The International Lunar Research Station: China's New Era of Space Cooperation and Its New Role in the Space Legal Order

Abstract

Tension between competition and cooperation is common in space activities. China's role in spearheading the International Lunar Research Station, in direct opposition to the US-led Artemis program, demonstrates its strong determination to upgrade its space cooperation. The configuration discourse on the International Lunar Research Station and the Artemis program is clearing a path for a new mixture structure and the interplay of competition and cooperation among space powers. The evolution of China's approach to space cooperation––from an emphasis on national independence to initiating multilateral cooperative platforms––provides insights into understanding the dynamics between techno-nationalism and external constraints, as well as the motivation to increase and an approach towards actually increasing soft power, alongside the development of hard power. This decade-lasting dynamics determines that openness and neutrality are viable means to guarantee the international prospect of China's lunar cooperation platform. Well-designed and targeted engagement measures and overall neutral strategies are needed to realise openness and promote neutrality. To compensate for China's ‘leadership deficit’ in international cooperation, a practical way forward is taking the Artemis program as a point of reference and transplanting the successful American experience while also differentiating from the Artemis program. The interplay of competition and cooperation challenges, forces compromise in, and maintains and develops the space order. Leading an international cooperation venture will accrue the soft power China needs to sustain its hard power and bring new positive energy to the space order. China's unique dual identity as a space power and a developing country could contribute to solving the dilemma of democratisation and decentralisation in the development of international space law.