Economics, Politics and Public Policy in East Asia and the Pacific
Author: Kent Anderson & Joseph Lo Bianco
Languages are back in the news. As part of the national curriculum debate, English is one of the first cabs off the rank and Languages Other Than English are following in the second group.
The National Asian Languages and Studies in Schools Program also adds limited funding for the next three years to promoting four targeted languages.
Author: Rajiv Kumar
Despite exhortations from successive G-20 summits, the Doha Development Round (DDR) has been in a state of suspended animation since July 2008. It is fortunate that protectionist measures taken by several governments since November 2008, have not resulted in a rash of competitive protectionism. But we are at the top of a very slippery path. It will not take much for governments to succumb to domestic protectionist pressures if unemployment continues to rise or the recovery falters. Therefore, it is quite important that the multilateral trading regime be strengthened and the credibility of the WTO which serves as its global watchman is enhanced. There can be no better means of achieving this than to ensure a successful conclusion of the DDR.
In this context, it is sad to realize that a successful outcome of the DDR is seen as an increasingly remote possibility. There is talk of ‘multilaterlizing regionalism’ which in all honesty is some what of an oxymoron. And some observers, on grounds of realism have suggested that we accept a failed DDR as a fait accompli and start to look for second best options. India and other emerging economies should not accept such a pessimistic prognosis. Instead they need to ensure that the DDR, is successfully concluded even if with a lower ambition level.
Author: Suman Bery
India’s Commerce Minister and his senior officials have been unusually candid about their motives in hosting this week’s conclave of trade ministers and officials in New Delhi to revive the Doha trade negotiations (the so-called Doha Development Round, or DDR).
Jointly with the U.S., India is commonly held accountable for the failure of the last mini-Ministerial meeting to discuss the Round, in July 2008.
Author: Peter Drysdale
Developments in Australia’s relations with China over the last few months or so have been less than sure-footed, though to some they might have been predictable. There have been missteps on both sides. Events like the commercial failure of the Chinalco deal, the arrest of Stern Hu (Rio Tinto’s iron ore price negotiator), Australian responses to the June 4 anniversary and to the Urumqi killings, Chinese reactions to the Melbourne film festival and the granting of a visa to Rebiya Kadeer to attend it were bound to disturb sensibilities in the relationship. The extent to which they have knocked it off course is a matter of debate. But there is no question that these events have been a cause for public and official reflection in both China and Australia. There is also no question that they have, for the moment, cooled Chinese diplomatic warmth towards Australia. Stephen FitzGerald, respected China scholar and Australia’s first Ambassador to China after the Whitlam Government established diplomatic relations with the PRC in 1972, sets out his clear view of how this came to pass and what might be done about it. Read more…
Author: Stephen FitzGerald
Whatever interpretation one chooses to put on China’s international posture, whether you think it will be more friend and partner or more hostile and overbearing, the question for us is the same: how well is the government managing our interests? The issues we’ve had on China over the past year point to major problems – on our side. The policy narrative is missing, there appears to be no long-term strategy, the quality of dialogue is demonstrably deficient, and there are failings in the strategic management of relations.
In the more than a year since the Prime Minister first set out his thinking on long-term regional architecture, in which China clearly would be central, there has been no extended explanation of long-term China policy. This is the more surprising given the issues that have arisen over that time. And each has left questions over policy and relationship-management.
Author: Ryo Sahashi
On August 26, election fever had hit Japan, and an op-ed signed by Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) leader Yukio Hatoyama appeared in the International Herald Tribune (IHT) Asian edition and the New York Times website. The piece elicited anxiety and criticism from some Japan watchers, especially in policymaking and media circles in Washington.
If we carefully read this piece, and the original Japanese version in Voice plus, we can see the ideas are modest compared with earlier DPJ defense policy positions. DPJ positions on suspending the oil refueling mission in the Indian Ocean, and reviewing the 2006 road map on realigning U.S. forces in Japan, are not mentioned either. Why, then, did this piece cause so much angst?
Author: Renu Kohli
The challenge for a central bank, as always, is to keep inflationary expectations anchored and moderate the rise in long-term rates. During a crisis such as the world is experiencing now, this is no easy feat.
Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor D. Subbarao recently drew attention to the central bank’s multiple indicator approach in setting monetary policy. This tells us the scope for discretion, and judgement, in framing monetary policy in India and the skills needed to conduct it. The accompanying charts tell us why.
Author: Tobias Harris
Hatoyama Yukio has made perhaps the most important personnel decision that he will have to make as the DPJ transitions into power. Ozawa Ichiro, his predecessor as DPJ leader, architect of the DPJ’s election victory, and without question the most powerful figure within the DPJ, will serve as the party’s secretary-general.
