(Opinion) Making an Island in the South China Sea: Sansha and Chinese Foreign Policy
2015-09-16 09:04:25 source：The CSIS
By Guanpei Ming
September 15, 2015
"The South China Sea has moved to the center of debates about China's increasingly assertive foreign policy. Most policy analyses of the situation have focused on either the implications for international law or China's proposed military plans to create a South China Sea version of the 'East China Sea Air Defense Identification Zone' (ADIZ). While there has been much excellent work analyzing China's influence on global politics, little has been done to understand the role China's domestic administrative institutions play in managing these disputed territories.
In 2012, the Chinese State Council upgraded Sansha, a tiny community on an island in the disputed region of the South China Sea, to the status of a prefecture-level city. The city population had not grown, and while Sansha's upgrade meant an increase in its administrative power, it meant very little in terms of physical construction or migration. However, following the announcement, Chinese officials argued that Sansha's designation as a prefecture-level city 'announces to the rest of the world that China has indisputable sovereignty over this region.' The decision to upgrade Sansha represents an attempt to expand Chinese governance over a region of growing importance and should not be considered 'hype' or a simple administrative reorganization by Beijing."
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