China is now the largest national source of the greenhouse gas pollution causing global warming and resulting changes to the Earth's climate. In coming decades, the growth in its emissions of carbon dioxide, the most significant greenhouse gas, will likely exceed that of the rest of the world combined. Therefore, on a very practical level, China is absolutely central to the world's efforts to address climate change. That said, it is quite a more complex and controversial question to ask whether, and to what degree, China is responsible for climate change. Certainly the question needs to be asked because the answer to it will be central to China's willingness, and indeed the willingness of the Chinese people, to be fully involved in global solutions to this problem. However, the question of China's responsibility for climate change is seldom posed, making this book possibly the first one devoted to it. No doubt more will be written in coming years.

I should state at the outset that the aim of this book is certainly not to single out China for blame. There is plenty of blame for causing climate change to go around, with the United States and most Americans foremost worthy of it. The received wisdom seems to be that China is not responsible for climate change, with justifications for this conclusion usually revolving around China's large population, relative poverty and low historical pollution relative to the world's wealthy countries. However, as the contributors to this volume demonstrate, the received wisdom, while having merit, may be too simplistic and increasingly anachronistic. The answer to the question of China's responsibility for climate change depends greatly on whether one is thinking in terms of practical contributions (for example, how much pollution comes from China's territory), time (for example, past, present and future contributions to the problem), ethics (for example, moral foundations and assumptions about what is right and wrong, just and unjust), agency (for example, whether it might be the Chinese state, Chinese people or Chinese corporations that are responsible) and so forth.

In other words, identifying whether China is responsible for climate change, and whether and how it will be involved in addressing the problem, is not a straightforward matter.