http://liu.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:433627/FULLTEXT01.pdf

Identifying risk issues and research advancements in supply chain risk management

of China (PRC) is more integrated into, and more cooperative within, regional and global political and economic systems than ever in its history. Yet there is growing uneasiness in the United States and the Asia-Paciac region about the implications of China’s increasing economic and military power. Characterizations of Chinese diplomacy in the policy and scholarly worlds are, if anything, less optimistic of late about China’s adherence to regional and international norms. In the 1980s there was little discussion in the United States and elsewhere about whether China was or was not part of something called “the international community.” Since the early 1990s, however, scholars and practitioners alike have argued increasingly that China has not demonstrated sufaciently that it will play by so-called international rules and that somehow it must be brought into this community. The subtext is a fairly sharp othering of China that includes a civilizing discourse (China is not yet a civilized state) or perhaps a sports discourse (China is a cheater). Many of the most vigorous policy debates in the United States in recent years have been over whether it is even possible to socialize a dictatorial, nationalistic, and dissatisaed China within this putative international community. Engagers argue that China is becoming socialized, though mainly in the sphere of economic norms (e.g., free trade and domestic marketization). Skeptics either conclude that this is not the case, due to the nature of the regime (for some, China is still Red China; for more sophisticated skeptics, China is oirting with fascism), or that it could not possibly happen because China as a rising power, by deanition, is dissatisaed with the U.S.-dominated global order (a power-transition realpolitik argument). A logical conclusion is that both groups view the problem of China’s rising power as the primary Is China a Status Quo Power?

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/4137603.pdf

Is China a Status Quo Power

Increasing economic competition combined with the powerful threat of transnational activism are pushing firms to develop new political strategies. Over the past decade a growing number of corporations have adopted policies of industry self-regulation --corporate codes of conduct, social and environmental standards, and auditing and monitoring systems. A Public Role for the Private Sector explores the phenomenon of industry self-regulation through three different cases --environment, labor, and information privacy --where corporate leaders appear to be converging on industry self-regulation as the appropriate response to competing pressures. Political and economic risks, reputational effects, and learning within the business community all influence the adoption of a self-regulatory strategy, but there are wide variations in the strength and character of it across industries and issue areas. Industry self-regulation raises significant questions about the place of the private sector in regulation and governance, and the accountability, legitimacy and power of industry at a time of rapid globalization.

A Public Role for the Private Sector: Industry Self-Regulation in a Global Economy

China’s vastly increased involvement in Africa over the past decade is one of the most significant recent developments in the region. It appears to contradict the idea of international marginalisation of Africa and brings significant economic and political consequences. China’s Africa interest is part of a recently more active international strategy based on multipolarity and non-intervention. Increased aid, debt cancellation, and a boom in Chinese-African trade, with a strategic Chinese focus on oil, have proven mutually advantageous for China and African state elites. By offering aid without preconditions, China has presented an attractive alternative to conditional Western aid, and gained valuable diplomatic support to defend its international interests. However, a generally asymmetrical relationship differing little from previous African–Western patterns, alongside support of authoritarian governments at the expense of human rights, make the economic consequences of increased Chinese involvement in Africa mixed at best, while the political consequences are bound to prove deleterious.

China's engagement in Africa : scope, signi¢cance and consequences

In the study of civil society, Tocqueville-inspired research has helped illuminate important connections between associations and democracy, while corporatism has provided a robust framework for understanding officially approved civil society organizations in authoritarian regimes. Yet neither approach accounts for the experiences of ostensibly illegal grassroots nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in an authoritarian state. Drawing on fieldwork in China, I argue that grassroots NGOs can survive in an authoritarian regime when the state is fragmented and when censorship keeps information local. Moreover, grassroots NGOs survive only insofar as they refrain from democratic claims-making and address social needs that might fuel grievances against the state. For its part, the state tolerates such groups as long as particular state agents can claim credit for any good works while avoiding blame for any problems. Grassroots NGOs and an authoritarian state can thus coexist in a “contingent symbiosis” that—far ...

/pdf/contingent-symbiosis-and-civil-society-in-an-authoritarian-2wn2pov6go.pdf

Contingent Symbiosis and Civil Society in an Authoritarian State: Understanding the Survival of China’s Grassroots NGOs1

1. The Death of the Huai River2. A Legacy of Exploitation3. The Economic Explosion and Its Environmental Cost4. The Challenge of Greening China5. The New Politics of the Environment6. The Devil and the Doorstep7. Lessons from Abroad8. Avoiding the CrisisNotesIndex

The river runs black : the environmental challenge to China's future

In The Third Revolution, Elizabeth Economy, one of America's leading China scholars, provides an authoritative overview of contemporary China that makes sense of all of the seeming inconsistencies and ambiguities in its policies and actions.

The Third Revolution: Xi Jinping and the New Chinese State

China's environmental woes are mounting, and the country is fast becoming one of the leading polluters in the world. The situation continues to deteriorate because even when Beijing sets ambitious targets to protect the environment, local officials generally ignore them, preferring to concentrate on further advancing economic growth. Really improving the environment in China will require revolutionary bottom-up political and economic reforms.

The Great Leap Backward

Much has been made of the environmental dark side of China's economic boom. Public health challenges, large-scale migration and diminishing economic opportunities are all costs incurred by China from the country's failure to integrate environmental protection and economic development successfully. Now China's leaders are attempting to use the country's transition to a market economy and integration into the global economy to help protect the environment, advancing policies such as green gross domestic product, tradable permits, environmental leadership by multinationals and national environmental model cities. The success of these policies, however, rests on a broader and more fundamental set of institutional reforms that would promote transparency, rule of law and official accountability, and thus remains in question.

Environmental governance: the emerging economic dimension

The article looks at Chinese President Xi Jinping. Particular focus is given to Xi's efforts to reform the country's leadership structure, economy, and foreign policy. According to the author, the reforms could empower China if Xi does not alienate supporters by cracking down on dissent and if he is able to maintain or improve economic growth. Details on Internet regulations, anticorruption efforts, and regional security policy in China are also presented. It is suggested that the U.S. should encourage China's participation in the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), maintain a strong military presence in the Asia-Pacific region, and support democracy and civil society in Southeast Asia.

Elizabeth C. Economy

Papers

The river runs black : the environmental challenge to China's future

The Third Revolution: Xi Jinping and the New Chinese State

The Great Leap Backward

Environmental governance: the emerging economic dimension

China's Imperial President