TIANXIA (ALL-UNDER-HEAVEN): AN ALTERNATIVE SYSTEM OR A ROSE BY ANOTHER NAME?

Year 2021, Volume: 10 Issue: 2, 183 - 196, 16.07.2021

Mehmet Şahin

https://doi.org/10.20991/allazimuth.874967

Abstract

Tianxia is considered as an alternative institutionalization to govern the international system. It refers to world governance that is regulated by a world institution. Accordingly, a world institution plays the harmonizer role under this system. States, on the other hand, choose their economic models and the leader organizes the relations among different units. This paper thus argues that Tianxia is an alternative framework to Western-oriented IR theories. In that sense, this article aims to explore the similarities between the philosophical idea of Tianxia and Western-oriented IR Theory. More specifically, the article explores the issue from the international system perspective. The epistemological gaps and ontological similarities between the two frameworks will be demonstrated.

Keywords

IR Theory, Chinese Hegemony, Tianxia

References

• Arrighi, Giovanni. Adam Smith in Beijing: Lineages of the Twenty-First Century. London: Verso, 2007.
• Arrighi, Giovanni. “Reading Hobbes in Beijing: Great Power Politics and the Challenge of the Peaceful Ascent.” In Blyth, Routledge Handbook of International Political Economy (IPE), 163–79.
• Bijan, Zheng. “China's "Peaceful Rise" to Great-Power Status.” Foreign Affairs 84, no. 5 (2005): 18–24.
• Blyth, Mark, ed. Routledge Handbook of International Political Economy (IPE): IPE as a Global Conversation. Routledge International Handbooks. London: Routledge, 2009.
• Bull, Hedley. The Anarchical Society: A Study of Order in World Politics. 3rd ed. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2002.
• Buzan, Barry. “China in International Society: Is 'Peaceful Rise' Possible?” The Chinese Journal of International Politics 3, no. 1 (2010): 5–36.
• Callahan, William A. “Chinese Visions of World Order: Post-Hegemonic or a New Hegemony?” International Studies Review 10, no. 4 (2008): 749–61.
• Carlson, Allen. “Moving Beyond Sovereignty? A Brief Consideration of Recent Changes in China's Approach to International Order and the Emergence of the Tianxia Concept.” Journal of Contemporary China 20, no. 68 (2010): 89–102.
• Chang, Chishen. “Tianxia System on a Snail's Horns.” Inter-Asia Cultural Studies 12, no. 1 (2011): 28–42.
• Chin, Gregory. “China’s Rising Institutional Influence.” In Rising States, Rising Institutions: Challenges For Global Governance, edited by Alan S. Alexandroff and Andrew F. Cooper, 83–104. Waterloo, Ont.: Centre for International Governance Innovation; Washington, 2010.
• Clark, Ian. Hegemony in International Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011.
• Do, Thuy T. “China's Rise and the ‘Chinese Dream’ in International Relations Theory.” Global Change, Peace & Security 27, no. 1 (2015): 21–38.
• Dreyer, June Teufel. “The ‘Tianxia Trope’: Will China Change the International System?” Journal of Contemporary China 24, no. 96 (2015): 1015–31.
• Gill, Bates. “China’s Evolving Regional Security Strategy.” In Power Shift: China and Asia's New Dynamics, edited by David L. Shambaugh, 247–65. Berkeley, Calif., University of California Press, 2005.
• Gilpin, Robert. “The Richness of the Tradition of Political Realism.” International Organization 38, no. 2 (1984): 287–304.
• ¬¬–––. “The Theory of Hegemonic War.” The Journal of Interdisciplinary History 18, no. 4 (1988): 591–613.
• –––. War and Change in World Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981.
• Hollist, Ladd W., and James N. Rosenau. “World System Debates.” International Studies Quarterly 25, no. 1 (1981): 5–17.
