The future of U.S.-China relations: Is conflict inevitable?

International Security

Volumn 30, Issue 2, 2005, Pages 7-45

  Friedberg, Aaron L ^a  

^a PRINCETON UNIVERSITY   (United States)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 33645504515     PISSN: 01622889     EISSN: 15314804     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1162/016228805775124589     Document Type: Review

References (166)

1. George W. Bush, The National Security Strategy of the United States of America (Washington, D.C.: White House, September 2002), p. 5.
2. For an overview of these developments, see Bonnie S. Glaser, "Rice Seeks to Caution, Cajole, and Cooperate with Beijing," Comparative Connections, Vol. 7, No. 5 (April 2005), http://www.csis.org/pacfor/cc/ 0501Qus_china.html.
3. Amity Shales, "U.S. Begins Rethink on China," Financial Times (London), June 26, 2005;
4. and Jonathan Anderson, "The End of the China Love Affair, Far East Economic Review, May 2005, http://www.feer.com/articles1/2005/a505/free/p020. html.
5. For the best brief overview of the difficulties involved in trying to predict the future, see Robert Jervis, "The Future of World Politics: Will It Resemble the Past?" International Security, Vol. 16, No. 3 (Winter 1991/92), pp. 39-46. Among other problems, Jervis notes that international relationships are likely to be characterised by what he has elsewhere termed "system effects." Systems composed of densely interconnected units are often characterized by feedback loops and nonlinear interactions. In such circumstances, small causes will often have large effects that are difficult to predict or to control. Although efforts to anticipate the future trajectory of complex political systems may not be an utter waste of time, Jervis concludes that the "interactive, strategic, and contingent nature of systems limits the extent to which complete and deterministic theories are possible."
6. Jervis, System Effects: Complexity in Political and Social Life (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1997), p. 295. Another useful examination of the difficulties of prediction, occasioned by the evident failure of most analysts to foresee the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War,
7. is John Lewis Gaddis, "International Relations Theory and the End of the Cold War," International Security, Vol. 17, No. 3 (Winter 1992/93), pp. 5-58. Gaddis reaches conclusions that are similar to Jervis's. He surmises that many important political phenomena and historical events are actually the product of nonlinear processes that cannot be adequately modeled using existing analytical techniques. The social sciences, Gaddis argues, have embraced "the traditional methods of the physical and natural sciences. But they did so at a time when physicists, biologists, and mathematicians, concerned about the disparities between their theories and the reality they were supposed to characterise, were abandoning old methods in favor of new ones that accommodated indeterminacy, irregularity, and unpredictability-precisely the qualities the social sciences were trying to leave behind."
8. International Security, Ibid., p. 54.
9. Gaddis elaborates on these observations in The Landscape of History: How Historians Map the Past (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), especially pp. 53-128.
10. See also Steven Bernstein, Richard Ned Lebow, Janice Gross Stein, and Steven Weber, "God Gave Physics the Easy Problems: Adapting Social Science to an Unpredictable World," European Journal of International Relations, Vol. 6, No. 1 (March 2000), pp. 43-76.
11. For earlier discussions of these issues, see Gabriel A. Almond and Stephen J. Genco, "Clouds, Clocks, and the Study of Politics," World Politics, Vol. 20, No. 4 (July 1977), pp. 489-522;
12. Stanley H. Hoffmann, "International Relations: The Long Road to Theory," World Politics, Vol. 11, No. 3 (April 1959), pp. 346-377;
13. and Ithiel de Sola Pool, "The Art of the Social Science Soothsayer," in Nazli Choucri and Thomas W. Robinson, eds., Forecasting in International Relations: Theory, Methods, Problems, Prospects (San Francisco, Calif.: W.H. Freeman, 1978), pp. 23-34.
14. Peter J. Katzenstein and Nobuo Okawara, "Japan, Asian-Pacific Security, and the Case for Analytical Eclecticism," International Security, Vol. 26, No. 3 (Winter 2001/02), p. 154.
