Over the last decade, an ocean of ink has been spilled describing China's apparent rise on the world stage. However, most of this writing has lacked coherent definitions of “rise,” lucid comparisons between China and past rising powers, and clearly stated empirical benchmarks against which to measure the scope of China's growing international influence. Robert S. Ross and Zhu Feng's China's Ascent is a well-researched and insightful exception to the shortcomings of this literature. As such, it is sure to emerge as one of the more influential works on China's expanding global role.

The volume is the product of a geographically and theoretically diverse group of scholars. It is grounded by Ross and Zhu's emphasis in the introduction on the need to explore the impact that systemic, regional, and domestic-level influences have had upon China's rise and the international responses to such a development. The contributors to the volume then generally agree that China's ascent has had a profound, far-reaching impact not only on Asia but also on world politics more generally. It has produced increased friction between China and the rest of the international system (particularly the United States), but it also has not resulted in the type of tumultuous conflict that has accompanied the rise of many historical great powers.

This perspective is developed via a four-part consideration of China's rise. Part I focuses primarily on structural concerns. It is led by Jack Levy's critical review of the applicability of power-transition theory to China's current international status. Levy emphasizes the inability of such an approach to take into account the existence of regional orders within the broader international system. In Chapter 2, Zhu acknowledges the complexity of the existing international order but still finds that American unipolarity is so pronounced that it places clear restraints upon China's rise. In Chapter 3, one of the strongest in the volume, Avery Goldstein reaches a similar conclusion through a consideration of the international circumstances and domestic constraints facing Beijing. In particular, Goldstein notes that the effort to promote national unity during a period in which China is facing multiple separatist threats will tend to force Beijing to continue to look inward (even as its international influence grows).

In Part II, attention is turned to China's involvement in multilateral institutions. In Chapter 4, John Ikenberry draws upon his well-known arguments about the nature of American hegemony, contending that the international organizations that the United States has built up since World War II contain space within them for the interests and concerns of a rising China. In Chapter 5, Qin Yaqing and Wei Ling employ Ikenberry's systemic level of analysis to analyze East Asian regional politics. While this move has much potential, their chapter is weighed down by a preoccupation with developing a new approach to constructivist international relations theory, rather than a better understanding of the empirical issues at hand.

Part III focuses on Chinese domestic politics. It begins with Tang Shiping's theory-laden chapter, an extended discussion of the prospects for developing an evolutionary constructivist analysis of Chinese security strategies. Like Qin and Wei, Tang is one of the foremost specialists on contemporary Chinese foreign relations, and here, too, the excessively abstract theorizing detracts from more concrete empirical insights. In Chapter 7, Jeffrey Legro boldly summarizes the evolution of Chinese national security and foreign policy strategies over the last century. While such an overview is necessarily schematic, Legro's focus on the relationship between China's self-conception and the broader norms of the international order is insightful, and it directs attention to the crucial question of whether or not China sees itself as a status quo or a revisionist power.

Part IV examines regional responses to China's ascent. Byung-Kook Kim's Chapter 8 focuses on South Korea and dwells extensively on perceived missteps made by former President Roh Moo-hyun, and Akio Takahara's Chapter 9 explores recent trends in Sino-Japanese relations. While both of these chapters present a rather conventional diplomatic analysis, Jonathan Kirshner's Chapter 10 offers a more penetrating account of the economic interdependence of China and the United States that has emerged over the last 30 years, placing particular emphasis on monetary issues and energy security.

Ross and Zhu conclude the volume by contending that while the future impact of China's ascent on the international system may not be peaceful, it need not be conflictual either. This “tempered optimism” cuts against the grain of many of the more dire predictions in the literature on China's rise. Yet, as Goldstein notes in Chapter 3, this viewpoint remains largely consistent with the emerging conventional wisdom in the field.

Indeed, this volume goes a long way toward establishing the conceptual and empirical foundations for such an outlook. However, it would have been even stronger had it pushed further on three fronts: more clearly specifying the meaning of “rise” within the context of great power relations; focusing attention on the role that national identity may play in shaping China's rise (while Goldstein's and Legro's chapters both touched upon this issue, they focused primarily on Chinese foreign policy strategies, rather than on how and why the Chinese sense of collective identity may be evolving); and taking seriously the concerns raised in Kirshner's chapter about the possibly limited sustainability of “current trends” within China's development. Kirshner made this point in regard to economic issues alone. But at a time when much in the broader international system appears increasingly fluid, the volume would have been improved by giving greater consideration to questions of potential turbulence within international relations. These weaknesses notwithstanding, the book brings together a range of expert perspectives on a topic of increasing importance, and in doing so makes an important contribution to scholarship on the geopolitics of China's ascendancy.