Authors: David Capie, Victoria University; and Amitav Acharya, American University
This week President Obama will join seventeen other Asian leaders in Bali for the Sixth East Asia Summit (EAS).
With a tough economy at home and the decision of the Congressional ‘super-committee’ on the federal budget only days away, this is hardly a good time for a US president to be out of the country. Obama’s decision to participate in the EAS for the first time in Bali is therefore a powerful symbol of a shift in American policy towards Asia. It also says much about the evolving nature of regional cooperation. Read more…
Author: Amitav Acharya, American University
The escalating regional tensions over territorial disputes in the South China Sea (SCS) have revived two crucial questions facing Asia’s strategic future: whether China is pursuing a ‘Monroe Doctrine’ over its neighbourhood, including the SCS area; and how far China’s neighbours can go in acquiescing to its rising power.
The Monroe Doctrine was first enunciated in 1823 by then-US President James Monroe as the policy of a rising US forbidding European powers to either colonise or interfere in the affairs of states in the Western Hemisphere. The essence of the Monroe Doctrine was to deny the Latin American and Caribbean region to European powers, and establish US regional hegemony. Read more…
Author: Amitav Acharya, Asia-Pacific Foundation of Canada and American University
It is bad enough that Canada is absent in Asia. But what’s worse is that nobody in Asia seems to care.
In a recent op-ed, Joseph Caron (Canada’s former ambassador to China and Japan and former High Commissioner to India) and David Emerson (former Canadian Foreign Affairs and International Trade Minister) wrote: ‘Canada remains on the fringes of [Asia’s] remarkable transformation, whether diplomatic engagement, trade, foreign investment or educational or cultural exchanges. We risk being left behind.’
Read more…
Author: Amitav Acharya, American University, Washington
What will the Association of Southeast Asian Nations look like in the year 2030? As a durable and successful regional grouping in the developing world, ASEAN is a force for stability and cooperation in Asia. But can we take its longevity and success for granted?
ASEAN’s irrelevance or even death has been predicted several times before. Read more…
Author: Amitav Acharya, American University
The US-China relationship is often touted as the most important for the world’s future, but bilateral tensions between the two powers over domestic politics will prevent a US-China duopoly from being a global problem-solver. The silver lining is that this leaves room for others to play a more meaningful international role.
No one should be disappointed by the outcome of the US-China summit in Washington on 19 January, because nothing much was expected from it. Read more…
Author: Amitav Acharya, American University
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s ‘new American moment in international relations’ speech, delivered to the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington DC on September 8, 2010, has been widely discussed and debated. Although the speech did not concern Asia only, it does signal important changes in the way the United States looks at Asia, especially its regional architecture.
One unusual aspect of the speech was the amount of space devoted to regions and regional organisations in general. Read more…
Author: Amitav Acharya, American University
The just concluded Fourth East Asia Summit (EAS) in Thailand will long be remembered as the venue for seemingly competing ideas from Australia and Japan for reorganizing regional cooperation in Asia. But will it also be known for having altered the course of Asian multilateralism?
At one level, the two proposals, Australia’s Asia-Pacific Community, and Japan’s East Asian Community, are timely. Read more…