15. See also Peter J. Katzenstein and Rudra Sil, "Rethinking Asian Security: A Case for Analytical Eclecticism," in J.J. Suh, Peter J. Katzenstein, and Allen Carlson, eds., Rethinking Security in East Asia: Identity, Power, and Efficiency (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2004), pp. 1-33.
16. Jervis, "The Future of World Politics," p. 40.
17. Gaddis, "International Relations Theory and the End of the Cold War," p. 44 (emphasis in original).
18. Paul M. Kennedy, The Rise of the Anglo-German Antagonism, 1860-1914 (London: Allen and Unwin, 1982).
19. This is a fact lamented by U.S. realists. See, for example, the writings of George Kennan, Henry Kissinger, Hans Morgenthau and, most recently, John Mearsheimer.
20. For an examination of the original formulation of these arguments by Immanuel Kant, see Michael Doyle, Ways of War and Peace: Realism, Liberalism, and Socialism (New York: W.W. Norton, 1997), pp. 251-300.
21. For an overview of recent evidence regarding the existence of what liberal optimists describe as the "Kantian triangle," see Bruce Russett and John Oneal, Triangulating Peace: Democracy, Interdependence, and International Organizations (New York: W.W. Norton, 2001).
22. U.S.-China Security Review Commission, The National Security Implications of the Economic Relationship between the United States and China (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, July 2002), pp. 38-39.
23. U.S.-China Business Council, "U.S.-China Trade Statistics and China's World Trade Statistics," http://www.uschina.org/statistics/ tradetable.html, updated February 28, 2005.
24. According to U.S. government figures, U.S. foreign direct investment in China increased from $354 million in 1990 to $9.58 billion in 2000. U.S.-China Security Review Commission, The National Security Implications of the Economic Relationship between the United States and China, p. 47.
25. See Robert D. Hormats, Elizabeth Economy, and Kevin Nealer, eds., Beginning the Journey: China, the United States, and the WTO (New York: Council on Foreign Relations, 2001);
26. Shuxun Chen and Charles Wolf Jr., eds., China, the United States, and the Global Economy (Santa Monica, Calif.: RAND, 2001);
27. and "China and the WTO: The Real Leap Forward," Economist, November 20, 1999, pp. 25-28.
28. For a statement of the argument regarding the pacifying effects of trade in Asia generally, see, for example, James L. Richardson, "Asia-Pacific: The Case for Geopolitical Optimism," National Interest, No. 38 (Winter 1994/95), pp. 28-39.
29. Regarding trade and U.S.-China relations in particular, see, for example, the remarks of President Bill Clinton at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, Washington, D.C., March 8,2000, in Public Papers of the Presidents, William J. Clinton: 2000 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 2001), Vol. 1, pp. 404-108.
30. The classic statement of many of these arguments is Robert O. Keohane, After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1984). For a summary of the literature,
31. see Lisa L. Martin and Beth A. Simmons, "Theories and Empirical Studies of International Institutions," International Organization, Vol. 52, No. 4 (Autumn 1998), pp. 729-757.
32. David M. Lampton, Same Bed, Different Dreams: Managing U.S.-China Relations, 1989-2000 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001), p. 163. For a brief summary of the recent mutual entanglement of China and the United States in institutions and regimes,
33. see ibid., pp. 161-188.
34. Making the case for the stabilizing effects of China's increasing participation in international institutions are (among many others) Michael Oksenberg and Elizabeth Economy, eds., China Joins the World: Progress and Prospects (New York: Council on Foreign Relations, 1999), pp. 1-41;
35. Paul Evans, "The New Multilateralism and the Conditional Engagement of China," in James Shinn, ed., Weaving the Net: Conditional Engagement with China (New York: Council on Foreign Relations, 1996), pp. 249-270;
36. and Alastair lain Johnston and Paul Evans, "China's Engagement with Multi-lateral Security Institutions," in Johnston and Robert S. Ross, eds., Engaging China: The Management of an Emerging Power (New York: Routledge, 1999), pp. 235-272.
