Description
While securitization theory and the securitization of China have attracted considerable attention in academia, there is less research on securitization as the transformation of a previously positive relationship of partnership. We argue that this dynamic can be explored by looking at German debates on China responding to the challenge of a more assertive and authoritarian China. In the first systematic longitudinal narrative study on the topic, we look at securitization trends in 232 German parliamentary speeches on China and the Sino-German relationship from 1994 to 2024 and investigate to what extent and how German articulations adhere to threatification, riskification, or normal politics. Conceptualising the narrative transformation of the relationship between Germany and China as the ambivalent securitization towards rivalry, we argue that German securitization narratives are marked by adjustment and adaptation, reconfiguring German discourse by highlighting continuity at some levels while enabling change at others.
