Dr Lai-Ha Chan

Chan, G., Lee, P.K. & Chan, L. 2012, China Engages Global Governance: A new world order in the making?, 1, Routledge, New York.
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This book focuses on China+s increasing involvement in global governance as a result of the phenomenal rise of its economy and global power. It examines whether and in what ways China is capable of participating in multilateral interactions; if it is willing and able to provide global public goods to address a wide array of global problems; and what impact this would have on both global governance and order. The book provides a comprehensive assessment of China+s increasing influence over how world affairs are being managed; how far China, with increasing clout, interacts with other major powers in global governance, and what the consequences and implications are for the evolving global system and world order. This book is the first to explore China+s engagement with global governance in traditional and new securities.

Chan, L. 2011, China Engages Global Health Governance: Responsible Stakeholder or System Transformer?, 1, Palgrave Macmillan, New York.
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China Engages Global Health Governance is the first book to systematically examine China's participation in the global health domain. It examines how and why China changed its stance on its HIV/AIDS epidemic and investigates China's emerging role in Africa's AIDS crisis and the controversial issue of access to anti-retroviral drugs for the continent's impoverished people. In scrutinizing China's evolving global role and its intentions for global governance and global health governance, this book argues that China is neither a system-defender nor a system-transformer of the liberal international order. While acting in concert with other major powers, China strives to defend itself from the encroachment of liberal democratic values on the world stage. In order to carve out some international space for itself and to fend off attacks by the liberal normative structure, China calls for multilateral cooperation in a "harmonious world." With the suggestion that there is no universally applicable blueprint for development, Beijing tries to shore up the principle of national sovereignty and non-intervention and strengthen ties with developing countries to consolidate a normative and political bulwark against liberal democratic values. In short, China possesses a hybrid national identity in its deepening engagement with global governance.

Chan, L., Chan, G. & Fung, K. 2011, China at 60: Global-Local Interaction, World Scientific Publishing, Singapore, Singapore.

Chan, G., Lee, P.K. & Chan, L. 2013, 'China's quest for greater influence in global economic governance' in Xiaoming Huang, Robert Patman (eds), China and the International System: Becoming a World Power, Routledge, New York, pp. 89-107.

Chan, L., Lee, P.K. & Chan, G. 2012, 'China's Vision of Global Governance: A Ressurection of the "Central Kingdom"?' in Mingjiang Li (ed), China Joins Global Governance, Lexington Books, UK, pp. 15-33.
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China's rapid ascendancy in the past decades has sparked off livcly debates in the mass media as well as in academic and policymaking circles as to what China will do with its newfound power. Previous studies about China's rise and irs gradual integration in rhe world can be broadly divided into duee different groups. Scholars in the first group examine if China would comply with the norms and rules made and proffered by the West. 1 They query whether China can adjust itself [0 the norms and ru les that have been set and preferred by the dominant powers since World War II. The second group of scholars has pondered whether China will arrempr to challenge the position of the United States as a hegemon in the world. Similar to those in the first group, they tend ro gauge China's commitmem to the liberal inrernational order and ask whether China is a status quo power,2 a (dis)satisfied power,J a regional threat,4 or a responsible state.s The third group of schola rs argues that China seeks great power status, clamoring for "a seat at the table" of the eli te club of major powers.

Chan, L. 2012, 'In Quest of Independence: An Unchanging Paradigm of China's Foreign Policy' in Emilian Kavalski (ed), The Ashgate Research Companion to Chinese Foreign Policy, Ashgate Publishing Limited, UK, pp. 23-32.

Chan, L., Chan, G. & Fung, K. 2011, 'China at 60: Global-Local Interaction - Introduction' in Chan Lai-Ha, Gerald Chan, Kwan Fung (eds), China at 60: Global-Local Interactions, World Scientific Publishing, Singapore, pp. 1-13.
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The year 2009 marks the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China (PRC). On its formation, the PRC leadership ought to achieve a 10ng-l1eld ambit ion to build a pro perous and strong Chinese state that could command respect and recognition among .its international peers. Previous studies on China have generally used the year 1979 as a watershed of its transformation from the Mao era to Deng's economic reform. This disjuncture between pre-1979 China and post-1979 China has dominated scholarly attention in their analyses of the role of political leadership in social and economic developments in these two separate periods. Examples include Loren Brandt and Thomas Raw ki, Kjeld Erik Brodsgaard and Zheng Yongnian, David Goodman, Doug Guthrie, Nichola Lardy, Li Cheng, Peter Nolan, Cze law Tubilewicz, Gordon Whit , as well as Dali L. Yang and Zhao Litao. There has been considerable work done by scholars such as Nick Knight and Zheng Yongnian on China's international linkages, particularly on its transformation in coping with the external forces of globalisation. They argue that while globalisation generates both opportunities and risks for China, opportunities outweigh the risks and China has been using a flexible approach to cope with globalisation. China's engagement with the outside world intersected with its internal development strategies in a host of complex ways over the course of these 60 years. With this in mind, a dual theme - change-and-continuity and global-local interactions on China's development - is adopted to assess the historical development of China's policies in various issue areas in the past 60 years. Focus is on the domestic impacts of China's previous and present engagement with the world, the global implications of China's reform efforts and growing power, and the long-lasting uniqueness of this non-European rising or re-emerging nation. What distinguishes this edited volume from others is its explicit empha is on the external factors that have impacted on China's internal development over the entire 60 years of the PRe's existence. The focus is on how China's interactions with global forces since 1949 have impacted on its domestic and foreign policy agenda and its changes and continuities. By arguing that one cannot have a proper understanding of present-day China without a sound knowledge of its past, this volume aims to explore the interactions between China and the world over the course of the Communist Party rule since 1949 and the impact of these interactions on China's domestic development.

