The lingering exceptionalism of global China

In response to DiCarlo and DeBoom's recent article ‘Six paths of Global China’, this commentary argues that the power of the ‘global China’ idea derives from the baggage of lingering exceptionalism that it continues to carry within it. While global China has been embraced by many scholars as a move away from the methodological nationalism, othering, and exceptionalism that has characterized much of the China studies field, the wide-ranging global China discourse has instead breathed new life into exceptionalist views of China. Because of this, we may do well to abandon the term altogether.