assuring
factors
(Fu)
X X
Empirical Strategy
Utilizing a longitudinal research design, I test my theory against two alternative explanations with
two empirical cases: Taiwan and Japan. Specifically, I investigate Taiwan and Japan’s interaction with
China since the end of the Cold War. These two cases are appropriate for the purpose of this study
for several reasons. First, given that China has never renounced the right to use military force against
Taiwan for re-unification and intensified territorial disputes with Japan in the East China Sea, the
fact that China’s economic and military capabilities are growing rapidly and has an autocratic regime
type make Taiwan and Japan two most-likely cases for the capabilities model and the democratic
55
peace theory.
105
These two cases should prove tough for an argument stressing the effects of
strategic restraints and economic assuring forces on states’ threat assessment of a rising power, as it
is widely maintained that the structural forces pushing Taipei and Tokyo to fear China are simply
overwhelming. Put differently, Taiwan and Japan are two least-likely cases for my theory. If I can
show that my theory still prevails in these seemingly overdetermined circumstances, my theoretical
argument is strengthened immeasurably.
106
These two cases also allows us to assess the validity of a
well-accepted assertion, that is, East Asian countries are constantly living in the mortal fear of China.
If this assertion cannot find empirical support in Taiwan and Japan, then this claim is probably
wrong. My research design presents perhaps the best way to falsify this well-accepted sweeping
claim.
107
Second, the predictions my theory makes in these two cases are unique and certain, and
more importantly, different from the predictions made by the two alternative theories. As such, the
selection of Taiwan and Japan as empirical cases allows us to compare the relative power of my
theory and the two competing theories.
108
Third, these two cases include great variation in national
capabilities, which allows us to fully test the hypothesis of whether power asymmetry is really the
driving force of decisionmaker’s threat perceptions. Finally, Taiwan and Japan are both consolidated
democracies and have almost identical electoral system for legislative elections, which help us
eliminate some possible confounds when making inferences.
It is true that Taiwan and Japan are perhaps two nonrepresentative cases because while almost all
East Asian countries have close economic ties with China, not all of them have active territorial
105
John Gerring, Case Study Research: Principles and Practices (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), pp. 117-118.
106
Andrew Bennett and Jeffrey T. Checkel, Process Tracing: From Metaphor to Analytic Tool (New York: Cambridge
University Press, 2015), p. 121; Derek Beach and Rasmus Brun Pedersen, Causal Case Study Methods: Foundations and
Guidelines for Comparing, Matching and Tracing (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2016), pp. 45-46.
107
Alexander L. George and Andrew Bennett, Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social Sciences (Cambridge, Mass.:
MIT Press, 2005), pp. 120-124.
108
Stephen Van Evera, Guide to Methods for Students of Political Science (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997), p. 83.
56
disputes with Beijing as Taipei and Tokyo do. However, since we have reliable prior knowledge
about the conditions under which my theory and the two competing explanations are most likely or
least likely to be valid, so long as I can show that my theory passes a least-likely test and the
alternative theories fail a most-likely test, then findings based on nonrepresentative samples can
certainly be generalized to the entire population.
109
I focus on within-case variation in order to enhance internal validity and perform the empirical
analysis in three steps. The first step is a congruence procedure test.
110
Using election manifestos,
congressional record, newspaper reports as data, I utilize the first dimension of the measure of
threat perception to establish the empirical pattern of Taiwan and Japan’s level of vigilance of China
across time. I then examine whether the pattern regarding the amount of attention Taiwan and
Japan paid to a rising China over time is congruent with any of the competing theories’ predictions.
Second, I utilize the second dimension of the measure of threat perception and assess whether the
type of threat perception I observe in different phases is in line with my theory’s expectations
through process tracing.
111
For this purpose, I pay attention to evidence that supports or
disapproves the intervening casual process laid out by the theory. Third, I utilize the auxiliary
dimension of the measure of threat perception and examine whether the Taiwan and Japan’s
strategic portfolios are consistent with the theory’s predictions.
109
Daryl G. Press, Calculating Credibility: How Leaders Assess Military Threats (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2005),
pp. 34-36.
110
Van Evera, Guide to Methods for Students of Political Science, pp. 61-63.
111
Derek Beach and Rasmus Brun Pedersen, Process-Tracing Methods: Foundations and Guidelines (Ann Arbor: University of
Michigan Press, 2013).
57
Chapter 4
Taiwan’s Threat Perception toward China:
A Mixture of Security Challenges and Enticing Economic Opportunities
The current state of the cross-Strait relations is best described as the MAED (Mutual Assured
Economic Destruction). Several billions of US$ will be destroyed if any side chooses to use force.
This is a very strong deterrence.
—William J. Perry, Former Secretary of Defense of the United States
112
Chapter 3 introduced a new psychological theory of regional threat perception and laid out the
observable implications implied by the theory. Using the history of cross-Strait relations, this chapter
focuses on how Taiwan assess the intentions of, and threats posed by China. Taiwan’s threat
perception toward China to test the theory. The case of Taiwan poses a great challenge to my theory
because of the conflicting sovereignty claims across the Taiwan Strait and the fact that Taiwan had
always been, as Lowell Dittmer puts it, “a focal point of [PLA’s] force concentration and advanced
weapon purchases.”
113
From this perspective, it is perhaps hard to imagine that Taiwan may not
think of China as that big of a threat. In what follows, I will demonstrate that Taiwan’s threat
perception is in fact a function of the configuration of security and economic parameters. In
particular, contrary to the conventional understanding of international relations theory and East
Asian security, the presence of economic assuring factors did affect Taiwan’s threat assessment of a
rising China.
112
United Daily News, January 13, 2016.
113
Lowell Dittmer, “Taiwan’s Political Security in an Era of Cross-Strait Detente,” in Peter C. Y. Chow, ed., National
Identity and Economic Interest: Taiwan’s Competing Options and Their Implication for Regional Stability, (New York: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2012), p. 235.
58
The rest of this chapter is composed of three sections. The first section investigates Taiwan’s
level of vigilance against China. This is only the first dimension that I emphasize in my measurement
of threat perception. The second section processes trace Taiwan’s interaction with China from 1949
to 2018, focusing on how the confluence of security and economic factors work in tandem to affect
Taiwan’s threat perception toward China in different phases and historical trajectories. The third
section concludes.
Taiwan’s Level of Vigilance against China
There are two goals for this section. First, I will use a handful of different source materials to
gauge Taiwan’s level of vigilance against China after the end of the Cold War. Second, I will evaluate
whether my theory is able to capture the general trend of the amount of attention Taiwan paid to
China in general and China’s military power in particular, alongside with the two competing
hypotheses.
I start by laying out the empirical expectation for each theory. Then I introduce the source
materials I utilize. Next, I present the empirical patterns and assess the performance of the
contending theories.
Theoretical Expectations
Here I briefly lay out the empirical expectations for each theory regarding Taiwan’s level of
vigilance against China.
• My psychological theory of regional threat perception: The amount of attention devoted
to an external state is determined by the presence of vivid threatening information. I
expect the 1995-96 Taiwan missile crisis would be the most vivid threatening stimulus,
59
followed by 1999, when Lee Tung-hui proposed the “two-nation theory,” which upset
China and lead to a series of targeted military exercises. In terms of the amount of
attention, there should be spikes in 1995-1996 and in 1999. And there should be a
downward trend after 1999, meaning the amount of attention devoted to China will
return the baseline.
• The capabilities model: The amount of attention paid to an external state is a function of
the external state’s capabilities. Given that China is a rising power, Taiwanese candidates
paid to China should be constantly high or rapidly increase as China’s power continues to
grow.
• The democratic peace theory: Given that Taiwan is a democracy and China is an
autocratic state, Taiwan should always be vigilance of China, suggesting the amount of
attention devoted to China should be always high. It will become even higher if China’s
behavior violates clear liberal-democratic norms.
Justifying the Use of Source Materials
Existing works heavily rely on internal memos, personal diary entries, and private letters to
measure a state’s perception of threat.
114
The assumption is that decisionmakers are less likely to
conceal their true perceptions. But this empirical strategy becomes infeasible when internal
documents are not available. Due to the time frame within which the dissertation is working, there
are no declassified documents at our disposal. We must find a solution.
Intuitively, we should look for source material that are likely to contain some clues about threat
perception toward an external state. And it would be ideal if the data source is longitudinal in nature
so that we can trace the temporal trend and variance. I use three different sources as data. They are:
114
Haas, The Ideological Origins of Great Power Politics, 1789-1989; Edelstein, Over the Horizon: Time, Uncertainty, and the Rise of
Great Powers; Stacie E. Goddard, When Right Makes Might: Rising Powers and World Order, Cornell Studies in Security Affairs
(Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2018); Joshua R. Itzkowitz Shifrinson, Rising Titans, Falling Giants: How Great Powers
Exploit Power Shifts (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2018).
60
legislative election manifestos, congressional record, and newspaper reports. Taken together, these
sources allow us to capture the general trend of the amount of attention Taiwan devoted to China at
both the mass public and the elite levels.
While it is quite common to use congressional record and newspaper reports for such purposes, I
am a trailblazer in using election manifesto to measure threat perception.
115
I argue that legislative
election manifestos are also an excellent source material for several reasons.
116
First, legislative
election manifestos in Taiwan contain some clues about threat perception toward China. While
some might argue that since legislative candidates are selected by their regional constitutes and
therefore they have no incentive to put any focus on national issues such as China-Taiwan relations,
China-related topics were not rarely seen in the manifestos produced by Taiwanese legislative
candidates. In fact, as I will show in the next section, China-related topics were actually widely
mentioned and highlighted by Taiwanese legislative candidates in their manifestos, especially in the
1990s and early 2000s.
Second, most legislative candidates take their manifestos seriously. Election manifestos are
distributed to all registered voters in the district two days before the election. Since promoting
strategies such as television and radio broadcasting are usually prohibited seven days prior to the
election day, and election manifestos are distributed to all registered voters in the district two days
before the election, candidates have incentives to take their manifesto seriously as that is probably
the last piece of printed information they could offer to voters before the voting day.
115
Yinan He, The Search for Reconciliation: Sino-Japanese and German-Polish Relations since World War II (New York: Cambridge
University Press, 2009); Jennifer M. Lind, Sorry States: Apologies in International Politics (Ithaca: Cornell University Press,
2008).
116
I use legislative election manifestos rather than presidential election manifestos because presidential candidates are
prohibited from listing their campaign platform in the manifesto.
61
Third, Amy Catalinac has convincingly shown election manifestos can be used to assess how the
importance of different topics and policy issues shifted over time in Japan’s electoral process.
117
This
is because due to the limited space of the manifestos, legislative candidates must prioritize their
political agendas and strategically choose the topics they want to put on the manifestos to articulate
their political views. Topics related to China should be prioritized by the vast majority of the
legislative candidates if Taiwan’s level of vigilance against China is high. Simply put, if there is indeed
a gathering storm, candidates may disagree on how to deal with it, but they are unlikely to ignore it.
Finally, there are eight legislative elections between 1992 and 2016 and almost three thousand
manifestos were produced, which renders a temporal analysis of Taiwan’s threat perception possible.
Source 1: Legislative Election Manifesto
We start with our analysis of Taiwan’s level of vigilance against China with the manifestos data.
In total, I collected 2,733 manifestos, which comes from 2,733 candidates running in the eight
Legislative Yuan ( 立法院; Lifayuan) elections held between 1992 and 2016.
118
The detailed coding
procedures are provided in the Appendix. Here it suffices to say that for each election manifesto, we
examine whether the candidate mentioned anything related to China or the cross-Strait relations.
117
Amy Catalinac, Electoral Reform and National Security in Japan: From Pork to Foreign Policy (New York: Cambridge
University Press, 2016).
118
I did not include manifestos produced by aboriginal candidates running for aboriginal seats because by and large their
manifestos were only targeted at aborigines. See Da-Chi Liao, Fu-Ren Lin, Yu-Ci Huang, Zi-Yu Liu, and Cheng-Xun
Lee, “The Establishment of Taiwanese Legislators’ Campaign Promise Database,” Journal of Electoral studies Vol. 19, No. 2
(2012), pp. 129-159.
62
Figure 4.1 Percentage of Manifestos Referring to China-related Topics, 1992-2016
I plotted the percentage of all candidates’ manifestos that contained China-related topics across
all eight elections in Figure 4.1. Figure 4.1 indicates that Taiwan’s amount of attention paid to China
is neither constantly high nor rapidly increasing, suggesting that both the capabilities model and the
democratic peace theory are wrong. Granted, the amount of attention paid to China in 1992 was
substantially high in that 55.69 percent of the election manifestos contained the topic of China.
However, the number decreased to 47.38 in 2001. After 2004, there was a precipitous drop in
Taiwan’s amount of attention paid to China. In 2004, 46.99 percent of the legislative candidate
manifestos contained China-related topics, by 2016 the number dropped to 20.92. It appears that the
importance of the topic of China increased a bit from 1992 to 1995, went down by about eight
percent from 1995 to 2004, and sharply declined since then. Among the three competing theses, my
theory is the only one capable of capturing the increase in 1995, the relatively high amount of
attention paid to China in 1999, and the overall downward trend. But it should be noted that my
theory does not perform perfectly because it does not expect that the downward trend would have
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016
% of all manifestos
63
to wait until 2004 to be more pronounced. That said, my theory still outperforms the other two
theories.
Some might speculate whether this general pattern will change if we only look at manifestos
produced by candidates from major parties. It may be that independent or non-partisan candidates
or candidates endorsed by non-major parties have idiosyncratic preferences and therefore do not
prioritize China-related topics. Is it so? We will find out in Figure 4.2.
Figure 4.2 Major parties’ attention paid to China, 1992-2016
Figure 4.2 was drawn from the same data as Figure 4.1, but here we confine the sample to
candidates sponsored by Kuomintang (KMT) and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).
119
The
overall trend of decreasing amount of attention devoted to China after the early 2000s remains the
119
KMT and DPP are the two major parties in Taiwan. All Taiwanese presidents after the democratization period were
endorsed by either KMT or DPP. KMT’s ideology is leaning toward liberal conservatism and in general, KMT
politicians oppose Taiwan’s independence. DPP’s ideology is more in line with social liberalism and most DPP
politicians do not oppose Taiwan’s independence.
0
10
20
30
40
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1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016
% of all manifestos
Year
DPP KMT
64
same. Does this pattern apply to candidates who actually got elected, as well? As Figure 4.3 suggests,
elected candidates’ paid amount of attention to China, proxied by the percentage of manifestos
containing China-related topics, is also on the decline.
Figure 4.3 Elected legislative candidates’ attention paid to China
While the above three figures strongly indicate that the importance of the topic of China has
shrunk overtime in absolute terms, some might argue that maybe it is not the case in relative terms.
It could very well be that the topic of China is still relatively salient compared to other topics. In
Figure 4, I plot the percentage of manifestos referring to different topics across the eight elections.
It provides a useful baseline to trace the change in relative salience among some important topics.
While in the 1990s and early 2000s, the topic of China seemed as important as other topics such as
education and culture, it is not the case anymore. In 2016, 64 percent of the election manifestos
contained the topic of education and culture, which is roughly 44 percent more than the topic of
0
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% of all manifestos
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65
China. It appears that while many topics remained highly salient, the issue of China becomes
significantly less salient over time.
Figure 4.4 Amount of Attention Paid to Different Topics
These four figures are significant because they show that the topic of China does not seem to be
one of the most critical issues that majority of the Taiwanese legislative candidates chose to
prioritize anymore, in both absolute and relative terms. Of course, this does not mean that the cross-
Strait relations are unimportant. The data here only show that this topic is not as salient as it used to
be in the legislative electoral process. While some might assume that because China is an important
0
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%
Year
China Future Legal Status
Economy and Finance Social Welfare and Environmental Hygiene
Education and Culture Judiciary and Organic Statute
Foreign Policy and National Defense Transportation
Interior
66
and potential source of active threat, “the China issue” will always dominate Taiwanese elections and
figuring out how to deal with China is always going to trump issues such as labor laws, marriage
equality, nuclear power, and everything else. The empirical pattern presented here suggests that such
argument is grossly wrong.
Next, I turn to the congressional record data. Here we want to examine the amount of attention
legislators devoted to Chinese military capabilities. As the measurement theory of threat perception I
develop in Chapter 2 suggests, perceived active threat leads to vigilance, which means high attention
paid to the opposing state’s military power.
Figure 4.5 Threat Intensity Score
Taiwanese legislators are allowed to raise questions to the government officials in the general
meetings or committee meetings. The type of questions thy asked reflect attention devoted to a
particular topic. From the Parliamentary Library of Legislative Yuan in Taiwan, I collected all the
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score
67
questions that referred to China’s military capabilities from 1989 to 2018. Because a legislator can
ask similar questions multiple times, therefore besides the number of questions related to Chinese
military power being raised for each year, it is equally important to calculate the number of
legislators that asked these questions. The actual numbers for these two pieces of information are
provided in Table A1 in the Appendix.
Intuitively, a high level of vigilance for a given year should be operationalized as a year where a
large number of questions related to Chinese military capabilities by a large number of legislators. A
low level of vigilance implies a small number of relevant questions raised by only a handful of
legislators. Using this intuition, we can calculate a Threat Intensity Score (TIS) for each year by
taking the product of the number of questions related to Chinese military power being raised and
the number of legislators that asked these questions. In theory, the range of the TIS is from zero to
infinity. Conceptually, the higher the TIS, the higher the level of vigilance.
A handful of observations can be drawn from Figure 4.5. First, TIS varies but does not increase
over time, which contradicts the predictions made by the capabilities model. As Table A1 indicates,
this observation holds even if we look at the number of questions being asked by legislators and the
number of legislators that asked the questions separately. Second, TIS is not constantly high as the
democratic peace theorists might assert. The fact that TIS is not particularly high in 1989 when the
July 4
th
Tiananmen Incident occurred further suggests that the democratic peace theory got it wrong.
