China-US Great-Power Rivalry This edited volume examines the competitive dynamics of two order-building projects in the Indo-Pacific, namely China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and the US-led Free and Open Indo-Pacific (FOIP). Foci are on how far the two major powers are able to use institutional projects to (re)order the region of the Indo-Pacific to suit their policy preferences, and on how regional powers perceive and navigate between the two ordering projects. This book discusses a wide array of actors in the Indo- Pacific, covering the two major powers of China and the United States, middle powers of Australia and New Zealand, India, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, and institutional actors of ASEAN, AUKUS, the Quad and the Pacific Islands Forum. Drawing on the concept of international order, the chapters examine the actor-specific foreign policies in relation to the rivalry between the FOIP and the BRI.
This accessible book will be a go-to resource for anyone looking for how the two great powers garner legitimacy and followership for their own version of ordering project, and how regional powers respond to the dynamic competition and navigate between China and the United States, and between the forces of liberal democracy and autocracy. Lai-Ha Chan is Senior Lecturer in the Social and Political Sciences Program, School of Communication, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Technology Sydney, Australia. Her current research foci centre on minilateralism, especially in the context of the Indo-Pacific, and global health governance. Lee is Senior Fellow of the Conflict Analysis Research Centre and a Research Fellow of the Global Europe Centre in the School of Politics and International Relations at the University of Kent, Canterbury, United Kingdom.
Politics in Asia Comparative Federalism in Asia Democracy, Ethnicity and Religion Baogang He, Michael G. Breen and Laura Allison-Reumann Taiwan and Southeast Asia Soft Power and Hard Truths Facing China’s Ascendancy Karl Chee Leong Lee and Ying-kit Chan The Political Economy of China–Myanmar Relations Yizheng Zou The Jamaat Question in Bangladesh Islam, Politics and Society in a Post-Democratic Nation Edited by Syed Serajul Islam and Md Saidul Islam Human Security and Empowerment in Asia Beyond the Pandemic Edited by Mely Caballero-Anthony, Yoichi Mine and Sachiko Ishikawa US-China Global Maritime Relations Nong Hong Islam and Citizenship in Indonesia Democracy and the Quest for an Inclusive Public Ethics Robert W. Hefner China-US Great-Power Rivalry The Competitive Dynamics of Order-Building in the Indo-Pacific Edited by Lai-Ha Chan and Pak K. Lee For more information about this series, please visit: www.com/Politics-in-Asia/book-series/PIA China-US Great-Power Rivalry The Competitive Dynamics of Order-Building in the Indo-Pacific Edited by Lai-Ha Chan and Pak K.
Lee First published 2024 by Routledge 4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2024 selection and editorial matter, Lai.Ha Chan and Pak K. Lee; individual chapters, the contributors The right of Lai-Ha Chan and Pak K. Lee to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Chan, Lai-Ha, editor. Title: China-US great-power rivalry : the competitive dynamics of order-building in the Indo-Pacific / edited by Lai-Ha Chan and Pak K.
Other titles: China-United States great power rivalry Description: First edition. | New York : Routledge, 2024. | Series: Politics in Asia | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Identifiers: LCCN 2023048196 (print) | LCCN 2023048197 (ebook) | ISBN 9781032492698 (hbk) | ISBN 9781032492773 (pbk) | ISBN 9781003392958 (ebk) Subjects: LCSH: Geopolitics—Indo-Pacific Region.
| Balance of power. | World politics—1989- | China—Foreign relations—United States. | United States—Foreign relations—China. | Indo-Pacific Region—Foreign relations—China.
| China—Foreign relations—Indo-Pacific Region. | Indo-Pacific Region—Foreign relations—United States. | United States—Foreign relations—Indo-Pacific Region. | Indo-Pacific Region—Strategic aspects.
Classification: LCC JC319 .5051— dc23/eng/20231201 LC record available at https://lccn.gov/2023048196 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.gov/2023048197 ISBN: 9781032492698 (hbk) ISBN: 9781032492773 (pbk) ISBN: 9781003392958 (ebk) DOI: 10.4324/9781003392958 Typeset in Galliard by codeMantra Contents List of Illustrations Notes on Contributors Acknowledgements List of Abbreviations and Acronyms 1 Introduction: The Competitive Dynamics of Order-Building in the Indo-Pacific LAI-HA CHAN AND PAK K. LEE 2 Can China Create a Stable Illiberal Regional Order through the BRI? A Study of China-Myanmar Economic Corridor PAK K. LEE AND CECILIA DUCCI 3 Competing Sino-US AUKUS Narratives: The Intended and Unintended Outcomes of ‘Naming and Shaming’ ANISA HERITAGE 4 Australia and New Zealand in the Indo-Pacific: How and Why the Pacific Islands Look to Authoritarian China? LAI-HA CHAN 5 India and the US-China Great Power Rivalry: Navigating between the BRI and the FOIP JABIN T. JACOB 6 Regional Order-Building in the Indo-Pacific: Japan as a Geopolitical Alternative KEI KOGA 7 Trapped into an Existential Cage: Korea’s Hedging between China and the US ANTONIO FIORI AND SUNHYUK KIM 8 Ideology and Market Linkages: Taiwan and the Preservation of the US-led Hegemonic Order through Soft Power and Geoeconomics VINÍCIUS GUILHERME RODRIGUES VIEIRA 9 Decentred? ASEAN’s Struggle to Accommodate Great Power Competition MARK BEESON 10 A ‘Weak(ened)’ Quad in the Indo-Pacific: What Do Its Strategic Narratives Tell Us? LAI-HA CHAN AND PAK K.