37. Belief in the virtues of institutions has had a real impact on U.S. policymakers. See, for example, the discussion in an article by a former commander in chief of U.S. forces in the Pacific and his top strategic adviser. Dennis C. Blair and John T. Hanley Jr., "From Wheels to Webs: Reconstructing Asia-Pacific Security Arrangements," Washington Quarterly, Vol. 24, No. 1 (Winter 2001), pp. 7-17.
38. The literature on this subject is vast. For useful overviews, see Miriam Fendius Elman, "The Need for a Qualitative Test of the Democratic Peace Theory," in Elman, ed., Paths to Peace: Is Democracy the Answer? (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1997), pp. 1-57;
39. and Russett and Oneal, Triangulating Peace, pp. 81-124.
40. See, for example, Minxin Pei, "Creeping Democratization in China," Journal of Democracy, Vol. 6, No. 4 (October 1995), pp. 64-79;
41. and Minxin Pei, "China's Evolution toward Soft Authoritarianism, " in Edward Friedman and Barrett L. McCormick, eds., What If China Doesn't Democratize? Implications for War and Peace (Armonk, N.Y.: M.E. Sharpe, 2000), pp. 74-98.
42. For the most clear-cut statement of this argument, see Henry S. Rowen, "The Short March: China's Road to Democracy," National Interest, No. 45 (Fall 1996), pp. 61-70. For a somewhat more cautious, but still basically optimistic assessment of likely near-term developments,
43. see George Gilboy and Eric Heginbotham, "China's Coming Transformation," Foreign Affairs, Vol. 80, No. 4 (July/August 2001), pp. 26-39.
44. See also Elizabeth Economy, "Don't Break the Engagement," Foreign Affairs, Vol. 83, No. 3 (May/June 2004), pp. 96-109.
45. Thus, according to one study, "The rule of law, public disclosure of financial data, and managerial accountability corrode command economies. These liberal practices are necessary for sustained growth in a market economy and . . . will inevitably spill over into civil society and the world of politics, thus leading to a more moderate China." Shinn, Weaving the Net, p. 40.
46. Similarly, one of the arguments in favor of the incorporation of China into the WTO was that it would promote domestic economic change and hence political reforms. In the words of a former Clinton administration national security adviser, "To enter the WTO, China must speed the demise of the state-run economy through which the Communist Party has wielded much of its power.... Just as NAFTA [North American Free Trade Agreement] membership eroded the economic base of one-party rule in Mexico, WTO membership ... can help do the same in China." Samuel R. Berger, "A Foreign Policy for the Global Age," Foreign Affairs, Vol. 79, No. 6 (November/December 2000), pp. 28-29.
47. Regarding the shifts in Clinton's policies, see James Mann, About Face: A History of America's Curious Relationship with China, from Nixon to Clinton (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1999), pp. 274-314.
48. Governor George W. Bush, "A Distinctly American Internationalism, " Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, Simi Valley, California, November 19, 1999, http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/bush/wspeech.htm.
49. Regarding the impact of anarchy, see Kenneth N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1979), pp. 89-93;
50. and John J. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (New York: W.W. Norton, 2001), pp. 29-54.
51. For an estimate of China's past growth, see Central Intelligence Agency, World Fact Book, 2005, http://www.odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ch. html#Econ, updated July 28, 2005. For other assessments of China's past performance and future prospects, see
52. K.C. Yeh, "China's Economic Growth: Recent Trends and Prospects," in Chen and Wolf, China, the United States, and the Global Economy, pp. 69-97;
53. and Angang Hu, "The Chinese Economy in Prospect," in Chen and Wolf, China, the United States, and the Global Economy, pp. 99-146.
54. See Angus Maddison, Chinese Economic. Performance in the Long-Run (Paris: Development Center of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, 1998), pp. 95-99.
55. See also the projections in Yeh, "China's Economic Growth," p. 110. These estimates are all based on optimistic projections of China's future growth rates and the use of purchasing power parity (as compared to exchange rate) conversion methods that tend systematically to increase the apparent size of the Chinese economy in relation to that of the United States. For an estimate that shows China's gross domestic product exceeding that of the United States in current dollar terms by 2039,
56. see Dominic Wilson and Roopa Purushothaman, "Dreaming with BRICs: The Path to 2050," Goldman Sachs Global Economics Paper No. 99 (New York: Goldman Sachs Group, 2003).
