April 09,2015 Special Forum

Kazakhstan’s Multi-vector Foreign Policy: Diminishing Returns in an Era of Great Power “Pivots”?

Since Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced the Obama administration’s “pivot” to Asia in 2011, the other most consequential powers—China, Russia, India, and Japan—have constructed their own versions of the “pivot.” Each ultimately seeks to make itself central to the reordering of strategic and economic power in Asia in the twenty-first century. China’s rise has been the dri..

Michael Clarke
April 09,2015 Special Forum

Europe’s Incomplete Pivot to Asia

We have been talking about the pivot to Asia, and discussing for so long about the US turning its back on Europe. I have always been convinced that we should together pivot to Asia, the US and the EU. It’s our joint interest, and it would be a strategically powerful move. The reality at the moment is that somebody else is pivoting to Asia. Yes, we have do have a security challenge now, which is ..

Daniel Twining
AIIB , EU , Transatlantic relations , Transpacific relations
March 18,2015 Country Reports

Country Report: South Korea (March 2015)

Assessments of the Park administration’s foreign policy Marking the third year of the Park administration, criticism of her foreign policy grew more intense. On March 2, a Chosun Ilbo article assessed it as unbalanced, charging that too much weight has been put on the inter-Korean relationship. Reunification is, for sure, important, but related policies are dominated by populism and propagan..

Editorial Staff (prepared by Han Minjeong)
Asia-Pacific alliance , TPP , Wendy Sherman
March 02,2015 Topics of the Month

The Negative Soft Power of the China Dream – II

As Ming Wan writes in his commentary in The Asan Forum on the “China Dream,” Chinese leaders use New Year’s celebrations as an opportunity to sum up the achievements of the recent past and to chart new directions for the future. Here, I discuss such New Year’s activity to argue that soft power works in interesting and unexpected ways in China. Joseph Nye famously defines soft power as ..

William A. Callahan
Anti-Japaneseism , China Dream , nationalism , negative soft power
March 02,2015 Country Reports

Country Report: Japan (February 2015)

South Korea preoccupied Japanese media more than China, recognized as a threat, North Korea, posing an ever greater threat, and Russia, which was transfixing the media elsewhere. Conservatives were obsessed with the “comfort women” issue and linked progressive dishonor of Japan with South Korean disrespect and campaigns in the United States and elsewhere to sully Japan’s name. The realist po..

Editorial Staff
historical revisionism , Murayama Statement , Yasukuni Shrine
February 27,2015 Review Article

‘Sengo 70nen hoshu no Ajiakan’ [‘The Asian Views of Conservatives over the Postwar 70 Years’]

Wakamiya Yoshibumi, Sengo 70nen hoshu no Ajiakan, [The Asian Views of Conservatives over the Postwar 70 Years] (Tokyo: Asahi Shimbun shuppan, December 25, 2014) In the face of an unrelenting onslaught of criticism from Japanese conservatives, the progressive side, led by Asahi Shimbun, continues to make its case. Unlike the era of the Cold War, when the principal foreign policy divide was the U..

Gilbert Rozman
collective self-defense , conservatism , hereditary leadership , Revisionism , Shinzo Abe , Yasukuni Shrine
February 27,2015 Country Reports

Country Report: China (February 2015)

An article by Zhong Feiteng in Waijiao pinglun describes China’s new Asian strategy. It observes that Europe has been the geopolitical center and Asia the periphery, and Great Britain and the United States have reigned as the leaders of the international system. With China and India rising, in the 21st century Asia is becoming the global geopolitical center, but this has caused the United States..

Editorial Staff (with the assistance of Dong Jiaxin*)
ASEAN , Cool Japan , Indo-Pacific strategy , Korean wave , Maritime Silk Road , Peaceful Development , Ukraine
February 10,2015 National Commentaries

A US Perspective

"India-US relations:Developments from the Fall and Winter of 2014 to the 2015 Modi-Obama Summit"   A Successful Summit Revives US-India Strategic Partnership   In the late 1990s, after decades of geopolitical alienation during and the Cold War, President Bill Clinton called America and India “natural allies.” In the 2000s, the George W. Bush administration had b..

Daniel Twining
Balancing China , Economic Relations , Indo-US relations , Republic Day parade
February 10,2015 National Commentaries

An Indian Perspective

"India-US relations:Developments from the Fall and Winter of 2014 to the 2015 Modi-Obama Summit"   Between Symbolism and Substance: An Assessment of Obama’s India Visit   Taking a step forward from his September 2014 state visit to the United States, Prime Minister Modi invited President Obama to visit India as the Guest of Honour at the 66th Republic Day celebrations. ..

Rahul Mishra
2+2 Ministerial , BIT , civil nuclear deal , climate change , CliND , defense cooperation , qualitative reinvigoration , Totalization Agreement