Who Accommodates Chinese Interests? Exploring Variation in National Responses to a Rising China.

Scott Kastner, Associate Professor of International Relations at University of Maryland collaborates with the Stanford China Program to examine China as a major political and economic actor on the world stage.

China and the World: The Stanford China Program, in cooperation with the Center for East Asian Studies, will host a special series of seminars to examine China as a major political and economic actor on the world stage. Over the course of the autumn and winter terms, leading scholars will examine China actions and policies in the new global political economy. What is China's role in global governance? What is the state of China's relations with its Asian neighbors? Is China being more assertive both diplomatically as well as militarily? Are economic interests shaping its foreign policies? What role does China play amidst international conflicts?

On the surface at least, there appears to be a great deal of variation in how countries across the world are responding to a rising China.  In a nutshell, some countries seem more willing than others to accommodate Chinese interests.  Such variation manifests itself in many different ways.  Some countries, for instance, have been much more willing than others to challenge China over its human rights record.  There is a great deal of variation across countries in the policies they adopt on issues like Taiwan and Tibet, with some countries being more willing than others to endorse PRC positions on these topics explicitly. Some countries challenge China more aggressively than others on economic issues.  And a number of studies have pointed to variation in the extent to which countries in East Asia are willing to balance against growing Chinese power.  This presentation explores the correlates of this sort of variation in national policies toward China.  It focuses in particular on the extent to which individual countries have been willing to endorse PRC policies relating to Taiwan and Tibet, and whether or not individual countries have been willing to recognize China as a market economy.

Scott L. Kastner is an Associate Professor in the Department of Government and Politics at the University of Maryland, College Park.  His research interests include international political economy and the international politics of East Asia.  He is author of Political Conflict and Economic Interdependence across the Taiwan Strait and Beyond (Stanford University Press, 2009), and his articles have appeared in journals such as International Studies Quarterly, International Security, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Comparative Political Studies, and Journal of Peace Research.