57. For estimates of China's defense spending, see U.S.-China Security Review Commission, The National Security Implications of the Economic Relationship between the United States and China, pp. 167-177.
58. For an analysis of Chinese military imports, see Bates Gill and Taeho Kim, China's Arms Acquisitions from Abroad: A Quest for "Superb and Secret Weapons" (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995). Regarding China's protracted and painful efforts to develop its own ballistic missile submarines,
59. see John Wilson Lewis and Xue Litai, China's Strategic Seapower: The Politics of Force Modernization in the Nuclear Age (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1994).
60. Regarding the progress of China's military modernization efforts, see Annual Report on the Military Power of the People's Republic of China, May 28, 2004, http://www.defenselink.mil/pubs/d20040528PRC.pdf.
61. See also Mark A. Stokes, China's Strategic Modernization: Implications for the United States (Carlisle, Pa.: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 1999);
62. James R. Lilley and David Shambaugh, eds., China's Military Faces the Future (Washington, D.C.: American Enterprise Institute, 1999);
63. Col. Susan M. Puska, ed., People's Liberation Army after Next (Carlisle, Pa.: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2000);
64. and David Shambaugh, Modernizing China's Military: Progress, Problems, and Prospects (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002).
65. Samuel P. Huntington, "America's Changing Strategic Interests," Survival, Vol. 33, No. 1 (January/February 1991), p. 12.
66. Robert Gilpin, War and Change in International Politics (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1981), pp. 22-23. On the links between growth and expansion,
67. see Fareed Zakaria, From Wealth to Power: The Unusual Origins of America's World Role (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1998).
68. Regarding the connections between national growth, expanding interests, and international conflict, see Robert North and Nazli Choucri, Nations in Conflict: National Growth and International Violence (San Francisco, Calif.: W.H. Freeman, 1975).
69. For an overview of the various alternative strategies states have used to deal with rising powers, see Randall L. Schweller "Managing the Rise of Great Powers: Theory and History," in Johnston and Ross, Engaging China, pp. 7-17.
70. For an analysis of the unhappy history of past efforts to incorporate rising powers peacefully into existing international systems, see Michael D. Swaine and Ashley J. Tellis, Interpreting China's Grand Strategy: Past, Present, and Future (Santa Monica, Calif.: RAND, 2000), pp. 197-229.
71. Huntington, "America's Changing Strategic Interests," p. 12.
72. Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, p. 400.
73. See Peter Hays Gries, China's New Nationalism: Pride, Politics, and Diplomacy (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004), pp. 43-53.
74. For an analysis that stresses the connections between the past two hundred years of "national decline" and China's likely goals in "a renewed period of international strength and power," see Richard Bernstein and Ross H. Munro, The Coming Conflict with China (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1997), especially pp. 51-81, at p. 53. Although they reach different conclusions about the likely implications for China's external behavior, Sinologists Andrew J. Nathan and Robert S. Ross also place considerable emphasis on China's comparatively recent experiences of vulnerability and weakness.
75. See Nathan and Ross, The Great Wall and the Empty Fortress: China's Search for Security (New York: W.W. Norton, 1997), pp. 19-34.
76. One observer goes so far as to suggest that, at the time of the Qing dynasty, a tendency toward authoritarianism and imperialism "entered China's cultural DNA and continued to replicate itself down through the centuries and the dynasties." Steven W. Mosher, Hegemon: China's Plan to Dominate Asia and the World (San Francisco, Calif.: Encounter Books, 2000), p. 26. In this view, China is essentially "hardwired" by its history and culture to seek domination. For a more measured attempt to draw links between China's distant past and its possible future behavior,
77. see Swaine and Tellis, Interpreting China's Grand Strategy, especially pp. 1-95.
78. See also Ross Terrill, The New Chinese Empire: And What It Means for the United States (New York: Basic Books, 2004). Regarding the possible reemergence of a Sinocentric system in Asia,
79. see Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of the World Order (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996), pp. 218-238;
80. and David C. Kang, "Hierarchy and Stability in Asian International Relations," in G. John Ikenberry and Michael Mastanduno, eds., International Relations Theory and the Asia-Pacific (New York: Columbia University Press, 2003), pp. 163-190.