Chan, L. 2011, 'Oscillating between Mao and Deng? The Domestic-Global Nexus of China's Public Health Reform' in Chan Lai-Ha, Gerald Chan, Kwan Fung (eds), China at 60: Global-Local Interactions, World Scientific Publishing, Singapore, pp. 255-281.
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Deng's China inherited a Maoist cradle-to-grave health-care system that emphasised wide entitlement and access to medical care that was backed up by the state or collective financing. However, the economic reforms since the late 19705 have sadly left the country with a failing public health system. From the turn of this century onwards, the Chinese government has gone to great lengths to revert its health-care system partially back to the Maoist universal one in different ways. Previous studies have largely ignored the external factors that contribute to the recent health reform in China. This chapter has demonstrated that what motivates the Chinese leadership to press ahead with public health reform in the country are not only internal demands, but also external factors, such as the pressures to make improvements exerted by intergovernmental organisations and international opprobrium over its rickety health-care situation. Owing to the powerful force of globalisation, it has now become a global norm that all states are obliged to cooperate with each other under a global institution to prevent a global spread of contagious diseases. First, the normative pressure from the global community, particularly the pressure that emerged during the SARS outbreak in 2003, has heightened China's awareness of the need to remedy its ailing health system and shoulder greater responsibility for providing public goods for health to its own citizens as well as the global community. Second, using 'naming and shaming' tactics, the WHO fairly succeeds in prodding countries into complying with its health regime. The global discourse on disease transmission creates a situation in which states can no longer afford to evade WHO advice. Third, due to the recent global economic downturn, the Chinese government increased its investment in its health system as part of an economic stimulus package to promote domestic consumption. Overall, China's increasing participation in globa health governance in the last two decades has been conducive to China's learning and acceptance of international norms. However, China has yet to fully internalise the norms of the global health regime. An advantage of China's politicoadministrative system is that it can readily mobilise local governments to tackle pandemic crises promptly as soon as the central government perceives the diseases as threats to national security. However, mobilisation is often a one-off incidence and depends on the leaders' preferences and interests. There is a sign of incipient norm change. In February 2009, for the first time, Premier Wen Jiabao referred to health care as a 'public good' when he said that the principle of the current reform is that 'public medical service must have public good as its goal'. At present, it is uncertain whether this goal can be achieved or not.

Lee, P.K. & Chan, L. 2007, 'Non-Traditional Security Threat in China: Challenges of Energy Shortage and Infectious Diseases' in Joseph Y.S. cheng (ed), Challenges and Policy Programmes on China's New Leadership, City University of Hong Kong Press, Hong Kong, pp. 297-336.
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Chan, L. 2012, 'China's Engagement with Global Health Democracy: Was SARS a Watershed' in Ellen Rosskam; Ilona Kickbusch (eds), Negotiating and Navigating Globabl Health, World Scientific Publishing, Singapore, Singapore, pp. 203-219.
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Growing interest in a wide range of global health issues makes China an increasingly important actor in the international health arena. This case study provides a closer look at the transitions in China's health policy after the epidemic of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome and yields insights into the wide-ranging consequences that can be observed both within and beyond the national borders.

Lee, P.K., Chan, G. & Chan, L. 2009, 'China Engages Myanmar as a Chinese Client State?' in Emile Kok-Kheng Yeoh (ed), Regional Political Economy of China Ascendant, Institute of China Studies, Malaysia, pp. 70-95.
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Chan, L. 2012, 'China in Darfur: humanitarian rule-maker or rule-taker?', Review of International Studies, vol. 38, no. 2, pp. 423-444.
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Most people hold that in its quest for natural resources abroad, China shields rogue states with egregious human-rights record from international opprobrium and sanctions. Its political support for Sudan is a case in point. By examining Chinese perspectives on humanitarian intervention and national sovereignty, this article first argues that Beijing's interests are so multiple and complex that concern about the implications of humanitarian intervention for national integration is more crucial than oil in determining its policy towards Sudan. Paradoxically it asserts that China, a non-democratic country, is more influential than liberal democratic states in making the rules of humanitarian intervention in Darfur because of a lack of political will in the West. In addition, there are early signs that China intends to utilise its newfound power to remake international rules regarding territorial sovereignty. Further development is likely to be shaped by its interactions with the United States