The reason why this decision is controversial is simple: as I argued at Foreign Policy last month, Ozawa as secretary-general could act precisely as he did in 1993-1994 and as LDP party officials have acted throughout the party’s time in government. He could inject himself into the policy process, using his control of the party apparatus to exercise a veto over cabinet decisions. The DPJ has quite rightly indicated that it wants to centralize power in cabinet, preventing the politicians outside the cabinet from playing a dominant role in the policymaking process. I have written about this dilemma before. How can the DPJ form a cabinet without its most powerful figure included in its ranks? As MTC has argued, there are obvious downsides to including Ozawa in the campaign, not least the scandal hanging over his head.
Author: Mohamed Ariff, MIER
Since opening up in a big way in the early 1990s, China has made amazing progress on the economic front, thanks mainly to its highly pragmatic, market-friendly policies.
China has emerged as the manufacturing warehouse for the whole world, facilitated by massive inflows of foreign investment into the country. China has moved up the development ladder rapidly, fuelled by blazing double-digit growth rates.
Author: Raghbendra Jha
As the world moves inexorably towards the Climate Summit in Copenhagen at the end of 2009, immense pressure has been brought to bear on India to accept legally binding carbon emissions targets. The latest attempt to pressure India came from US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during her recent visit to India.
Such pressures on India and some other countries (particularly China) are occurring against the backdrop of a new wave of environmental activism among western commentators over the climate change debate. For example, Al Gore has called on all countries to place an immediate moratorium on coal-fired power plants. This would simply be a no go for India. More than half of the 800,000 megawatts of power India plans to produce by 2030 are to come from coal-fired plants because coal is abundant in India and other energy sources are relatively scarce.
Author: Daniel Kliman
China’s reemergence as the preeminent power in East Asia poses a seminal challenge to Japan. In navigating this challenge, Tokyo has pursued two complementary strategies: binding—enmeshing Beijing in international institutions—and hedging—consolidating alliance ties with the United States and developing new indigenous military capabilities.
Why Japan has settled on this bifurcated approach to China is an understudied topic. To shed light on Japan’s China policy, the author conducted 29 interviews in Tokyo from March to June 2009. The findings of this research trip are striking: China’s regime type plays a key role in Japan’s strategic calculus. Indeed, Beijing’s decision making process— opaque and unconstrained by checks and balances—has generated a host of negative perceptions in Tokyo. These perceptions have compelled Japan to bind and hedge. Japan’s China policy will remain unmoved by political developments in Tokyo, even with the recent electoral victory of the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ).
Author: William Maley
At 6 am on 20 August, I headed out from my hotel in the Kabul Shahr-e Naw district to join a team of observers visiting polling places in different parts of the Afghan capital.
Most election observation by international observer teams is as much an exercise in confidence building as in detailed monitoring, since at best one can witness only a tiny fraction of the vote-casting even at a single polling station. My own day proved quite uneventful. A bomb blast in a nearby suburb, and a gunfight downtown, did nothing to disrupt my monitoring, and in the polling places I visited, the polling staff conducted themselves well, right down to the proper recording of serial numbers on the tamperproof seals that hold the lids of ballot boxes in place. Many journalists in Kabul saw much the same thing, and this lent a distinct tone of relief to reporting of election day.
Author: Neville Maxwell, ANU
‘So solidly built into our consciousness is the concept that China is conducting a rapacious and belligerent foreign policy that whenever a dispute arises in which China is involved she is instantly assumed to have provoked it.’ — Felix Greene 1965.
India is heavily reinforcing its Army and Air Force units on its undefined border with China (two additional infantry divisions, a squadron of attack aircraft, refurbishing airfields etc). This is in breach of the parties’ obligation under a 1993 Sino-Indian treaty to keep force levels in border areas to ‘a minimum level compatible with … friendly and good neighbourly relations’, and Beijing has protested angrily and publicly.
Author: Fergus Hanson
Watching China’s reaction to the failed Rio-Chinalco deal and the decision to let Rebiya Kadeer into the country has been interesting. To an outside observer, the rhetoric and response from Beijing sometimes seem surprisingly immature.
But China doesn’t reserve its overzealous responses for the big picture multi-billion deals and alleged terrorists. In 2008, I released a policy brief on China’s aid program in the Pacific. The Chinese Foreign Ministry opted to counter with an official rebuke at a news conference, calling it ‘totally pointless and unacceptable’. When this year’s version of the report, which tracks China’s aid giving in the region, came out, it was the Communist Party mouthpiece, the Global Times that laid in.
Author: Paul Dibb and Geoffrey Barker
Foreign business negotiators in China face greatly increased uncertainty now that detained Rio Tinto executive Stern Hu, a Chinese-born Australian, has been formally charged with espionage offences.
The affair underscores the need for businessmen to understand Chinese communism and Chinese culture, history and attitudes, as well as the commercial and legal systems, when they deal with Chinese officials and business executives.