The Senkaku/Diaoyu Dispute: An In-Depth Look at Chinese and Japanese Motivations

This thesis was written to evaluate the relative importance of ethnic, economic, and military nationalism between China and Japan over a two-year period on the subject of the Senkaku/Diaoyu Island dispute. From 2010 to 2012, this ongoing dispute generated a lot of open source media that delved into the issue, from published books, to newspaper articles. What I found was the relative importance of economic over ethnic and military nationalism: the two countries fought to maintain economic stability above all else. This leads me to believe that despite these ongoing feuds, both countries realize that trade and maintaining other economic ties are far more important today than before.