Heightened tensions in the South China Sea have raised serious concerns about the dangers of conflict in this region as a result of unresolved, complex territorial disputes. This volume offers detailed insights into a range of country-perspectives, addressing the historical, legal, structural, regional and multilateral dimensions of these disputes
'The book has been written by many highly qualified observers and academicians that have spent a lot of time observing and analyzing the recent developments in the South China Sea, particularly those relating to the dispute and way of overcoming them. I do hope that this publication will throw some light on such important matters and indicate possible roads to follow in solving the territorial disputes through joint development concept.' Hasjim Djalal, Director of Southeast Asian Studies, Jakarta, Indonesia This highly informative and up-to-date book brings together expert scholars in law of the sea to explore the legal and geopolitical aspects of the South China Sea disputes and provide an in-depth examination on the prospects of joint development in the South China Sea. The South China Sea has long been regarded as a source of conflict and tension in Asia. Underlying this conflict is the dispute between China, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei over the features in the South China Sea, as well as the resources in the surrounding waters. One viable solution is for the claimants to set aside their claims and jointly develop the hydrocarbon resources in the South China Sea. Unlike previous works, this book takes a unique approach by examining existing joint development arrangements in Asia to see if there are any 'lessons learnt' that may be applicable to the South China Sea. This approach has enabled the editors to move beyond a mere theoretical discussion on joint development and focus on the law, policy and practical issues related to joint development. Beyond Territorial Disputes in the South China Sea will strongly appeal to Government officials, policy-makers from ASEAN Countries, China and the United States, as well as academics, particularly those who are involved in legal scholarship on the South China Sea disputes. Practitioners of oil and gas law will also find much to benefit them in this book.
Since 1949 and the founding of the People's Republic, China has been involved in more than one territorial dispute with its neighbours. Currently the most unstable and dangerous dispute is the one over the Paracel and Spratly islands in the South China Sea. With their potentially rich and accessible petroleum resources, these islands have become the new arena of conflict for the 1970s and 1980s, China having already fought a war with South Vietnam over the Paracel Islands. This book, based on a wealth of primary materials in the Chinese language, is the first to make a thorough and overall investigation of China's policy towards these islands. It deals with the battle for the Paracels, the dispute with Vietnam, the disputes with the Philippines and Malaysia, and the relationship between the territorial disputes and China's maritime claims in the South China Sea.
The South China Sea has long been regarded as one of the most complex and challenging ocean-related maritime disputes in East Asia. Recently it has become the locus of disputes that have the potential of escalating into serious international conflicts. Historical mistrust, enduring territorial disputes, and competing maritime claims have combined to weaken an at least partially successful regional security structure. Issues of concern include territorial sovereignty; disputed claims to islands, rocks, and reefs; jurisdiction over territorial waters, exclusive economic zones, and the seabed; regional and international rights to use the seas for military purposes; maritime security; rapid economic development; and environmental degradation. The fear is that increasing competition for energy and other resources will exacerbate conflicts and further fuel nationalism and sovereignty issues in the region. The SCS has an integrated ecosystem and is one of the richest seas in the world in terms of marine flora and fauna: coral reefs, mangroves, sea-grass beds, fish, and plants. National economic security can be easily affected by conflicts occurring in major international trade routes like the SCS, or how such an unclear situation might even give rise to environmental challenges in the future. The book creates an understanding as to why this region is important not only to the claimants but to global powers like the United States and India. The book examines current and potential conflicts in the South China Sea, and also evaluates how conflicts have been “managed” to date and suggests as to how they might be better managed in the future. This book concludes with recommendations for improving the situation in the region by ensuring a strong economic relationships, using high-resolution observation satellites, and undertaking joint development, and resource exploration etc.
This book assesses the Sino-Japanese strategic competition in the context of the South China Sea (SCS) territorial disputes. The South China Sea territorial disputes are quickly becoming the most significant security problem in East and Southeast Asia. Two major powers, China and Japan, have interests in the region and are pursuing different strategies that can significantly impact the outcome of the disputes. Utilizing Securitization Theory, this study evaluates the Sino-Japanese strategic competition through political narratives that galvanize the military and economic policies that are transforming the region. It highlights how these narratives, so closely bounded to the political legitimacy of current governments and supported by provocative policies, have resulted in a co-constitutive pattern of enmity and securitization, thus making it increasingly difficult to resolve the disputes.