Chan, L., Chen, L. & Xu, J. 2010, 'China's Engagement with Global Health Diplomacy: Was SARS a Watershed?', PLoS Medicine, vol. 7, no. 4, pp. 1-6.
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SARS not only exposed a fundamental shortcoming of China's public health surveillance system but also forced China to realize that, in the era of globalization, public health is no longer a domestic, social issue that can be isolated from foreign-policy concern. There are signs that China is now using public health as a means to strengthen its diplomatic relations with the developing world, in particular the African continent. While China has embraced multilateral cooperation in a wide array of global health issues, its engagement remains "state centric".

Chan, L., Lee, P.K. & Chan, G. 2009, 'China Engages Global Health Governance: Processes and Dilemmas', Global Public Health: An International Journal for Research, Policy and Practice, vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 1-30.
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Using HIV/AIDS, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), and avian influenza as case studies, this paper discusses the processes and dilemmas of China's participation in health governance, both at the domestic level and the global level. Globalization has eroded the boundary between public and private health and between domestic and global health governance. In addition, the SARS outbreak of 2002-2003 focused global attention on China's public health. As a rising power with the largest population on earth, China is expected by the international community to play a better and more active role in health management. Since the turn of this century, China has increasingly embraced multilateralism in health governance. This paper argues that China's multilateral cooperation is driven by both necessity and conscious design. International concerns about good governance and its aspiration to become a 'responsible' state have exerted a normative effect on China to change tack. Its interactions with United Nations agencies have triggered a learning process for China to securitize the spread of infectious diseases as a security threat. Conversely, China has utilized multilateralism to gain access to international resources and technical assistance. It is still a matter of debate whether China's cooperative engagement with global health governance can endure, because of the persistent problems of withholding information on disease outbreaks and because of its insistence on the Westphalian notion of sovereignty.

Lee, P.K., Chan, G. & Chan, L. 2009, 'China's "Realpolitik" Engagement with Myanmar', China Security, vol. 5, no. 1, pp. 105-126.
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This paper asks why China engages with the reclusive military regime of Myanmar and shields it from international opprobrium over its dismal human rights record. Conventional wisdom has it that China wishes to gain a foothold in the untapped energy resources of this Southeast Asian nation when China is increasingly reliant on imported oil and gas and to establish military bases on Myanmar soil. Without completely repudiating the first argument, the paper contends that the scramble for energy is not the principal reason for China to adopt an accommodating approach towards Myanmar. The principle and practice of non-interference espoused by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), with regard to democracy and the human rights situation in Myanmar, also plays a pivotal role in shaping ChinaÔ++s relations with the military junta. The paper sheds light on ChinaÔ++s grand strategy of building up an architecture of global governance on the basis of regional intergovernmental organisations, aimed at reducing the hegemonic influence of the United States in Asia and the world.

Chan, L., Chan, G. & Lee, P.K. 2008, 'China's Environmental Governance: The Domestic-International Nexus', Third World Quarterly, vol. 29, no. 2, pp. 291-314.
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This paper examines the connection between China's domestic governance and its involvement in global governance in environmental protection by studying the major actors and issues involved in the interaction between the domestic and international spheres of activities. These actors include international institutions, national and local governments, nongovernmental organisations, and others. The paper demonstrates that China has made some substantive progress in protecting its environment, but much more needs to be done. Internationally it seems to lack the will or the capability to make much contribution towards global environmental governance. However, because of its huge aggregate size, what it does or does not do to avert environmental degradation at home could have a significant impact on collective efforts to protect the environment at the global level.

Chan, L., Chan, G., Lee, P.K. 2008, 'Rethinking Global Governance: A China Model in the Making?', Contemporary Politics, vol. 14, no. 1, pp. 3-19.
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This paper examines Chinese perspectives on global governance, an area in which China has increased substantially the depth and breadth of its participation. The paper attempts to draw a mainstream perspective to inform our understanding of some key aspects of China's foreign policy. It demonstrates that while China's statist preference appeals to some Third World countries, such a preference leads the country to clash with the West over how to tackle global issues collectively, particularly over humanitarian intervention. While the Chinese perspective is in the process of evolving and far from reaching maturity, it is questionable whether the global community led by the West would find the Westphalian practice that China embraces admirable.

Chan, L. 2010, 'WHO: the world's most powerful international organisation?', Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, vol. 64, no. 2, pp. 97-98.
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In light of the outbreaks of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in 2003 and the recent A/H1N1(swine influenza), this article argues that the World Health Organization (WHO) is growing to be the most powerful international organisationd even more influential than the United Nations (UN) Security Council. `Power+ here is defined as the ability to performand act effectively to get a desired outcome.