This dissertation aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of the decision-making process in China's hydro-politics arena through an in-depth case analysis of the Nu River hydropower development project in Yunnan Province, China. The research argues that broad conceptual lenses such as civil society and corporatism only offer a static description that cannot capture evolving state-society relations in China. The Fragmented Authoritarianism model, which only focuses on the competitive bargaining and negotiation process at the bureaucratic level, is also no longer adequate in explaining the evolving political dynamics in the Chinese hydropower decision-making process.

Drawing on the Advocacy Coalition Framework, this dissertation examines how China's societal as well as governmental entities interact in the decision-making process through the case of the Nu River hydropower development project. I analyze how two broad coalitions, which represent competing priorities and policy beliefs regarding the environmental protection and economic development, have emerged from various entities. Based on the shared policy beliefs and goals, the members of these coalitions have collaborated internally within their coalitions and have competed with their counterparts externally. I focus specifically on the roles that China's environmental NGOs and the media have played in this hydropower development decision-making process and the strategies and resources they have utilized to influence the public policy outcome. Through process-tracing, this dissertation argues that the struggle between the two coalitions has led to the current policy outcome by influencing final decision-making authorities within the central government and the general public.

The finding that a pluralistic coalition-based explanation such as the ACF better captures the decision-making process over the Nu River case than state or bureaucracy-centric models of the Chinese policy-making process strongly suggests that these models need to be revised to incorporate societal entities and their policy beliefs, roles, and influence. These societal entities have exerted their influence in the policy-making process by finding their allies from within the government and from international NGOs and organizations. They have also utilized multiple strategies and resources. These aspects of pluralization and diversification cannot be fully explained by the existing conceptual tools and frameworks. The coalition-based explanation offers a more comprehensive understanding than existing models of the transition that is taking place in the Chinese environmental politics arena as dramatized through the case of the Nu River hydropower development project.