• Kang, David C. “Getting Asia Wrong: The Need for New Analytical Frameworks.” International Security 27, no. 4 (2003): 57–85.
• Keohane, Robert O. After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy. Princeton: Guildford Princeton University Press, 1984.
• –––. “The Old IPE and the New.” Review of International Political Economy 16, no. 1 (2009): 34–46.
• Kirshner, Jonathan. “The Tragedy of Offensive Realism: Classical Realism and the Rise of China.” European Journal of International Relations 18, no. 1 (2012): 53–75. Lanteigne, Marc. Chinese Foreign Policy: An Introduction. 2nd ed. London: Routledge, 2009.
• Layne, Christopher. “China’s Challenge to US Hegemony.” Current History 107, no. 705 (2008): 13–8.
• Linklater, Andrew, and Hidemi Suganami. The English School of International Relations: A Contemporary Reassessment. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Liping, Xia. “China: A Responsible Great Power.” Journal of Contemporary China 10, no. 26 (2001): 17–25.
• Mearsheimer, John J. “China's Unpeaceful Rise.” Current History 105, no. 690 (2006): 160–62.
• Medeiros, Evan S. “Is Beijing Ready for Global Leadership?” Current History 108, no. 719 (2009): 250–56.
• Owen, John M. “Ikenberry, International Relations Theory, and the Rise of China.” The British Journal of Politics and International Relations 21, no. 1 (2019):55-62.
• Shih, Chih-Yu, and Chiung-Chiu Huang. “Preaching Self-Responsibility: The Chinese style of global governance.” Journal of Contemporary China 22, no. 80 (2013): 351–65.
• Singer, David J. “The Level-of-Analysis Problem in International Relations.” World Politics 14, no. 1 (1961): 77–92.
• Strange, Susan. States and Markets. 2. ed. London: Continuum, 2004.
• van de Haar, Edwin. Classical Liberalism and International Relations Theory: Hume, Smith, Mises, and Hayek. 1st ed. The Palgrave Macmillan History of International Thought Series. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.
• Waltz, Kenneth Neal. Man, the State and War: A Theoretical Analysis. New York, Chichester: Columbia University Press, 2001.
• Watson, Adam. The Evolution of International Society: A Comparative Historical Analysis. London, New York: Routledge, 1992.
• Wong, John. “A China-Centric Economic Order in East Asia.” Asia Pacific Business Review 19, no. 2 (2013): 286–96. https://doi.org/10.1080/13602381.2012.739358.
• Xiao, Ren. “A Reform-Minded Status Quo Power? China, the G20, and Reform of the International Financial System.” Third World Quarterly 36, no. 11 (2015): 2023–43.
• Xuetong, Yan. “A Comparative Study of Pre-Qin Interstate Political Philosophy.” In Ancient Chinese Thought, Modern Chinese Power, edited by Xuetong Yan et al., 21–69. The Princeton-China Series. Princeton, N.J., Woodstock: Princeton University Press, 2011.
• Yeung, Henry Wai-Chung. “The Rise of East Asia: An Emerging Challenge to the Study of International Political Economy.” In Blyth, Routledge Handbook of International Political Economy (IPE), 201–15.
• Zhang, Feng. Chinese Hegemony: Grand Strategy and International Institutions in East Asian History. Stanford California: Stanford University Press, 2015.
• Zhang, Shuguang. “Theory of Tianxia and World Institution: Learning from Mr. Zhao Tingyang by Asking Questions on Tianxia System.” China Book Review 5 (2006): 18–30.
• Zhang, Yongjin. “‘China Anxiety’: Discourse and Intellectual Challenges.” Development and Change 44, no. 6 (2013): 1407–25.
• Zhao, Tingyang. “A Political World Philosophy in terms of All-under-heaven (Tian-xia).” Diogenes 56, no. 1 (2009): 5–18.
• –––. Redefining a Philosophy for World Governance. Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019.
• –––. “Rethinking Empire from a Chinese Concept ‘All-under-Heaven’ (Tian-xia).” Social Identities 12, no. 1 (2006): 29–41.