Content area
Full Text
STRONG BORDERS, SECURE NATION: Cooperation and Conflict in China's Territorial Disputes. By M. Taylor Fravel. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2008. xvi, 376pp. (Tables, graphs, maps.) US$27.95, paper. ISBN 978-0-691-13609-7.
Will China's rise be peaceful? Certainly this is what Beijing insists it desires. Taking the government of the People's Republic of China at its word (and there seems little reason to doubt its sincerity), what are some possible obstacles? Territorial disputes are often mentioned as having the potential to trigger conflicts between China and its neighbours. Indeed, it has become conventional wisdom that Beijing is prepared to fight for territory. At last we have a careful, focused study on border disputes to provide a sounder basis for drawing conclusions about Beijing's behaviour.
So is China likely to resort to force over territory? According to Taylor Fravel, the short answer is that Beijing has exhibited a preference for peacefully resolving territorial disputes through negotiations. In fact, since 1949 China negotiated compromises in 17 of 23 territorial disputes, frequendy conceding anywhere between 40 and 100 percent of the area of the disputed territory (table 1.3, 46-47). Fravel furtiier asserts that while these...