In fact, there were 99 questions raised by 52 legislators in 1996, and only 20 questions were asked by
eight legislators in 1989. Third, from 1989 to 2018, there are two peaks. The first one occurred in
1996 and the second one appeared in 1999. The emergence of these two peaks is explicable only
when the presence or absence of vivid threatening information is placed at the center of the analysis.
Overall, my theory performs very well.
68
Figure 4.6 Number of News Articles that Refer to “China’s Military Power”
The last source we will use is newspaper reports. As did the congressional record data, we want
to examine the amount of attention newspapers devoted to Chinese military power. The United
Daily and the China Times were selected because they are the two of the major newspapers in
Taiwan and were the only two sources that allow us to investigate the temporal trend of Taiwan’s
amount of attention devoted to China from the end of the Cold War until 2018.
120
For each
newspaper, I collect the articles that specifically mentioned “Chinese military power” and calculate
the number of published articles for each year from 1989 to 2018. I plot the data in Figure 4.6. In
120
As the two other major newspapers in Taiwan, Liberty Times and Apply Daily unfortunately do not grant access to
individuals
0
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number of articles
United Daily China Times
69
general, the empirical patterns I derived from both newspapers are similar. Basically there were two
major peaks, with 1996 being the highest and 1999 seconded. There was also a minor peak in 2004.
How do the competing theories perform against these empirical patterns? It is clear that the
capabilities model performs poorly because Taiwan’s amount of attention paid to China’s military
capabilities, measured by the number of newspapers articles published related to Chinese military
power, did not increase as China’s power continues to grow. The democratic peace theory fares
slightly better because at least the number of newspapers articles in 1989 was greater than the
numbers for most years after 2000, suggesting that maybe China’s violation of liberal-democratic
norm in 1989 did have some impact on whether the newspapers might pay more attention to
China’s military power. However, the democratic peace theory has a difficult time explaining for the
most sizeable increase of attention devoted to China. My theory performs reasonably well as it is
able to capture the two peaks in 1996 and 1999. However, the minor peak in 2004 was not predicted
by my theory. Qualitative reading of the newspapers articles suggests that there was a minor peak
mainly because there was a presidential election held in 2004.
Overall Assessment
The three sources we use to gauge Taiwan’s level of vigilance against China set up the stage for a
horse race for the three competing theories. As discussed above, the capabilities model would
predict that the amount of attention paid to China should either be always high or continue to
increase as China’s power grows. The democratic peace theory’s prediction is that the amount of
attention devoted to China should be constantly high, and particularly high when China clearly
violates liberal-democratic norms. My theory predicts that the amount of attention devoted to
China will be significantly high when China adopted escalatory and coercive policies against Taiwan.
70
My theory performs perfectly well in the congressional record data, reasonably well in the data of
manifestos and newspapers reports. And it outperforms the other two competing theories in all of
the three tests composed of different sources.
Explaining Taiwan’s Threat Perception toward China
This section investigates the cross-Strait relationship since its establishment in 1949 until 2018. I
provide a theoretical account for how Taiwan perceived and responded to a rising China, based on a
constellation of security and economic parameters put forth by my psychological theory of regional
threat perception. Structurally speaking, the cross-Strait relationship can be categorized into three
sequential phases. The first phase is from 1949 to 1978, featured by intense security competition and
both sides’ escalatory policies against each other, and total absence of economic interaction. The
second phase is from 1978 to 1988, when China started the reform and opening-up policy and
switched the gear from liberating the island to emphasizing peaceful reunification and deepening
cultural and economic interaction while reserving the use of force as a backup. Taiwan did not
response to China’s right away but eventually and gradually changed its policy stance in the late
1980s, which led to the beginning of the whole new phase. From 1988 and onward, the two defining
features of the Taiwan-China relations are the security challenges China posed to Taiwan, and the
economic interdependence across the Taiwan Strait. The configurations of these two features
experienced some changes as the relations evolved. But the security and economic parameters
defined by these two features continued to affect the formation of Taiwan’s threat perception
against China.
71
Continuation of the Chinese Civil War
The cross-Strait relationship between Taiwan and China was formed in 1949 after the
Kuomintang regime retreated to Taiwan after being defeated in the Chinese Civil War and the
Chinese Communist Party established the People’s Republic of China (PRC) on Mainland China.
The two regimes did not put an end to the civil war even if the two parties were separated by the
Taiwan Strait. PRC’s position is clearly revealed in a public statement released by the authority of the
CCP on 31 December 1949, which stated, “The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and Chinese
people have a glorious goal to achieve in 1950, that is, to liberate Taiwan…to destroy the remaining
forces led by thief Chiang Kai-shek and reunite China.” The Kuomintang government in Taiwan
also considers “retaking Mainland China” or “rolling back” as the most important source of its
regime legitimacy. Simply put, the Kuomintang government was also not satisfied with the status
quo.
121
It was a battle between two expansionist powers.
In April 1950, the PLA started their mission of “liberating” Taiwan and deployed 150,000
soldiers in the Fujian province. A total attack against Taiwan was about to be initiated once the
troops got ready. By early June 1950s, Taiwan was gripped with pessimism over the KMT regime’s
ability to withstand what seemed an imminent Chinese invasion. The outbreak of the Korean War in
June gave Taiwan a breathing space because China temporarily shifted its main strategic focus to the
Korean Peninsula and American President Truman ordered the U.S. Navy’s Seventh Fleet into the
Taiwan Strait to prevent a Chinese attack on Taiwan.
In September 1954, following the order from Premier Zhou Enlai, the PLA began shelling both
Kinmen and the Matsu Islands, where roughly 75,000 troops were placed by the ROC government.
121
Feng Wang, Fan Gong Da Lu VS. Jie Fang Taiwan (Taibei Shi: Xi Dai Shu Ban Gu Fen You Xian Gong Si, 1995), pp.
52-55.
72
This was the so-called “First Taiwan Strait Crisis.” The United States chose to formalize its security
guarantee to Taiwan in the US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty in return. Right after the Korean War
ended, the Second Taiwan Strait Crisis, or the 823 Artillery Bombardment broke out on August 23,
1958. While Beijing began as early as the 1950s to emphasize “peaceful liberation” in its policy
toward Taiwan, contingency plans were still devised by the PLA officials to seize Taiwan militarily.
A stalemate soon reached because neither side had the military superiority to completely defeat the
other side. The U.S. aid clearly played a critical role in Taiwan’s effort to strengthen military
capabilities and balance against a possible communist invasion.
122
Both sides continued to bombard
each other until 1979 when PRC and the United States established official diplomatic relations.
During this period, the Chiang Kai-shek administration refused to negotiate with the communist
regime on any matter. It was hardly surprising as the defining characteristic of the relations across
the Taiwan Strait during this period was intense militarized conflict and confrontation. Vivid
threatening stimuli abounded. There was no economic or societal exchange between Taiwan and
China. China was a revolutionary state that did not prioritize openness to global economy and
internationalization. Economic assuring factors were absent. China was perceived as implacably
hostile and the CCP regime was portrayed as the symbol of evil. This narrative was enshrined in
political propaganda and even education policy, used to justify both martial law and the suspension
of many constitutional rights. It also had profound implications for Taiwan’s allocation of resources.
Throughout the 1950s, military spending accounted for almost 90 percent of the total
government spending. The government devoted an unbelievably high amount of resources on
defense and war preparation. In the 1960s, the number dropped to 70 because the ROC government
122
Su-ya Chang, “The Taiwan Strait Crises and U.S. Attitude toward “Reconquering the Mainland” in the 1950s,” Bulletin
of the Institute of Modern History Academia Sinica Vol. 36 (2001), pp. 238-239 (Chinese).
73
gradually gave up the unrealistic goal of retaking Mainland China by force. The ratio of military
spending to total government expenditures dropped to roughly 60% in the early 1970s. At the same
time, Taiwan adjusted the doctrine of its security policy from “offensive posture” to the “unity of
the offensive and defensive.”
123
But Taiwan’s strategic portfolio toward China still predominantly, if
not solely, relied on the competitive element. The KMT leadership’s claim as the legitimate
government of all China remained largely unchanged through the 1970s. The slogan of reunification
remained for the rest of Chiang Kai-shek and Chiang Ching-kuo’s presidencies, but there was a
gradual acceptance that retaking the mainland by force was perhaps infeasible.
124
1978-1988
Under Deng Xiaoping’s leadership, Beijing started the reform and opening-up policy in 1978.
This policy signified Deng’s determination that China should adopt a doctrine that prioritized
economic development. Following the normalization of US-China relations in 1979 and the
abolition of the US-ROC Mutual Defense Treaty, China stopped shelling Taiwan’s offshore islands.
Taiwan reciprocated by stopping bombarding mainland. China’s rhetoric shifted from highlighting
the need to liberate the island to an emphasis on peaceful reunification premised on a certain degree
of Taiwan’s autonomy. This policy stance was indicated clearly in the 1 January 1979 “Declaration to
Taiwanese Compatriots.”
125
In the “Nine-Point Proposal regarding Peaceful Reunification with
Taiwan,” then chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress Ye Jianying
123
Eric S. Lin, Yi-Hua Wu, and Ta-Sheng Chou, “Country Survey: Defense Policy and Military Spending in Taiwan,
1952–2009,” Defence and Peace Economics Vol. 23, No. 4 (2012), p. 346.
124
Dafydd Fell, Government and Politics in Taiwan, Second Edition. ed. (London: Routledge, 2018), p. 175.
125
Full text can be accessed at http://www.people.com.cn/BIG5/historic/0101/5549.html.
74
laid out some potential material gains that China would be willing to offer to Taiwan.
126
For
example, the proposal encouraged Taiwanese businessmen to do business in China and argued that
both sides should strive to reach an agreement on the “Three Links” to open up postal,
transportation, and trade linkages between China and Taiwan.
127
Taiwan would be allowed to Beijing
set up a series of special economic zones to attract Taiwanese investment and know-how. These
initiatives, proposals, and policies reflected China’s intention to expand economic ties with China as
a way of promoting political integration.
128
Despite all these positive inducements, Beijing did not
renounce its right to liberate Taiwan should certain conditions were met.
Beijing’s initiatives received no positive response from Taipei. In fact, Chiang Ching-kuo
mentioned in his diary that KMT had been tricked by CCP’s stratagem multiple times and he would
never be fooled by CCP’s conspiracy again.
129
Therefore, Taiwan adopted the “no contact, no
compromise, and no negotiation (Three Noes)” policy in response to China’s proposal to have
direct contact with Taiwan. But some Taiwanese citizens had already started doing business with
China via Hong Kong. Some indirect trade relations across the Taiwan Strait had already been
established without the permission from the government. According to the estimation of the
Mainland Affairs Council of Taiwan, the indirect trade between Taiwan and China was worth about
one hundred million US Dollars.
130
Limited in numbers notwithstanding, this is already in stark
126
Full text can be accessed at http://www.china.com.cn/chinese/zhuanti/ffl/733739.htm.
127
Richard C. Bush, Untying the Knot: Making Peace in the Taiwan Strait (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press,
2005), pp. 36-39.
128
Syaru Shirley Lin, Taiwan’s China Dilemma: Contested Identities and Multiple Interests in Taiwan’s Cross-Strait Economic Policy
(Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2016), p. 61.
129
Ching-kuo Chiang, Liangren Zhang, Ruicheng Zhang, and Jiang Jingguo Xian Sheng Quan Ji Bian Ji Wei Yuan Hui,
Jiang Jingguo Xian Sheng Quan Ji (Taibei Shi: Xing Zheng Yuan Xin Wen Ju, 1991), pp. 251-252.
130
Chen-yuan Tung, “Trade Relations between Taiwan and China,” in Jing Luo, ed., China Today: An Encyclopedia of Life in
the People’s Republic, (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2005), p. 625.
75
contrast to the period between 1949 and 1979, when the economic exchange between Taiwan and
China was virtually nonexistent due to political and military hostilities across the Taiwan Strait. Due
to the strong pressure from the civil society to increase economic relations with China, Taipei
eventually announced that Taiwanese could travel to China to visit their relatives on 2 November
1987.
131
Just a year ago, Chiang Ching-kuo had already hinted that some changes must be done. He
said, “Times are changing, trends are changing, the environment are changing. Therefore, KMT
must accommodate the current with new concepts and approaches, so that we can always stand with
the people.”
132
After Beijing started the reform and opening-up policy, facilitating economic development had
become the top priority for the CCP. This economic-development-first mindset was the main driver
for the adjustment of Beijing’s policy toward Taipei. From 1980 to 1988, there was literally no use of
force and militarized conflict. Compared to the period prior to 1979, the level of military
confrontation had significantly lowered in this phase. When Beijing softened its policy stance toward
Taipei, it took Taipei several years to adjust its stance accordingly. It was largely due to the fact that
China still had targeted military deployment against Taiwan and Chinese leaders, despite spoke
mostly in conciliatory terms, refused to renounce use of force in certain contingencies. Therefore,
signs of change in Taipei’s policy toward Beijing in general, its policy regarding the cross-Strait
contact specifically, only appeared in the last two or three years of Chiang Kai-shek’s reign.
In a way, the KMT needed time to verify the CCP’s real attitude and intentions given its longtime
trust issue with the CCP and also because China was undoubtedly viewed an active threat before.
But it is certainly true that while the relationship with China still contained some threatening stimuli
131
Lin, Taiwan’s China Dilemma: Contested Identities and Multiple Interests in Taiwan’s Cross-Strait Economic Policy, p. 61.
132
Zixiang You, Ling Xiu De Sheng Yin: Liang an Ling Dao Ren Zheng Zhi Yu Yi Pi Ping, 1906-2006, Chu ban. ed. (Taibei
Shi: Wu Nan Tu Shu Chu Ban Gu Fen You Xian Gong Si, 2006), p. 354.
76
to cause concern, they were not as vivid as the case during the Chiang Kai-shek’s years. Moreover,
China’s adoption of the reform and the opening-up policy, which made the regime significantly less
revolutionary and conflict-prone, as well as the strong demand from the civil society for more open
cross-Strait economic interaction, compelled the Chiang administration to adjust its level of fear of
China. So even if Taiwan’s official policy stance was still based on the “Three Noes,” Taipei did
allow Taiwanese to visit the mainland and even tolerate some economic exchange across the Taiwan
Strait that was conducted illegally, so long as it did not affect national security. Meanwhile, Taiwan
decreased its military spending in terms of total government expenditures from 70% in the 1960s,
60% in the early 1970s, to less than 50% after the China’s implementation of the reform and
opening-up policy, which was a significant drop. It was clearly that Taiwan’s threat perception
toward China had gradually changed. Overall, Taiwan’s strategic portfolio against China in the early
years of this period was inherited from the Chiang Kai-shek’s period, despite the intensity of internal
balancing is a bit lower. In the last few years, some, albeit limited cooperative strategies were
incorporated into the strategic portfolio.
The Emergence of a New Interactive Structure across the Taiwan Strait
Chiang Ching-kuo died on 13 January 1988 and Lee Teng-hui succeeded him as the national
leader. What distinguished the previous period and the years ahead was the emergence of close
economic ties across the Taiwan Strait. Back in 1979 and the early 1980s, China had tried to facilitate
trade with Taiwan with various initiatives, but its call was initially not answered. Taiwan eventually
announced that the indirect trade between China and Taiwan was legally allowed on August 5th,
1988.
77
China continued its push to expand economic ties with Taiwan by providing more incentives.
For example, in July 1988 Beijing issued the “Regulations on Incentives for Taiwanese Compatriots’
Investments.” This policy soon caught Taiwanese’s attention and within a few months, the total
Taiwanese investment in China by 1988 amounted to 430 cases, with a value of US$600 million.
Note, however, that Taiwanese investments in China, direct or indirect, were actually not legally
allowed. Taipei’s basic position is that the government would not encourage investment in China but
had no intent to forcefully stop business people from doing it. On October 6th, 1990, the Taiwanese
government officially promulgated the “Regulations on Indirect Investment or Technological
Cooperation in the Mainland Area” to manage Taiwanese investment in China. Taiwanese were
allowed to investment in China but can only do it through companies based in a third location.
Given that cross-Strait contact was inevitable, but the two sides were unable to overcome their
long-standing political estrangement right away, the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) in Taiwan,
and the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS) in China, two semiofficial
negotiating bodies were therefore created as a communication channel between Taiwan and China.
In November 1992, Koo Chen-foo from SEF and Wang Daohan from ARATS met and engaged in
unofficial talks in Hong Kong. During the meeting, they reportedly reached an important
understanding on the legal status of the cross-Strait ties. This unofficial agreement, which later
became known as the “1992 consensus,” allowed both sides to accept the “one China” principle,
subject to their own different interpretations.
Trade across the Taiwan Strait started to grow rapidly owing to China’s policy incentives and
Taiwan’s gradual relaxation of limits on the cross-Strait economic exchange. Cross-Strait trade was
less than US$ 1 billion in 1991, the figure jumped to 10 in 2000. And by 2018, cross-Strait trade
exceeded US$ 150 billion. China replaced the United States and became Taiwan’s largest trading
partner in 2003. This trend is clearly indicated in Figure 4.7.
78
Figure 4.7 Trade between Taiwan and China, 1991-2018
Besides the trade relationship between Taiwan and China, Taiwanese investment in China also
increased drastically after 1988, both regarding the number of investment cases and the total value
of the investment. This trend of investment flows is clearly indicated in Figure 4.8. In addition to the
incentives provided by China, Taiwanese firms were eager to investment in China in order to
advantage of China’s cheaper labor and lower their manufacturing cost, which was abruptly
increased due to the pressure of currency revaluation requested mainly by the United States.
133
Even
the Tiananmen Incident did not affect Taiwanese businessmen’s interest in the mainland market.
