Evaluating the ‘China Threat’: power transition theory, the successor-state image, and the dangers of historical analogies

Abstract

The rise of China and its implications for stability in both the Asia-Pacific region and the world more generally continues to exercise the minds of scholars and policy makers alike. In particular, questions of the geostrategic importance of shifting power patterns marked, in particular, by China's elevation stand at the forefront of contemporary scholarship concerned with international and Asian security. The three works with which this article is primarily concerned all seek to address the challenges posed by a resurgent China.