The rule of law (ROL) is invoked by multinational institutions, Western governments and in China as a political expectation of what legitimate governance looks like. Chinese leaders regularly make claims that are translated into commitments to uphold the ROL, and they generalize this rhetoric to the international level. Constrained by top-down conceptions, China’s idea of an international ROL becomes a hypothetical yet coherent and attractive possibility. Western legal scholars and political scientists are significantly more diverse and sceptical; most do not speak about an international rule of law, for a variety of reasons. This does not mean that there is no role for international law, but it does mean that for many Western scholars and practitioners, domestic conversations about an ROL ideal do not travel to the international level. Ideals can be useful even if they remain elusive. Yet the very different Western and Chinese understandings of the ROL ideal and its international implications may limit China’s international efforts to build international support for the vision that Chinese leaders are intentionally and assiduously creating.