Quite the opposite, precisely because economic sanctions were imposed on China for its brutal
repression of the citizens gathered in the Tiananmen, investment from Taiwan in China dramatically
increased to 1,000 cases which are worth of one US$ billion. Taiwanese businessmen were highly
133
Murray Scot Tanner, Chinese Economic Coercion against Taiwan: A Tricky Weapon to Use (Santa Monica, CA: RAND
Corporation, 2007), p. 39.
0
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US$ billion
Export to China Import from China
79
privileged by Chinese local officials when other foreign investment agencies were hesitant to
continue investing in China due to the incident. Figure 4.9 further points out the proportion of
Taiwan’s investment in China in terms of its total FDI. In 1991, investment in China only accounted
for 9.5 percent of Taiwan’s entire FDI. The figure went up to 65.6 in 1993, and 83.8 in 2010. While
each Taiwanese president had different preferences regarding the priority and desirability of cross-
Strait economic exchange, none of them could reverse the overall trend of growing economic ties
across the Taiwan Strait.
Figure 4.8 Taiwan’s Direct Investment in China
0
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US$ billion
80
Figure 4.9 Percentage of Taiwan’s investment in China in terms of total FDI
While the economic exchange between Taiwan and China started to develop, the PLA had also
gradually emerged as a professional and capable fighting force thanks to the continued investment
on defense projects and increasing military expenditures. In the early 1990s, China deployed around
320,000 troops in the Taiwan Strait area and stationed roughly 40 short-range ballistic missiles
(SRBMs) were positioned in the Nanjing military region. In 2000, there were 200 SRBMs possibly
targeted at Taiwan. And then the figure basically increased by 100 for each year, and then started
increasing then it hit 1300. The PLA then focused on improving the precision and quality of the
missiles. By 2018, more than 1,200 SRBMs were deployed against Taiwan. To prepare for a potential
air war, modern fighter aircraft, including the Su-27, J-20, J-31 stealth fighter were deployed. The
naval capabilities are rapidly increasing as well. It is believed that the navy of PLA now has
0
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%
81
remarkable amphibious warfare capabilities.
134
China’s military deployment targeted at Taiwan were
particularly troubling for Taiwan in that China has never renounced its rights to use force against
Taiwan in order to achieve re-unification.
135
As Deng Xiaoping stated unequivocally, “While we
[China] shall persevere in our efforts to solve the Taiwan question by peaceful means, we have never
ruled out the possibility of using non-peaceful means. We cannot and will never make that
promise.”
136
This guiding principle is also clearly enshrined in China’s Anti-Secession Law in 2005,
that the “PRC [People’s Republic of China] government regards itself as entitled to employ non-
peaceful and other necessary means against Taiwan.”
137
Now that we have laid out the two main characteristics of the cross-Strait relations since 1988, I
will demonstrate how the security and economic parameters along these two dimensions play out in
different critical historical conjunctures.
When Lee Teng-hui came to power in 1988, he had hoped that cross-Strait could liberalize or
even facilitate the democratization process of China. This belief is clearly based on the
modernization theory. Lee himself did not believe that Taiwan must rely on China to thrive
economically. His administration allowed cross-Strait trade and investment for mainly because there
was a strong demand from the civil society and he initially believed that these economic tools can be
used to liberalize China. But the CCP regime did not collapse or liberalize as Lee expected. It
134
Andrew T. H. Tan, The Arms Race in Asia: Trends, Causes and Implications (Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2014), pp. 46-
47.
135
Alan Wachman, Why Taiwan?: Geostrategic Rationales for China’s Territorial Integrity (Stanford, CA: Stanford University
Press, 2007).
136
Deng Xiaoping, “Speech at the Third Plenary Session of the Central Advisory Commission of the Communist Party
of China,” October 22, 1984, https://dengxiaopingworks.wordpress.com/2013/03/18/speech-at-the-third-plenary-
session-of-the-central-advisory-commission-of-the-communist-party-of-china/
137
“Full Text of Anti-Secession Law,” Xinhua News Agency, March 14, 2005,
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2005-03/14/content_2694180.htm
82
consolidated and became even more resilient thanks to impressive economic performance. Lee
believed that as the economic ties across the Taiwan Strait further deepened, China might use this as
a tool to economically coerce Taiwan. That is, the deeper the cross-Strait economic ties became, the
more dangerous it is for Taiwan. He then announced the “Go South” policy, aiming to direct
investment flows from China to Southeast Asian countries. The policy was showered by objections
and criticism and was a total failure as the “China fever” was hard to cure. For example, in an
editorial op-ed published in Economic Daily News, the author argued that the mainland market was
so alluring and for cross-Strait economic exchange, there is no way back. The government ought to
realize that it must follow the rules of the market and economic incentives.”
138
The deepening cross-Strait ties did not stop China from engaging in military preparation against
Taiwan, although the main purpose was to use military power to deter independence movements.
Because the CCP was not willing to renounce use of force and because of the targeted military
deployment against Taiwan, Taipei kept trying to purchase advanced self-defense weapons from
other countries. For example, Taipei acquired 150 F-16 Fighting Falcon from the United States in
1992. But because the threat from China was not as vivid as before, Taiwan decreased its military
effort to 30 percent in terms of total government spending. To put it in perspective, the figure was
80-90 in the Chiang Kai-shek period, and 50-70 in the Chiang Ching-kuo period.
Lin Yu-fang, a professor on security studies at the Tamkang University, who later became a
legislator and was widely recognized as the most professional legislator with an expertise on national
security policy by news reporters gave his assessment of the likelihood of China’s use of force
against Taiwan in 1994. He argued that “because economic reform is the only achievement for the
Deng Xiaoping regime, China is not likely to attack Taiwan at will because it will sabotage China’s
138
Economic Daily News, November 30.
83
economic development.”
139
In other words, he believed that China had imposed a self-restraint
device on itself. Chiao Jen-ho, secretary-general of Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission further
developed Lin’s argument. He asserted that China would prioritize economic reforms and facilitate
international trade. If there is a militarized conflict across the Taiwan Strait, China’s efforts would be
all in vain. His suggested that Taiwan should make every effort to ensure that China continues to
focus on economic development and other social reforms. This is the best way to secure Taiwan’s
national security.
140
As will become clear, this belief was commonly held by a lot of Taiwanese
citizens, regardless of their political orientations.
In January 1995, Jiang Zemin called for termination of cross-Strait hostilities with his “Eight-
Point Proposal.” While the overall tone was conciliatory, Jiang insisted that cross-Strait negotiations
should take place on the basis of the “one China” principle and he refused to renounce the use of
force. Lee Tung-hui responded with a six-point statement, which emphasized that eventual
unification can happen only after the two sides shared a common commitment to democracy.
141
Both China, willingly, and Taiwan, somewhat reluctantly, made lots of efforts to promote their
economic ties in the first half of 1995. On January 13th, Chiang Pin-kung, Taiwan’s Minister of
Economic Affairs announced that he would prioritize tasks concerning cross-Strait economic
exchanges. No one would imagine a crisis was brewing.
139
United Daily News, October 12, 1994.
140
United Evening News, February 25, 1995.
141
United Daily News, April 9, 1995.
84
1995-1996 Taiwan Missiles Crisis
In 1995, the United States granted a visa for Lee Teng-hui to visit Cornell University, his alma
mater, despite previous high-level assurance to Beijing that Washington would not permit Lee to
visit the United States. The reversal on the visa issue was a product of pressure from the congress.
This decision infuriated Beijing, even though U.S. officials stated repeatedly assure Beijing that Lee
would only visit in a private capacity. China denounced the decision and recalled its ambassador to
signal the depth of its displeasure. Beijing also canceled a second round of the upcoming Koo-Wang
Talk between SEF and ARATS that had been scheduled for July. China’s most demonstrative
response, however, was three series of military exercises and missile tests carried out ahead of
Taiwan’s legislative election in 1995 and the island’s first-ever presidential election in 1996.
Beijing decided to conduct a series of military exercises designed to send a message to Taiwan
and Washington because it was concerned that Taiwan was drifting away from reunification because
of the tacit support from the United States. From 21 to 28 July 1995, China conducted live-fire
military exercises, including six ballistic missile launches into the ocean, in an area about eighty
nautical miles northeast of Taiwan. From 15 to 25 August, the PLA conducted another round of
live-fire exercises and launched six more missiles. The U.S. response was relatively muted, but in
December, around the time of Taiwan’s second democratic legislative elections, the U.S. aircraft
carrier Nimitz transited the Taiwan Strait. The PLA conducted an even larger round of military
exercises in March 1996, beginning just weeks before Taiwan’s presidential election. This time, the
military demonstration involved four short-range ballistic missile tests and a major display of
firepower involving all three military services and much of China’s most technologically advanced
equipment. In a way, this was a show of capabilities and resolve presented by China, featured the
PLA. The missiles were fired into closure areas off two of Taiwan’s major ports, Kaohsiung and
85
Keelung. Washington responded by dispatching two aircraft carrier battle groups to the area around
Taiwan, to underscore the credibility of its commitment to the island.
Our content analysis of the data on congressional record and newspaper reports has clearly
demonstrated the increased amount of attention devoted to Chinese military capabilities triggered by
the Taiwan Missile Crisis. It shows that China’s escalatory behavior did cause serious concern.
During the crisis, a lot of people weighted in to talk about their assessment of the likelihood of
war across the Taiwan Strait. By examining how they made threat assessment of China, we will be
able to see if there is evidence in support of the causal mechanisms implied by my theory.
Jeffrey Koo Sr., the Chairman of the Chinese National Association of Industry and Commerce in
Taiwan noted, “A series of aggressive actions taken by China showed that Jiang Zemin’s regime was
not stabilized yet. That said, the Shanghai Gang led by Jiang Zemin prioritized economic reform so
that the likelihood of a war across the Taiwan Strait remained low. After all, China heavily relied on
Taiwanese business men and foreign investment.”
142
In another occasion, he reiterated his point and
said that using force against Taiwan was equivalent to committing economic suicide.
143
Lin Tsang Sheng, general manager of the Uni-President Enterprises Corporation, believed that
China was unlikely to attack China because it would cost the regime at least six billion Renminbi,
which almost accounted for a quarter of the total GDP. The Uni-President Enterprises Corporation
would continue investing in China and he believed that Taiwan’s best strategy was to refrain from
doing stupid things to make them fight us.
144
Wang Yung-tsai, general manager of the Formosa
Plastic Group, also believed that as long as Taiwan kept a low profile and did not antagonize China,
142
United Daily News, July 20, 1995.
143
United Daily News, February 21, 1997.
144
Economic Daily News, September 6, 1995.
86
China would not use of force against Taiwan. He also noted that China needed Taiwan’s investment
and know-how so much that it would not “shoot itself in the foot.”
145
The threat assessment of China made by the editorial board of the Central Daily News was very
similar. It asserted that China is unlikely to use military force against Taiwan because it is too costly.
Specifically, it will hamper China’s economic development, which will sabotage one major source of
legitimacy of the Chinese communist regime. Chinese citizens who benefited from the Reform and
Opening-up policy will also strongly oppose this.
146
We do not have access internal documents to understand President Lee Tung-hui’s threat
assessment of China during the crisis. Fortunately, a secret ambassador for Lee Tun-hui in charge of
negotiation with Chinese leaders recently revealed some information regarding Lee’s threat
assessment to the Sankei News, which makes it possible for us to evaluate whether my theory is
correct.
147
Basically, Lee’s assessment was that China was unlikely to use of force against Taiwan. He
reached at this conclusion based on two reasons. First, he got an anonymous phone call, saying that
China would launch missiles but would not really attack the island. So Taipei should not engage in
military retaliation. Lee believed the call was from a CCP’s high-profile official. Second, Deng
Xiaoping’s reform and opening-up policy was hampered because of the Tiananmen Incident and he
just ordered to further facilitate economic development in 1992. China desperately needed Taiwan’s
investment and technology assistance and know-now and therefore would not attack Taiwan. It was
a very easy political decision to make.
148
The second reason Lee provided is precisely one of the
145
Economic Daily News, January 31, 1996.
146
Central Daily News, March 9, 1996.
147
https://special.sankei.com/a/international/article/20190403/0002.html?_ga=2.185071786.229454011.1554263365-
698037967.1554263365
148
World Journal, April 4, 2019.
87
mechanisms associated with economic assuring factors that I propose, that is, when states believed
that a rising power would prioritize economic development and foreign economic exchange, their
threat assessment of the rising power would be lower.
The above threat assessments made by different individuals demonstrated that the two
mechanisms associated with the economic assuring factors were at work. Facing a rising China, they
did not simply assume the worst-case scenario as the capabilities predicts. Nor did they automatically
securitize China as an active threat due to its autocratic regime as the democratic peace theory
asserts. In fact, for those who believed in the trading state thesis, they would argue that China was
unlikely to use force because of cost-benefit calculation based on the strong preference over
economic development and integration to the global economy. For those who were eager to secure
the economic interests from China, they would argue that China’s intentions were malleable so long
as Taiwan adopted appropriate policies to accommodate it.
After the Taiwan Missiles Crisis, the Lee administration announced the “No Haste, Be Patient”
policy. While the government did not shut down the economic interaction across the Taiwan Strait,
the new policy did impose a series of restrictions on Taiwanese investment in China. Lee urged
Taiwanese business people to “leave their roots” in Taiwan. And Lien Chan, the vice president as
well as the premier of Taiwan, criticized China for “using economic integration to force political
concession” in his report to the congress.
149
The “No Haste, Be Patient” policy got criticized and
objected by many important China-based Taiwanese business figures such as Wang Yung-ching,
who had been enshrined by other people as the “God of management” in Taiwan, and Chang Yung-
fa, the chairman of the Evergreen Group who owned the Eva Air.
150
149
Liberty Times, September 6, 1996.
150
Economic Daily News, October 25, 1997.
88
Two-State Theory Crisis
On 9 July 1999, President Lee Teng-hui declared in an interview with Deutsche Welle that the
relationship between China and Taiwan was not one between a central government and a local
government, but a “state-to-state, or at least special state-to-state (Two-state theory)” relationship.
Washington quickly became concerned that Lee’s comments would provoke a crisis in cross-Strait
relations, and Beijing took the statement as evidence confirming its suspicion that Lee was a
dangerous pro-independence ideologue. In addition to excoriating Lee in the People’s Daily, China
responded to Lee’s Two-state theory by conducting military exercises and increasing air activity over
the Taiwan Strait. The military deployed additional planes to a base opposite Taiwan, increased its
sortie rate, and for the first time employed its most advanced aircraft over the Taiwan Strait. Since
The air force of PLA sent fighter aircraft to engage in aggressive patrolling of the Taiwan Strait,
which rarely happened before 1999, several hundred times after Lee gave the remark. The crisis
dissipated after an earthquake on Taiwan.
151
Compared to the Taiwan Missiles Crisis, this crisis was relatively shorter. Thus, even if China’s
aggressive behavior was vividly threatening, the level of vigilance triggered by this crisis should be
lowered than the one induced by the Taiwan Missiles Crisis. Our content analysis of the three
sources confirmed this prediction.
Chen Shui-bian’s Gamble
The policy of “No Haste, Be Patient” was so unpopular that all of the candidates from
opposition parties as well as the independent candidates for the upcoming Taiwanese presidential
151
United Daily News, August 4, 1999.
89
election openly criticized it. They, despite with different political orientations, all preferred a cross-
Strait economic policy with higher level of openness. This may or may not reflect their true
preferences on trade across the Taiwan Strait. It is entirely possible that those candidates pretended
to be the type of candidate that prioritized cross-Strait trade purely based on the calculation of votes.
The policy of “No Haste, Be Patient” was widely opposed so that anyone chose to criticize this
policy may be getting more votes. DPP candidate Chen Shui-bian maintained that he was willing to
negotiate with China regarding any issues related to cross-Strait economic relations, so long as
Taiwan’s national security would not be compromised.
For Chen, securing economic benefits from China meant higher likelihood to win the election
and wider support foundation should he actually win. Chen was from a party that traditionally
supported Taiwan’s independence and opposed deepening cross-Strait economic ties. He must find
a way to be trusted by the CCP so that he can ensure the continuation of cross-Strait economic ties
and maximize his vote share. He therefore announced that he would adopt a “New Third Way” and
facilitate the economic interaction across the Taiwan Strait. Chen later won the election.
The next day after he got elected, Chen stated that he was willing to negotiate with China over
the issue of “three links.” Two days later, he revealed that he planned to build the so called “mini-
three links” between China and the ROC-controlled Matsu and Kinmen Islands before the formal
three links between China and Taiwan would be officially built. He was motivated to secure the
economic profits from China so that he could broaden his support base. And he really believed that
with the right policy stance, he could let China’s guard down. In his inaugural speech, Chen
announced the “Four Noes and One Without.,” which basically meant that his administration would
never declare Taiwan’s independence. But his gamble failed. China did not find Chen trustworthy
mainly because of his party affiliation. When Chen finally realized that China’s assessment of him
90
would not change no matter what he did, Chen soon retreated to his old position. In a way, this
demonstrates the power of motivated reasoning, When Chen was motivated to acquire the
economic benefit from China, his mindset was he must do something so that China would keep
providing economic profits to his constituents and would not engage in military coercion or
anything that might disrupt the cross-Strait economic activities. But he was not motivated to secure
economic interaction from China, he would not move an inch from his ideal point. This was clearly
reflected in his second term, when he proposed the notion of “One Side, One State.”
What does President Chen’s threat assessment of China look like? When Chen Shui-bian had a
meeting with Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega, Ortega made a comment that Taiwan is unlikely
to be attacked and therefore he believes rather than spending money on weapon systems and
developing military capabilities, it is better to spend the money on improving citizens’ welfare. Chen
disagreed. He argues that while the chance of a Chinese attack is low, Taiwan should still keep
necessary defensive weapons for self-defense.
152
Premier Tang Fei also provided his threat assessment of China. He maintained that Taiwan’s
pressure of survival necessarily increased as China continued to enhance its military capabilities.
Fortunately, China’s top priority was economic development. Once China did not prioritize
economic development, Taiwan would be put in a very difficult situation.