81. These statements are taken, respectively, from Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet, "The Worldwide Threat in 2003: Evolving Dangers in a Complex World," February 11, 2003, http://www.cia.gov/cia/ public_affairs/speeches/2003/dci_speech_02112003.html;
82. and Annual Report on the Military Power of the People's Republic of China, p. 10.
83. For a restatement of the view that "America's geopolitical objective must remain to prevent Asia's domination by any single power or its coalescence into an unfriendly bloc," see Henry A. Kissinger, Does America Need a Foreign Policy? Towards a Diplomacy for the Twenty-first Century (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2001), pp. 110-163, at p. 112.
84. The distinction here is between so-called offensive realists, who believe that states necessarily aim to enhance their power to the greatest extent possible, and "defensive realists," who believe that most states seek security. See Robert Jervis, "Cooperation under the Security Dilemma," World Politics, Vol. 30, No. 2 (January 1978), pp. 167-174;
85. and Robert Jervis, Perception and Misperception in International Politics (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1978), pp. 58-113. For an insightful application to the East Asian context,
86. see Thomas J. Christensen, "China, the U.S.-Japan Alliance, and the Security Dilemma in East Asia," International Security, Vol. 23, No. 4 (Spring 1999), pp. 49-80.
87. On this issue, see, for example, Denny Roy, "Tensions in the Taiwan Strait," Survival, Vol. 42, No. 1 (Spring 2000), pp. 76-96;
88. June Teufel Dreyer, "Flashpoint: The Taiwan Strait," Orbis, Vol. 44, No. 4 (Autumn 2000), pp. 615-629;
89. and Andrew J. Nathan, "What's Wrong with American Taiwan Policy," Washington Quarterly, Vol. 23, No. 2 (Spring 2000), pp. 93-106.
90. See, for example, Michael McDevitt, "Beijing's Bind," Washington Quarterly, Vol. 23, No. 3 (Summer 2000), pp. 177-186;
91. Evan S. Medeiros, rapporteur, "Ballistic Missile Defense and North-east Asian Security: Views from Washington, Beijing, and Tokyo," report of the Stanley Foundation and the Center for Nonproliferation Studies (Monterey, Calif.: Monterey Institute of International Studies, April 2001);
92. Kenneth W. Allen et al., "Theater Missile Defense in the Asia-Pacific Region," Working Group Report No. 34 (Washington, D.C.: Henry L. Stimson Center, June 2000). On the links between the TMD and Taiwan issues,
93. see Thomas J. Christensen, "Theater Missile Defense and Taiwan's Security," Orbis, Vol. 44, No. 1 (Winter 2000), pp. 79-90.
94. Regarding Chinese concerns over U.S. alliances and, in particular, its alliance with Japan, see Christensen, "China, the U.S.-Japan Alliance, and the Security Dilemma in East Asia."
95. See also David Shambaugh, "China's Military Views the World: Ambivalent Security," International Security, Vol. 24, No. 3 (Winter 1999/2000), pp. 52-79, especially pp. 65-67.
96. Chinese assessments of U.S. actions in Asia since September 11 are discussed in Aaron L. Friedberg, "11 September and the Future of Sino-American Relations," Survival, Vol. 44, No. 1 (Spring 2002), pp. 33-50.
97. For the argument that China's power and importance have been greatly overstated, see Gerald Segal, "Does China Matter?" Foreign Affairs, Vol. 78, No. 5 (September/October 1999), pp. 24-36.
98. For a useful survey of China's economic challenges, see Nicholas R. Lardy, China's Unfinished Economic Revolution (Washington, D.C.: Brookings, 1998). Some observers believe that the pace of China's recent economic growth has been considerably overstated.
99. See Thomas G. Rawski, "China by the Numbers: How Reform Has Affected China's Economic Statistics," China Perspectives, No. 33 (January-February 2001), pp. 25-34.
