University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities / Department of Government and Public Administration

University of Macau / Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities / Department of Government and Public Administration

This senior thesis is an exploration of Chinese soft power and the implications on the future of US-China relations. The first chapter looks into the objectives/goals to attain by using soft power set by the Chinese government followed by the exploration of methods that the Chinese have used to further their goals. The second chapter takes a look at the implicit and explicit successes of soft power in the peripheral regions of China and neighboring countries. The third chapter explores the negative and positive results that have come from China's soft power efforts. And the final chapter covers the fluctuation in American soft power and the effect China's soft power will have on global stability. The paper concludes with policy suggestions for the United States if it wants to protect national interests against China's soft power in the future.

No abstract available. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2006.

As the world’s largest emitters and economies, the United States and China play a critical role in global climate mitigation. Using Putnam’s two-level game showcases how the domestic political context of each country impacts their international policies. However, Putnam’s framework does not differentiate between bilateral and multilateral circumstances. The clarity and concentration of perceived costs and benefits for the United States and China from climate policies lead to differing outcomes on the multilateral and bilateral stage. Fear of the free-rider effect makes players assume payoffs that resemble the Prisoner’s Dilemma during multilateral climate negotiations, whereas bilateral negotiations usually result in more cooperative outcomes. These contrasting policy outcomes reflect the hot and cold relationship between the United States and China. The additional expediency and effectiveness of bilateral agreements suggest that substantial climate action will likely originate from strong bilateral agreements. In an optimal scenario, increased U.S.-China climate collaboration translates into a stronger relationship between the two global superpowers and provides other nations with the confidence and certainty to invest in abatement in a renewed global climate regime.

This thesis is primarily based on ethnographic fieldwork that lasted fifteen months, between 2010 and 2012, in Keqiao, a municipal county in eastern Zhejiang Province, China. Despite its inferior administrative status and rather inland location, Keqiao is China's trading frontier for fabrics, which are the semifinished textiles that are industrially weaved, knitted, dyed, and printed in bulk before being exported. Contributing to the turnover of more than one-third of all fabric produced in China, the county's fabric wholesale market is not only the mainstay of Keqiao's economy. It is also the world's centre for fabric supplies, and where around 10,000 Indians have flocked to start their intermediary trading businesses. The major aim of this thesis is to examine the everyday encounters between Indians and Chinese in the local fabric market. It begins by exploring how Keqiao emerged as the global distribution centre for a wide variety of cheap fabrics. It also shows how Keqiao becomes characterized by the growing importance of low-end fabric sales and the influx of Indian traders, who specialize in exporting these fabrics. The thesis then describes the encounters between Indians and local Chinese in the fabric market, addressing the challenges and difficulties that these Indians, especially the newcomers, confront when dealing with the Chinese suppliers. Focusing on novice traders, the thesis turns to investigate the internal dynamics of Indian trading companies. Remarkably, novice Indian traders successfully learn several strategies to counteract their precarious position in the workplace. These strategies leverage the accumulation of work experience and expanding social networks. These insights bring the thesis to chapters that highlight other strategies, particularly those created from encounters between Indian traders and Chinese clerks, as well as those between Indian traders and Chinese salespersons. Taken together, this thesis illustrates how transnational and local actors team up to create their own, locally based, intermediary economy within a small Chinese county, and how such a collaborative economy, which I term a 'global fabric bazaar', sustains these actors. Without this collaborative economy, these players would otherwise be vulnerable within the fabric wholesale industry because this supply chain is increasingly polarized and weakened by today's global capitalism.

Submitted by ANA TEREZA LOPES MARRA DE SOUSA null (anatereza_lms@yahoo.com.br) on 2016-04-25T22:01:56Z No. of bitstreams: 1 tese.pdf: 2479015 bytes, checksum: 84a1c1718528ac991d045d1dff08c859 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Felipe Augusto Arakaki (arakaki@reitoria.unesp.br) on 2016-04-28T12:03:44Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 sousa_atlm_dr_mar.pdf: 2479015 bytes, checksum: 84a1c1718528ac991d045d1dff08c859 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-28T12:03:44Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 sousa_atlm_dr_mar.pdf: 2479015 bytes, checksum: 84a1c1718528ac991d045d1dff08c859 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-03-17 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) / Partindo-se da constatação do adensamento das relações entre Brasil e China na década de 2000 e da crescente importância que elas apresentam principalmente para o Brasil, nesta tese o nosso objetivo é compreender se as relações do Brasil com a China fortaleceram o projeto brasileiro de inserção internacional. O trabalho analisa tal questão desde a normalização das relações entre os países, em 1974, contudo focará maiores esforços no período 2004-2012, que é a época em que as relações entre os países, dada sua intensificação, tornam-se mais relevantes no conjunto da política externa brasileira. Ênfase é dada na nossa análise as relações bilaterais e multilaterais relacionadas a matérias econômicas e políticas em que os países participaram conjuntamente. / The starting point of this work is the intensification of relations between Brazil and China in the 2000s and the growing importance they have mostly for Brazil. In this thesis we intend to understand if the relations of Brazil with China have strengthened the brazilian project of international insertion. The work will examine this issue since the normalization of relations between the countries in 1974, however will focus in the period 2004-2012, which is the season that the relations between the countries have intensified and become more relevant to brazilian foreign policy. We will emphasize the analysis of bilateral and multilateral relations in which countries have participated together .

The U.S. has enjoyed global hegemonic power for over 70 years and even more so after the fall of the Soviet Union. However, some political scientists argue that it is descending and the evidence lies in the increasing power of China. An imbalance of power in the international structure has the ability to result in different outcomes. The realist theory suggests that a conflict between the U.S. and China is unavoidable, the liberal theory suggests that the economic dependency between the two makes conflict less possible, while the constructivist theory suggests that the outcome depends on the reaction of the leaders and social change. This study asks what the reaction of the President of the U.S. is to the rise of China to find out the result of this hegemonic power imbalance. By using discourse analysis, this study has analyzed the remarks of President Trump from the period of January 2017 to November 2017 in search of his reaction to the rise of China. The results of this study show that President Trump divides the world in two parts making the U.S. the protagonist and the rest of the world, including China, the antagonist in his discourse as his reaction. Due to this reaction, Trump takes nationalistic and protectionist measures against China.

No description available.

This thesis analyzes the current disputes between the United States and China over the exchange rate of the Chinese currency renminbi using an International Political Economy (IPE) analysis. Monetary relations are not mere economic affairs, but bear geopolitical implications. Money is power. Money is politics. The pursuit of monetary power is an important part of great power politics. Based on this assertion, the thesis studies past cases of monetary power struggles between the United States and the Great Britain, the Soviet Union, Japan, and the European Union (EU), respectively. The thesis then investigates the dollar’s status as the dominant international reserve currency in the current international monetary system, as well as the power that this unique status can generate and provide. The dollar’s monetary hegemony has become the main characteristic of the current international monetary system and an important power source for continued U.S. hegemony. The dollar’s hegemony and the asymmetrical interdependency between the dollar and the renminbi are the source and the key basis for the recent U.S.-China monetary disagreements. The U.S.-China monetary disputes reflect not only each country's respective domestic interests and perceived benefits, but also the monetary power struggle between the two biggest global economies. Predictions are also entertained for the future monetary relations between the two countries, as well as the geopolitical implications that this relationship may have for the U.S.-China bilateral relationship in coming decades.