153
Similarly, Lin Chong-
pin, former Vice Minister of the Ministry of National Defense, argued that the PLA is unlikely to
engage in any militarized conflict with Taiwan, at least not until 2012, because leaders of the CCP
152
United Daily News, August 29, 2007.
153
United Daily News, July 22, 2000.
91
reckoned that they have to seize the great opportunity to develop the economy. Everything will go
down the drain if should China attack Taiwan.
154
Anti-secession law was passed by the National People’s Congress in March 2005, which stated
China’s opposition to Taiwan independence and the essential importance of the one-China principle.
It identified a number of ways in which economic, cultural, and other forms of interaction would
occur and defined the basic security and political issues that the two sides would discuss in a phased
and flexible way to achieve peaceful reunification.
However, it also set forth a warning: Article 8 In the event that the “Taiwan independence”
secessionist forces should act under any name or by any means to cause the fact of Taiwan’s
secession from China, or that major incidents entailing Taiwan’s secession from China should occur,
or that possibilities for a peaceful reunification should be completely exhausted, the state shall
employ non-peaceful means and other necessary measures to protect China’s sovereignty and
territorial integrity. The warning was striking in its vagueness and the discretion that Beijing reserved
to interpret Taiwan’s action as it pleased.
In April 2005, one month later, Lien Chan journeyed to Beijing, the first time that a chairman of
the KMT had been on the Mainland since the party’s defeat in 1949. Lien and Hu Jintao, the general
secretary of the CCP, issued a press communique on April 29. The two parties agreed to uphold the
1992 consensus, oppose Taiwan independence, pursue peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait, and
promote the development of cross-Strait relations. Both parties, should the KMT regain power,
would resume cross-Strait negotiations, work toward an end to the state of hostilities, and conclude
a peace accord.
155
154
United Daily News, August 23, 2004.
155
United Daily News, May 3, 2005.
92
It may be informative to trace the how Lien Chan’s position on China changed as the level of
economic interdependence increased. In 1996, when he was the vice president, he criticized China
for propelling Taiwanese concession using economic integration. In 1999, when he was a
presidential candidate, he was reluctant to admit that the “No Haste, Be Patient” may have to be
rethought. In short, at least until 1999, his main position had always been Taiwan did not have to
accommodate China because the olive the olive branch extended by China was benign outside,
malign inside. But after he lost the election twice, first in 2000, the second in 2004, Lien’s strong
desire to secure economic benefits from China completely changed his behavior and China-related
narratives. Now he usually emphasized that as long as Taiwan could adopt a series of appropriate
policies, peace across the Taiwan Strait can be secured as China would not become an expansionist
or greedy state.
From Ma Ying-jou to Tsai Ing-wen
Among all Taiwanese presidents, Ma Ying-jou is the one who genuinely believe in the importance
of economic benefit from China. He believed that Taiwan’s economic growth must be primarily
relied on amicable cross-Strait relations. But when he was the Chairman of KMT, Ma Ying-jou
claimed that even if China is a potential enemy, regarding the question of whether China poses a
military threat to Taiwan, we should examine some relevant factors such as how both parties deal
with disagreements and maintain a peaceful and constructive relationship.
156
It suggested that he had
always believed that with proper policies, China’s intentions were entirely malleable. The duration of
Chen Sui-bian’s motivated reasoning was fairly short because the harsh reality the CCP presented to
156
United Daily News, September 3, 2005.
93
him made Chen soon updated his assessment. But Ma Ying-jou was strongly motivated to believe
that the “1992 consensus” would always ensure a stable cross-Strait relationship.
Due to China’s targeted military deployment, the Ma administration still spent around two
percent of GDP on defense. As the speaker of the Ministry of National Defense Yu Sy-tue noted,
“it is true that the cross-Strait relations had greatly improved, and the tension had been eased.
However, China still poses a military threat due to its targeted military deployment against Taiwan
and does not renounce use of force to solve the sovereignty problem.”
157
But Ma wholeheartedly
believed that effective diplomacy is more useful than a formidable army.
Under his term, the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement was signed and Taiwan’s
investment in China reached a peak. But as he tried to push through the Cross-Strait Service Trade
Agreement, he ran into strong opposition. The Sun Flower Movement broke out and the Legislative
Yuan was occupied by students for about 22 days. Ma lamb ducked since then.
President Tsai Ing-wen said she believes that the Xi administration is a rational decision maker,
the possibility of using force against Taiwan should not be an option on the menu.
158
A few months
later, in another interview, President Tsai argues that no one can rule out this possibility, and this all
depends on whether the decisionmaker in China is rational or not.
159
While one might accuse Tsai of
being contradictory, her two claims are actually not incompatible. In fact, what she said is entirely in
line with the notion of perception of dormant threat: China is only somewhat likely to attack
Taiwan.
157
United Daily News, Sep 11, 2010.
158
Central News Agency, December 30, 2017.
159
Liberty Times, January 22, 2018.
94
Which Type of Perception of Threat Prevails?
In this section, I use data the election manifestos to examine which type of perception of threat
prevails from 1992 to 2016. This exercise can serve as an additional test for my theory.
In brief, each election manifesto was categorized into one of the three types of perception of
threat based on the classification scheme I developed in Chapter 2. The detailed coding rules and
procedures are provided in the Appendix.
Figure 4.10 Perceptions of Threat toward China
The capabilities model and the democratic peace theory would expect the dominance of
perception of active threat across all elections, as Figure 4.10 indicates, this is not the case. The
population of Figure 4.10 is all candidates, regardless of their party identification. To be sure, the
shared percentage of perception of active threat was 39, which was only a bit lower than the
0
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30
40
50
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1992 1995 1998 2001 2004 2008 2012 2016
%
Perception of Unlikely Threat Perception of Dormant Threat
Perception of Active Threat
95
perception of dormant threat. And it increased further for a bit in 1995, when there was the Taiwan
Missile Crisis. Overall, we see a gradual and then dramatic downward trend of the perception of
active threat after 1998. The shared percentage of perception of dormant threat was 40 in 1992. The
number slightly increased to 43 in 1995. Since then, more than half of election manifestos that we
were able to derive beliefs regarding the China-Taiwan interaction fall into this category. Perception
of unlikely threat never prevailed in any of the election from 1992 to 2016. However, the shared
percentage of this type of perception of threat was not negligible. Overall, the data reveal that China
was perceived more as a dormant threat by majority of the Taiwanese legislative candidates.
Some might argue that the empirical pattern indicated by Figure 4.10 may be distorted as all
candidates were included in the analysis. Some non-partisan candidates or those who were endorsed
by minor parties may simply have idiosyncratic preferences. The empirical pattern may be totally
different if we only look at candidates nominated by major parties. This is a legitimate concern that
we must address. However, the general finding that we derive from the analysis of all candidates still
holds even if we focus on major parties’ candidates. Figure 4.11 suggests that majority of the KMT
candidates held a perception of dormant threat since 1992, although the balance of power between it
and the perception of active threat was roughly the same. It should be particularly noted that the
shared percentage of perception of dormant threat never went below 50 since 1998. In other words,
starting from the late two years of the ruling of Lee Teng-hui, more than half of KMT legislative
candidates perceived China as a dormant threat, rather than an active threat. Another clear pattern
revealed in Figure 4.11 was that although the shared percentage of perception of unlikely threat had
never been the largest, after 2001, there were more KMT candidates who perceived China as an
unlikely threat than those who portrayed it as an active threat.
96
Figure 4.11 KMT Candidates’ Perception of Threat toward China
Figure 4.12 DPP Candidates’ Perception of Threat toward China
0
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%
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97
The pattern indicated in Figure 4.12 was even more telling. Considering DPP’s position in terms
of the ideological spectrum and its stance on the issue of Taiwan’s interdependence, the expectation
will be that DPP candidates are more likely to perceive an active threat from China than their KMT
counterparts. To be sure, higher percentage of DPP candidates identified China as an active threat,
when compared to KMT candidates. However, majority of DPP candidates still held a perception of
dormant threat since 1992. The overall trend that we observe from only examining DPP candidates
was quite similar to the trends revealed in Figure 4.10 (all candidates) and Figure 4.11 (KMT
candidates only). As one additional robustness check, we examine elected candidates’ perception of
threat toward China in Figure 4.13. The result suggests that our conclusion is robust because the
general pattern remains the same for four different samples.
Figure 4.13 Elected Candidates’ Perception of Threat toward China
The prevalence of a perception of dormant threat also exists in the opinion of the general public.
On one hand, it is true that majority of Taiwanese people are unlikely to be indifferent to Chinese
targeted military deployment. But according to the Taiwan National Security Studies Surveys
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
1992 1995 1998 2001 2004 2008 2012 2016
%
Perception of Unlikely Threat Perception of Dormant Threat
Perception of Active Threat
98
(TNSSS), more than 50 percent of the respondents believe that Taiwan should improve and deepen
the economic ties with China. In addition, more than 70 percent of the respondents believe that
China will not attack Taiwan if Taipei does not declare independence. When being asked how to
deal with the military threat from China, more than 60 percent of the respondents argued that
Taiwan should mainly adopt political and diplomatic measures rather than military measures. It also
appears that individuals who argue that Taiwan should deepen the economic ties with China are
more likely to believe that China will not attack Taiwan and the China challenge should be dealt with
cooperative means than individuals who oppose the idea of a deepening economic ties across the
Taiwan Strait.
160
So far, TNSSS have been conducted for eleven times and the above trends can be
identified in almost each wave of the survey, demonstrating the robustness of these trends.
Strategic Portfolios Devised by Different Taiwanese Presidents
The mixture of Chinese targeted military deployment and material gains associated with the
cross-Strait economic ties determine the strategic and economic environment in which Taiwan find
itself. As President Ma Ying-jeou asserts, it’s an environment that represents both “threat and
opportunity.”
161
Based on this configuration, my theory predicates that a perception of dormant
threat should be formed and sustained. In fact, the four Taiwanese presidents after Chiang Ching-
kuo, while they all expressed some concern over China’s growing military capabilities and military
deployment (SRBMs in particular), they also emphasized the need and desirability of cooperating
with China in various occasions, suggesting that the type of perception of threat held by them was
160
The data can be accessed here: https://sites.duke.edu/pass/data/.
161
http://news.ltn.com.tw/news/politics/paper/277853
99
perception of dormant threat.
162
The prevalence of a perception of dormant threat across different
levels (presidents, legislative candidates, and the general republic) explains why Taiwan mainly
adopted a strategic portfolio that emphasizes both competitive and cooperative elements since the
early 1990s.
In terms of the cooperative element of the strategic portfolio, all Taiwanese presidents tried to
signal benign intentions through various channels and methods. For example, Lee Teng-hui created
a National Unification Council (NUC). The “Guidelines for National Unification” issued by the
NUC clearly laid out the specific measures that should be taken to facilitate the mutual
understanding and cooperation between Taiwan and China. The establishment of Taiwan’s Straits
Exchange Foundation and the Koo-Wang summit started in 1993 further indicates Lee’s attempt to
institutionalize the bilateral dialogue across the Taiwan Strait.
163
Chen Shui-bian, who served as
Taiwan’s president from 2000 to 2008 also used his inaugural address to communicate his benign
intentions. He removed some of the restrictions on Taiwanese direct investment to China and trade
policies toward China imposed by the previous administration. Ma Ying-jeou further improved the
economic ties between Taiwan and China by proposing a free trade agreement with the PRC
government. He also substantiated the “Three Link” policy so that the social and economic
exchange between the two sides can be more efficient and convenient. The current Taiwanese
president Tsai Ing-wen just came to power in May 2016. However, at least for now, she appears to
162
Bruce Dickson and Jianmin Zhao, eds., Assessing the Lee Teng-Hui Legacy in Taiwan’s Politics: Democratic Consolidation and
External Relations (Armonk, New York: M.E. Sharpe, 2002), pp. 204-263; Richard C. Bush, Uncharted Strait: The Future of
China-Taiwan Relations (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2013), pp. 11-30; Gunter Schubert, ed., Taiwan and
the ‘China Impact’: Challenges and Opportunities (London: Routledge, 2016), pp. 261-300.
163
The Taiwan Missile Crisis in late 1995 and early 1996 triggered by Lee’s visit to the Cornell University compelled him
to de-emphasize and downplay the cooperative element of Taiwan strategic portfolio during the last few years of his
terms. For example, Lee tried to slow down the pace of economic integration between China and Taiwan by imposing
some restriction on Taiwan’s direct investment to China. However, his policy did not reverse the trend.
100
be willing to include some confidence and trust-building measures in the strategic portfolio she
devised for Taiwan.
164
Figure 4.14 Military Spending of Taiwan and China, 1989-2017
But it is also clear that all these presidents include some competitive element in their grand
strategy toward China. For example, while Taiwan’s military spending remains flat since the early
2000s, each president still took care that at least two percent of the GDP was devoted to national
defense. All presidents, despite with varying degree of success, tried to maintain a close security tie
with the United States. They also engaged in arms purchases from the United States and other
foreign suppliers. Recently, the Tsai administration even started the project of Indigenous Defense
Submarine. Taken together, their security portfolios contain both the elements of cooperation and
competition. The ratio of cooperation to competition may be different, but neither portion is
164
http://www.chinatimes.com/realtimenews/20171026002739-260407
0
50
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250
1989 1991 1993 1995 1997 1999 2001 2003 2005 2007 2009 2011 2013 2015 2017
US$ billion
Taiwan China
101
predominantly prioritized over the other portion. Among these four presidents, it appears that Ma
Ying-jeou was the one who emphasized the cooperative portion most owing to his firm belief that
China was the remedy for Taiwan’s stagnant economy and that he was strongly motivated that
China’s intentions were malleable. Relatively speaking, Lee Teng-hui was the one who highlighted
the competitive portion due to the fact Taiwan Missile Crisis broke out late in his term.
165
Figure 4.15 Taiwan’s defense effort
165
Michael S. Chase, Taiwan’s Security Policy: External Threats and Domestic Politics (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers,
2008).
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Share of GDP Share of Govt. spending
102
Chapter 5
Explaining Japan’s Threat Perception of China:
A Transition from Unlikely Threat to Dormant Threat
Chapter 4 explored how Taiwan perceive China since the Lee Teng-hui period until 2018. I show
that my theory outperforms the other two alternative explanations and that the presence of
economic assuring factors is the chief reason why Taiwan did not view China as an imminent threat
that must be contained despite the fact that Chinese national leaders have never renounced the
legitimate right of reunification by force under certain contingencies. In this chapter, I examine
Japan’s threat perception toward a rising China after the end of the Cold War. As I have argued,
Japan is a difficult case for my theory due to a variety of reasons, most notably the active territorial
disputes in the East China Sea and the “history problem.” Therefore, if I can demonstrate that my
theory is able to explain the broad trend of Japan’s threat perception toward China and outperform
the two competing theories again, we can have more confidence in the theory. Overall, I find that in
perceiving China’s rise and against the backdrop of deepening economic interaction between the
two countries, Japan has transitioned from a perception of unlikely threat to a perception of
dormant threat around the mid-1990s mainly due to China’s nuclear testing and use of “missile
diplomacy” against Taiwan. Japan’s threat perception did not experience qualitive change since then.
China’s confrontational stance and escalatory policies in its territorial disputes with Tokyo, and its
tolerance of the anti-Japanese demonstrations in various Chinese cities fueled Japan’s security
concern. But thanks to the presence of assuring economic factors, Japan-China relations did not
exacerbate further.
The chapter is organized as follows. First, I examine Japan’s level of vigilance against China,
using the sources of election manifestos, congressional record, as well as newspaper reports. Second,
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I delve into the case and show how different configurations of security and economic factors affect
how Japan perceived and coped with China’s rise. This in-depth case study allows us to adjudicate
the relative explanatory power of each theory and highlight casual mechanisms implied by the
theory.
Japan’s Level of Vigilance against China
In this section, I examine the amount of attention Japan devoted to China after the end of the
Cold War. As my measurement theory of threat perception indicates, we look at this dimension to
gauge a state’s level of vigilance against a rising power. The first source we use is Japanese-language
election manifestos.
Figure 5.1 Percentage of manifestos referring to “China”
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
18
20
1986 1990 1993 1996 2000 2003 2005 2009 2012
%
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In total, I collected 8,372 Japanese-language candidate manifestos across nine elections of the
House of Representatives ( Sh ū g iin) from 1986 to 2012.
166
The coding procedure for the manifestos is
simple and straightforward. Manifestos mentioning China are coded as 1, otherwise 0. The only trick
is that we have to exclude manifestos that referring to the Chūgoku region ( 中 国地方) as the first
two characters of this term in Kanji is the same as China ( 中国). I then calculate the percentage of
manifestos referring to China for each election year.
As Figure 5.1 indicates, Japan’s amount of attention paid to China is neither constantly high nor
steadily increasing as the capabilities model would predict. Granted, the percentage of manifestos
devoted to the topic of China was 4.8% in 1986, and 18.56% in 2012. However, this should not be
taken as evidence in support of the capabilities model for two reasons. First, China’s military
capabilities have significantly improved at least since the early to mid-1990s. If the capabilities model
is indeed true, the amount of discussion devoted to China should have hiked around the same time
and remained high ever since. However, this prediction is clearly a swing and a miss. Second, even if
we look at economic capabilities instead of military capabilities, the capabilities model still gets Japan
wrong. China surpassed Japan to become the world’s second-largest economy in 2010 and its
nominal GDP is almost as large as Japan’s in 2009. It suggests that if China’s economic power is the
main determinant of Japan’s amount of attention paid to China during the electoral process, the
percentage of manifestos mentioning China should sharply increase in 2009 as the economic balance
of power between China and Japan is about to be rewritten. As Figure 5.1 points out, this prediction
is way off.
166
The manifesto data are compiled and kindly shared by Dr. Yutaka Shinada of Kobe University in Japan.
