China’s Political Warfare and Western Democracies

This event is part of a special series on Political Warfare in East Asia. In the Spring 2020 special issue of Orbis, nine articles assess political warfare in, and emanating from, East Asia. Authoritarian regimes in Asia, including China and North Korea, use the weapons of political warfare and the tools of sharp power to influence, and sometimes undermine, other polities. Political warfare includes overt and covert use of diplomatic, political, economic, and information means to affect policy-making or the political context affecting decision-making in another state. In East Asia, the techniques are deployed against immediate neighbors and far-away targets and rivals. Political warfare particularly exploits the characteristic vulnerabilities of open societies and liberal-democratic polities, including businesses that seek access, new and traditional media that are porous to foreign influence, publics that are receptive to divisive and bias-confirming messages, civil society structures and educational