The chapter provides a comparative account of cybersecurity public–private partnerships (PPPs). It argues that PPPs bring together the law-making powers of the states with the know-how of the private sector, that both are necessary to effectively deal with cybersecurity threats, and that the benefits of PPPs outweigh their limitations. It then empirically analyses the laws and regulations surrounding cybersecurity PPPs in eighteen different domestic jurisdictions to find a common denominator that could be transposed into international cybersecurity PPPs. Finally, it discusses the modalities that international cybersecurity PPPs could take and proposes a new international treaty incorporating PPPs, under which states undertake to establish domestic mechanisms for collaborating with the private sector in cybersecurity.

Disarmament – in the sense of eliminating weapons – has not been a success as a means of restraining the use of force between states. Significant discarding of conventional weapons took place in Europe after the Cold War under an agreement (CFE) between NATO and the Warsaw Pact. Large scrapping of whole categories of tactical nuclear weapons also occurred through parallel commitments under the so-called Presidential Initiative by Presidents Bush and Gorbachev. However, the subject of ‘general and complete disarmament’ that has long been on the international agenda, has hardly even been taken seriously. And while the non-nuclear weapon states allowed the Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1970 to be prolonged indefinitely, the five nuclear weapons states parties have failed to live up to their obligation to agree on disarmament. A significant failure is also that the US and some other nuclear weapon states have failed to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty concluded in 1996. The US and the Soviet Union/Russia have sought – not disarmament but – important strategic stability through ‘arms control’ in bilateral agreements. In 2021, they prolonged the START agreement setting limits on the number of American and Russian strategic nuclear weapons and carriers and providing for important mutual verification.

The high ambition of the UN Charter Art. 2:4 to prevent interstate use of force is confirmed by the narrow right to individual or collective self-defence given to states under Art.51 ‘if an armed attack occurs’. States have many times invoked ‘self-defence’ as default justification of interventions and sometimes sought room for interpretations giving them more elbow room to use force in response to hostile acts of gravity. The general right of reprisal has been rejected, but in cases of grave or repeated terrorist attacks responses by armed force have not been criticized even though taken much after the attacks. A right has also been recognized to use force in self-defence where armed attacks are ‘imminent’ (pre-emption), but no such right has been acknowledged where the threat of attack is not imminent (‘anticipatory self-defence’ or ‘preventive’ use of force).

The chapter examines the distinction between public and private cyberattacks and responses to them in domestic law (e.g. application of criminal law) and international law (e.g. self-defence and countermeasures). After describing the different purposes, nature, and effects of cyberattacks committed by public and private actors, it argues that the determination of whether a particular cyberattack is of a public or private nature should define how states respond to cybersecurity risks. It then argues that the existing domestic and international law frameworks regulating cyberattacks suffer from serious limitations and proposes a holistic approach for responding to cyberattacks, taking into account the difference between public and private cyberattacks.

While the focus of the book is on the interstate use of force post-WWII, this chapter holds a rear mirror and offers a perspective of evolution of restraints that started long before states came into being. It recounts how human societies over the centuries became states free from widespread internal use of armed force and how great powers sought to avoid major armed conflicts through policies of balance of power and multilateral conferences. It describes how they developed common rules by concluding conventions and built institutions such as the League of Nations and the United Nations to create a rule-based order and mechanisms and methods to prevent the interstate use of force.

The chapter discusses cybersecurity from the perspective of human rights protection. It first identifies adopting border measures as one approach to fulfilling a state’s duty to protect its citizens against human rights violations caused by cybercrimes. It then examines the tension between these FDI restrictive border measures and states’ investment protection and promotion obligations under IIAs. The analysis demonstrates a limitation in the current international law framework in which invoking the concept of national security remains the only means for states to address cyberthreats, which involves the risk of an accelerating shift to protectionism.

Most states are of the view that military forces are needed and effective as means to reduce the risk of foreign attacks. They must note that some of today’s political and military realities are very different from those that existed up to the end of WWII. Border lines and land have lost some importance. The United Nations is a new factor but one that has not reduced the importance of national defence. Underestimating the need may be fatal, but exaggerating it means taking resources from more deserving needs. A table is offered of the military expenses of several states. Military budgets are currently (2023) sharply rising in many countries. The NATO alliance has set a minimum target of 2 % of GDP for national military budgets of their members. The US has long declared a policy of ‘all sector dominance’ and has by far the largest military budget. To deter the threat of nuclear and other non-conventional weapons raises intractable new issues. The three major nuclear weapon states seek to make sure that they will not ever lose the capacity to deter nuclear attacks by a second strike that would bring pain calculated to be unacceptable.