105
The democratic peace theory does not perform better. Two possible predictions can be derived
from the theory. First, given that Japan is a full-fledged democracy and China is an autocratic rising
power that is likely to be securitized, the first prediction is that candidates should pay constant
attention to China in their manifestos. This prediction is the same as the one made by the
capabilities model, which as I have argued, is not in line with the broad trend. The second
predication is that the amount of discussion devoted to China should significantly increase after
1989 due to the Tiananmen Square incident happed on June 4, 1989 as it was a clear violation of
liberal-democratic norms. It turns out not to be the case. The percentage of manifestos devoted to
China actually went down from 1986 to 1990.
Here we can consider one more alternative explanation provided by Amy Catalinac. Catalinac’s
main argument is that electoral system reform is the main driver for increase of discussion devoted
to national security. The transition from the Single Non-Transferable Vote in Multimember Districts
(SNTV-MMD) system to the a mixed-member majoritarian (MMM) system eradicates intra-party
competition within the same district such that candidates can start focusing on issues other than
pork such as security policy. As Chinas’ rise is an important development related to Japan’s external
security environment, it should be reasonable to assume that China’s rise is a topic of national
security. According to her thesis, Catalinac would predict that the amount of attention devoted to
China should increase significantly after the electoral reform in 1994. While the percentage of
manifestos mentioning China did go up from 1993 to 1996, in 2000 it went down by a significant
margin. To be more specific, the amount of attention devoted to China in 2000 was even lower than
the three elections (1986, 1990, and 1993) that happened prior to the electoral system reform. It
suggests that Catalinac’s thesis is probably incorrect. In fact, if her argument is valid, then we should
observe the electoral system exerting similar effects on the amount of attention Taiwanese
candidates devoted to China as Taiwan also experienced a transition of electoral system reform from
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SNTV-MMD to MMM. However, as Figure 4.1 clear shows, the amount of attention paid to China
in Taiwan’s electoral process decreased, rather than increased, after the electoral system reform in
2005. 2008 was the first election that adopted MMM and yet the percentage of manifestos
mentioning China-related topics went down by 5 percent, compared to the 2004 manifestos
(46.99%). Catalinac got both Japan and Taiwan wrong. It appears that variables other than the
electoral system reform are doing the causal work. She confidently asserts that “their new attention
to national security was not made in China.”
167
But as I will show, the amount of attention
candidates devoted to China is largely a function of China’s strategic behavior vis-à-vis Japan.
My theory predicts that candidates will increase their attention to China when China adopted
escalatory or coercive policies in its interaction with other states. Specifically, my theory expects that
Japan’s attention devoted to China will significantly increase in certain years. First, after 1996, when
China conducted missile drills against Taiwan to show resolve. Second, after 2005, when a Chinese
nuclear submarine trespassed into Japanese territorial waters near the Ishigaki Island in November
2004 and large-scale anti-Japanese demonstrations broke out in the Spring of 2005.
168
Third, after
2009, when a series of events occurred, most notably the intensification of territorial disputes in the
East China Sea and the 2012 anti-Japanese demonstrations. Based on the empirical pattern revealed
in Figure 5.1, my theory nicely captures the general trend of the amount of attention devoted by
Japanese election candidates. The percentage of manifestos mentioning China significantly increased
in 1996, 2005, and spiked after 2009. There seems to be, contrary to Amy Catalinac’s claim, a robust
association between China’s strategic behavior and Tokyo’s level of vigilance.
167
Catalinac, Electoral Reform and National Security in Japan: From Pork to Foreign Policy, p. 2.
168
The Japan Times, November 12, 2004.
107
Figure 5.2 Frequency of Diet meetings that refers to “Chinese military power”
Next, we use the data derived from the Japanese Diet meetings record to trace the trend of
attention devoted to China by members of the Japanese National Diet (Kokkai).
169
In other words,
the analysis here includes both the House of Councillors (Sangiin) and the House of Representatives
(Shugiin). Due to the unique structure of the data source, the unit of analysis here is the meeting took
place in the general meetings and the committee meetings. I calculate and plot the number of
meetings that mentioned China’s military power for each year in Figure 5.2. The assumption here is
that the higher the level of Japan’s vigilance against China is, the greater the number of meetings
would refer to China’s military power. Based on the empirical patterns revealed in Figure 5.2, it
appears that the democratic peace theory performs worst. The theory would predict a spike in 1989
or 1990 in light of the Tiananmen Square incident. The capabilities model captured the upward
trend after 2009, when China was catching up economically and eventually took over the place as
the world’s second-largest economy. But the model cannot explain the sharp decline from 1997 to
169
The data can be accessed here: http://kokkai.ndl.go.jp/.
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
1989
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
number of meetings
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1998, 2006 to 2008, and 2015 to 2016. My theory cannot explain the radical downward trend from
2015 to 2016 but is able to account for the timing for most of the upward trends. But overall, while
my theory still fares better than the two competing hypotheses, it does not perform perfectly in this
horserace.
Figure 5.3 Frequency of Japanese News Articles that Refer to “Chinese military power”
The last source we use is Japanese-language newspapers. This source is useful for us to trace the
amount of attention Japan devoted to China over time, given the newspaper’s’ wide readership and
high circulation. I include the three leading newspapers in Japan: Yomiuri Shimbun, Mainichi
Shimbun, and Asahi Shimbun. For each newspaper, I calculate the number of articles that refer to
China’s military power per year from 1989 to 2018. The overall trends revealed in these three
newspapers are strikingly similar, despite their ideological differences. According to the patterns
indicated in Figure 5.3, the democratic peace theory’s prediction is entirely wrong. There is no clear
association between China’s violation of liberal-democratic norms and the surging amount of
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
1989
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
number of articles
Yomiuri Mainichi Asahi
109
attention paid to China’s military capabilities. The capabilities model does not perform better. The
model would either predict a constant high attention paid to China’s military power or a steady
increase as China’s power continues to grow. Neither of these two predictions are correct. My
theory performs reasonably well as it is able to predict the timing of various surging trends.
So far, we have utilized three different sources to investigate the shifting amount of attention
Japan paid to China from different levels. The broad trends revealed in these sources are quite
similar. Generally speaking, the amount of attention Japan paid to China is correlated to China’s
strategic behavior. Significant increase in the amount of attention Japan paid to China and China’s
adoption of confrontational policies or escalation in territorial disputes usually go hand in hand.
When China’s policy is not particularly escalatory, the amount of attention generally fell back to the
baseline level. The capabilities model and the democratic peace theory have a difficult time capturing
these dynamics and therefore they have failed in the congruence procedure test. My theory does not
perform perfectly in all of the tests but still outperforms it competitors by a large margin.
Explaining Japan’s Perception of Threat against China
In this section, we will investigate Japan’s threat perception toward China from 1972 to 2018.
Specifically, I will highlight some important episodes or factors that may cause Japan’s security
concern over China implied by the three competing theories. I will then process trace the case at
hand and examine whether the empirical pattern is in line with the empirical expectations implied by
the theory. Finally, I will consider how the presence economic assuring factors affect Japan’s threat
assessment of China.
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Golden Period for Sino-Japanese Relations
On July 15, 1971, President Richard Nixon shocked the world with the information that his
National Security Advisor, Henry Kissinger had secretly visited Beijing a few days ago, and Nixon
himself would visit China before May 1972. Despite being arguably one the most important
American allies in Asia, Japan was also shocked by Nixon’s move. In fact, Prime Minister Eisaku
Sato claimed that he only learned the news after it was made public.
170
But Japan soon normalized
the relations with China in 1972, just one year next after the “Nixon shock.”
171
Tokyo and Beijing
signed the Japan-China Treaty of Peace and Friendship in August 1978. Several months after the
signing of the treaty, Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping announced that China would adopt the reform
and opening up policy. His decision was motivated by Japan’s impressive economic performance
and successful economic and trade policies. In 1979, Japan decided to provide Official Development
Assistance (ODA) to China and became the largest provider of bilateral ODA to China in 1980. It is
clear that Japan wanted to use ODA to facilitate its economic interaction with China and promote
Japan’s commercial interests. In fact, even before the normalization of the relations, Japan had long
desired to build a robust economic relationship with China and was well aware of the potentials of
the Chinese market.
172
Beyond economic reasons, it is also clear that Japan wanted to facilitate China’s modernization
process so that China would not become a revolutionary state again and would have better relations
170
Yoshihide Soeya, “Japan’s Relations with China,” in Erza F. Vogel, Ming Yuan, and Takahara Akio, ed., The Golden
Age of the U.S.-China-Japan Triangle, 1972-1989, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2002), pp. 212-213.
171
For Japan-China relations prior to the normalization period, see Chae-Jin Lee, Japan Faces China: Political and Economic
Relations in the Postwar Era (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1976). For Japan-China relationship from 1972 to
1989, consult
172
Ming Wan, Understanding Japan-China Relations: Theories and Issues (Hackensack, N.J.: World Scientific, 2015), p. 188.
111
with the Western world and Japan
173
Japan’s official support for facilitating trade and investment
with China, as Reinhard Drifte notes, “motivated by the desire to stabilize China through economic
development.”
174
It is in Japan’s interest that China continued to be a “trading state.”
The 1980s was the golden age for Sino-Japanese relations. Some minor political friction
notwithstanding, the two countries’ perception of the other side were positive. No vivid threatening
stimulus was present to activate the active threat claim against China. Despite the two sides do not
agree on the legal status of the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands but Tokyo did not think that this issue
would lead to escalation and militarized conflict. China’s steadily developed its reform and opening
up policies and was thankful to the financial and technical assistance from Japan.
175
After the 1985
Plaza Accord and the resulting yen appreciation, China soon rapidly became an important
investment destination for Japanese firms against backdrop of the surging of Japanese FDI.
176
Throughout the 1980s, China was seen as a potential market even by radical conservative politicians
such as Shintaro Ishihara.
177
The strategic portfolio Japan devised to deal with China predominantly
relied on cooperative measures such as engagement, facilitating economic exchange, and aid giving.
This is puzzling for the capabilities model as Japan should try to weaken rather than strengthen a
neighboring state with a large population that is likely to become a power with formidable offensive
173
Takahara Akio, “Fourty-Four Years of Sino-Japanese Diplomatic Relations since Normalization,” in Lam Peng Er,
ed., China-Japan Relations in the 21st Century: Antagonism Despite Interdependency, (Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), p. 28.
174
Reinhard Drifte, Japan’s Security Relations with China since 1989: From Balancing to Bandwagoning? (New York: Routledge,
2003), pp. 28-29.
175
Akio, “Fourty-Four Years of Sino-Japanese Diplomatic Relations since Normalization,” pp. 32-34.
176
Seichiro Takagi, “Japan and the Rise of China: From Affinity to Alienation,” in Thomas Fingar, ed., Uneasy
Partnerships: China’s Engagement with Japan, the Koreas, and Russia in the Era of Reform, (Stanford, California: Stanford
University Press, 2017), p. 99.
177
Chikako Kawakatsu Ueki, “The Rise of "China Threat" Arguments,” (Ph.D. dissertation., Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, 2006 ), p. 333.
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capabilities. The democratic peace theory also cannot explain for Japan’s threat perception toward
China because Japan should have perceived China as an active threat due to its autocratic regime
type and communist ideology.
Putting the Sino-Japanese Relations to a Test: The June 4
th
Tiananmen incident
On June 4, 1989, Tiananmen incident happened, which was a clear indication of China’s violation
of the liberal-democratic norms, which put the bilateral relations between China and Japan to the
test. The democratic peace theory would predict that this incident would ignite Japan’s security
concern as it was a clear violation of the liberal-democratic norms and this perhaps reflects how
China might resolve its disputes with other states.
178
Did Japan’s threat perception toward China
change?
At the July 1989 G-7 Summit in Paris, member countries including Japan condemned the
Chinese government for violating human rights and imposed sanctions against it. However, the
Japanese government was the most cautious among the G-7 countries with regard to taking strong
actions against Beijing.
179
In fact, Japan initially opposed attempts by other Western nations to
impose economic sanctions because Tokyo believes that such decision will not only alienate Beijing
but also push China back to the revisionist path. Between April to September in 1990, ten
parliamentarians visited China.
180
A Japanese delegation from the Japan-China Association of
Economy and Trade, led by Ryoichi Kawai, chairman of the association, visited Beijing on
178
Farnham, “The Theory of Democratic Peace and Threat Perception,” pp. 395-415.
179
Murata Koji, “Domestic Sources of Japanese Policy Towards China,” in Lam Peng Er, ed., Japan’s Relations with China:
Facing a Rising Power, (New York: Routledge, 2006), pp. 37-38.
180
Ryo ̄sei Kokubun, Yoshihide Soeya, Akio Takahara, and Shin Kawashima, Japan-China Relations in the Modern Era, trans.
Keith Krulak (New York: Routledge, 2017), p. 133.
113
November 9-13. It was the first business delegation to visit Beijing since the incident. Eishiro Saito,
then chairman of the Federation of Economic Organizations (Keidanren), was also invited.
181
The
delegation came for a clear purpose: to pave the way for Western nations to remove economic
sanctions against China.
182
On November 2, Tokyo decided to lift the freeze on the third ODA yen
loan package, which made Japan the first country to remove the economic sanctions on China
among G-7 countries. The Japan-China long-term trade agreement was also extended for five years
in December 1990.
The reason why Japan opposed imposing economic sanctions on China is clearly stated in the
official document. The 1991 Diplomacy Bluebook notes, “Isolating China is not desirable. Japan’s
basic policy is to cooperate to the extent possible with Chinese efforts to modernize its economy
based on its reform and openness policies.”
183
The underlying theory here is that to stabilize China,
Japan must ensure that the Chinese government continued prioritizing economic development and
engaging in international economic activities. Japan also believed that China will strive to build a
stable international environment in order to deepen its economic reforms.
184
Japan’s approach was
vindicated in early 1992 when Deng Xiaoping made his famous sojourn to southern China to
rekindle and accelerate the reform and opening-up policy. It shows that Japan perceives the level of
Chinese revisionism to be low. Our quantitative content analysis of the data of manifestos, Diet
meetings record, and newspaper reports strongly support this claim as the Tiananmen incident did
181
On the relationship between Keidanren and zaikai (business community), see Gerald L. Curtis, The Logic of Japanese
Politics: Leaders, Institutions, and the Limits of Change (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999), pp. 51-53.
182
Japan Times, November 20, 1989, p. 9.
183
https://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/other/bluebook/1991/1991-4-1.htm
184
https://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/other/bluebook/1989/1989-contents.htm
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not lead to increased amount of attention devoted to China. Public opinion toward China, however,
did deteriorate rapidly after 1989.
Figure 5.4 Japanese views of China
According to the polls conducted by the Cabinet Administration Office of Japan, and as Figure
5.2 shows, more than 60% of Japanese citizens held positive views of China during the first several
years after China adopted the reform and opening-up policy in 1978. The gap between positive
views and negative views of China started to shrink in 1989. The only plausible explanation is that
the sharp drop was due to the Tiananmen incident. Some might postulate that it indicates that
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
1978 1980 1982 1984 1986 1988 1990 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016 2018
%
positive negative
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Japan’s threat perception of China was experiencing a qualitative change.
185
Our quantitative analysis
of Japan’s level of vigilance against China during this time has suggested the opposite. Equally
important, as I have argued in Chapter 2, we should not conflate threat perception with other
concepts. Therefore, it is fairly clear that Japan’s threat perception toward China was not affected by
the Tiananmen incident too much.
China’s Increasing Military Expenditures
Since the late 1980s, China started to engage in the process of military modernization. To this
end, China started to invest a considerable amount of national wealth on its defense. For example,
China’s military expenditure in 1989 was 21 billion USD, measured in constant 2016 USD. The
figure went up to 22.36, 27.17, and 25.06 in 1990, 1991, and 1992, respectively. While the increase
was not particularly large, given that China was a major recipient of Japan’s ODA, there is good
reason for Tokyo to be skeptical about whether China used the money it received from Japan to
develop its military capabilities.
Under some congressional pressure, the Miyazawa administration revised the ODA Charter in
June 1992, to include extra principles regarding the distribution of aid. One of the four new
principles stated that “full attention should be paid to trends in recipient countries’ military
expenditures, their development and production of mass destruction weapons and missiles, their
export and import of arms.” The capabilities model would perhaps argue that while China’s
violation of liberal-democratic norms may not be a concern for Japan, China’s increasing military
capabilities since the early 1990s will definitely lead to heightened security concern. The revision of
185
David Martin Jones, Nicholas Khoo, and M. L. R. Smith, Asian Security and the Rise of China: International Relations in an
Age of Volatility (Northampton, MA: Edward Elgar, 2013), p. 45.
116
the ODA Charter is a clear indication. Is it really the case? In practice, the Japanese government had
not strictly insisted on China adhering to the 1992 guidelines. But setting the implementation issue
aside, if China’s growing military expenditures really caused Japan to have a higher threat assessment
of China, we should be able to locate relevant narratives in some official documents.
Defense white papers should be the most-likely place to detect the heighted perceived threat, if
there is any. However, despite the PLA’s growing military budgets and its efforts at military
modernization, we cannot find evidence in support of such as claim until 1996, suggesting that there
may be some potential variables at work. The Japanese Defense Agency (JDA)
186
argued in the 1989
Defense White Paper that the most important task for China was economic development, which
necessarily limited its defense effort.
187
The 1990 Defense White Paper noted again that China
prioritized economic development.
188
The 1991 Defense White Paper wrote that Chairman Jiang
Zemin focused on facilitating the reform and opening-up policy and China was having some
budgetary difficulties.
189
In the defense white paper from 1989 to the mid-1990s, the JDA kept
emphasizing that China’s main focus was on economic development and advancing the reform and
opening-up policy, while noting China’s growing military expenditures.
190
In short, while China had continued increasing its military spending, Japan’s Defense White
Papers in the early 1990s did not emphasize any immediate threat from such efforts. It may be that
186
Japan did not establish a ministry of defense until 2007.
