Rising China's Influence in Developing Asia

Rising China has been reshaping world order for the last two decades, but this volume argues that we cannot accurately understand rising China's global impacts without first investigating whether and how its growing power resources are translated into actual influence over other states' choices and policies. Concentrating on the developing countries in East and South Asia, where the power asymmetry is greatest and China ought to have the biggest influence, the volume investigates China's influence in bilateral relationships, and on key political actors from these countries within key issue areas and international institutions. Using an influence framework, the volume demonstrates how China tends to try to gain the support of smaller and weaker countries without forcing them to change their preferences or to act against their own interests. China does purposefully coerce, induce, or persuade others to behave in certain ways, but whether and the extent to which it succeeds is determined as much by the reactions, political context and decision-making processes of the target states, as it is by how skilfully Chinese actors deploy these tools. The contributors detail how China's influence even over these weaker states does not result from easy applications of power; rather it tends to be mediated through the competing interests of target state actors, the imperatives of other existing security and economic relationships, and more complex strategic thinking than we might expect. The book's findings carry lessons for conceptual refinement, as well as policy implications for those coping with China's reshaping of international order.

Table of Contents:
1: Evelyn Goh: Introduction 2: Michael A. Glosny: Chinese Assessments of China's Influence in Developing Asia Part One: Small Developing Asian States 3: Evelyn Goh and David Steinberg: Myanmar's Management of China's Influence: From Mutual Benefit to Mutual Dependence 4: Cheng Guan Ang: China's Influence over Vietnam in War and Peace 5: Aileen S. P. Baviera: The Domestic Mediations of China's Influence in the Philippines 6: Neil Devotta: China's Influence in Sri Lanka: Negotiating Development, Authoritarianism, and Regional Transformation Part Two: Issues and Institutions 7: Ralf Emmers: China's Influence in the South China Sea and the Failure of Joint Development 8: Pichamon Yeophantong: China's Hydropower Expansion and Influence Over Environmental Governance in Mainland Southeast Asia 9: James Reilly: Chinese Sunshine: Beijing's Influence on Economic Change in North Korea 10: John D. Ciorciari: China's Influence in Asian Monetary Affairs 11: Rosemary Foot and Rana Siu Inboden: China's Influence on Developing Asian States During the Creation of the United Nations Human Rights Council, 2005-7 Part Three: Extensions 12: Scott L. Kastner: Analysing Chinese Influence: Challenges and Opportunities 13: Evelyn Goh: Conclusion

About the Author :
Evelyn Goh is the Shedden Professor of Strategic Policy Studies at the Australian National University, where she is also the Director of Research at the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre.

Review :
Evelyn Goh's edited volume, Rising China's Influence in Developing Asia, is a welcome addition to efforts at presenting systematic, theoretically informed analyses of the way the PRC exercises power. A timely and well written work that is marked by a cohesiveness quite unusual for an edited volume. Evelyn Goh has made a substantial contribution to our understanding of Chinas influence or its lack of influence. She has clearly underscored the importance of this lack of influence as it could lead to possible unintended consequences for East Asia and International relations if China prefers to wield its power when its influence fails. This volume, edited by Evelyn Goh, assesses the degree of Chinese influence on the developing countries of east, south-east and south Asia, through individual country case-studies and by examining issue areas... A valuable book for anyone who wants to understand the ways in which international influence works. Goh and her contributors move beyond speculations about China's rise to examine the ways China's growing capabilities may, or may not, bring greater international influence. The book combines a provocative re-consideration of the ways international influence works with a close examination of China's influence over many of its smaller neighbours in Asia. Impressive in its theoretical and empirical richness, this should be required reading for anyone trying to understand China's changing international role in the twnety-first century. This volume offers the most updated and in-depth analysis to date of China's influence over its developing neighbours. The contributors uncover the distinctive Chinese way of exercising power, but also expose China's suprisingly limited success in shaping the behaviour of targeted neighbours, even in overwhelmingly asymmetric power relationships. The book also lays down a theoretical framwork, which could be further tested if the power dynamic continues to favour a stronger China. It is a must-read study for policy makers and policy watchers inAsia, as well as those interested in theorizing power. Whilst growing Chinese power and influence is often taken for granted as being self-evidently true, this volume digs deep into real world case studies to identify different dimensions and levels of influence. It shows that is it harder to find cases of China trying to force change on others than the common sense understanding of Chinese power would have us believe. Crucially, the contributors do not just ask what China does and wants; they focus on the agency of those who are the 'recipients' of Chinese influence, and how domestic actors in developing Asia have responded to-and often mediated-Chinese influence. Rising China's Influence in Developing Asia is a timely and important work in the ongoing chronicle of the rise of China.