100. Making the case that China's growth continues to be robust is Nicholas R. Lardy, "China's Economy after the WTO," paper presented to the Thirty-first Sino-American Conference on Contemporary China, National Chengchi University, Taipei, Taiwan, June 2-4,2002. For the argument that China is on the brink of collapse,
101. see Gordon G. Chang, The Coming Collapse of China (New York: Random House, 2001).
102. On China's present and likely future military shortcomings, see, for example, Solomon Karmel, China and the People's Liberation Army: Great Power or Struggling Developing State? (London: St. Martin's, 2000);
103. Michael G. Gallagher, "China's Illusory Threat to the South China Sea," International Security, Vol. 19, No. 1 (Summer 1994), pp. 169-194;
104. Bates Gill and Michael O'Hanlon, "China's Hollow Military," National Interest, No. 56 (Summer 1999), pp. 55-62;
105. and Michael O'Hanlon, "Why China Cannot Conquer Taiwan," International Security, Vol. 25, No. 2 (Fall 2000), pp. 51-86.
106. For a statement of many of the arguments laid out above, see Michael R. Chambers, "Rising China: A Threat to Its Neighbors?" in Carolyn W. Pumphrey, ed., The Rise of China in Asia: Security Implications (Carlisle, Pa.: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2002), pp. 65-91.
107. See also Patrick E. Tyler, "Who's Afraid of China?" New York Times Magazine, August 1,1999, pp. 4649.
108. See William C. Wohlforth, "The Stability of a Unipolar World," International Security, Vol. 24, No. 1 (Summer 1999), pp. 5-41;
109. and Stephen G. Brooks and William C. Wohlforth, "American Primacy in Perspective," Foreign Affairs, Vol. 81, No. 4 (July/August 2002), pp. 20-33.
110. In addition, Schweller points out that rising powers may vary in their propensity to take risks, with some risk acceptant and others highly risk averse. See the discussion in Randall L. Schweller, "Managing the Rise of Great Powers: Theory and History," in Johnston and Ross, Engaging China, pp. 18-22.
111. For the argument that China is neither a fully satisfied power nor a revolutionary threat to the status quo, see Nathan and Ross, The Great Wall and the Empty Fortress.
112. See also Alastair lain Johnston, "Is China a Status Quo Power?" International Security, Vol. 27, No. 4 (Spring 2003), pp. 5-56.
113. Other recent assessments that describe China's strategic aims as limited include Avery Goldstein, Rising to the Challenge: China's Grand Strategy and International Security (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2005);
114. and David Shambaugh, "China Engages Asia: Reshaping the Regional Order," International Security, Vol. 29, No. 3 (Winter 2004/05), pp. 64-99.
115. Robert S. Ross, "Beijing as a Conservative Power," Foreign Affairs, Vol. 76, No. 2 (March/ April 1997), pp. 33-44. In 2004 China's leaders introduced (but later abandoned) a slogan meant to convey a reassuring message about its intentions.
116. See Robert L. Suettinger, "The Rise and Descent of 'Peaceful Rise'" China Leadership Monitor, No. 12 (Fall 2004), http://www. chinaleadershipmonitor.org/20044/rs.html.
117. For the general argument that bipolar systems are more stable than multipolar systems, see Waltz, Theory of International Politics, pp. 161-193. On the supposed emergence of bipolarity in Asia, see
118. Robert S. Ross, "The Geography of the Peace: East Asia in the Twenty-first Century," International Security, Vol. 23, No. 4 (Spring 1999), pp. 81-118. Because it focuses only on East Asia, this view does not take into account the possible role of India.
119. Avery Goldstein, "Great Expectations: Interpreting China's Arrival," International Security, Vol. 22, No. 3 (Winter 1997/98), p. 70.
120. For general arguments regarding the presumed stabilising effects of nuclear weapons, see Robert Jervis, The Meaning of the Nuclear Revolution: Statecraft and the Prospect of Armageddon (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1989).
121. On the impact of geography, see Ross, "The Geography of the Peace";
122. and Michael McDevitt, "Roundtable: Net Assessment - Objective Conditions versus the U.S. Strategic Tradition," in Paul D. Taylor, ed., Asia and the Pacific: U.S. Strategic Traditions and Regional Realities (Newport, R.I.: Naval War College Press, 2001), pp. 101-105.