187
http://www.clearing.mod.go.jp/hakusho_data/1989/w1989_01.html
188
http://www.clearing.mod.go.jp/hakusho_data/1990/w1990_01.html
189
http://www.clearing.mod.go.jp/hakusho_data/1991/w1991_01.html
190
http://www.clearing.mod.go.jp/hakusho_data/1992/w1992_01.html;
http://www.clearing.mod.go.jp/hakusho_data/1993/w1993_01.html;
http://www.clearing.mod.go.jp/hakusho_data/1994/w1994_01.html;
http://www.clearing.mod.go.jp/hakusho_data/1995/w1995_01.html.
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the JDA would intentionally refrain from using certain words that are likely to offend or antagonize
other countries. For example, perhaps the word, threat (kyoi; 脅威) is too provocative to be used in
the official documents. But in fact, the JDA had used this term several times when referring to
North Korea. When discussing China’s military expenditures, the JDA also did not use two terms,
kenen ( 懸念) and chumoku ( 注視), that were widely used by Japanese people to express their
concern. But these terms did appear, for example, in the JDA’s discussion on Russia’s defense
modernization project and military spending in the 1993 Defense White Paper. The fact that even
the defense white papers did not find China’s growing military expenditures that threatening or
troubling in the early 1990s really shows that Japan’s threat perception toward China was really not
that high as many, the capabilities model in particular, would suggest.
In fact, the belief that China would concentrate on economic develop and remain on the path
of reform and opening-up could also been found in other official documents other than the defense
white papers. For example, we can find numerous instances where the Diplomatic Bluebooks
mentioned China’s concentration on enhancing economic development and facilitating trade
relationships with other countries. This narrative also appeared in the 1994 Higuchi Report: “China,
blessed with a stable international environment almost unprecedented in recent history, is devoting
its maximum energy to modernization.”
191
The East Asian Strategic Review, published by the
National Institute for Defense Studies under the Ministry of Defense, illustrated this logic well. It
stated that China’s focus on economic development and dependence on foreign economies serves as
191
Advisory Group on Defense Issues (Japan), The Modality of the Security and Defense Capability of Japan: The Outlook for the
21st Century (Tokyo: 1994), p. 6.
118
a “stabilizing factor.”
192
Overall, this indicates that the trading state thesis was widely believed in the
Japanese policy circles.
Vivid Threatening Stimuli Emerged, One after Another…
Starting from 1995, a handful of vivid threatening stimuli started to cause some security concern
on the Japanese end. These different events inevitably affected Japan’s threat perception toward
China.
In early 1995 it was discovered that China had occupied Mischief Reef close to the Philippines.
The 1995 Defense White Paper expressed its concern about China’s activities in the surrounding
seas, which stated, “Such Chinese movements toward the expansion of the scope of activities at sea
need continued attention.” The use of the word, “ 注目 (chui)” reflected Tokyo’s concern. China’s
maritime activities increased. The number of vessels that conducted marine research and drilled
experimental oil wells sighted by the Japanese Coastal Guard also greatly increased.
193
Despite Prime Minister Murayama’s request that China suspend a nuclear test in his visit to
Beijing in May 1995, China conducted an underground nuclear test soon after and again in August
the same year. These nuclear tests aroused anti-nuclear sentiments within Japanese public opinion of
China. The Chinese nuclear test in triggered a domestic debate on whether to continue providing
ODA to China, but the debate resulted only in the suspension of the financially meager grant-in-aid
program.
194
Suspending this program was intended to signal Japanese concern without causing
192
National Institute for Defense Studies, East Asian Strategic Review 2003 (Tokyo: NIDS, 2004), p. 159.
193
Ueki, “The Rise of "China Threat" Arguments” (Ph.D. diss.), p. 364.
194
Koji, “Domestic Sources of Japanese Policy Towards China,” p. 40.
119
serious damage to China’s economy.
195
In the end, Japan suspended US$75 million in grand aid to
China in August 1995.
196
It never rains but it pours. After the nuclear test, the Taiwan Missiles crisis happened. China
conducted three series of military exercises and missile tests between July 1995 and March 1996 after
Taiwanese President Lee Teng-hui gave a speech at his Alma mater, Cornell University. China was
extremely upset for the fact that President Lee was granted visa by the Department of State and that
he emphasized Taiwan’s successful and unique experience of being a democratic state in his speech.
Foreign Minister Yohei Kono, when being asked to comment on the Taiwan Missiles Crisis,
expressed his concerns about a change in Chinese behavior in October 1995. Given that he was
considered to be a “dove” on China within the LDP, his expression of concern showed that China’s
escalatory and aggressive behavior is vivid enough as a threatening stimulus that even dovish people
will take notice. However, he was not overly pessimistic because he mentioned that China would
return to the path of the reform and opening-up policy.
197
Prime Minister Hashimato also expressed
his “very strong concern (kenen)” regarding the Taiwan Missiles Crisis. He elaborated that his
concern did not arise from China’s disrespect for democratic elections, but because the increased
tension in the Taiwan Strait was very bad for peace and stability of East Asia.
198
It was clear that China did not exercise restraint and its behavior had caused concern. The JDA
stated in the 1996 Defense White Paper that, “We need to continue to watch Chinese actions, such
as modernization of its nuclear forces, naval and air forces; expanding its scope of activities in the
195
Takagi, “Japan and the Rise of China: From Affinity to Alienation,” p. 100.
196
Saori N. Katada, “Why Did Japan Suspend Foreign Aid to China? Japan’s Foreign Aid Decision-Making and Sources
of Aid Sanction,” Social Science Japan Journal Vol. 4, No. 1 (2001), pp. 39-58.
197
http://kokkai.ndl.go.jp/SENTAKU/sangiin/134/1110/13410191110001a.html
198
http://kokkai.ndl.go.jp/SENTAKU/syugiin/136/0110/13603130110004a.html
120
high seas; and growing tension in the Taiwan Strait caused by its military exercises.”
199
Without
explicitly naming China, the FY1996 National Defense Program Outlines (NDPO) expresses
concerns about China’s growing nuclear arsenals and military capabilities. It also portends a tighter
security embrace of the US, stipulating that the alliance would be upgraded in the event of a crisis
arising in “areas around Japan.”
200
This also shows that under combined with its escalatory behavior
in territorial disputes, China’s military spending also became a source of security problem for Japan.
Overall, China’s increased activities in the East China Sea, nuclear testing in 1995, despite
Tokyo’s explicit objection, as well as its military exercises and missile drills against Taiwan in 1995
and 1996, can be considered as factors that may substantiate the claim of China being a potential
security threat to Japan.
201
As our content analysis of Japan’s level of vigilance against China shows,
there was a spike of the amount of attention Japan devoted to China’s military power revealed in the
Diet meeting record and newspaper reports, triggered by the vivid threatening information from
China’s strategic behavior.
202
An opinion poll conducted by Yomiuri Shimbun revealed a similar pattern. When being asked to
name the potential security threat to Japan, only 18 percent of the Japanese respondents identified
China as a potential military threat in 1994. The figure went up to 40 in 1997. Respondents further
identified that the main causes of concern are China’s aggressive behavior in the East China Sea, the
missile drills against Taiwan, as well as the nuclear tests.
203
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http://www.clearing.mod.go.jp/hakusho_data/1996/103.htm
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https://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/security/defense96/
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Michael Yahuda, Sino-Japanese Relations after the Cold War: Two Tigers Sharing a Mountain (London: Routledge, 2014), p.
114.
202
Recall that the increase of attention devoted to China was not that sizeable in election manifestos.
203
Yomiuri Shinbun, April 30, 1994, p. 14.
121
Prime Minister Hashimoto and President Bill Clinton signed the Japan-US Joint Security
Declaration in April 1996, just after the Taiwan Strait crisis. They emphasized that “it is extremely
important for the stability and prosperity of the region that China play a positive and constructive
role, and, in this context, stressed the interest of both countries in furthering cooperation with
China.”
204
That explains why, despite China’s behavior, the Japanese government only suspended a
modest amount of grant assistance in protest, and only until 1997, when it resumed grants to China.
Assistance in the form of loans, however, continued unabated.
Prime Minister Hashimoto elaborated on cooperating with China was necessary. He stated, in a
speech entitled, “Seeking a New Foreign Policy Toward China,” that, “I believe that the further the
Chinese economy develops, the more stable China will become, leading to the stability of Asia and
the world. Japan has continued to actively assist in the development of the Chinese economy. I am
not only proud of this, but I consider our future economic relationship with China to be of great
importance, and we will continue providing economic cooperation.”
205
The implicit theory
underpins his argument is that China will behave less aggressively if we can keep it on the trading
state track. The basic framework laying out the foundation for cooperation between China and
Japan in the 21st century was established by the “Japan-China Joint Declaration on Building a
Partnership of Friendship and Cooperation for Peace and Development,” issued in 1998 during
President Jiang Zemin’s visit to Japan. This Declaration stresses that Japan and China should
cooperate not only for their own benefit, but to contribute to the international community.
206
204
http://ryukyu-okinawa.net/pages/archive/17496.html
205
https://www.mofa.go.jp/region/asia-paci/china/seeking.html
206
https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/sato_01.pdf
122
The Emergence of New Vivid Threatening Stimuli
From the late 1990s to the early 2000s, Japan was most concerned about increasing activities by
nonmilitary Chinese research vessels operating in Japan’s exclusive economic zone. In 2001, Japan
and China agreed to inform the other side in advance of the activities of ocean research vessels in
designated waters. But Chinese vessels often failed to comply with the agreement. Chinese marine
research vessels undertook frequent research activities within Japan’s exclusive economic zone
without prior consent from Japan.
207
In January 2004, a Chinese Han-class nuclear-powered submarine made a sub-merged transit
through Japanese territorial waters near Okinawa’s Miyako Strait. Tokyo immediately placed its
maritime forces on a state of alert.
208
In response, the National Defense Program Guidelines
(NDPG) approved in December 2004 mentioned China for the first time. The NDPG stated,
“China, which has a major impact on regional security, continues to modernize its nuclear forces
and missile capabilities as well as its naval and air forces. China is also expanding its area of
operation at sea. We will have to remain attentive to its future actions.”
Emotions towards China further dipped in 2005 when fierce anti-Japanese demonstrations took
place in a number of Chinese cities in the spring. In response to the government-approved history
textbooks used in the Japanese secondary education and Japan’s effort to become a permanent
member of the UN Security Council, anti-Japan demonstrations were organized in seventeen major
Chinese cities in March 2005. The demonstrations went violently in several cities. The
demonstrators started to attack and damage Japanese embassies, consulates, and franchise
207
Akio, “Fourty-Four Years of Sino-Japanese Diplomatic Relations since Normalization,” p. 56.
208
Howard W. French, “China’s Grandiose Maritime Ambitions Challenge Japan,” in James D.J. Brown and Jeff
Kingson, ed., Japan’s Foreign Relations in Asia, (London: Routledge, 2018), p. 75.
123
businesses. Tokyo accused the Chinese government of intentionally manipulating nationalism and
tolerating violence against Japanese people and properties. China’s inability to manage the surging
nationalism worried Japan, as there was a surging number of newspaper articles published in Yomiuri
Shimbun, Asahi Shimbun and Mainichi Shimbun.
Figure 5.5 The numbers of Chinese government and civilian vessels entering the contiguous zone or
territorial sea surrounding the Senkaku Islands
Four naval vessels, including Sovremennyy-class destroyers were observed in the waters near
Okinawa in October 2008. Two months later, official Chinese vessels intruded into the territorial
waters of the Senkaku for the first time. Somewhat ironically, China and Japan had just signed a joint
statement regarding a “Mutually Beneficial Relationship Based on Common Strategic Interests” in
May 2008. In fact, China has dramatically increased the scale and complexity of its naval and air
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124
activities in the East China Sea, most notably after 2010. This overall trend is reflected in the
growing number of Chinese government and civilian vessels entering the surrounding waters of
Senkaku Islands and scrambles in Figures 5.5 and 5.6.
209
Figure 5.6 Number of scrambles against Chinese aircraft
In 2010, a Chinese fishing boat collided with two patrol boats of the Japan Coast Guard,
touching off a diplomatic row. Chinese officials canceled numerous high-level engagements,
suspended exports or rare earth minerals to Japan, and tolerate widespread mass protests and
vandalism against Japanese property in China. Japan released the fishing boat captain after detaining
him for over two weeks, but the incident elevated the islands as a point of friction in the China-
209
Joint Staff of the Ministry of Defense of Japan, https://www.mod.go.jp/js/Press/press.htm; Ministry of Defense,
https://www.mod.go.jp/e/d_act/ryouku/index.html
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Japan relationship.
210
Beijing reduced the number of Chinese tourists and curtailed the exports of
rare earth minerals to Japan after the 2010 fishing boat incident. It was clearly that China used this as
a way of economic coercion in order to change Tokyo’s behavior. Bilateral strains deepened
considerably after Japan’s national government purchased three of the islands from a private
Japanese owner in 2012, ostensibly in an effort to preempt the purchase and development of the
islands by Shintaro Ishihara, at the time the outspoken nationalist governor of Tokyo. Protests,
some of them violent, spread through China. In the days following Tokyo’s purchase of the islands
in 2012, two China Marine Surveillance vessels penetrated the territorial seas of the Senkaku Islands,
setting a precedent for an intensified penetration campaign into the waters around the Senkakus by
Chinese maritime law enforcement vessels. Both incidents led to large-scale anti-Japanese
demonstrations in China.
211
Combined with China’s confrontational stance in the surrounding
waters, the vivid information that might render an active threat claim against China is present.
The impact of these developments on Japanese strategic distrust of China can be observed in
surveys. According to the Yomiuri Shimbun polls conducted in November 2006 and October 2010,
respondents who considered China to be a “military threat to Japan” increased from 54.5 percent in
2006 to 79 percent in 2010. In another poll conducted by the Asahi Shimbun in 2012, 74 percent of
the respondents answered “yes” when being asked, “Do you feel China’s military power is a threat
to Japan, or not?” Polls conducted annually since 2005 by Genron NPO show a similar trend in the
responses of national samples and samples of “knowledgeable” Japanese. In the 2008 survey, China
was mentioned by 54.8 percent of the general national sample and 66.3 percent of the
210
BBC, September 24, 2010.
211
Akio, “Fourty-Four Years of Sino-Japanese Diplomatic Relations since Normalization,” p. 48.
126
knowledgeable sample. In 2012, China was mentioned by 58.7 percent of the general national
sample and 81.3 percent of the knowledgeable sample.
212
In November 2013, without prior formal consultation with neighboring countries, China
announced the formation of an East China Sea Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ). The zone
stretches into the East China Sea, covers the disputed Senkaku Islands, and overlaps with the
ADIZs of Japan and some neighboring countries. Beijing claimed that, all aircraft entering the zone
must identify themselves to Chinese authorities and are subject to emergency military measures
should they fail to abide by the rules governing the ADIZ. The move drew immediate protest from
Tokyo. MOFA of Japan released a statement expressing “deep concern about China’s establishment
of such zone and obliging its own rules within the zone,” which it described as “profoundly
dangerous acts that unilaterally change the status quo in the East China Sea, escalating the situation,
and that may cause unintended consequences in the East China Sea.” Yoshihide Soeya suggests that
the “Senkaku/Diaoyu” dispute indicates a paradigm clash between Tokyo and Beijing.
213
In a way,
China’s escalatory behavior in the East China Sea was the main trigger for the establishment of the
National Security Council in December 2013. From 2014 to 2018, there continued to be intrusions
by Chinese Government-owned vessels into the territorial waters around the Senkaku Islands, as
well as numerous scrambles against Chinese aircraft.
214
But there appears to be a downward trend
since 2016.
The intensified competition and confrontation in the East China Sea clearly fueled Japanese
security concern over China. That is perhaps the reason why in a series of opinion polls conducted
212
Takagi, “Japan and the Rise of China: From Affinity to Alienation,” pp. 115-116.
213
Yoshihide Soeya, “The Rise of China in Asia: Japan at the Nexus ” in Asle Toje, ed., Will China’s Rise Be Peaceful?
Security, Stability, and Legitimacy, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018), p. 285.
214
https://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/other/bluebook/2016/html/chapter2/c020102.html
127
by Yomiuri Shimbun, China was identified by more than 70 percent of the respondents as a military
threat in almost every year after 2010.
Figure 5.7 Yomiuri Polls: Identifying China as a Military Threat
Now, if security concern is the only factor in threat assessment, then people in Japan would
consider China’s economic development as bad news for Tokyo, as the more powerful it is, the
more dangerous it can be. However, in a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center in 2006,
68% of the respondents answered that they believe China’s growing economic power is a good
thing. Only 28% believe it to be a bad thing.
215
The same question was asked again in 2017, and the
result remained largely the same. 53% of the respondents tended to think that China’s growing
215
http://www.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2006/09/GAP-Asia-report-final-9-21-06.pdf
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economy is a good thing for Japan.
216
Their assessment was that, perhaps as Foreign Minister Taro
Aso put it in December 2005, “the rise of China is something we [Japanese] have been eagerly
waiting for.”
217
Moreover, if security concern is the only, or the most important factor in the equation of threat
assessment, Japanese should generally agree that it would be better if China’s growth can be
inhibited. However, an opinion poll jointly conducted by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and
Genron NPO shows, a plurality of Japanese (39%) prefer pursuing a policy of friendly cooperation
and engagement with China rather than actively working to limit its growth (23%).
218
This suggests
that there must be some other factors at work to affect Japanese citizens’ threat assessment of
China. In fact, besides security competition, another key defining characteristic of the Sino-Japanese
relations is the economic interdependence between Japan and China.
Economic Assuring Factors Strike Back
Japan played a key role in China’s journey of the reform and opening-up policy. When Deng
Xiaoping was decided to which China under his leadership should go, he turned to Japan for
inspiration. In fact, he decided that China would be adopting the reform and opening-up policy after
he finished his visit to Japan.