The chapter gives a detailed account of Chinese cybersecurity policy as an example of a state-oriented model of internet governance. After describing China’s early attitudes towards cyberspace, it analyses in detail its cybersecurity policy under the Xi Jinping administration, and how its concept of ‘cyber sovereignty’ differs from Western countries’ approaches to cyberspace. It also examines China’s efforts to export the Chinese model of cyber laws and regulations based on the concept of cyber sovereignty to non-liberal countries. It also analyses how the country is actively involved in the formation of international rules for cybersecurity in order to spread this concept.

The chapter begins by giving an overview of the background against which efforts to agree on international norms regulating cybersecurity take place. It highlights intensifying cyberthreats, increasing geopolitical tensions, and the rise of China, as well as a backlash against economic globalisation, which call for a reassessment of cybersecurity governance. It then summarises the main aims of the book, which examines cybersecurity challenges, governance responses to them, and their limitations, engaging an interdisciplinary approach combining legal and international relations disciplines. It builds on the fundamental premise that cybersecurity challenges require a widely agreed-upon set of international norms. it examines the current political and legal contexts of cybersecurity governance and highlights the divide between two contrasting models of cybergovernance: state-oriented and market-oriented. The chapter then offers a brief overview of all chapters of the book.

This chapter responds to the theme of “geographies of rivalry” and international relations by exploring the implications of recent debates over uneven and combined development (U&CD) for the US and China within global capitalism. On one hand, the two powers remain deeply economically interlinked. On the other, recent discussions of, for instance, a “new Cold War” have brought to light tensions between the two world powers. Thus, this chapter asks two major questions. First, what can a U&CD perspective help us understand about global politics and world power? Second, how can this help us make sense of the complex intertangles between the US and China?

In recent years, a wide variety of studies have begun to explore the implications of the critical idea of U&CD for explaining the dynamics of global power. Justin Rosenberg, in particular, has been developing it as a framework for making sense of international relations from a perspective engaging with Marxism (Rosenberg 1996, 2009, 2013, 2019). At the same time, this perspective has been criticized for, perhaps, trying to do more than it can. In this regard, the first section of this chapter examines this debate, suggesting that while the concept of U&CD can play a key role in framing questions of global power, its uses are limited, as it is a helpful concept, not a comprehensive approach or theory.

Second, this chapter uses this concept to explore questions of the US, China, and their geographics of conflict. Beginning with an overview of the political economy of the US, the chapter suggests that U&CD is useful for developing a narrative of the rise of American world dominance and its possible contemporary decline, and the uneven dynamics of this question. This framework makes it possible to link together the ways capitalist class power and neoliberalism intersect with the dynamics of U&CD globally as class relations are shaped both by forces within states, and by movements on uneven and multilayered international scales. That being said, the argument presented here also notes the limits of a U&CD approach, as it is a useful tool within a broader framework but limited as an overall approach to making sense of global power relations.

Introduction

Over the past decade, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has continued to rise as a great power on global politics and to challenge the interests of the US. While security competition is not new to US–China relations, its nature is changing and evolving in a new direction with past differences becoming more acute, and new areas are emerging, such as the Arctic region, that are intensifying this security dilemma (Allison 2017; Medeiros 2019; Mearsheimer 2021). The rapidly changing climate of the Arctic has given rise to China’s emergence as major influence within the region. Scholars have discussed the geopolitical ramifications of Arctic ice melt and accelerated prospects of an ice-free Arctic (Depledge 2021; Briggs 2013; Depledge 2021). As a rising global superpower, China has amassed incredible diplomatic, informational, military, and economic capabilities to influence and reshape the Arctic region (Briggs 2013; Connolly 2017). China was granted status as an observer to the Arctic Council in 2013, providing it a seat at the table with a new-found voice and ability to engage within the region. This engagement, primarily through economic and diplomatic means, has for many raised serious concerns regarding its long-term intentions considering its heavy-handed practices in other regions of the world (Miller 2019; Vitug 2018; Garlick 2019). China’s efforts within the region are considered a threat to long-term regional stability, impacting the human, environmental, and national security objectives for several members of the Arctic Council, including the US, Canada, and Sweden (Cassotta et al 2015; Lackenbauer et al 2018; Doshi et al 2021). With regional resource, access, and longer-term interests at stake, Chinese investment and diplomatic overtures within the Arctic serve as a point of regional friction prompting numerous countries to take notice and address the competitive challenges posed by this evolving rivalry (Connolly 2017; Depledge 2021). While there have been many studies on the influence of China in the Arctic region, there has been little research on how abrupt climate change in combination with Chinese actions in the region could create unpredictable black swan events that undermine US and regional security (Zysk and Titley 2015; Valentine et al 2021).

