Levy, Jack.  Power Transition Theory and the Rise of China.  

In:  Ross, Robert S, and Feng Zhu. China’s ascent: power, security, and the future of international politics. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008.

"I argue that applications of power transition theory to the rise of China are compromised by the failure to recognize both the theoretical limitations of power transition theory and the contextual differences between a potential Sino-American transition and past power transitions.  I give particular attention to the theory's focus on a single international hierarchy and its lack of a conceptual apparatus to deal with global-regional interactions, which are important because China is more likely to pose a threat to US interests in East and Southeast Asia than to US global interests, at least for many decades" (11).

Reviews Organski's contribution to power transition theory.  "Organski and his colleagues measure productivity in terms of GDP/capita.  Their aggregate measure of power is the product of GDP and political capacity.  If a great power increases in strength to the point that it acquires at least 80 percent of the power of the dominant state, it is defined as a 'challenger' to the dominant state and to that state's ability to control the international system" (13).

"It is the combination of parity, overtaking, and dissatisfaction that leads to war, though power transition theorists have been inconsistent regarding the precise relationship among these key causal variables.  In the most recent statement of the theory, it appears that dissatisfaction and parity each approximate a necessary condition for war between the dominant state and the challenger" (14).

"Thus, population has a critical impact on power in the long term; economic growth has a large impact in the medium term; and political capacity has its greatest impact in the short term" (16).

"The question, according to power transition theory, is not whether China will eventually overtake the United States, since that is practically inevitable once China completes its modernization and moves up its growth trajectory, but rather when and with what consequences.  Power transition theorists equivocate in their discussion of the timing of the transition  but not about the conditions determining whether the transition will be peaceful or warlike" (16).

"Power transition theory posits that national power is a function of population, economic productivity, and the political capacity to extract resources from society and transform them into national power.  Thus in most applications of the theory national power = population * GDP/capita * political capacity.  One problem with the emphasis on population and GDP is that while GDP captures quantitative changes in the growth of the economy as a whole it does not fully capture qualitative changes int eh form of technological innovations that generate new leading economic sectors and trigger paradigmatic shifts in economic production" (18).

"To summarize, although power transition theory suggests that China's overtaking of the United States is both inevitable and imminent sometime within the next generation, a focus on the leading economic sectors and technological innovations that drive them suggests a more cautious attitude in predicting a Sino-American power transition" (20).

"To summarize, although power transition theory claims to provide a theory of great power war at the top of the international hierarchy, a look at its application to historical cases reveals that in important respects the theory mis-specifies the causal mechanisms leading to war" (30).

McNally: Sino-Capitalism

McNally, Christopher A. “Sino-Capitalism: China’s Reemergence and the International Political Economy.” World Politics 64, no. 4 (2012): 741–776.

Outlines the IR debate on the rise of China.  Then focuses on IPE interpretation of Sino-Capitalism in contrast to Anglo-Capitalism.  Sino-Capitalism:  "...relies on informal business networks rather than on legal codes and transparent rules.  It also assigns the Chinese state a leading role in fostering and guiding capitalist accumulation." (744)  "Central to Sino-capitalism's institutional structure is a unique duality that combines top-down state-led development with bottom-up entrepreneurial private capital accumulation" (744).

Piece goes on to place Sino-Capitalism within the varieties of capitalism literature.  It argues that the unique characteristics of this economic structure will be challenging to assimilate within the liberal economic order.  Author makes the interesting observation that China is entering the international system characterized by neoliberal globalization and other Asian countries that entered the system earlier did so  when it was more characterized by embedded liberalism.  

The article then goes on to document the moves that China is making to internationalize the yuan.  The further implications for the rise of China and US-China relations are ambiguous, but the author claims that the rise of Sino-Capitalism will continue to challenge the international financial order.

Ray and SInger: Measuring Concentration of Power

Ray, James Lee, J. David Singer. 1973. Measuring the concentration of power in the international system. Sociological Methods & Research. 1: 403.

"The purpose of this paper is to examine some earlier efforts to measure the inequality of distribution within several different substantive contexts, and to see how appropriate these different measures might be if they were applied to the distribution of 'power potential' in the international system or any of its subsystems" (405).

 "We should admit, and indeed will even emphasize, that the criteria for selection of an index will vary as research purposes change" (405).

Mearshimer: The Gathering Storm

Mearsheimer, John J. “The Gathering Storm: China’s Challenge to US Power in Asia.” The Chinese Journal of International Politics 3, no. 4 (December 21, 2010): 381–396.

 The argument here is that "China cannot rise peacefully" (382). This is because of power transition theory and standard Realist accounts of behavior in the international system. There are three arguments for why China will rise peacefully and Mearsheimer refutes each. 1. China will mitigate fears of it's revisionist nature by signaling to their neighbors that it will be peaceful. This isn't possible because states can have no truthful expectation about the behavior of other states. Cites Hobbes related work. Second, China could build defensive military capabilities in place of offensive. This isn't plausible because the line between defensive and offensive capabilities is blurry. 3. China's behavior to her neighbors has been peaceful lately. Problem with this thinking is that past behavior isn't predictive of future behavior.

 He also addresses the US role in the future and its desire to remain the global hegemon. This will further initiate conflict.

Then, after telling the reader that we can't understand the decisions of leaders in 2025 he goes on to tell us how we should expect countries to behave.