219
The argument that China will behave less aggressively if it can focus
on economic development and integration to the global economy is supported by many people, with
different ideologies or political orientations in Japan. In fact, as I have shown, a handful of Japanese
216
http://www.pewglobal.org/question-search/?qid=752&cntIDs=&stdIDs
217
https://www.mofa.go.jp/announce/fm/aso/speech0512.html
218
https://www.thechicagocouncil.org/sites/default/files/asia-age-of-uncertainty-report_20170201.pdf
219
Soeya, “Japan’s Relations with China,” pp. 210-212.
129
Prime Ministers and Foreign Ministers, even the Defense White Papers endorsed such a perspective.
Nishihara Masashi, a well-known conservative scholar also presented a very interesting argument in
the op-ed he wrote for New York Times. He noted, “If Japan and the United States invest in China
and provide food for North Korea, it would probably help both communist countries remain
politically stable.”
220
Ozawa Ichiro, in his book, also urged that Japan must do everything possible
to foster China’s stability and development.
221
Their argument is embedded in a belief that the
trading state thesis works. In a way, the economic reform process China has chosen to embark on
towards openness and integration to the global economy seems to be irreversible.
222
As long as this
serves as a pre-existing theory for observers, it will become a prior that affects how an observer
perceive a rising power.
The benefits associated with the economic interdependence between Japan and China serves
as the second mechanism in affecting threat assessment. There is an argument that because
economic interdependence cannot eradicate political friction, therefor it does not exert, or has very
limited causal influence on bilateral or multilateral relationships.
223
But I argue that it is more useful
to examine whether actors benefited from or aspire to be the beneficiaries of the Japan-China
economic relations will try to dilute the threat and use their network and resources to affect
decisionmakers. As Ming Wan notes, “It would be naïve to view economic interdependence as a
sufficient condition for peace. But one would also be blind to ignore how close economic ties
220
The New York Times, April 22, 1999.
221
Quoted from Drifte, Japan’s Security Relations with China since 1989: From Balancing to Bandwagoning?, pp. 142-143.
222
Ibid., p. 143.
223
Michael Yahuda, “The Limits of Economic Interdependence: Sino-Japanese Relations,” in Alastair Iain Johnston and
Robert S. Ross, ed., New Directions in the Study of China’s Foreign Poicy, (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press,
2006), pp. 162-185.
130
between Japan and China have served as a positive constraint on their relations.”
224
But first, what
does the economic interdependence between the two countries look like?
Japan’s economic relations with China have rapidly expanded since the early 1990s. In 1990, the
total trade between China and Japan was 18.18 US$ billion. The figure went up to 85.73 in 2000,
301.9 in 2010. By 2017, it exceeded 300. As of 2017, China was the largest trading partner with
Japan in terms of import. China seconded in export. Given the growing size of Japan-China trade,
the Japanese industrial sector is largely in favor of pursuing an economic partnership agreement
(EPA) that includes free trade with China. Keidanren, the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry
(METI) is seeking a possible free trade agreement (FTA) with China.
225
Figure 5.8 Trade between Japan and China, 1987-2017
224
Wan, Understanding Japan-China Relations: Theories and Issues, p. 6.
225
Yoichiro Sato, “Tango without Trust and Respect? Japan’s Awkward Co-Prosperity with China in the Twenty-First
Century,” in Kevin J. Cooney and Yoichiro Sato, ed., The Rise of China and International Security: America and Asia Respond,
(New York: Routledge, 2009), pp. 98-99.
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Figure 5.9 Japan’s direct investment in China
In 1990, Japan’s investment in China was 0.41 billion US$. The figure went up to 7.25 in 2010. In
general, from 1987 to 2017, Japan’s FDI to China was a clear upward trend. Figure 5.10
demonstrates the relative salience of Japan’s investment in China in proportion of its total FDI.
Started at 1 percent, in 2004, during the heyday, Japan’s investment in China accounted for 19
percent of its total investment in the world. Of course, Japan’s FDI to China was not as salient as
the case of its FDI to the United States. However, business enthusiasm for China continues to be
high. Japanese businessmen continue to be drawn to China by the potential scale of the Chinese
market and its value as a production base. In general, the two economies are largely complementary.
As Prime Minster Koizumi noted in this speech at the Boao Forum, “Some see the economic
development of China as a threat. I do not. I believe that its dynamic economic development
presents challenges as well as opportunity for Japan...Since there are differences in our industrial
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structures, Japan and China can strengthen their mutually complementary bilateral economic
relations.”
226
Figure 5.10 Percentage of Japan’s investment in China in terms of total FDI
It is true that China’s rapid economic growth has threatened some Japanese industries, which are
not competitive internationally due to higher labor costs. Some business leaders were worried about
the “hollowing out” of their industries.
227
However, this concern soon dissipated as China’s
economic growth has been important for Japan’ economy, particularly its economic recovery since
the early 2000s. The rapid growth of demand in China helped Japanese economy a lot.
228
In general,
226
https://www.mofa.go.jp/region/asia-paci/china/boao0204/speech.html
227
Akio, “Fourty-Four Years of Sino-Japanese Diplomatic Relations since Normalization,” pp. 37-38.
228
Akio Takahara, “A Japanese Perspective on China’s Rise and the East Asian Order,” in Robert S. Ross and Feng
Zhu, ed., China’s Ascent: Power, Security, and the Future of International Politics, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008), p. 218.
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China has been portrayed more as an economic opportunity than an economic threat for Japan, at
least starting in the 2000s.
229
For decades, as Sheila Smith notes, “Japanese businesses with direct trading or investment
interests in China were the dominant voice advocating for good relations with Beijing, and the
relationships between Japan’s economic leaders and China’s elite were an asset.”
230
Keidanren (Japan
Business Federation) and Keizai Doyukai (Japan Association of Corporate Executives), represent
the most powerful lobby for maintaining and deepening economic ties with China.
231
Since the early 2000s, Keidanren and Keizai Doyukai published periodic papers and policy
proposals on Japan’s relations with China. They generally believe that China is a trading state that
welcomes foreign investment and trade opportunities. Japan only had to employ certain policies to
accommodate it.
And it appears that strong business groups did have access to the decisionmakers. Or sometimes,
decisionmakers would come to them, suggesting that these large business groups’ preferences and
threat assessment of China were unlikely to go unnoticed by decisionmakers. In fact, Keizai Doyukai
played a key role in paving the way for the normalization of relationship between China and
Japan.
232
In 2003, for example, the Koizumi cabinet turned to Yotaro Kobayashi, former chairman
229
Ming Wan, Sino-Japanese Relations: Interaction, Logic, and Transformation (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2006),
p. 225.
230
Sheila A. Smith, Intimate Rivals: Japanese Domestic Politics and a Rising China (New York: Columbia University Press,
2015), p. 51, 238.
231
James Babb, Business and Politics in Japan (Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press, 2001), pp. 128-132.
232
Sadako N. Ogata, Normalization with China: A Comparative Study of U.S. And Japanese Processes (Berkeley: Institute of East
Asian Studies, University of California, 1988), p. 14.
134
of the Keizai Doyukai and chairman of the New 21st Century Committee for Japan-China
Friendship, to lead a new initiative for a more positive relationship with China.
In 2001, in a policy proposal, Keidanren emphasized that Japan must work with China to resolve
existing issues so that both countries could become more prosperous. The proposal also argued that
mutual trust can and must be made. It shows that Keidanren assumed that China and Japan could
get along easily since they already had strong economic bonds, as long as Japan could adjust its
policy stance.
233
In 2005, Keidanren advocated that the two governments make effort to overcome
differences in values and standpoints. In a way, Keidanren’s argument implies that the China threat
is a self-prophecy: if you treated it as a threat, it will become a threat. It also indicates that Keidanren
was aware of the lack of common identity, but it felt that the two countries could build good
relations despite the differences.
234
In 2004, Yotaro Kobayashi expressed opposition to Koizumi’s visit to the Yasukuni Shrine.
Kakutaro Kitashiro, chairman of Keizai Doyukai expressed his views in November 2004 that most
of the business community thought that Prime Minister Koizumi should refrain from visiting the
Yasukuni Shrine. Kitashiro argued that Koizumi’s visit could “undermine the ability of Japanese
companies to do business in China.”
235
He challenged Koizumi’s position again in 2006, saying
“There can be no stable development while national sentiments are in conflict.”
236
In 2006, Keizai Doyukai issued the proposal on “The Future Japan-China Relations.” And again,
Keizai Doyukai tried to make a case that maintain a stable environment should be the most
233
https://www.keidanren.or.jp/english/policy/2001/006.html
234
https://www.keidanren.or.jp/japanese/policy/2005/002/honbun.html
235
Financial Times, November 25, 2004.
236
Japan Times, May 28, 2006.
135
important task for the government, even if that meant changing your long-held policy stances.
237
In
2011, Keizai Doyukai published a policy proposal, entitled “Building A Timely Japan-China Mutually
Beneficial Relationship Based on Common Strategic Interests.” In this highly influential document,
it argued that China’s reform and opening-up policy had achieved a great success, which benefited
Japan a lot. It is expected that the level of economic interdependence between Japan and China
would be further increased. Japan’s economy was not in a good shape and must use the opportunity
provided by the Japan-China economic relations to adopt new economic growth strategy and get
back to the right track of economic development
238
The business organizations sought better relations with China because they hoped to enter the
Chinese economy and expanded their business. There are also groups who genuinely value the
importance of economic cooperation between Japan and China, and they truly believed that China’s
intentions were largely determined by Japan’s policy choices. Japan-China Economic Association
(JCEA) is one clear example in its capacity to provide guidance on Sino-Japanese relations for the
government.
239
Since 2003, JCEA would submit an annual policy recommendation proposal to the
Japanese government. And it is very interesting to note that besides all major Japanese newspapers,
JCEA would also circulate their proposal in China and took care that Chinese official media took
notice.
240
From 2003 to 2017, JCEA had published 13 policy recommendation proposals, addressing issues
such as the Yasukuni Shrine visit, history textbook controversy, the Senkaku Island dispute and
237
https://www.doyukai.or.jp/policyproposals/articles/2006/060509a.html
238
https://www.doyukai.or.jp/policyproposals/articles/2010/110121b.html
239
http://www.jc-web.or.jp/jcea/publics/index/729/
240
For example, the online version of People’s Daily reported JCEA’s policy proposal on November 07, 2012. See
http://world.people.com.cn/n/2012/1107/c1002-19519289.html.
136
occasional incidents, and trade dispute settlements.
241
Oftentimes the takeaway message that JCEA
offers is that the relations with China could be “managed” and the trust between the two sides could
be built through accommodating policies. It is entirely possible to build a “win-win” relationship.
Importantly, it is true that Japanese and Chinese governments were not able to resolve their
disputes, despite the tremendous economic interests involved for both countries.
242
However, as
Ming Wan suggests, “Without economic ties, Sino-Japanese political relations would have been
more contentious.”
243
No Appetite for Too Much Competition
The preceding discussion demonstrates that the confluence of security and economic factors
largely determine a state’s threat perception toward a rising power. Japan represents a case of a
transition from a perception of unlikely threat to a perception of dormant threat.
The existence of a perception of dormant threat will lead us to the expectation that citizens are
more likely to prefer a strategic portfolio that incorporates both the competitive and cooperative
elements if they are not forced to pick one element.
In a 2006 survey conducted by the Cabinet Office regarding the Japan-U.S. Security
Arrangements, only 10.1% of the respondents support the enhancement of the Japan-U.S. alliance,
with 42% in favor of maintain the status quo, and 24.9% in favor of weakening the alliance. It is
interesting to note that after twelve years, a Yomiuri Shimbun survey got very similar result, despite
241
http://www.jc-web.or.jp/publics/index/489/0/
242
Smith, Intimate Rivals: Japanese Domestic Politics and a Rising China, p. 237.
243
Wan, Sino-Japanese Relations: Interaction, Logic, and Transformation, p. 223.
137
China has become even stronger. 55% of the respondents supported the status quo, 29% in favor
of weakening, and only 3% in favor of strengthening the alliance. Moreover, based on the polls
conducted by the Cabinet Office, majority of Japanese citizens preferred maintaining the current
force level of SDF over increasing or decreasing. Simply put, there is little public support for
increasing defense spending to counter China.
Figure 5.11 Optimal SDF Force Level
Figure 5.12 Optimal Amount of Military Expenditures
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Chapter 6
Conclusion
The process of states’ threat assessment of a rising power can be highly complex. The
international environment, the rising power’s dispositional attributes such as identity and regime
type, and even individuals’ pre-existing theories may all exert some constraints or influences on the
formation of states’ threat perception vis-à-vis the rising power. For obvious reasons, no theory fits
the evidence in every detail. But this dissertation has shown that we can capture broad trends in how
states perceive a rising power in its region if the rising power’s strategic behavior toward other states
and the examination of the presence or absence of economic assuring factors associated with it are
placed at the center of the analysis. Moreover, the theory I propose is able to broad trends in ways
that account for more of the data than competing theories. And by this standard the new theory
both outperforms orthodox views and shows significant consistency with the observed record of
Taiwan and Japan’s threat perception toward China. This chapter summarizes the findings of the
dissertation, lays out theoretical and policy implications of the research, and discusses directions for
further inquiry.
Summary of the Findings
The measure of threat perception I propose in this dissertation allows us to demonstrate the
configuration and change of perceptions of threat in Taiwan and Japan in a systematic manner. In
light of Taiwan and Japan’s perception toward a rising China after the end of the Cold War, it is
hard to claim that East Asian states really fear China’s rise as proponents of the China threat thesis
do. Overall, my psychological theory of regional threat perception performs well in the cases of
139
Taiwan and Japan. More broadly, in each case, whether China adopted coercive and escalatory
policies or exercised restraint, as well as the absence or presence of economic assuring factors
appear to have had important effects on Taipei and Tokyo’s threat perception toward Beijing.
Overall, I find that Taiwan’s threat perception is in fact a function of the configuration of
security and economic parameters. In particular, contrary to the conventional understanding of
international relations theory and East Asian security, the presence of economic assuring factors did
affect Taiwan’s threat assessment of a rising China. With regard to Taiwan’s level of vigilance against
China, I show that among the three competing theories, my theory is the only that is able to capture
the general trend of the amount of attention Taiwan devoted to China across the sources of
legislative election manifestos, congressional meetings record, as well as newspaper reports. I find
that Taiwan’s level of vigilance was the highest when China conducted three waves of military
exercises and missile drills against Taiwan in the between July 1995 and March 1996. In general,
when China’s behavior was not particular escalatory, Taiwan’s level of vigilance would go back to
the baseline. Taiwan’s level of vigilance was modest but no extremely low because of China’s
targeted military deployment.
In the case study, I highlight a handful of smoking gun evidence in support of the mechanisms
implied by my theory. For example, during the Taiwan Missiles Crisis, when assessing the likelihood
of a Chinese attack, many individuals either invoked the trading state thesis to rationalize their
assessment that the likelihood was low or emphasized that China’s intentions could be manipulated
by Taiwan’s policies.
In the case of Japan, I find that in perceiving China’s rise and against the backdrop of deepening
economic interaction between the two countries, Japan has transitioned from a perception of
unlikely threat to a perception of dormant threat around the mid-1990s mainly due to China’s
140
nuclear testing and use of “missile diplomacy” against Taiwan. Japan’s threat perception did not
experience qualitive change since then.
Generally speaking, the amount of attention Japan paid to China is correlated to China’s strategic
behavior. Significant increase in the amount of attention Japan paid to China and China’s adoption
of confrontational policies or escalation in territorial disputes usually go hand in hand. When China’s
policy is not particularly escalatory, the amount of attention generally fell back to the baseline level.
China’s confrontational stance and escalatory policies in its territorial disputes with Tokyo, and its
tolerance of the anti-Japanese demonstrations in various Chinese cities did fuel Japan’s security
concern. But thanks to the presence of assuring economic factors, Japan-China relations did not
exacerbate further.
My analysis does not show that the rising power’s capabilities are completely unimportant for
determining how states perceive it’s rise, but I do find that the consideration of the rising power’s
capabilities are more often than not overridden by the assessment of the rising power’s level of
revisionism, which is a function of the rising power’s strategic behavior and the economic assuring
factors associated with it.
Overall, my arguments survive challenging tests. My theory outperforms the capabilities model
and the democratic peace theory under conditions that should have offered easy predictive success
these two theories if true. If states’ threat perception toward a rising power is merely a function of
the rising power’s capabilities, then threat perception per se essentially is essentially unworthy of
study because it adds little value to our understanding of international politics. The cases of Taiwan
and Japan strongly refute this assertion. China’s capabilities or regime type alone is a poor predictor
of perceived China threat.
141
Implications for Theory
The dissertation has profound implications for international relations theory. First, despite the
ubiquity of threat perception as a theoretical construct, the field as I have shown, has had less
success providing practical guidance for the operationalization and measurement of threat
perception. This limitation casts a shadow on the validity of existing theories that utilize threat
perception as their main independent variable and discourages scholars from studying threat
perception as an explanandum. My measurement theory of threat perception fills this void and enables
us to put some sweeping claims regarding threat perception under rigorous empirical scrutiny. With
this measure, our scholarly discipline is equipped with a tool for better assessing the empirical reality
of the security dynamics of any particular region. In and of itself, this is an important theoretical
advancement.
Second, by utilizing a rising power’s strategic behavior in its interaction with other states as a
benchmark, my theory generates clear empirical expectations about whether a rising power might be
considered as having aggressive intentions. My theory thus supplements Stephen Walt’s balance of
threat theory by operationalizing the notion of aggressive intentions ex ante. While the balance of
threat theory is theoretically plausible, it is not easy to apply the theoretical parameters of aggressive
intentions to empirical analysis, precise because Walt assumes that we can easily detect a state with
aggressive intentions when we see it. It is not always that simple.
