April 29,2016 Special Forum

Synopsis of the German Marshall Fund’s Japan Trilateral Forum, March 1-2, 2016

Why is it important to forge a global triangular framework under the auspices of Washington, Tokyo, and Brussels? Triangularity was assumed to exist during the Cold War, but Japanese horizons remained seriously limited and Europeans relied heavily on US power in East Asia. A triangle of this sort was posited as the emerging structure in the early 1990s before China’s rise and Japan&rsqu..

Editorial Staff
AIIB , Asianism , Populism , Post-modern Syndrome , Refugee crisis
April 29,2016 Special Forum

Navigating Historical Tensions: Pragmatic Leadership, Empathy, and the United States Factor in Japan-South Korea Relations

The year 2015 was, arguably, an important turning point for Japan’s relations with South Korea. Since the advent of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) administration of Prime Minister Abe in 2012, and the election of Park Geun-hye as South Korea’s president in 2013, political relations between East Asia’s most vibrant democratic polities had been in the doldrums. Despite rep..

John Nilsson-Wright
Abandonment-Entrapment model , Han Miracle , Kono Statement , Yasukuni Shrine
April 15,2016 Open Forum

Can’t Buy Me Soft Power (with Hard Power): China’s Appeal to South Koreans

In January 2016, Twice, a multinational girls pop group of South Korea, was at the center of controversy. Chou Tzu-yu, one of the members from Taiwan appeared on a show holding the Taiwanese official national flag (quite possibly asked to do so by the production team). The clip was uploaded on the Internet and then was bombarded with criticism by Chinese netizens. Some even threatened to boyc..

Kim Jiyoon*
American culture , Confucius Institutes , Global leadership , Liberal democracy , Smart power , Twice
April 14,2016 Country Reports

Country Report: Japan (April 2016)

In the late winter of 2016, the Japanese mainstream was pleased with US foreign policy, if nervous about campaign rhetoric: reassured about triangularity opposed to North Korea, but still trying to keep dialogue with the North alive for the sake of the abductions issue; exceedingly quiet on Abe’s plan to meet with Putin in Sochi in early May; and disappointed that hopes for improving ti..

Editorial Staff
December 28 Japan-ROK agreement , History textbooks , JICA , South China Sea , Takeshima , Trump
April 07,2016 Review Article

Ex-ambassadors to Seoul Advise It to Change

G. A. Ivashentsov and Shin Beom-shik, eds., Bezopasnost’ i Sotrudnichestvo v Severo-Vostochnoi Azii: Sovmestnyi Dokument Rossiiskikh i Iuzhnokoreiskikh Ekspertov (Security and Cooperation in Northeast Asia: Joint Document of Russian and South Korean Experts) (Moscow: Spetskniga, 2015) Muto Masatoshi, Nikkan Tairitsu no Shinso (The True Face of the Opposition between Japan and South..

Gilbert Rozman
Historical consciousness , North Korean threat , Sino-US Relations , trilateralism
March 25,2016 Country Reports

Country Report: Russia (March 2016)

Vladimir Lukin, after explaining shortcomings of the United States, wrote in Rossiia v Global’noi Politike, no. 1, about his conceptions of China and India. He praised Deng Xiaoping for controlling China’s not inconsiderable foreign ambitions to devote all energies to resolving severe domestic problems. Over the following three-and-a-half decades, China lost not in the least its ..

Editorial Staff (with the assistance of Olga Puzanova)
EEU , Russian Far East , Silk Road Economic Belt , Sino-US Relations , TPP
February 23,2016 Open Forum

Synopsis: German Marshall Fund Workshop on Sino-Russian Relations After Maidan—A New Reality? (February 4, 2016)

In 2015, Sino-Russian relations figured into debates on international relations more than at any time since the end of the Cold War. There was notable divergence on the state of these relations. There was also concern about what should be done to limit the relationship from drawing closer with little consensus on how to proceed. From the point of view of US relations with allies, there was disagre..

Editorial Staff
Sino-Russian Relations
January 25,2016 Country Reports

Country Report: Russia (January 2016)

The message in Russian media of late 2015 was pessimism about economic ties to China, but reluctance to blame the Chinese. Little is said about Russia’s relations in East Asia apart from China. Debate continues on the “turn to the East,” some seeing it as ongoing and inevitable, and others calling it an economic failure now ended.   Relations with China On November 24 in lenta.ru, I..

Editorial Staff (with the assistance of Olga Puzanova)
Chinese diaspora , Geopolitics , National identity , Regionalism , Yellow Peril
December 18,2015 Alternative Scenarios

Positive Scenario for Modi’s India “Acts East” Take Two: A Response to Manish Tewari

American officials worked closely with the previous Indian government, led by the Congress Party and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, to build a wide-ranging strategic partnership after decades of geopolitical alienation between the world’s largest democracies. Since India’s May 2014 elections, they have worked closely with the current Indian government, led by Narendra Modi of the Bharatiya Ja..

Daniel Twining
India-US relations , Indian soft power , Indian sovereignty , National identity