In China and Its Small Neighbors, Sung Chull Kim examines the political implications of the economic asymmetry between China and its small neighbors, part of wider changes in international relations brought about by the rise of China. While being critical of the current trend that focuses on the China-U.S. rivalry alone, Kim argues that a microanalysis of China's advances toward its neighbors is a guide to understanding the trajectory of China's expanding influence and transitions in world politics more broadly. Economic asymmetry—as seen in trade concentration, non-transparency, and reliance on bilateral aid—has made China's small neighbors vulnerable on the political front, thus generating potential threats to their sovereignty and independence. Because China has the upper hand in the bilateral relationships, these weak states practice dual-core hedging as a strategy for survival. They hedge on China for expected economic benefits and at the same time hedge against their powerful neighbor to mitigate the risks involved in that hedging-on. Each small state's mode of hedging depends on its degree of vulnerability and its availability of policy instruments such as multilateral institutions and bilateral partnerships with extra-regional powers.

This book seeks to understand the evolution of China's relations with its neighbors, both Central Asian and in particular its Southeast Asian neighbors.

Chinese residential communities are places of intense governing and an arena of active political engagement between state and society. In The Government Next Door, Luigi Tomba investigates how the goals of a government consolidated in a distant authority materialize in citizens’ everyday lives. Chinese neighborhoods reveal much about the changing nature of governing practices in the country. Government action is driven by the need to preserve social and political stability, but such priorities must adapt to the progressive privatization of urban residential space and an increasingly complex set of societal forces. Tomba’s vivid ethnographic accounts of neighborhood life and politics in Beijing, Shenyang, and Chengdu depict how such local "translation" of government priorities takes place. Tomba reveals how different clusters of residential space are governed more or less intensely depending on the residents’ social status; how disgruntled communities with high unemployment are still managed with the pastoral strategies typical of the socialist tradition, while high-income neighbors are allowed greater autonomy in exchange for a greater concern for social order. Conflicts are contained by the gated structures of the neighborhoods to prevent systemic challenges to the government, and middle-class lifestyles have become exemplars of a new, responsible form of citizenship. At times of conflict and in daily interactions, the penetration of the state discourse about social stability becomes clear.

What does the rise of China represent, and how should the international community respond? With a holistic rereading of Chinese longue durée history, Fei-Ling Wang provides a simple but powerful framework for understanding the nature of persistent and rising Chinese power and its implications for the current global order. He argues that the Chinese ideation and tradition of political governance and world order—the China Order—is based on an imperial state of Confucian-Legalism as historically exemplified by the Qin-Han polity. Claiming a Mandate of Heaven to unify and govern the whole known world or tianxia (all under heaven), the China Order dominated Eastern Eurasia as a world empire for more than two millennia, until the late nineteenth century. Since 1949, the People's Republic of China has been a reincarnated Qin-Han polity without the traditional China Order, finding itself stuck in the endless struggle against the current world order and the ever-changing Chinese society for its regime survival and security. Wang also offers new discoveries and assessments about the true golden eras of Chinese civilization, explains the great East-West divergence between China and Europe, and analyzes the China Dream that drives much of current Chinese foreign policy.

China’s relations with its neighbors have evolved since 1949, and in the 21st century many scholars argue that China’s rising power has led it to be increasingly domineering over those smaller countries in Northeast, Southeast, Central, and South Asia. The evolution of China’s regional relations needs to be examined comprehensively, since China counts twenty-seven countries as its "neighbors" large and small. While China’s official policy toward all of these countries is to treat them as "good neighbors" and "partners," some of these relationships have been spectacularly deteriorating, while others have been quietly improving over the last two decades. Jackson takes a comparative foreign policy approach, and compares China’s status as a regional hegemon with the United States, Russia, India, Brazil, South Africa and Nigeria. The result is a broader theory as to why regional powers are sometimes intimidating and at other times accommodating. An important contribution to studies on China, this book will prove useful to scholars and students in Chinese and Asian foreign policy, comparative foreign policy, and international relations.

"China's relations with its neighbors have evolved since 1949, and in the 21st century many scholars argue that China's rising power has led it to be increasingly domineering over those smaller countries in Northeast, Southeast, Central, and South Asia. The evolution of China's regional relations needs to be examined comprehensively, since China counts twenty-seven countries as its "neighbors" large and small. While China's official policy toward all of these countries is to treat them as "good neighbors" and "partners," some of these relationships have been spectacularly deteriorating, while others have been quietly improving over the last two decades. Jackson takes a comparative foreign policy approach, and compares China's status as a regional hegemon with the United States, Russia, India, Brazil, South Africa and Nigeria. The result is a broader theory as to why regional powers are sometimes intimidating and at other times accommodating. An important contribution to studies on China, this book will prove useful to scholars and students in Chinese and Asian foreign policy, comparative foreign policy, and international relations."--Provided by publisher.

"China's relations with its neighbors have evolved since 1949, and in the 21st century many scholars argue that China's rising power has led it to be increasingly domineering over those smaller countries in Northeast, Southeast, Central, and South Asia. The evolution of China's regional relations needs to be examined comprehensively, since China counts twenty-seven countries as its "neighbors" large and small. While China's official policy toward all of these countries is to treat them as "good neighbors" and "partners," some of these relationships have been spectacularly deteriorating, while others have been quietly improving over the last two decades. Jackson takes a comparative foreign policy approach, and compares China's status as a regional hegemon with the United States, Russia, India, Brazil, South Africa and Nigeria. The result is a broader theory as to why regional powers are sometimes intimidating and at other times accommodating. An important contribution to studies on China, this book will prove useful to scholars and students in Chinese and Asian foreign policy, comparative foreign policy, and international relations."--Provided by publisher.