What do China’s scholars make of the nature of China’s global rise? And what is the significance of academic debates for Chinese policy goals and preferences?

In this book, leading Chinese specialists outline how their colleagues are studying and interpreting different dimensions of China’s evolving global role, opening these Chinese language debates to a new audience. Collectively they show that while some ideas and ways of thinking are more prominent than others, there is no homogeneity of scholarship and no single conception of what China thinks and wants. Not only has the range of issue areas under discussion actually increased as China’s global role and impact has changed, but there also remains considerable diversity when it comes to thinking on what China can, might, and should try to do as a global power, and how China’s global role should be studied and theorized.

The chapters in this book were originally published in the journal, The Pacific Review.

Shaun Breslin is Professor of Politics and International Studies at the University of Warwick and Senior Research Fellow, The Wong MNC Center. This collection was completed while he held a Leverhulme Major Research Fellowship to study the nature of China as a global power.

Ren Xiao is Professor of International Politics at the Institute of International Studies at Fudan University in Shanghai, where he is also Director of the Center for the Study of Chinese Foreign Policy.