123. For a similarly broad use of the term "liberal," see Andrew Moravcsik, "Taking Preferences Seriously: A Liberal Theory of International Politics," International Organization, Vol. 51, No. 4 (Autumn 1997), pp. 513-553.
124. On the role of nationalism in shaping Chinese foreign policy, see Allen S. Whiting, "Chinese Nationalism and Foreign Policy after Deng," China Quarterly, Vol. 142 (June 1995), pp. 295-316;
125. David Shambaugh, "Containment or Engagement of China? Calculating Beijing's Responses," International Security, Vol. 21, No. 2 (Fall 1996), pp. 180-209;
126. Erica Strecker Downs and Phillip C. Saunders, "Legitimacy and the Limits of Nationalism: China and the Diaoyu Islands," International Security, Vol. 23, No. 3 (Winter 1998/99), pp. 114-146;
127. and Suisheng Zhao, "We Are Patriots First and Democrats Second: The Rise of Chinese Nationalism in the 1990s," in Friedman and McCormick, What If China Doesn't Democratize? pp. 21-48.
128. See Edward D. Mansfield and Jack Snyder, "Democratization and the Danger of War," International Security, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Summer 1995), pp. 5-38;
129. and Edward D. Mansfield and Jack Snyder, "Democratic Transitions, Institutional Strength, and War," International Organization, Vol. 56, No. 2 (Spring 2002), pp. 297-337.
130. For the most recent and comprehensive version of Mansfield and Snyder's argument, see Edward D. Mansfield and Jack Snyder, Electing to Fight: Why Emerging Democracies Go to War (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2005).
131. Jack Snyder, From Voting to Violence: Democratization and Nationalist Conflict (New York: W.W. Norton, 2000), p. 158.
132. Fei-Ling Wang, "Self-Image and Strategic Intentions: National Confidence and Political Insecurity," in Yong Deng and Wang, eds., In the Eyes of the Dragon: China Views the World (Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999), p. 35.
133. For the contrary argument, see Willy Wo-Lap Lam, "The Prospects of Political Liberalization in China," paper presented at a seminar of the Project for the New American Century, Washington, D.C., October 8, 1999.
134. See also the provocative analysis in Bruce Gilley, China's Democratic Future: How It Will Happen and Where It Will Lead (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004), pp. 227-241.
135. Michael Doyle, "Kant, Liberal Legacies, and Foreign Affairs, Part 2," Philosophy and Public Affairs, Vol. 12, No. 3 (Summer 1983), pp. 325-326.
136. The influence of ideology on U.S. foreign policy is well analyzed in two recent surveys. See Walter A. McDougall, Promised Land, Crusader State: The American Encounter with the World since 1776 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1997);
137. and Walter Russell Mead, Special Providence: American Foreign Policy and How It Changed the World (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2001).
138. Regarding shifting U.S. perceptions of Taiwan and their impact on U.S. policy, see Mann, About Face, pp. 315-338.
139. For a recent Chinese assessment of the alleged messianic and aggressive tendencies in U.S. foreign policy, see Lanxin Xiang, "Washington's Misguided China Policy," Survival, Vol. 43, No. 3 (Autumn 2001), pp. 7-23.
140. Regarding Chinese suspicion of engagement, see Shambaugh, "Containment or Engagement of China?" pp. 206-207;
141. and Wu Xinbo, "China: Security Practice of a Modernizing and Ascending Power," in Muthiah Alagappa, ed., Asian Security Practice: Material and Ideational Influences (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1998), pp. 132-133.
142. Although his conclusions are not entirely pessimistic, David Lampton describes how domestic political processes in both the United States and China can make it extremely difficult for them to improve their bilateral relationship. Lampton, Same. Bed, Different Dreams, pp. 279-309.
143. A number of analysts have emphasized the role of "domestic political incentives for hard-line policies in both countries" in explaining specific incidents, such as the 1995-96 downturn in Sino-American relations. See, for example, Phillip C. Saunders, "China's America Watchers: Changing Attitudes towards the United States," China Quarterly, Vol. 161 (March 2000), p. 59.
