Territorial Disputes Among Japan China And Taiwan Concerning The Senkaku Islands Boundary Territory Briefing Vol3 No7

This book examines the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands dispute from a foreign policy perspective, focusing on three key stakeholders: China, Japan and the United States. The Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands dispute is a prominent territorial dispute between China and Japan. This book critically assesses that dispute in a pragmatic, policy-oriented manner. The central question of the work focuses on the various military (direct invasion, coercion) and non-military (bilateral negotiations, binding and non-binding third-party options and delaying) foreign policy avenues available to China to pursue its key interests over the disputed islands. To compare and contrast these different options, the book employs a qualitative rational-choice framework. This allows for a critical analysis on the merits and demerits of various options and to anticipate China’s potential course of action based on the principle that China is expected to act in a rational manner. This research offers two main contributions. First, it adopts a security-focused approach to complement the economic-focused works on the subject. Second, it critically examines the various foreign policy options as opposed to offering an avenue based on purely theoretical assumptions. While the work concludes that a delaying/status quo approach is rational for all parties involved, it highlights alternative policy avenues that can build on the conclusion of the rational-choice analysis. Through this it seeks to address the possibility of escalation and de-escalation on the East China Sea and highlights the critical role pro-active foreign policy making plays in averting a negative outcome of the dispute. This book will be of much interest to students of Chinese Foreign Policy, Asian Politics, Security Studies and International Relations.

Since the coming into force of the United Nations Law of the Sea, states have been targeting outlying islands to expand their exclusive economic zones, simultaneously stirring up strident nationalism when such plans clash with those of neighbouring states. No such actions have brought the world closer to the brink of war than the ongoing face-off between China and Japan over the Diaoyu/Senkaku islands, an uninhabited archipelago in the East China Sea. In this timely and original book, Godfrey Baldacchino provides a detailed exploration of seven tried and tested solution protocols that have led to innovative 'win-win' solutions to island disputes over the last four centuries. A closer look at the circumstances and processes that brought contending regional powers to an honourable, even mutually advantageous, settlement over islands provides a convincing and original argument as to why the conflict over the Diaoyu/Senkaku islands need not conclude in a ‘zero-sum’ or 'winner takes all' solution, as is the likely outcome of both open conflict and international arbitration. The book will be of interest to scholars and practitioners concerned with the festering Diaoyu/Senkaku dispute, as well as students, scholars and policy specialists in geography, geopolitics, international relations, conflict studies, island studies, Asian studies and history.

Although the flare-up of tensions in East Asia over the disputed islands, which are alternatively called Diaoyu (China), Diaoyutai (Taiwan) and Senkaku (Japan), seems to be ever more frequent, it has not always been the case. Lessons from the Disturbed Waters traces the origin of the issue back to when it first surfaced in the 1970s. The book explains the positions of the claimants, China, Japan and Taiwan, and explores the reasons why they have taken such positions over the past few decades. Unlike the other books which analyse the disputes predominantly from a geopolitical perspective, this books tries to do so mainly from the perspectives of international law, conflict management, negotiation strategies, and history. Readers will get to see an interesting dynamism played out among the three actors which are directly involved and the influence of extra-regional stakeholders such as the US over the disputes. While the disputes are still evolving, the author hopes this book can shed new light on the intricacies and complexities of the disputes and can provide some threads for further in-depth discussions.

The territorial conflict over the Diaoyu / Senkaku Islands sovereignty has dragged on since the 1970s. Today, Japan administers the islands, which are also claimed by Taiwan and the People's Republic of China. All claimants use historical evidence to bolster the legal strength of their claim. The dispute over the islands is also linked to other important factors, such as nationalism in an irreconciled international environment and the rights to exploitation of natural resources. The unresolved Taiwan / China question puts another burden on its resolution. This particular conflict will be compared with other similar remote islands, which already have been subject to a legal procedure and, in some cases, resolution. This thesis aims to outline the impediments involved in a potential legal resolution without ignoring the political and other relevant facts. Given the regional political setting, the only viable resolution is likely to be more political than legal. This thesis aims to propose a joint development scheme on basis of other previously settled territorial disputes.

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.

Maritime Border Diplomacy examines critical issues in international maritime boundary disputes together with the important global role of Indonesia, whose maritime boundaries are imperative to its sovereign status identity. Stressing the seminal importance of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea to world order, international experts analyze root causes of boundary disputes including historical claims and competition for natural resources. Issues of preventative diplomacy and activism in maritime affairs are explored, as are legal issues arising in the context of creating zones of cooperation in the oceans. Practical issues in fisheries and environmental management, and the volatile questions involved in the South China Sea, are detailed. The volume concludes with a substantive presentation on dispute resolution mechanisms.

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