IPE and Law Enforcement: Understanding China’s Abroad Law Enforcement Activities through an Internatinal Political Economy Perspective

Abstract

Western media and the academic literature have been increasingly discussing that the rise of criticisms towards the existing international order by the Global South countries has been attempted to be represented by the BRICS organization under the auspices of China especially following the 2008 financial crisis. Recent years have also shown a rise against international norms and principles constructed following the WWII. Those criticisms have also reflected themselves in the law enforcement sector. China’s rising international law enforcement activities have been regarded especially by the Western officials and media outlets as a fundamental threat to the liberal democracies and the concept of rule of law as its domestic law enforcement activities have been regarded as extremely repressive. Within the framework of an accelerating competition between the USA and China and the increasing abroad activities of China, analyzing the future of law enforcement has been an urgent and necessary endeavour. Thus, this paper aims to explore China’s impact on global law enforcement ecosystem through its strategies and implementations.It questions the motivations and mechanisms that China’s Communist Party uses to impact global law enforcement environment. It will analyze this by looking at the Ministery of Public Security’s (MPS) global activities abroad such as bilateral police diplomacy, joint action plans, training for counterparts, the rise of Chinese overseas police outposts and the Lianyungang Forum as an alternative law enforcement governance organization. For analyzing the scope of the Chinese effectivenes in the global law enforcement sector, the paper firstly discuss the Beijing’s and MPS’s vision for its role abroad. Then, it will demonstrate the types of MPS’ overseas activities. After showing the Beijing’s vision and types of activities, the paper will discuss its potential impact on the global law enforcement governance through a broad lense of international political economy. The paper argues that China has an increasing impact on global law enforcement sector even though its current is relatively limited. The paper also concludes that China’s abroad activities regarding law enforcement are mediated through political economic factors such as constructing an alternative law enforcement governance model with an alternative interpretation of the concept of “the rule of law”, prompted and legitimazed by the individual countries’ urgent needs to secure their national territory and the Chinese strategies to secure their officials, citizens and investments in the host countries. Thus, it concludes that the MPS’ global efforts to implement the CCP’s directive to “actively build a law enforcement security cooperation system with Chinese characteristics” are conceptualized through Chinese political economy interests and strategies. Finally, it argues that by trying to provide alternative governance model and an alternative technological infrastructure for other states, China has the ability to impact the law enforcement practices globally towards a direction different from liberal democracies experiences and practices.