The book explores the proactive and reactive features of China and India's domestic and foreign policies to address two intertwined challenges: first, China and India have taken policy measures that accord with their own domestic priorities; second, both countries have had to alter the trajectory of their proactive policy measures as a result of external pressures. The book argues that China and India's proactive and reactive policy measures to address energy insecurity and climate change have been shaped by their two-level pressures. At the domestic/unit level, both countries have had to sustain fast economic growth and eradicate poverty in order to maximize their economic wealth. At the international/systemic level, both countries have sought to enhance their great power status in the international system which is characterized by not only asymmetrical interdependence but also global governance in general, and global energy and climate governance in particular.
