IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/cdanxx/v41y2025i3p525-543.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Deterrence by demography? Southeast Asian migrant workers and the incentives for a Chinese blockade of Taiwan

Author

Listed:
  • Brad Williams

Abstract

This article adopts a novel “narrow yet broad” conceptualisation of deterrence and applies it to the Taiwan issue. Deploying a framework that draws on an expanded understanding of deterrence that incorporates non-military elements, it introduces the concept of demographic deterrence to investigate the type of military measures China will be encouraged to adopt once it decides to use force to take control of Taiwan. Demographic deterrence in the Taiwan Strait is based on the various costs of foreign civilian casualties, especially Southeast Asian migrant workers. This article posits that this demographic factor creates strong disincentives for China to launch a deadly and destructive full-scale invasion of Taiwan. Reinforced by certain inherent operational advantages, China will instead be incentivised to begin military options to annex Taiwan by blockading the renegade province.

Suggested Citation

  • Brad Williams, 2025. "Deterrence by demography? Southeast Asian migrant workers and the incentives for a Chinese blockade of Taiwan," Defense & Security Analysis, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 41(3), pages 525-543, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:cdanxx:v:41:y:2025:i:3:p:525-543
    DOI: 10.1080/14751798.2025.2512638
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/14751798.2025.2512638
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/14751798.2025.2512638?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:cdanxx:v:41:y:2025:i:3:p:525-543. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/CDAN20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.