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Book Reviews, China and Inner Asia

Volume 87 – No. 2

CHINA GOES GLOBAL: The Partial Power | By David Shambaugh

Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. xvi, 409 pp. (Figures, tables.) US$29.95, cloth. ISBN 978-0-19-986014-2.


This summer my son and I visited an air show in coastal Maine. World War Two-era planes were displayed alongside a small number of vets who discussed the war, their planes, and the political context in which America triumphed over fascism. A side exhibit on science caught my attention and there I noticed the only display of modern technology was an exhibit about the Mag-Lev train in Shanghai. The lesson that was, perhaps unwittingly, taught to the crowds of summer-camp children: American power is in the past; China’s is the future. David Shambaugh’s examination of the parameters and limits of China’s power is written with exactly this problem in mind. Americans’ knowledge about and understanding of China is limited. If we only understand Chinese power in the context of its most recent achievements and its most high-
profile successes (the Beijing Olympics, advanced infrastructure, rapid growth), we are likely to overestimate its true power and its capacity to become either a global partner or a global competitor.

Shambaugh does not mince words when he discusses the current contradictions and almost psychological complexes that hound the worldviews and aspirations of China’s elite. Insecure, paranoid, defensive are a few adjectives that he uses repeatedly to describe some corners of 
the Chinese government, punditry and academia. His core argument is that China is, as the title states, only a “partial” power. In each realm of power
—economic, cultural, political and military—China is hampered by material constraints but even more so by its own internal disagreements and its own deeply held beliefs and principles about China’s role in the world. These internal constraints are also embedded in the institutions of the Chinese Communist Party and government. Change will be difficult.

The volume is comprehensive, examining Chinese power from nearly every possible angle and providing an interpretation of the debates within China about everything from the high power of diplomacy and foreign policy to the soft power of Chinese films, art and tourism. Shambaugh is fair and gives space to viewpoints from the hypernationalist far-right (that 
is, confusingly, in China the “new left”) to the liberal internationalists 
who see China having a benevolent effect on the West and global governance. It is striking, however, that even this liberal side of the elite no longer openly professes much deep admiration of Western political institutions or sees China as progressing along a path of convergence and modernization as happened to China’s neighbours, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, over the past century. So while China may be confused, it is clear that it remains ambitious in forging new political and economic models for itself, if not for other developing countries. Unfortunately for China, there is no consensus as to what these alternative models might be. This also makes China a deeply insecure power.

Shambaugh’s aim is straightforward: to show how China’s power is constrained and less than often imagined or represented in the West. Chapters on diplomacy, global governance, the economy, culture (soft power) and security each provide a wealth of information to make this case. While he also examines the internal debate and divisions in China about the nature of its constrained power and the possible paths forward for greater power projection, he does not and perhaps cannot tell us which opinions hold more sway, which direction is more or less likely for China in the future. His analysis is also necessarily centred on China’s elites: government officials, business and media leaders, leading academics, etc. While he acknowledges that mass public opinion has an increasing impact on how the elite behave, how policies are made and packaged for public consumption, the elite focus may mask the importance and the diversity of public opinion in contemporary China. Each school of thought among elite opinion leaders realizes that there are strong incentives to reach out to the public, to cultivate public support, and to mobilize the public when elite disagreements emerge in policy making. While Shambaugh is mostly concerned with the international implications of China’s “identity crisis,” his analysis of the disagreements, the divisions, and the confusion among China’s elite decision makers and thinkers led this reader to worry about China’s domestic political capacity to manage elite differences and rising public demands for greater projection of China’s power.


Mary E. Gallagher
The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA

pp. 311-313


Last Revised: June 20, 2018
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