LEE Index Illustrations Maps 2.1 The China-Myanmar Economic Corridor (CMEC) 4.1 Map of Oceania Figure 8.1 Taiwan FDI Outflow Tables 8.1 What correlates with variation in exports? 10.1 Comparison of all four countries’ statements following the 2017 working-level quadrilateral meeting Notes on Contributors Mark Beeson is an adjunct professor at the University of Technology Sydney and Griffith University, Australia. He was previously Professor of International Politics at The University of Western Australia (UWA). Before joining UWA, he had taught at Murdoch, Griffith, Queensland, York (UK), and Birmingham, where he was also the Head of the Department of Political Science and International Studies. His latest book is Environmental Anarchy? International Security in the 21st Century (Bristol University Press, 2021).
Lai-Ha Chan is Senior Lecturer and Honours Degree Coordinator in the Social and Political Sciences Program, School of Communication, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Technology Sydney, Australia. Her current research foci centre on minilateralism, especially in the context of the Indo-Pacific, and (global and China’s) health governance. She is an author of two scholarly books and one edited volume. Her peer-reviewed articles have appeared in Asia Policy, Australian Journal of International Affairs, Contemporary Politics, China Security, East Asia, Global Change, Peace and Security, Global Governance: A Review of Multilateralism and International Organizations, Global Public Health, PLoS Medicine, Review of International Studies, and Third World Quarterly.
Cecilia Ducci is a PhD candidate in International Relations in the Department of Political and Social Sciences at the University of Bologna, Italy. After submitting her dissertation in January 2024, she takes up a postdoctoral fellowship at Bologna in the following March. Her dissertation is about contestation over international norms on the prohibition of genocide with special reference to Darfur in Sudan and the Rohingya in Myanmar. Her publications about Asian genocide and the International Criminal Court have appeared in Third World Quarterly (2020) and Interdisciplinary Political Studies (2022).
Antonio Fiori is Associate Professor of History and Institutions of Asia in the Department of Political and Social Sciences at the University of Bologna (Italy) and President of the Asia Institute. He is also Adjunct Professor at Korea University in Seoul and UPES in Dehradun (India). He has been a visiting scholar at the United International College (Zhuhai, PRC), East-West Center (Honolulu, USA), and Kyujanggak Center for Korean Studies (Seoul National University, Korea). He has published widely in the fields of Inter-Korean relations and North Korea’s domestic and international affairs.
Among his latest publications are: The Korean Paradox: Domestic Political Divide and Foreign Policy in South Korea (Routledge, 2019) and The Routledge Handbook of Europe-Korea Relations (Routledge, 2022). Anisa Heritage is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Defence and International Affairs at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, Camberley, UK. She is a co-author of Order, Contestation and Ontological Security-Seeking in the South China Sea (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020), and has published in Cambridge Review of International Affairs (2020) and International Politics (2023). With primary research interest in US-China relations in the Indo-Pacific, she is working on a monograph on the development of US Indo-Pacific strategy from Obama to Biden.
Jacob is Associate Professor at the Department of International Relations and Governance Studies, and Director of the Centre of Excellence for Himalayan Studies at the Shiv Nadar Institution of Eminence, Delhi National Capital Region, India. His latest publications included two co-edited special issues for the China Report journal on the Communist Party of China’s 100th anniversary (February and August 2022) and co-edited volumes titles, China’s Search for ‘National Rejuvenation’: Domestic and Foreign Policies under Xi Jinping (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020) and How China Engages South Asia: Themes, Partners and Tools (Centre for Social and Economic Progress, 2023). Sunhyuk Kim is Professor in the Department of Public Administration at Korea University, Seoul, Korea. In 2015–2019, he was the Vice President for International Affairs of the same university.
He has been Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Southern California (USA), Visiting Professor at Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies at Harvard University (USA), and Research Fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University (USA). He is the author of The Politics of Democratization in Korea, Economic Crisis and Dual Transition in Korea, and numerous scholarly journal articles and book chapters. His most recently published articles include “The Origins of ‘Collaborative Governance’ in South Korea,” “Dealing with COVID-19 in South Korea,” and “The Making of Presidential Agendas in Korea.” Kei Koga is Associate Professor/Head of Division of Public Policy and Global Affairs, School of Social Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. Recent major publications include “Tactical Hedging as Coalition-Building Signal: The Evolution of Quad and AUKUS in the Indo-Pacific,” British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 2024; “Institutional Dilemma: Quad and ASEAN in the Indo- Pacific,” Asian Perspective 47(1), 2023: 27-48; “Getting ASEAN Right in US Indo-Pacific Strategy,” The Washington Quarterly 45(4), 2022: 155– 175; “Conceptualizing Equidistant Diplomacy in International Relations: The Case of Singapore,” International Relations of the Asia-Pacific, 22(3), 2022.
His most recent book is Managing Great Power Politics: ASEAN, Institutional Strategy, and the South China Sea (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022). Lee is a Senior Fellow of the Conflict Analysis Research Centre and a Research Fellow of the Global Europe Centre in the School of Politics and International Relations at the University of Kent, Canterbury, UK, after retiring from the University at the end of April 2023. He is undertaking research on the narratives of the US-China ‘tech war’ and on China’s contestation of international norms on minority rights. His most recent monograph is Order, Contestation and Ontological Security- Seeking in the South China Sea (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020) (with Anisa Heritage).
His work has appeared in leading academic journals such as Australian Journal of International Affairs, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, China Quarterly, Contemporary Politics, East Asia, Global Governance, International Politics, Nationalities Papers, Pacific Review, Review of International Studies, and Third World Quarterly.