This innovative Routledge Handbook sheds light on the complex and transformative nature of Global China, prompting a re- evaluation of existing theories on global and regional dynamics. It encourages theoretical innovation, methodological reflection and analytical transformation, providing new avenues for critical engagement with China’s global interactions. The chapters propose three key commitments for the study of Global China: Advocating for diverse viewpoints and non- binary frameworks, employing nuanced analysis to understand Beijing’s transnational relations and utilizing alternative methodological approaches to explore different trajectories for China in international affairs.
The Handbook also identifies and avoids epistemic traps that hinder the understanding of Global China, such as othering and strategic narcissism. It suggests five analytical frameworks related to relationality, global capitalist processes, language and discourse power, planetary- scale modernization and experimentalism to guide future research. By adopting these frameworks, researchers can gain a deeper understanding of the multifaceted factors shaping Global China within the broader global context of cooperation, competition and crisis.
List of figures List of tables List of contributors Introduction: Global China: New Approaches to Research on China and the World Maximilian Mayer, Emilian Kavalski, Marina Rudyak and Xin Zhang I. Framing Global China 1. Global China, Sinology, and Chinese Studies Bart Dessein 2. China’s Questions in Geography Ingo Liefner 3. China’s Traditional, Modern, and Neo–Socialist World Orders William A. Callahan 4. Americans’s Reactions to Global China’s Rise: Power Shift, Problem Shift, and Policy Shift Steve Chan 5. China as a Driver of a Post–Western Global Imaginary Yih-Jye Hwang 6. The China Challenge? A Holographic Global China Perspective Chengxin Pan and Wanyi Zhao II. Actors and Agencies of Global China 7. Great Power Relationships or Common Destiny? Chinese Government and Private Actors’s Long and Winding Road to Find a Place in Global Cyberspace Rogier Creemers 8. International Actorness of the Chinese Local Governments Dominik Mierzejewski and Anna Rudakowska 9. The Party–State’s Global Transgressive Political Activities and Influence Work Ralph Weber 10. Chinese Rationality and the Design of Diplomatic Initiatives Chiung-Chiu Huang 11. Exporting Chinese Digital Authoritarianism Martin K. Dimitrov 12. From the Oriental to the Global City: China’s Urban Rise Ryanne Flock and Elena Meyer-Clement 13. The State of the American and Chinese Technological Competition Czaba Moldicz III. Global China and International Organizations 14. Alternative Leadership: China and Global Finance Jörn-Carsten Gottwald and Niall Duggan 15. Global China in Health Governance: Inherent Conflicts in Governance Norms Lai-Ha Chan 16. Global Climate Governance in Transition and China’s Contribution Hongyuan Yu, Bo Yu and Yunhan Yu 17. China in Global Cultural Governance: Crafting a Culture of Dialogue and Cooperation through UNESCO Tiewa Liu and Huawei Zong 18. China, Catalyst of Change: Altering the Dynamics of Development in the Global South Jeremy Garlick 19. Decoding China's Reading of Global Development and Cooperation Norms Marina Rudyak IV. Global China’s Responses to Global Challenges 20. China and Sustainable Transition—Chairman Coal vs. Green Cyber–Dragon David Tyfield 21. Meating Global China at Home Tracey Fallon 22. Global China in the Age of Algorithms Séverine Arsène 23. China and Modernity Josef Gregory Mahoney 24. From “Debt Diplomacy” to Donorship: China’s Changing Role in Global Development Pádraig Carmody, Tim Zajontz, and Ricardo Reboredo V. Entangled Encounters: Internalizing Global China at Home and Localizing Global China Abroad 25. Innovation in China: Indigenous Efforts and Global Integration Cong Cao and Yutao Sun 26. China’s Subnational Foreign Policymaking Nicholas Thomas 27. Chinese Indonesian Intellectuals’s Quest for Post–Chineseness: Introduction of an Intellectual History Agenda Harryanto Aryodiguno and Chih-yu Shih 28. Nationalism with Chinese Characteristics: Xinjiang and the Politics of (In)Security David O’Brien and Melissa Shani Brown 29. Regionalizing Global China: Institutions, Competitions and Reactions Tony Tai-Ting Liu 30. Limits of Chinese Infrastructure Power and the Local Political Economy in Developing Countries: Evidence from Pakistan Muhammad Tayyab Safdar 31. Globalising China and Peripheral Urbanisation Xiangming Chen Epilogue: Epistemic Traps and Analytical Registers Maximilian Mayer, Emilian Kavalski, Marina Rudyak, and Xin Zhang Index
Maximilian Mayer, Assistant Professor of International Relations and the Global Politics of Technology at the University of Bonn, Germany. Emilian Kavalski, NAWA Chair Professor at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland. Marina Rudyak, Assistant Professor at the Institute of Chinese Studies at Heidelberg University, Germany. Xin Zhang, Associate Professor, School of Politics and International Relations, East China Normal University, China.
Reviews for Routledge Handbook on Global China
"""The Routledge Handbook on Global China charts a refreshingly new course in China studies that is both audacious and solidly grounded in academic research. Departing from the ontological and epistemological traps where China is often treated as a monolithic other and the study of China increasingly framed in great-power competition, this pathbreaking volume seeks to unpack the complexity of China as it engages the outside world at both globally and regionally, affecting the latter’s diplomatic, economic, and security dynamics as much as being affected by external opportunities and constraints. It calls for a non-binary, nuanced, and comprehensive understanding of China that is at once global in its reach and impact, and local in its perspectives steeped in history, culture and a sense of exceptionalism. The complexity of Global China defies simplicity in its characterization and interpretation. Indeed, the China scholarship can be advanced only if current debates and analyses go beyond conventional frameworks of great-power rivalry, peak China, or China to be socialized, to engage in ontological and epistemological conversations that explore, test, compete, and generate knowledge of Global China and its impacts at the systemic and local levels. The handbook will be timely addition to the existing literature and an important guide for both scholars and analysts at a time of transformational changes in international relations."" Jingdong Yuan, Senior Researcher and Director of the SIPRI China and Asia Security Programme, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. ""I have rarely felt inspired to read, let alone use, an academic Handbook on anything – this volume on Global China is the one exception. The approach, to explicitly build non-binary frameworks in order to envision different future trajectories for China in international affairs, is inspired. Whether readers are seeking something thoughtful, something useful, something visionary, or something applicable, they will find inspiration in these pages. Ten out of ten, will read again."" Astrid H. M. Nordin, Chair of Chinese International Relations, Lau China Institute, King’s College London"
