China's Rise, Developmental Regionalism and East Asian Community Building: Cooperation Amid Disputes in the South China Sea

Abstract

Why the rapid rise of China coincides with peace and cooperation in East Asia? The paper argues for a distinctive form of regionalism practiced in East Asia, which can be called developmental regionalism. It means that regional processes are development-oriented and development-focused, featuring pragmatism, flexibility and developmental security. In development-oriented region-alization, practices and institutions coevolve for progress. Practices of developmental regionalism nurture the habit of cooperation and promote community building. As the growth engine in the region, China facilitates developmental regionalism. The paper takes the South China Sea disputes in the past few years as a case to illustrate how conflicts were averted and cooperation maintained and deepened between China and ASEAN and in East Asia even in a most sensitive area of territorial disputes and in the context of the dramatic change in regional power structure with China's rapid rise. In conclusion, the paper also briefly discusses conditions and implications of developmental regionalism in world politics.