October 05,2013 Open Forum

Economic Priorities and Geopolitical Advantages

After World War II, the structure of geopolitical competition changed. New economic strategies created extraordinarily high growth rates that enabled countries to become major powers quickly by focusing on economic development. Exceptionally destructive new military technologies made traditional geopolitical strategies, organized around military power and territorial expansion, very dangerous and ..

William H. Overholt
economic strategies , geopolitical strategies , peaceful rises , Rebalancing
October 04,2013 Open Forum

Modeling a “New Type of Great Power Relations”: A Chinese Viewpoint

Forging a “new type of great power relations” is a novel foreign relations concept that China has proposed and emphasized of late, drawing widespread attention. It has taken shape mainly in the process of conceptualizing and operationalizing policy toward the United States. According to Western international relations theory, as a new great power arises, it needs to change the existing order, ..

Ren Xiao*
established power , New type of great power relations , rising power , Xi Jinping
October 04,2013 Country Reports

Country Report: China (October 2013)

Chinese writings on international relations in the Asia-Pacific region continue to be the most prolific and informative in comparison to Japanese, Korean, and Russian writings. Despite censorship and huge gaps in the analysis, there is a lot of interesting material. In recent weeks coverage of each of the principal bilateral relations in the region has offered new insights on Chinese debates and o..

Editorial Staff (with the assistance of Pang Zengjun)
Bipolarity , economic regionalims , equal dialogue with US , India , Japan’s threat , North Korean buffer , Park Geun-hye , SCO , seapower , Shinzo Abe
September 30,2013 National Commentaries

US Perspective

Deterrence, NPT and the Two Koreas What Has Changed and What Is New in Engaging North Korea? (from remarks prepared for the Asan Nuclear Forum, February 2013) The year 2013 marks the twentieth anniversary of the beginning of talks to address the first North Korean nuclear crisis. That crisis arose when the IAEA found the DPRK to be in violation of its safeguards commitments. The UN Security Cou..

Robert L. Gallucci
deterrence , Engagement , Nuclear terrorism , Nuclear weapons , Reunification
September 17,2013 Review Article

Making Headway on the “Economic-Security Nexus”: Contributions from Southeast Asia

What is the relationship between economic growth, interdependence, and competition on the one hand, and geopolitical security and stability on the other? Do international trade, production, and investment linkages intensify interdependence and foster common interests and values to the extent that they inhibit conflict? Or, is economic competition an inevitable extension of underlying geopolitical ..

Evelyn Goh
ASEAN , Conflict Management , Economic Interdependence , Regime Insecurity , Vulnerability
September 16,2013 Country Reports

Country Report: Russia (September 2013)

Russia’s thirst for multipolarity on terms that would not require reconsideration of its assumptions about countries active in East Asia was on vivid display through the summer. Hopes rose appreciably for North Korea’s help in this pursuit, doubts about China were limited in ways supportive of this overall objective, and commentaries on South Korea, Japan, and India did not suggest anything to..

Editorial Staff (with the assistance of Olga Puzanova)
ASEAN , China alliance , Cold war school , Collective system of security , Evgenyi Bazhanov , Gleb Ivashentsov , Multipolarity , Putin
September 16,2013 Open Forum

Asan Washington Forum Synopsis Part 2: The Alliance and North Korea

In this second and final part of the synopsis of the June 24-25 discussion, we focus on the triangle with North Korea. This summation may be read in conjunction with Topics of the Month, in which we are following the ROK-US alliance closely, and the Special Forum in this issue of The Asan Forum, which is devoted to analysis of how five countries are thinking strategically about North Korea. The fo..

Editorial Staff
Denuclearization , Optimists , Park Geun-hye , Pessimists , ROK-US Alliance , Trustpolitik
September 13,2013 Country Reports

Country Report: South Korea (September 2013)

In a speech delivered on the sixty-eighth anniversary of Liberation Day, Park Geun-hye said, “Japanese politicians need to show courageous leadership to heal wounds from the past to develop the bilateral relationship to a sincere cooperative partnership.” She also urged Japan to take “responsible and sincere” measures for victims of history and together to establish peace and shared prospe..

Editorial Staff (prepared by Han Minjeong)
dependency on China , inter-Korean trust process , Merkel , mutual abandonment , Park Geun-hye , Shinzo Abe , Xi Jinping , Yasukuni Shrine
September 01,2013 National Commentaries

South Korean Perspective

Deterrence, NPT and the Two Koreas A South Korean View on Further Cuts in Nuclear Weapons In April 2009, during his visit to Prague, President Obama announced his plan for “a world without nuclear weapons.” Through a series of negotiations, the United States and Russia reached an agreement to reduce nuclear weapons to 1,550 each—the New START Treaty. Four years later in Berlin, Obama..

Choi Kang*
Barack Obama , Berlin speech , Extended deterrence , Non-proliferation treaty , Nuclear weapons
September 01,2013 Country Reports

Country Report: Japan (September 2013)

Coverage of Abe Shinzo in the Japanese media has centered on three familiar themes and on one that has gone mostly unnoticed abroad. The July 21 Upper House elections were a referendum on Abenomics. Speculation about Abe’s revisionism only quieted some after it became known that Abe would not visit the Yasukuni Shrine on August 15. Moreover, moves to bolster Japan’s defense capabilities, natio..

Editorial Staff (with the assistance of Iwaki Shigeyuki*)
Apology diplomacy , Chinese power struggle , PLA , virtuous history , Xi Jinping