Although US President Bill Clinton had nonchalantly floated the imagery of South Asia as “the most dangerous place in the world” in the wake of the nuclear tests by India and Pakistan in 1998, his views were outrightly rejected by India (Babington and Constable 2000). Besides, China emerged as a stabilizing force in the region as it instigated its shuttle diplomacy between India and Pakistan not only after the nuclear tests in 1998 but also after the Mumbai attack in 2008. Even as the disputed Kashmir remains a nuclear flashpoint (notwithstanding the US offer to “help” resolve this lingering issue), several topical incidences—for example, the Doklam standoff, Pulwama attack, Ladakh clash, Taliban takeover, arms race, trade war, pandemic blame-game, and Russia–Ukraine crisis—have triggered fresh patterns of quadrilateral interactions between four key (non-)state actors in South Asia, namely, India, Pakistan, China, and the US. While the competitive and cooperative trends underpinning these quadrilateral interactions are difficult to fathom in terms of traditional Western realism (which considers the sphere of “the international” as fraught with dualistic self-other enmity), this chapter evokes a non-dualistic Global International Relations (IR) theory inspired by the Indian philosophy of Advaita to appraise India’s strategic response to the ongoing US–China rivalry in South Asia: unlike the dualistic Western IR theories based on a fundamental self–other distinction, the non-dualistic Advaita Global IR theory ties the self and the other together with a globe marked with single hidden connectedness. Since India is increasingly recognized as a rising power in world politics, a systematic study of its strategic response to the ongoing US–China rivalry in South Asia is decisive for making sense of the overall global transformations. The chapter is divided into three sections. The first section illustrates the historical trajectory of geopolitical rivalries in South Asia. The second section identifies the topical issues that have cropped up as departure points in this conventional historical trajectory. Finally, the third section employs the Advaita Global IR theory (which refutes the Western style of IR hooked on the fixed logic of self–other enmity, friendship, or neutrality) to facilitate an improved investigation of these topical issues, thereby providing an alternative intellectual framework to interpret the contemporary postures of US–China contestations in world politics.

The chapter analyses existing regional cybersecurity treaties to highlight the differences in these treaties that reflect the divide between the state-oriented and market-oriented models of internet governance, and to find possible areas of convergence that may pave the way towards global co-operation. It also discusses the role and limitations of the private sector, including IT industries, technical experts, and civil societies, in cybersecurity governance. Realistic scenarios of future global cybersecurity governance would envision expanding and strengthening regional co-operation and co-operation between like-minded states. However, reaching a consensus on particular cybersecurity issues will not automatically result in effective cybersecurity governance. Fundamental differences in the levels of cyber-preparedness and the ability of states to combat cybercrimes will create a living space for cybercriminals and other malign actors to engage in illegal activities. Continuous efforts to support states with less cybercapacity, including through strengthening education, technical skills, and material resources should accompany any attempts to create cybersecurity governance norms.

Introduction

One of the greatest puzzles in the academic study and contemporary practice of international politics is whether the rise of China, as a re-emerging global power, would be peaceful amidst the perception of declining US dominance (Christensen 2006; Mearsheimer 2006; Starrs 2013; Monteiro 2014: 122–126; Regilme and Parisot 2017a; 2020; Regilme and Hartmann 2018). Considered as the “most important rising power” (Hameiri and Jones 2015: 3), China, with its expanding sphere of influence in world politics, will “undoubtedly be one of the great dramas of the twenty-first century” (Ikenberry 2008: 23). Despite the countervailing discourses from some Chinese political elites who advocate a more pacifist tone, some Western scholars, pundits, and policy makers warned that China’s political ascendancy is inevitably dangerous (Mearsheimer 2006; Regilme 2019; Regilme and Parisot 2020). This sense of insecurity is felt more increasingly in the Southeast Asian region, where many of the smaller countries have traditionally depended upon the US leadership and security guarantees. The South China Sea (or the SCS hereafter)—a marginal sea area that is partially surrounded by Northeast (China and Taiwan) and Southeast (Malaysia, the Philippines, Brunei, Indonesia, Singapore, and Vietnam) Asian countries—has become one of the most visible maritime geographic spaces of conflict in the region. In Southeast Asia, four out of ten countries therein are active claimants of a part of the SCS region: Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, and Brunei.

As one of the world’s highly militarized site of inter-state territorial conflicts, the SCS is economically significant for the global economy primarily because a large chunk of annual world trade output passes through this maritime area. The US interest in the dispute is discursively sold as about “ensuring freedom of navigation,” considering that “half the world’s commercial shipping passes through the SCS—$5 trillion a year—and US warships regularly transit the region on their way to and from the Persian Gulf, Southwest Asia and the Indian Ocean” (Spitzer 2012: 8). The UN Conference on Trade and Development emphasizes the economic significance of the SCS, because nearly 60 percent of maritime trade comes through the Asia-Pacific, and at least one-third of the global trade needs to pass through the SCS ( Jennings 2021: 6).