Heidi Wang-Kaeding - Chinas Environmental Foreign Relations

Over recent decades, China has moved from being a follower towards taking on a leadership role in global environmental governance. This book discusses this important development. It examines the key role of Chinese interest groups, showing that, through various domestic dynamics, they have influenced how China has approached issues such as climate change and the environment. Focusing on examples of multilateral environmental treaties, bilateral cooperation and the proposition of alternative normsthe idea of China as an ecological civilisationthe book provides crucial insights on the evolution of Chinas approach to international relations and engagement with global environmental governance and contributes to the discussion of what kind of power China is poised to become.

Heidi Wang-Kaeding is Lecturer in International Relations in the School of Social, Political and Global Studies at Keele University.

Series Editor: Zheng Yongnian

Advanced Institute of Global and Contemporary China Studies, Chinese University of Hong Kong (Shenzhen)

56. The Politics of Expertise in China

Xufeng Zhu

57. Gender Dynamics, Feminist Activism and Social Transformation in China

Edited by Guogang Wu, Yuan Feng, Helen Lansdowne

58. The Struggle for Democracy in China, Taiwan and Hong Kong

Sharp Power and its Discontents

Andreas Fulda

59. The Chinese Communist Party in Action

Consolidating Party Rule

Edited by Zheng Yongnian and Lance L.P Gore

60. Development and Poverty Reduction

A Global Comparative Perspective

Edited by Zheng Yongnian and Jiwei Qian

61. Designing Emergency Management

Chinas Post-SARS Experience, 20032012

Wee-Kiat Lim

62. Chinas Environmental Foreign Relations

Heidi Wang-Kaeding

63. The Decline of the Western-Centric World and the Emerging New Global Order

Contending Views

Edited by Yun-han Chu and Yongnian Zheng

For more information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com/China-Policy-Series/book-series/SECPS

First published 2021

by Routledge

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2021 Heidi Wang-Kaeding

The right of Heidi Wang-Kaeding to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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ISBN: 978-0-367-71232-7 (hbk)

ISBN: 978-1-003-14992-7 (ebk)

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3.1 Implementing agencies of the Montreal Protocol and CBD

3.2 Substantive versus procedural enforcers, CBD

5.1 Ecological civilisation research projects funded by NPOPSS

5.2 Yearly breakdown of funded ecological civilisation projects (by discipline)

5.3 Chinas environmental policy system

5.4 Eco-civilisation system (before 2018)

5.5 Environmental bureaucracy after 2018 cabinet reshuffle

3.1 Matrix of implementation

3.2 Enforcing agents in the Montreal Protocol

3.3 Matching enforcement and compliance groups

Two topics are gradually and fundamentally changing the future outlook on international relations: the rise of China and the emergence of global environmental governance. The debate on Chinas rise centres on the question of whether the Chinese Communist Party is set to re-write the rules that govern the international community and potentially undermine the liberal international order. Meanwhile, scholars have devoted an increasing volume of work to exploring effective paradigms to address ecological challenges through international cooperation. The convergence of these two topics entered the popular domain when President Donald Trump announced the withdrawal of the United States from the Paris Agreement, which was a landmark achievement of the United Nations Frame Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Western media outlets started looking for a suitable candidate to fill the so-called power vacuum left by this departure in the sphere of international environmental cooperation and subsequently found hope in China. At the 2018 World Economic Forum in Davos, Chinese leader Xi Jinping not only reassured the global audience that he recognised the severe challenge of climate change but also impressed the world with green policies and considerable investment in clean energy.