China, the European Union and the Fragile World Order

The EU ( European Union) and China are the two arguably most unusual powers in today's world: the EU as the most integrated regional association of states and China as the largest developing great power. As the post-Cold War American-led liberal world order is facing challenges from forces unleashed by the power transition and power diffusion in the international system, this article will look into the order-shaping roles of the EU and China, to identify their respective visions of a desirable world order and to conceptualize how the EU and China can make themselves 'building blocks' of a working world order through parallel, complementary and concerted order-shaping.