ABSTRACT

If the scholarly field of international political economy (IPE) is a ‘global conversation,’ then voices from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) are only beginning to be heard (Blyth, 2009). The field itself is young, but Chinese scholars played no role in its early development. This reflected the relative closure of the country after 1949, the social and political trauma of the following decades, and the barriers to external intellectual exchange associated with the Asian chapter of the Cold War. The ideological uniformity promoted by the ruling Communist Party of China (CPC) did not completely silence internal reflection on the transnational interaction of

Wang Yong1 and Louis Pauly2 1School of International Studies, Peking University, Beijing, China

2Department of Political Science, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada

ABSTRACT

KEYWORDS

If the scholarly field of international political economy (IPE) is a ‘global conversation,’ then voices from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) are only beginning to be heard (Blyth, 2009). The field itself is young, but Chinese scholars played no role in its early development. This reflected the relative closure of the country after 1949, the social and political trauma of the following decades, and the barriers to external intellectual exchange associated with the Asian chapter of the Cold War. The ideological uniformity promoted by the ruling Communist Party of China (CPC) did not completely silence internal reflection on the transnational interaction of

politics and economics. But a distinctive contribution to global debates had to wait until the country began its modern period of reform and ‘opening up.’ Even then, language barriers remained formidable until a new generation of Chinese scholars took advantage of rapidly expanding opportunities to travel and study abroad and until a growing number of their foreign counterparts learnt Mandarin and went the other way. A genuine ‘conversation’ between Chinese and foreign IPE scholars not necessarily specializing in China studies, however, dates back little more than two decades. At its center have been changing perceptions of the systemic role of the United States. That conversation is rapidly gaining in volume, so now is the time to discern the baseline against which its future impact may be assessed. Hardly alone, Ikenberry (2011: 343) concludes his study of the origins

and contemporary transformation of the post-1945 American-led world order in the following terms:

China is in critical respects the ‘swing state’ in world politics . . . . As China goes, so goes the international system. The future of a oneworld system that is open and loosely rule-based hinges on China. But China’s choices also hinge on how the United States and the other liberal democracies [at the core of that system] act to reform and renew the existing rules and institutions.