1. On the role of nationalism as identity marker, see C. Kinnvall (2004) ‘Globalization and religious nationalism: Self, identity, and the search for ontological security’, Political Psychology, 25/5, 741–2.
2. This corroborates the claim by T. Flockhart (2006), ‘“Complex socialization”: A framework for the study of state socialization’, European Journal of International Relations, 12/1, 89–118 that ‘if a social group manifestly cannot provide high self-esteem, membership will eventually become unsatisfactory and members of a negatively biased social group will either leave the group for membership of a more positively distinct group, or pressure will build up within the group to make it more positively distinct’.
3. H. Harvey (2000) ‘The future of the Chinese state’, in D. Shambaugh (ed.) The Modern Chinese State (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), p.227, claims that, in fact, the ideological vacuum in China has lasted almost a century as ideology serves as a rationalization for a particular political and economic order (italics mine).
4. On China’s and the Soviet Union’s leadership position in the communist world, see Zh. Chen (2005) ‘Nationalism, internationalism and Chinese foreign policy’, Journal of Contemporary China, 14/42, 41–4.
5. J. C. Ramo (2004) The Beijing Consensus (London: The Foreign Policy Centre), p.25, notes that ‘it is easy to see why in an era of increasing scepticism about globalization, a model that tells about balanced growth and self-reliance is appealing to other nations’. Wang Jisi of Beijing University has observed that ‘many developing countries that have introduced Western values and political systems are experiencing disorder and chaos’, and that China’s alternative model explains why countries from Africa (Rwanda) to the Middle East (Dubai) to Southeast Asia (Vietnam) are taking this advice seriously; see The Economist, 1 March 2014, p.44.