| Abstract [eng] |
The research object: the termination of China’s economic coercion against Lithuania. The research problem: it is still not known why China has stopped applying economic pressure which creates uncertainty about the future of relations between Lithuania and China. This raises the question: why China eventually stopped economic pressure on Lithuania, although it did not achieve the goal of getting Lithuania to reverse its decision on the Taiwan representation? The research aim: this master’s thesis aims to investigate what circumstances and interests led China to end the economic pressure on Lithuania. In order to answer the research question, the following objectives are raised: 1) to introduce Brantly Womack's asymmetry theory and discuss its applicability to the Lithuanian–Chinese case; 2) to identify the independent variables and hypotheses 3) to discuss the interests of Lithuania and China vis-à-vis each other and the context of economic coercion; 4) to conduct an empirical analysis, drawing on public sources, in order to identify the objectives and actions of China and Lithuania in the context of China's economic pressure; 5) to assess the contribution of international organisations in the bufferisation of the relationship; 6) to determine which hypothesis would the most accurately explain the withdrawal of economic pressure by China. The hypotheses of this research: H1: China's economic coercion on Lithuania has been lifted due to the consolidation of Lithuanian domestic political actors in relation to the name of the Taiwan representative office, despite some politicians' vacillations in their relationship with China; H2: China's decision to cease economic coercion on Lithuania is linked to the European Commission's case at the WTO and the EU's accelerated process for adopting an Anti-Coercion Instrument; H3: China's decision to end economic coercion on Lithuania was prompted by the assurance that there would be no ‘pro-Taiwan’ domino effect in the region and that other European countries and the US would be discouraged from recognising Taiwan. In summary, China's decision to end the economic pressure on Lithuania using the power asymmetry theory approach was driven by two necessary (but insufficient) reasons – the successful prevention of the development of political recognition of Taiwan in Europe and the adoption of the European Commission's Anti-Economic Coercion Instrument which could have effectively stopped the continuation of such sanctions. The assurance of Chinese interests and the potential costs of further economic pressure may have encouraged China, as the stronger country in the asymmetric relationship, to step back from pressure from the weaker country. Lithuania has been successful in demonstrating the injustice of China's unofficial economic restrictions and in ‘buffering’ the asymmetry of the relationship through the European Union institutions by making the issue part of the agenda of China–EU trade relations. Therefore, hypotheses H2 and H3 were both confirmed. This research has contributed to studies of the political reasons behind the decisions to terminate economic coercion and asymmetrical bilateral relations between stronger and weaker countries of different capacities. Future research could make greater use of and reconceptualise Womack's theoretical tool which has proved to be particularly valuable for the study of countries with different capacities and positions in the international arena. Moreover, this study also encourages an assessment of some of the shortcomings of Womack's theory which could be modified – for example, while it is argued that only consolidation within the weaker country is able to counter the pressure of the stronger country, the internal dynamics of politics can be highly contradictory and ultimately fail to send a clear signal to the larger country. |
