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Greening the Chinese Leviathan: China’s renewable energy governance as a source of soft power

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Abstract

This article examines China’s rapid and large-scale renewable energy expansion and the challenge it presents to orthodox approaches to sustainable energy diffusion that emphasise soft interventions and stakeholder participation. We show that China eschewed participatory modes of energy governance and pursued a centrally steered, hard interventionist strategy adapted to its non-democratic regime. We observe that China’s approach provides an alternative blueprint for development that is potentially attractive to some audiences. Drawing on recent soft power debates, we argue that China’s hard interventionist mode of governance in the renewables sector has the potential to enhance Chinese soft power both domestically and abroad.

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Notes

  1. While in general China’s renewable energy sector performs well, not each renewable energy sector has been supported. For example, the scale of the development of biomass fuel remains relatively limited. Although China’s biomass fuel has been ranked in the global top five countries, it lags far behind the United States and Brazil. At the same time, because of the relative inward-looking policy measures in this sector that disfavoured foreign companies, the country struggled to achieve the goals which had been set by the policymakers (Kim 2019b, a: 11‒12; REN212015: 44).

  2. The Chinese public seems to blame local government for long-standing environmental problems, while satisfaction with central government remains high. For instance, in 2014 a survey conducted by the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University showed that nearly 92.8% of respondents expressed their satisfaction with the central government (Forsythe 2015). Saich noted that the public seems to be looking for a strong government in general (Saich 2015; cited in Forsythe 2015). Public expectations seem to be different from Western countries in terms of attitudes toward the government: Chinese citizens wish for a more powerful central state to handle environmental health issues and curb corruption (Forsythe 2015).

  3. The methods of data collection include face-to-face semi-structured interviews and archival data conducted in 2013 and in 2019. 37 interviewees have joined these interviews. Snowballing technique was used to identify relevant participants who hold local knowledge of renewable energy. Among them, 10 interviewees are government officials serving for the relevant policy making of the sectors, and the rest were professionals working in corporations, think tanks and research institutes. For the interview questions, the themes that the interviewer asked about include the background, participation, developments over time, policy decision-making actors, potential cooperation conflict between decision-makers, and more importantly, the role of the central government and other international organisations and domestic actors in the renewable policy area. The majority of interviews were completed in 2013, while five people were interviewed in 2019. The questions asked were basically the same to understand some of the major changes during this period. The analysis of this article does not only rely on interview materials as sole evidence to form our arguments. These analyses compare interview materials with relevant regulations, policy documents, and news materials from 2010 to 2019 for triangulation.

  4. Interview with Zhu Jinwei, Legal Director of ET Solar Corporation, Nanjing, 13 March, 2013.

  5. Interview with Jin Jingcheng: Director of Power and New Energy Department, Hangzhou, 9 May, 2013.

  6. Interview with Jie Li, a senior manager of a local private firm, Zhenjiang Tongwei Huantai HuiJin New Energy Co. Ltd, Zhenjiang, 3 April, 2019.

  7. Interview with Zhu Jinwei, Legal Director of a local private firm, ET Solar Corporation, Nanjing, 13 March, 2013.

  8. The other six are Vestas (Denmark, 12.9 percent), GE Wind (the United States, 8.8 percent), Gamesa (Spain, 8.2 percent), Enercon (Germany, 7.9 percent), Suzlon (India, 7.7 percent) and Siemens Wind Power (Denmark, 6.3 percent) (REN212012: 58).

  9. Jiangsu Province has in this decade become an important renewable energy equipment manufacturing province, in which a complete industrial chain has formed that supplies nearly a third of the world’s solar related equipment; a number of large-scale domestic solar manufacturers are headquartered in this province, such as Trina Solar (Mo and Zhao 2020; Chen and Lees 2019).

  10. Interview with anonymous senior official at the Provincial Energy Bureau, Nanjing, 29 March, 2013.

  11. CEEG is a private-owned corporation listed on Nasdaq Stock Exchange, which contains 15 subsidiary companies that focus on businesses of PV solar energy, power transformer, power electronics, and honeycomb materials.

  12. Interview with Jia Yangang, Nanjing, 1 April, 2013.

  13. The development of offshore wind power has resistance, mostly from various local government departments due to uncertainty over the local governments’ jurisdiction over the geographical resources of the sea. The lack of clear understanding of the division of labour has delayed development of this policy area.

  14. There are indeed new challenges in the field of renewable energy governance, such as the overcapacity problem of solar equipment manufacturing, the competition between Sino-US trade protection, and the emerging conflicts between conventional utilities and renewable energy producers which led to the fundamental question of energy transition (see, for instance, Toke 2018: 131‒39; 2017; Lewis 2014)

  15. Interview with Qi Haifeng, Vice President of the New Energy Design Institute, Huadong Engineering Corporation, Hangzhou, 22 May, 2013. Huadong Engineering Corporation provides consulting services for governments and state-owned enterprises and provides technical and market research services.

  16. Interview with Zhang Qian, the Deputy Director General of Jiangsu Provincial Bureau of Quality and Technical Supervision, Nanjing, 27 March, 2013.

  17. Interview with Xiaojing Fan, Yangzhong City, 3 April, 2019.

  18. For example, in 2009, Goldwind installed its first wind turbines in the United States, completing a wind farm in Shady Oaks in Illinois and setting up production bases in the United States (Wu 2012; U.S. Department of Energy, 2011). In addition, Goldwind has started constructing a 165-MW wind farm, with 2.5-MW turbines, to be installed in Australia. The project was, prior to 2009, the biggest international project that Chinese domestic manufacturers had ever conducted (Wu 2009).

  19. The main difference is the active involvement of the role of the central NDRC and the engagement of state-owned enterprises protects the state from the constant struggle or competition in the fossil fuel industry found under neoliberal modes of governance. By contrast, Western countries such as Germany have kick-started their renewable sectors by creating policy innovations like feed-in tariffs and other tax incentives (see, for instance, Moe 2015).

  20. However, China’s is not a Soviet-like state-control governance model. Instead, the governance system demonstrates the state’s ability to allocate resources through industrial policies, while at the same time inspiring new economic actors – corporate entities and new entrepreneurs – to join the investment and expansion of the emerging renewable energy industry through its mobilisation capacity. The close relationship between the government and enterprises shapes the new renewable energy development market.

  21. It is must be noted that the successful experience of China’s renewable energy governance in this article does not mean that we believe that such experience can adequately explain all other policy areas. China has severe challenges in water resources, soil pollution, air pollution, and, more importantly, carbon emissions. These environmental challenges are mostly due to the malfeasance of both central and local governments in preventing and controlling environmental pollution at sources (Shapiro 2012) as well as incorrect policy settings and incentives (Zhang 2017; Ran 2014). Corruption and the monopoly of the party-state in cultural affairs remain obstacles to Chinese soft power (Creemer 2015).

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Acknowledgements

We wish to thank the editors and three reviewers of the Journal of International Relations and Development for investing considerable time in providing constructive comments and suggestions. This research is partially supported by Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University Research Development Fund (RDF-17-01-03).

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  1. Xian Jiaotong-Liverpool University, Suzhou, China

    Geoffrey Chun-fung Chen

  2. Flinders University, Adelaide, Australia

    Charles Lees

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Chen, G.Cf., Lees, C. Greening the Chinese Leviathan: China’s renewable energy governance as a source of soft power. J Int Relat Dev 25, 79–106 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41268-021-00213-3

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