144. For statements of the constructivist approach to the study of international relations, see Alexander Wendt, Social Theory of International Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999);
145. Alexander Wendt, "Anarchy Is What States Make of It: The Social Construction of Power Politics," International Organization, Vol. 46, No. 2 (April 1992), pp. 391-425;
146. Alexander Wendt, "Constructing International Politics," International Security, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Summer 1995), pp. 71-81;
147. and Ronald L. Jepperson, Alexander Wendt, and Peter J. Katzenstein, "Norms, Identity, and Culture in National Security," in Katzenstein, ed., The. Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), pp. 33-75.
148. See Alexander Wendt, "Collective Identity Formation and the International State," American Political Science Review, Vol. 88, No. 2 (June 1994), pp. 384-396.
149. Wendt, "Anarchy Is What States Make of It," p. 410.
150. This is the term that Alastair lain Johnston uses to describe the long-standing, dominant Chinese approach to the conduct of international affairs. See Johnston, Cultural Realism: Strategic Culture and Grand Strategy in Chinese History (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1995).
151. Regarding the persistence of realism in China, see also Thomas J. Christensen, "Chinese Realpolitik," Foreign Affairs, Vol. 75, No. 5 (September/October 1996), pp. 37-52.
152. See, for example, Matthew Evangelista, Unarmed Forces: The Transnational Movement to End the Cold War (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1999).
153. Alastair lain Johnston and Paul Evans, "China's Engagement with Multilateral Security Institutions," in Johnston and Ross, Engaging China, p. 265.
154. For a careful assessment of what he describes as China's gradually increasing "comfort level" with regional security institutions, see Alastair lain Johnston, "The Myth of the ASEAN Way? Explaining the Evolution of the ASEAN Regional Forum," in Helga Haftendorn, Robert O. Keohane, and Celeste A. Wallander, eds., Imperfect Unions: Security Institutions over Time and Space (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), pp. 287-324.
155. For a general argument about the role of institutions and dialogue in promoting the evolution of "security practices" throughout Asia, see Muthiah Alagappa, "Asian Practice of Security: Key Features and Explanations," in Alagappa, Asian Security Practice, pp. 611-676.
156. Indeed, as Wendt notes, "Sometimes social structures so constrain action that transformative strategies are impossible." Wendt, "Constructing International Politics," p. 80.
157. Thomas Berger, "Set for Stability? Prospects for Conflict and Cooperation in East Asia," Review of International Studies, Vol. 26, No. 3 (July 2000), p. 420.
158. See, for example, Allen S. Whiting, China Eyes Japan (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986);
159. Robert Manning, "Burdens of the Past, Dilemmas of the Future: Sino-Japanese Relations in the Emerging International System," Washington Quarterly, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Winter 1994), pp. 45-58;
160. and Nicholas D. Kristof, "The Problem of Memory," Foreign Affairs, Vol. 77, No. 6 (November/ December 1998), pp. 37-49.
161. See also Gerrit Gong, ed., Remembering and Forgetting: The Legacy of War and Peace in East Asia (Washington, D.C.: Center for Strategic and International Studies, 1996).
162. Wendt, "Anarchy Is What States Make of It," p. 411.
163. See the discussion of U.S. suspicions in David Shambaugh, "Sino-American Strategic Relations: From Partners to Competitors," Survival, Vol. 42, No. 1 (Spring 2000), p. 110.
164. Similarly, the April 2001 EP-3 incident, in which the crew of a downed U.S. spy plane was detained for several days by the Chinese authorities, appears at least temporarily to have had a strong negative impact on perceptions in each country. See Craig S. Smith, "Chinese Youths Adopt a Darkening View of U.S.," New York Times, April 22, 2001;
165. and "Poll Shows Americans Think Less of China after Spy Plane Incident," CNN.com, April 23, 2001, http://www.cnn.com/2001/US/04/23/poll. china.us/index.html.
166. Gaddis, "International Relations Theory and the End of the Cold War," p. 44.