Third, my research further advances the liberal argument that economic interest influences states’
strategic behavior by theorizing the effect of economic threat-reducing stimuli on states’ threat
assessment of a rising power with clear causal mechanisms. To begin with, the implication of the
emergence of trading states is widely discussed but how a state’s embarking on the trading state path
affects how other states threat assessment of the state is undertheorized. I propose a mechanism to
142
fill the lacuna. Moreover, I enrich the liberal argument by marrying it with the literature of motivated
reasoning and showing that the mechanism of how individuals’ perception is colored by the
desirability of economic benefits.
Fourth, if fear is endemic to states in the international system, states’ level of fear should be
particularly high in the face of a rising power. Joining a growing literature developed by Charles
Glaser and Andrew Kydd, my theory specifies the scope condition in which states’ level of fear of a
rising power can be reduced to a modest and even trivial level, even if the international structure
remains anarchic.
244
This runs counter to John Mearsheimer’s famous claim that states will regard
each other with suspicion, and that the level of fear between states can never be reduced to a modest
level because the stakes are too high to allow that to happen.
245
The theoretical propositions I put
forth provides a foundation for understanding the absence of pure hard balancing in East Asia.
From this perspective, states will commit to cooperative policies that may even widen the gap of
relative power between them and the rising power if they do not view a rising power an active threat.
States are more likely to see the concrete economic benefits of cooperating with the rising power
than the intangible benefit to balance and deter a rising power that may or may not become a
revisionist state in the distant future. It is vivid threatening signals and the absence of economic
assuring factors that lead to the certainty that balancing against or even containing a rising power is
warranted. This condition simply does not obtain in today’s East Asia. This is, of course, likely to
change if the rising power behaves in ways that render the active threat claim against it highly
plausible.
244
Glaser, Rational Theory of International Politics: The Logic of Competition and Cooperation; Charles L. Glaser, Andrew H.
Kydd, Mark L. Haas, John M. Owen, and Sebastian Rosato, “Correspondence: Can Great Powers Discern Intentions?,”
International Security Vol. 40, No. 3 (2016), pp. 197-215.
245
Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, p. 32.
143
Fifth, Barry Buzan and his colleagues of the Copenhagen School argues that while securitization
is essentially an intersubjective process, they note that it is easier to achieve securitization under
some conditions than under others.
246
Scholars working on identity have established how identity as
a variable can affect the interaction among states, but they are also eager to know the scope
condition under which certain type of identity might come into being.
247
For example, David
Rousseau shows the casual effects of threatening identity but his discussion on the origins of such
identity is rather limited.
248
Based on different configurations of security and economic parameters,
my theory specifies the conditions conducive to the formation of particular type of perception of
threat. As such, although I do not include identity as a variable in the theoretical framework, with
some extension, my theory can also contribute the theoretical understanding of securitization and
identity.
Finally, the dissertation examines the consequences of the mixture of security concerns and
economic assuring factors, an undertheorized phenomenon in international relations theory.
249
It is
undertheorized because for realists, proponents of balancing theory in particular, they find it hard to
believe that a state would ever develop burgeoning and perhaps even unequal commerce with an
external state that is potentially an existential threat.
250
For liberalists, it is puzzling why profound
246
Barry Buzan, Ole Wæver, and Jaap de Wilde, Security: A New Framework for Analysis (Boulder, Colo: Lynne Rienner
Publishers, 1997), p. 57.
247
Alexander Wendt, Social Theory of International Politics, Cambridge Studies in International Relations (Cambridge ; New
York: Cambridge University Press, 1999).
248
David L. Rousseau, Identifying Threats and Threatening Identities: The Social Construction of Realism and Liberalism (Stanford,
Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2006).
249
Masanori Hasegawa, “Close Economic Exchange with a Threatening State: An Awkward Dilemma over China,”
Asian Security Vol. 14, No. 2 (2018), pp. 155-171.
250
Daniel H. Nexon, “The Balance of Power in the Balance,” World Politics Vol. 61, No. 2 (2009), pp. 330-359; Chan,
Looking for Balance: China, the United States, and Power Balancing in East Asia, p. 134-135.
144
economic interdependence does not lead to the convergence of state interests, thereby containing
political friction and security competition. My theory entertains the scenario where both realists and
liberalist neglect and demonstrates how the confluence of security concern and economic assuring
factors leads to a perception of dormant threat.
Implications for Policy
The findings of this dissertation also have policy implications. First, an increasingly popular and
widely-accepted claim asserts that China’s ascendancy has led to increased level of threat perception
and fear-induced balancing behavior from neighboring countries. A direct implication of such
argument is that the United States should double down its military presence in the region to help
East Asian countries to deter China. In so doing, the United States can ensure the endurance of its
leadership in East Asia. However, this conventional understanding of East Asian security actually
inflates the perceived threat toward China in East Asia. Based on my research, Taiwan and Japan,
two most-likely cases to validate the conventional wisdom, do not view China as an active threat. If
the China threat thesis cannot work here, it will not work anywhere. It suggests that, at least as of
now, the presumption of East Asian countries living in the shadow of threat perception every day is
invalid and does not stand under empirical scrutiny. This fact must be pointed out as a grand
strategy based on a delusional assumption will lead to catastrophic implications for American
national interests. Better intelligence about how China was perceived is the first step toward better
policies to enhance American interests in East Asia. If my research is right, then the United States
would be better off strategically if it can employ a grand strategy of restraint, rather than one that
prioritizes military means and competition.
145
The second policy implication is regarding the stability of East Asia against backdrop of
China’s rise. To be clear, the future of East Asian security will be even more stable and peaceful if
China can exercise restraint, continue focusing on economic development and providing economic
benefits to other states in the region. But it does not follow that China’s recent foreign policy
assertiveness will necessarily drag East Asia into severe security competition. My research shows that
the presence of economic assuring factors can alleviate states’ threat perception toward China and
reduce their fear to a much lower level. However, if China continues to engage in repeated
aggression and shows no intent to impose self-restraint in the use of its newly gained power, the
marginal effect of economic assuring factors on alleviating threat perception will significantly
diminish. As Ziva Kunda has convincingly shown that while there is substantive evidence that
motivational factors induce people to arrive at conclusions that they want to arrive at, their ability to
do so is constrained by their ability to construct seemingly reasonable justifications for these
conclusions.
251
The effect of motivated reasoning triggered by the desirability of economic benefits
is likely to be weakened if the information deviating from deviating from such beliefs is extremely
strong and salient.
252
Directions for Future Inquiry
The dissertation points to a number of avenues for future research. First, if we reconceptualize
the economic assuring factors associated with the rising power as its strategic behavior in economic
affairs, then this study essentially provides a foundation for understanding how states use a rising
251
Ziva Kunda, “The Case for Motivated Reasoning,” Psychological Bulletin Vol. 108, No. 3 (1990), pp. 490-498; Ziva
Kunda, Social Cognition: Making Sense of People (Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 1999), ch. 6.
252
Jack S. Levy, “Psychology and Foreign Policy Decision-Making,” in Leonie Huddy, David O. Sears, and Jack S. Levy,
ed., The Oxford Handbook of Political Psychology, (Cambridge: Oxford University Press, 2013), pp. 308-309.
146
power’s behavior in the realms of security and economic affairs, demonstrating how the logic of
inference works in a signaling process. Nonetheless, it represents an important limitation and an
opportunity for future research. If as Robert Jervis and Jonathan Mercer suggest, the sender and the
receiver are two sides of the same coin, then it is important to also deal with the logic of signaling.
253
In other words, instead of simply looking at how states process the signals sent by a rising power, it
may be useful to also examine how the rising power actively manipulates other states’ image of it
through a variety of different policies. Ideally, the logic of signaling and the logic of inference should
be theorized simultaneously. A theory that addresses both logics will surely add significant nuance
and insight into the literature on perceptions and signaling.
Second, my theory is the first of its kind that incorporates both cognitive and motivational
influences on the formation of threat perception. It demonstrates how these two complex factors
can be synthesized into a parsimonious theoretical framework. But it is hardly the only theorizing
path that one can possibly take. There are other cognitive and motivational factors introduced in the
literature to entertain. For example, a synthesis of analogical reasoning and motivated reasoning will
give us a completely different theory from the one I develop here.
Third, there may be opportunities to expand the analysis to other regions. Is the security
dynamics between China and its neighbors unique? Can we use similar theoretical variables to
predict how Post-Soviet states view Russia’s resurgence? Similarly, will our theory be useful for
understanding how South Asian states view India’s ascent? The extent to which the theory travels to
other circumstances may have important insights for exactly what is special about China’s rise.
253
Robert Jervis, The Logic of Images in International Relations (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1970); Jonathan
Mercer, “Rational Signaling Revisted,” in James W. Davis, ed., Psychology, Strategy, and Conflict: Perceptions of Insecurity in
International Relations, (New York: Routledge, 2013), p. 73.
147
Appendix
Coding Rules and Procedures for Taiwanese legislative manifestos
Below I will discuss the coding rules for attention and the three perceptions of threat,
respectively. The basic unit of analysis is the manifesto of individual legislative candidates for both
dimensions.
Coding Rules for Amount of Attention (Topics)
I examine the political promises and policies highlighted by each candidate. For the purpose of
our analysis here, the primary goal is to determine whether the issue of China was mentioned in the
manifesto. Besides comparing the proportion accounted for manifestos containing the topic of
China for each election, it is also important to see the topic of China’s relative importance vis-à-vis
other topics so that we can have a useful baseline for comparison. Because the aim is to detect and
identify topics being highlighted in manifestos, abstract political slogans (e.g. 友善高雄、幸福台
灣; Friendly Kaohsiung and Happy Taiwan”) that cannot be categorized into specific issue area were
excluded from the analysis. The coding scheme contains nine topics and the coding is 0/1 for each
of the below categories. In some cases, a proposed policy might fall into multiple categories. For
example, “cross-Strait direct flight ( 兩岸直航)” is a policy that directly related to issues of China and
transportation. In such scenario, we acknowledged the multi-dimensionality of this proposed policy
and assign the policy with a score of 1 in relevant topics. Arbitrarily categorizing it into one single
category is misleading. It is also possible that a candidate might advocate more than one policy in the
same issue area, such as social welfare. Given the binary structure of our coding scheme and that we
are only interested in the kind of topic being mentioned in the manifesto, we would just give a score
of 1 in the relevant topic even if multiple policies were proposed in this issue area.
148
The specific coding rules by detailed category is discussed as follows:
1. China: Topics related to China ( 中國), People’s Republic of China ( 中華人 民共和國),
Communist Party of China ( 中共), cross-Strait relations( 兩岸關係), and Taiwan Strait ( 台海).
2. Future Legal Status: Issues concerned with Taiwan’s future legal status, such as Taiwan
Independence ( 台獨), Unification ( 統一), and Self-Determination ( 自決).
3. Economy and Finance: Issues related to economic development ( 經濟發展), domestic and
foreign investment ( 國內與外來投資), trade ( 貿易), and tax reform ( 稅制改革).
4. Social Welfare and Health and Environment: Issues related to the supply of social services to the
general public or particular underprivileged social groups. Examples include elderly pension ( 老人年
金) and national health insurance ( 全民健康保險); Topics concerned with promoting the health
condition of citizens and environmental protection, such as advocating for the use of solar energy
( 太陽能) and reducing air pollution ( 減少空氣污染).
5. Education and Culture: Topics related to educational policy and cultural policies. Some examples
include founding new universities ( 開辦新大學) and the promotion of Taiwanese local culture ( 台
灣本土文化推廣).
6. Judicial and Organic Laws: Topics concerned with judicial justice ( 司法正義), judicial reform ( 司
法改革), courts, anti-corruption ( 反貪/反黑金), and freedom of information ( 資訊公開).
7. Foreign Policy and Defense: Topics concerned with the domain of foreign affairs, such as entering
the United Nations ( 進入聯合國), and facilitating participation in the international community ( 提
升國際參與); Issues related to the enhancement of Taiwan’s defense capabilities ( 增強國防實力).
149
8. Transportation: Issues concerned with transportation, tourism, and meteorology, and
communication. Examples include traffic congestion improvement ( 改善塞車) and allowing the
running of private television stations ( 開放民營電 視台).
9. Interior: To render this category useful, we only counted issues that related to the core functions
and duties of the Ministry of the Interior and not included in the coding scheme, such as local self-
governing ( 地方自治), public safety ( 治安), and population policy ( 人口政 策).
Coding Rules for Perceptions of Threat
When legislative candidates mentioned China (or China-related topics) in their manifestos, we
examine relevant sentences to derive the specific type of belief they possessed related to the nature
of China-Taiwan interaction, China’s intentions, as well as the desirability of cooperating with China.
I then determine this belief should fall into which type of the three perceptions of threat (perception
of active threat, perception of dormant threat, and perception of unlikely threat). These three
categories are mutually exclusive. I coded three types of perception of threat:
1. Perception of active threat
Decision rules:
When there is an expression of concern that disputes with China are highly likely to be
solved by force
When China is depicted as implacably hostile and/or completely untrustworthy
When the security environment relating to China is described as dangerous and zero-sum
When the cooperation with China is described as precarious and not worth pursuing
150
When only competitive policies (e.g. enhancing Taiwan’s defense capabilities) are proposed
and no cooperative policies (e.g. increasing economic ties) toward China are suggested
Example: 粉碎中共犯台 野心 (We shall smash Chinese Communist Party’s ambition of invading
Taiwan).
2. Perception of dormant threat
Decision rules:
When China’s intentions are depicted as uncertain and some measures of improving mutual
understanding are proposed
When the security environment relating to China is described as neutral (neither dangerous
nor completely amicable)
When the sovereignty dispute with China is mentioned and yet the expected probability of
dispute escalating to war is not particularly high
When the cooperation with China is described as conditionally desirable
When both competitive policies and cooperative policies toward China are proposed
Example: 支持強化國防 ,推動兩岸經貿發展 (I support basic national defense and the
development of the cross-Strait trade relations)
3. Perception of unlikely threat
Decision rules:
When there is no expression of concern regarding the disputes with China escalating to
conflict or war
When China is depicted as having benign intentions and/or completely trustworthy
151
When the security environment relating to China is described as amicably stable
When the cooperation with China is described as rewarding and worth pursuing
When only cooperative policies are proposed and no competitive policies toward China are
suggested
Example: 兩岸和平─ 活 化基隆:突破僵局,恢復兩岸對談,簽訂和平、經貿協定,完成直
航 (Peace across the Taiwan Strait - Reviving Keelung: breaking the deadlock, resuming talks with
China, signing peace treaty and trade agreement, and establishing direct flights linking Taiwan to
China)
152
Table A1. Legislative Questions Related to Chinese Military Power
Year Number of questions being asked Number of legislators that asked the
questions
1989 20 8
1990 23 18
1991 26 20
1992 27 28
1993 43 31
1994 54 49
1995 68 37
1996 99 52
1997 12 6
1998 24 20
1999 49 38
2000 37 34
2001 29 18
2002 20 13
2003 28 15
2004 22 8
2005 20 12
2006 11 10
2007 16 6
2008 8 5
2009 18 6
2010 24 5
2011 28 3
2012 10 4
2013 8 5
2014 6 3
153
2015 6 3
2016 5 2
2017 3 2
2018 7 4
154
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Abstract (if available)
Abstract
This dissertation investigates how East Asian states assess the intentions of, and the threats posed by, a rising China. I seek answers to questions such as these: Is a rising China perceived by East Asian states as a serious threat? What causes the perception of threat toward China to vary and through what mechanisms? When and how, if possible, can East Asian states’ fear of a rising China be reduced to a modest level? ❧ In answering these questions, I first offer a theoretically-guided and empirical falsifiable new measure of threat perception. With this new measure, I show that, contrary to prominent existing arguments in East Asian security, East Asian states do not perceive China as that big of a threat as many pundits imagine they do. Second, I develop a new theory of regional threat perception to account for this empirical puzzle. This new theory synthesizes the balance of threat theory and the liberal argument of peace by trade and economic interdependence, spiced with a dose of political psychology. I theorize that threat perception toward a rising power is a function of states’ perceived level of revisionism of the rising power, which is determined by a sequence of two variables. First, whether the rising state exercises restraint in its interaction with other countries, especially in the area of sovereignty disputes. And second, whether economic assuring factors associated with the rising power are present or absent. The first variable indicates whether the threat posed by the rising power is vivid or not, thereby determining whether a rising power is likely to be securitized as a military threat. The second variable determines whether the perceived threat can be downplayed by economic assuring factors. I test my theory against the empirical cases of Taiwan and Japan, two least-likely cases for my theory. I use election manifestos, congressional record, newspaper reports, public speeches delivered by national leaders, official documents, as well as public surveys to examine and process-trace how Taiwan and Japan perceive China’s rise since the end of the Cold War. To further strengthen the validity of my finding, I use the strategic portfolios devised by these two countries in response to China’s rise as data to triangulate. ❧ The dissertation makes a handful of contributions. First, while existing literature oftentimes measures threat perception tautologically or in an ad hoc manner, it develops a new measurement of threat perception and offers practical guidelines on the conceptualization, operationalization, and measurement of this construct. This measure enables us to put some sweeping claims regarding threat perception under rigorous empirical scrutiny. Second, my theory is the first of its kind that incorporates both cognitive and motivational influences on the formation of threat perception. Third, utilizing a state’s behavior as a benchmark, my theory generates clear expectations about whether a state might be considered as having aggressive intentions. It thus supplements the balance of threat theory by operationalizing the notion of aggressive intentions ex ante. Finally, my research further develops the liberal argument that economic interests influence states’ assessment of threat by marrying it with the literature of pre-existing beliefs and motivated reasoning.
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Fu, Ronan Tse-min
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Core Title
Perceiving and coping with threat: explaining East Asian perceptions toward China’s rise
School
College of Letters, Arts and Sciences
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Doctor of Philosophy
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Political Science and International Relations
Publication Date
07/19/2021
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threat perception