Gostujoče predavanje: »China, Taiwan and the Thucydides Trap: War Risks in the Strait and Beyond«
Vabljeni na predavanje prof. Jean-Pierre Cabestana (Hong Kong Baptist University) z naslovom: »Kitajska, Tajvan in Tukididova past: nevarnost vojne v ožini in širše« (China, Taiwan and the Thucydides Trap: War Risks in the Strait and Beyond).
Predavanje bo potekalo v sklopu simpozija oddelka za azijske študije v četrtek, 22. maja 2026, ob 16.50 uri v Zbornični dvorani UL. Predavanje bo v angleškem jeziku.
Abstract: In his talk, Jean-Pierre Cabestan will revisit the Thucydides Trap and analyse the major hotspot around China – the Taiwan Strait – where Beijing has embarked into grey zone tactics and operations that can lead to military crises and even war. Nonetheless, the speaker will show that crossing the threshold of war carries many risks and unpredictable consequences, including a nuclearization of the conflict with the United States, which may eventually dissuade China from going to war. Instead, the Chinese authorities may continue to privilege a two-pronged strategy: on the one hand, intensifying the People’s Liberation Army’s intimidations to weaken the Taiwanese’s resilience and will to fight; on the other hand, deepening the Chinese Communist Party’s united front work towards the island in order to convince the Taiwanese society that unification with the People’s Republic of China is their only future. Will this strategy succeed? This remains today quite uncertain, despite the United States’ willingness under Trump to stabilise its relationship with Xi’s China.
Jean-Pierre Cabestan is Senior Researcher Emeritus at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (Centre national de la recherche scientifique), attached to the French Research Institute on East Asia (IFRAE) of the National Institute of Oriental Languages and Civilisations, and Professor Emeritus at Hong Kong Baptist University. He is also Senior Researcher at Asia Centre, Paris, Associate Research Fellow at the French Centre for Research on Contemporary China in Hong Kong and a Non-Resident Visiting Senior Fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States in Washington DC. His most recent publications include China Tomorrow: Democracy or Dictatorship?, Lanham, MD, Rowman & Littlefield, 2019 translated into Chinese, updated and published under the title 中國的未來會走向民主還是獨裁, Taipei, 八旗 Gusa, 2024; Facing China: The Prospect for War and Peace, Lanham, MD, Rowman & Littlefield, 2023; and Deng Xiaoping, révolutionnaire et modernisateur de la Chine (Deng Xiaoping, Revolutionary and China’s Moderniser), Paris, Tallandier, 2024.
