Dylan Loh’s recently published book, China’s Rising Foreign Ministry: Practices and Representations of Assertive Diplomacy, is likely to become a central work for the study of PRC foreign policy. The book tackles a difficult subject of study—a foreign ministry that is not particularly known for being willing to be studied. As I am sure that the readers of this review are aware, the PRC diplomatic bureaucracy (as also detailed in the book) is relatively opaque and not exactly welcoming of outside scrutiny. It is a system that maintains considerable discipline over its members, and this means that much of the research that we do see on Chinese foreign policy works from statements and actions that are observable from a distance and/or quantifiable via external analysis. Loh, however, did not let the obstacles that surround the object of his study discourage him, and he has been able to paint a very comprehensive picture of the current status of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) within the larger PRC foreign policy apparatus. This he did by using interviews with both Chinese officials and insiders to the system as well as their foreign interlocutors, not to mention by engaging an extensive set of primary and secondary sources. The portrait he renders is one in which the MOFA is both taking on a much more central role in certain elements of PRC foreign policy and using the tools that it has at its disposal—“advising, implementing, and facilitating/coordinating”—to exert its influence.

The book is densely packed, but, roughly speaking, its initial chapters introduce existing literature and its theoretical apparatus—practice theory—and make an argument for considering the influence of its subject: MOFA. To these ends, Loh cites various illustrative incidents that demonstrate MOFA’s increasingly high profile, including Wang Yi’s aggressive response at a press conference in Canada, intervention in ASEAN’s statements on the South China Sea, and PRC interference with a transshipment of military materiel through Hong Kong to Singapore. It then moves on in its third chapter to situate MOFA within the institutional setting of the PRC as well as the temporal context of Xi Jinping’s push for a more activist foreign policy—a useful overview of the structures and trends of PRC foreign policy making. A further chapter offers insights into MOFA’s institutional habitus: the various ways in which institutional memory, fealty displays, and internal discipline shape how PRC diplomats perform their roles. The penultimate chapter explores MOFA’s relatively new use of Twitter as a diplomatic tool in ways both helpful and harmful to the PRC’s external relations, while a concluding chapter offers a peek inside the material environment that is the space for MOFA press briefings.

On the whole, Loh makes the persuasive argument that the PRC foreign ministry constituted the primary face of what was widely considered an assertive turn in PRC foreign behavior. Looking at how its representatives conducted themselves and projected a particular image in their interactions with foreign interlocutors, he documents their role in shaping external perceptions about PRC attitudes (or perhaps better said, the notion that the PRC ‘had an attitude’). By serving as one of the most visible (or audible) outward sources of representations of the PRC via diplomatic interactions, through press briefings, and even on Twitter, how PRC diplomats have behaved and deployed rhetoric has had a major influence on how the PRC is viewed more generally.

He additionally offers evidence that MOFA has now assumed the lead position in dealing with policy and frictions concerning the South China Sea and the Sino-India border. His findings suggest a very different picture from the relatively weak MOFA amidst a pack of unruly actors described previously in work by Jakobson or Hameiri and Jones.Footnote ¹ He cites interviewees sharing that MOFA is now leading on the South China Sea with the authority to tell other actors to cease and desist (43).

Readers may nevertheless ask the extent to which Loh is overselling the Foreign Ministry’s influence. Indeed, while Loh claims that “the coordinating and facilitating functions and work duties of MOFA have extended, in a substantive manner, into other areas,” he nevertheless caveats this with the statement that “I am not proposing that MOFA has policymaking powers in those fields” (8). It is thus important to disentangle several different strands of his argument.

One strand is the claim that MOFA has risen absolutely in international prominence because it has more resources and is a key voice speaking on behalf of an opaque policymaking apparatus belonging to a country that has ascended in international importance. In this sense, the story of the rise of MOFA is that of the rise of the PRC. There is little to quibble with here.

A second strand is a more difficult argument that MOFA’s influence has risen relatively within the PRC system. Here it is harder to tell, and one might question whether being more visible is the same as being influential. Potentially even more important is the question of what it means for the foreign ministry to be influential when the entire system appears to be under pressure to subordinate itself to the will of the party and Xi Jinping. Loh writes that “Xi’s drive to impose his vision of foreign policy meant exerting control over MOFA and the attendant players in the Chinese diplomatic field” (77). So while “Xi has given MOFA greater importance and responsibility” (77), it now appears to be much more Xi’s MOFA; and this may mean it offers even less of an alternative voice that one could identify as belonging to diplomats.

There also still remain many questions about how MOFA fits into the decision-making process. More needs to be done to fully understand the relationship of MOFA to the Central Foreign Affairs Work Commission and the Central Foreign Affairs Office attached to it, the relationship between MOFA and the International Department of the Chinese Communist Party (both institutionally and in terms of personnel transfers), and how the PRC’s security services also operate within this picture. That said, these are not easy questions to answer and Loh’s findings are valuable contributions to our debates over their answers.

Apart from the empirical contributions his book makes, it also seeks to further the development and deployment of practice theory within international relations. A critic might question whether the language of practice theory is doing anything more than adding a gloss of social science jargon to what is a primarily descriptive account. Even so, I found value in Loh’s analysis of the different “fields” involved and the ways in which certain quotidian practices and environments shaped how PRC diplomatic actors interacted with others. I am certain that his will become a well-cited example of how practice theory can be employed beyond typical “Western” settings.

All in all, this book is likely to become required reading for those studying Chinese foreign policy making. It offers a valuable exploration of the Chinese Foreign Ministry and its role in representing the People’s Republic of China that should be of interest to students, scholars, and practitioners alike.