The Essence of Interstate Leadership: Debating Moral Realism

Bringing together eminent International Relations (IR) scholars from China and the West, this book examines moral realism from a range of different perspectives. Through its analyses, it verifies the robustness of moral realism in IR theory. The first section of the book is written by Chinese scholars and dedicated to debates about how moral realism relates to traditional schools of IR theory. The latter portion, provided by Western contributors, critically investigates both the universal and practical values of moral realism. Finally, Yan Xuetong concludes by responding constructively to all criticisms and further exploring the nature and characteristics of interstate leadership in moral realism.

Yan Xuetong is Director of the Institute of International Studies at Tsinghua University. Fang Yuanyuan is Associate Professor in the Department of International Relations at Tsinghua University.