Disputation IR - Yeonju Jung

Opponent: Catherine Jones, School of International Relations, University of St Andrews

Supervisors: Karl Gustafsson, Maria Wendt, Karina Shyrokykh (all from Department of Economic History and International Relations, Stockholm University)

Committee:
Anna Michalski, Department of Political Science, Uppsala University
Mikael Weissmann, Department of War Science, Swedish Defence University
Niklas Bremberg, Department of Political Science, Stockholm University

Deputy: Mark Rhinard, Department of Economic History and International Relations, Stockholm University

Chairman: Magnus Petersson, Department of Economic History and International Relations, Stockholm University

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From the abstract: China has become a key player in peacebuilding, both supporting and sometimes obstructing international cooperation. It appears to adhere to certain established norms in global peace governance while simultaneously resisting and contesting others. For example, while China has supported the Women, Peace, and Security agenda, it has also backed actions and resolutions that challenge this. This leads to the research problem: How can we make sense of China's seemingly contradictory behavior in global peace governance?

This compilation thesis argues that existing International Relations (IR) literature struggles to capture China's complex and contradictory engagement in global peace governance. First, much of the literature relies on dichotomies to understand this behavior. It tries to categorize China's behavior as driven by either material interests or by norms. It views China as a non-Western, non-liberal, and non-traditional actor that is the opposite of Western, liberal, and traditional actors. It also seeks to categorize China as either a status-quo actor or a challenger to the liberal international order.

Read full thesis here