Understanding China's Energy Security

This paper seeks to offer a different perspective on China's energy policy and of the role played by security issues in its definition. Hence, it will impart particular attention to conceptions and ideas held by the actors involved in the energy policy decision-making process. It will demonstrate that the different measures that make up Chinese energy policy are the result of a debate among proponents of three frames – a strategic vision, a market approach, and a conception of "scientific development"– simultaneously exhibited within China's energy policy community. Each one of these frames sheds light in a unique fashion on the objective conditions confronting Chinese decision-makers by identifying some of them as problematic while leaving others in the shadows, and, at the same time, they offer solutions articulated in their own terms.