Maritime Security between China and Southeast Asia: Conflict and Cooperation in the Making of Regional Order

At the empirical level, in terms of maritime security between China and Southeast Asia, this text claims that the Spratly dispute has engendered a transformation, from a narrow focus on the security problems inherent in the Spratly area, to a comprehensive focus on the problems of order. Beginning with the premise that the picture often painted of this subject was principally caused by two inter-related focal points. First, the debate on security in the South-China Sea tends to treat maritime security as a peripheral, yet potentially explosive phenomenon. Second, a continuing realist approach in security studies in the region implies the prospects of conflict inherent in regional disputes are accentuated. This book takes as a central issue the disregard for the inclination of the issue of maritime security to confront Chinese and Southeast Asia policies on the balance of power, diplomacy and international law. This dispute, it claims, is central, not only because it questions the ability of the states to maintain peace and stablility in the area, but also the means by which the states have traditionally maintained regional peace and security. A main ambition of the book is to demonstrate that maritime disputes offer opportunities for inter-state rapprochement as well as risks of conflict.

Table of Contents:
Contents: Maritime security between China and Southeast Asia; The English school and the study of order; The Spratly dispute: from non-essential to essential; A governance structure for the South China Sea; An organizational network for the South China Sea; A code of conduct for the South China Sea; A regional order in the making; Bibliography; Index.

About the Author :
Liselotte Odgaard is Assistant Professor in International Relations, Department of Political Science at the University of Aarhus, Denmark. She has written articles on East and Southeast Asian security published by Contemporary Southeast Asia, Kluwer Law International and IBRU Boundary and Security Bulletin.

Review :
’Odgaard has produced an elegant analysis of the South China Sea disputes which goes beyond mainstream views which focus on conflict and war. Her critical use of the English School together with her unique fieldwork experience in the South China Sea workshops persuasively shows how the disputes are not just a problem, but an opportunity for crafting a new form of regional order in East Asia. This impressive work thus pushes the boundaries of both international theory and East Asian international relations; it will be valuable for both teaching and research.’ Dr William A. Callahan, University of Durham, UK '...comprehensive and well researched and argued, and will be of interest to analysts concerned with Asia-Pacific security in general and the South China Sea disputes in particular...a valuable contribution to the field and is worth a careful read.' The China Journal