October 14,2016 Open Forum

Asian Security after US Hegemony: Spheres of Influence and the Third Wave of Regional Order

The Asian security landscape is unsettled. The region is quickly becoming multipolar. Hedging strategies—even by US allies—are now commonplace. Intra-regional trust remains low amid myriad territorial and strategic disputes. And Asia’s regional institutions remain unwilling to take on the tasks of security governance because member states will not allow it. These trends signal a reg..

Van Jackson
ASEAN , Cold War , imperialism , soft balancing , spheres of influence , THAAD
October 13,2016 Open Forum

On the Brink of a Breakthrough or Doomed to Fail Again: Will A Fresh Effort at Repairing Russo-Japanese Relations Bear Fruit?

Of all major countries, Japan has been the only one to pursue relations with Russia on a generally positive trajectory since the 2014 Ukraine crisis. Recently, the pace of exchanges has accelerated, and the scope and depth of Russo-Japanese discussions have been growing quickly. From May 2016, Moscow and Tokyo have entered a period of intense diplomacy aimed at achieving a breakthrough in the..

Dmitri Trenin
1956 Moscow Declaration , Crimea , Northern Sea Route , Putin , Shinzo Abe , turn to the East , Ukraine crisis , Yamaguchi summit
June 24,2016 Open Forum

The Pivot vs. the “Progressives”

For more than a decade the two most divisive issues in East Asia have been the gap over how to deal with: 1) the Sino-US relationship and which side is responsible for damaging it and endangering regional stability; and 2) North Korea’s nuclear weapons and missile threats and how best to resolve them. In recent commentaries we find misleading talk of both China’s limited aspiratio..

Gilbert Rozman
Asia for the Asians , China first , G2 , hegemonism , Kurt Campbell , Six-Party Talks , Sunshine Policy
June 22,2016 Open Forum

China and the Evolving World Order: A Stakeholder or a Revolutionary Power?

China’s rapid rise has raised the question if China is a stakeholder or a dissatisfied revolutionary power to advance its alternative visions. This article argues that although China is not a simple rule-taker content to preserve the existing order, it is not yet a revolutionary power discontent with and willing to undermine the existing order. Not only is China far from the position to..

Suisheng Zhao
AIIB , Bretton Woods , Institution-building , OBOR , Reformist , Revisionist , sovereignty , Tianxia
June 22,2016 Alternative Scenarios

Negative Scenario II: The Integration of China’s Northeast and Russia’s Far East in the Silk Road Economic Belt

Russia pursues a top-down, state-led policy formulated in Moscow to promote economic development of the Russian Far East and its economic relations with the Asia-Pacific. Can this policy be considered state-led industrialization with characteristics similar to Japanese, Chinese and South Korean models of state-led industrialization and export-led growth? Given Russia’s asymmetric econo..

Gaye Christoffersen
Access Meeting China-Russia , Asymmetric economic relations , Silk Road fever , State-led industrialization , Valdai Discussion Club
June 16,2016 National Commentaries

A View from the United States: Defending Camelot

President Obama’s final G7 summit meeting occurred against the backdrop of a world in which the core values espoused by the G7—democracy, the free-market economy, and respect for international norms of security and human rights—are increasingly under stress. The very fact that this was a G7 rather than a G8 meeting underscored the recent setbacks in what had been a trend toward cons..

Frank Jannuzi
Brexit , Consensus-building , International norms , Musudan IRBM , TPP , UNCLOS Tribunal , US nuclear deterrence
June 16,2016 National Commentaries

A View from Germany

The summit in Ise-Shima was already the third G7-meeting without Russia. (Germany had hosted the previous gathering in Elmau in 2015.) Japan, thus, worked particularly closely with Germany in coordinating the substance of this summit. This is evident from the importance given to issues such as global health, climate change, and women’s empowerment and gender equality in the discussions ..

Hanns W. Maull
German-Russian cooperation , ITLOS , Leaders' Declaration , Quantitative easing , Three arrows , UN sanctions regime , Wandel durch Annäherung
June 16,2016 National Commentaries

A View from Japan

No other diplomatic event in recent years has benefitted Prime Minister Abe Shinzo more than the G7 Ise-Shima summit held on May 26 and 27. G7 summits held annually since 1975 (transforming into the G8 and back) have rarely been occasions to make historic decisions; they are more often occasions for the leaders of the seven industrial democracies to review and discuss pressing issues and incr..

Tanaka Akihiko*
Consumption tax , G7 Ise-Shima Summit , G8 Okinawa Summit , Global Fund , Health , Hiroshima visit , Infrastructure , Internationalism , Okinawa ID Initiative , Women
June 15,2016 Country Reports

Country Report: China (June 2016)

In the spring of 2016, Chinese analysts considered the repercussions of North Korea’s latest nuclear test. They assessed the prospects for China’s “One Belt, One Road” (OBOR) policy, with particular attention to its implementation in Iran and Afghanistan. They also evaluated the prospects for Sino–Russian cooperative relations, and sharply criticized Japan’s intervention in the South C..

Danielle F. S. Cohen (assisted by Dong Jiaxin)
Afghan reconstruction , Cuban missile crisis , enuclearization , Japanese intervention , Sino-Iranian relations , SLOC , Sustainable security , THAAD
June 10,2016 Alternative Scenarios

Positive Scenario II

In 2009 in New York, a vast program for cooperation between the regions of the Russian Far East and Eastern Siberia, on one side, and Northeast China, on the other, extending to 2018, was adopted by the leaders of Russia and China (Dmitri Medvedev and Hu Jintao). For the realization of this program, they were to carry out economic integration of these two border regions on a qualitatively new leve..

Ivan Zuenko
Agricultural cooperation , Free port Vladivostok , SREB EEU Convergence , Yellow Peril