Increasing tensions in the South China Sea have propelled the dispute to the top of the Asia-Pacific’s security agenda. Fuelled by rising nationalism over ownership of disputed atolls, growing competition over natural resources, strident assertions of their maritime rights by China and the Southeast Asian claimants, the rapid modernization of regional armed forces and worsening geopolitical rivalries among the Great Powers, the South China Sea will remain an area of diplomatic wrangling and potential conflict for the foreseeable future. Featuring some of the world’s leading experts on Asian security, this volume explores the central drivers of the dispute and examines the positions and policies of the main actors including China, Taiwan, the Southeast Asian claimants, America and Japan. The South China Sea Dispute: Navigating Diplomatic and Strategic Tensions provides readers with the key to understanding how this most complex and contentious dispute is shaping the regional security environment.
China’s rise has upset the global balance of power, and the first place to feel the strain is Beijing’s back yard: the South China Sea. For decades tensions have smoldered in the region, but today the threat of a direct confrontation among superpowers grows ever more likely. This important book is the first to make clear sense of the South Sea disputes. Bill Hayton, a journalist with extensive experience in the region, examines the high stakes involved for rival nations that include Vietnam, India, Taiwan, the Philippines, and China, as well as the United States, Russia, and others. Hayton also lays out the daunting obstacles that stand in the way of peaceful resolution. Through lively stories of individuals who have shaped current conflicts—businessmen, scientists, shippers, archaeologists, soldiers, diplomats, and more—Hayton makes understandable the complex history and contemporary reality of the South China Sea. He underscores its crucial importance as the passageway for half the world’s merchant shipping and one-third of its oil and gas. Whoever controls these waters controls the access between Europe, the Middle East, South Asia, and the Pacific. The author critiques various claims and positions (that China has historic claim to the Sea, for example), overturns conventional wisdoms (such as America’s overblown fears of China’s nationalism and military resurgence), and outlines what the future may hold for this clamorous region of international rivalry.
Combining practical and theoretical approaches, this book addresses the political, legal and economic implications of maritime disputes in East Asia. The maritime disputes in East Asia have multiplied over the past few years, in parallel with the economic growth of the countries in the region, the rise of nationalist movements, fears and sometimes fantasies regarding the emergence of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as a global power, increasing military expenses, as well as speculations regarding the potential resources in various disputed islands. These disputes, however, are not new and some have been the subject of contention and the cause of friction for decades, if not centuries in a few cases. Offering a robust analysis, this volume explores disputes through the different lenses of political science, international law, history and geography, and introduces new approaches in particular to the four important disputes concerning Dokdo/Takeshima, Senkaku/Diaoyu, Paracels and Spratlys. Utilising a comparative approach, this book identifies transnational trends that occur in the different cases and, therefore, at the regional level, and aims to understand whether the resurgence of maritime disputes in East Asia may be studied on a case by case basis, or should be analysed as a regional phenomenon with common characteristics. This book will be of interest to students of Asian Politics, Maritime Security, International Security, Geopolitics and International Relations in general.
Unresolved Border, Land and Maritime Disputes in Southeast Asia, edited by Alfred Gerstl and Mária Strašáková, sheds light on various unresolved and lingering territorial disputes in Southeast Asia and their reflection in current inter-state relations in the region. The authors, academics from Europe and East Asia, particularly address the territorial disputes in the South China Sea and those between Vietnam and Cambodia and Thailand and Cambodia. They apply International Relations theories in a wider regional and comparative perspective. The empirical analyses are embedded in a concise theoretical discussion of the principles of sovereignty, territorial integrity and borders. Furthermore, the book discusses the role of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and other multi-track mechanisms in border conflict mediation. Contributors are: Petra Andělová, Alica Kizeková, Filip Kraus, Josef Falko Loher, Padraig Lysaght, Jörg Thiele, Richard Turcsányi, Truong-Minh Vu and Zdeněk Kříž.
China‘s rise casts a vast and uncertain shadow over the regional balance of power in the Asia Pacific, and nowhere is this clearer than in the South China Sea. The significance of the fraught territorial disputes in this potentially resource-rich sea extends far beyond the small groupings of islands that are at their heart, and into the world of great-power politics. As the struggle for hegemony between the US and China intersects with the overlapping aspirations of emerging, smaller nations, the risk of escalation to regional conflict is real. Christian Le Mi and Sarah Raine cut through the complexities of these disputes with a clear-sighted, and much-needed, analysis of the assorted strategies deployed in support of the multiple and competing claims in the SCS. They make a compelling case that the course of these disputes will determine whether the regional order in Southeast Asia is one of cooperation, or one of competition and even conflict.
