Economics, Politics and Public Policy in East Asia and the Pacific
Author: Shiro Armstrong, ANU
In President Obama’s landmark speech in Canberra last month, an over-riding theme was that the United States welcomes China’s rise so long as it plays by the global rules.
Yet those rules are dynamic, and there is a need to have China involved in setting them given the scale of China and its importance to the regional and global economy, as well as to global security. Read more…
Author: Shiro Armstrong, ANU
East Asia’s pursuit of policy strategies of openness to trade and investment have resulted in its being economically one of the world’s most internationally-integrated regions — both intraregionally and towards the rest of the world.
Author: Gary Hawke, NZIER
While in Honolulu for the APEC summit recently, President Obama announced a 12-month timeframe to complete negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).
Some have welcomed this development, but, in truth, it is a disappointing one. Read more…
Author: Shiro Armstrong, ANU
The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement got a big boost around the APEC meeting in Honolulu. A broad framework was announced, progress highlighted, and a 12 month deadline for a deal was set.
The TPP is the first trade agreement which President Obama did not inherit from his predecessors, and it is seen as a means of keeping the US engaged in Asia. Read more…
Authors: Peter Drysdale and Shiro Armstrong, East Asia Forum
Suddenly Asia has emerged as a major player in the global economy.
Asia already accounts for 27 per cent of world GDP and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) 2050 Report issued last May suggests that it will account for as much as 51 per cent a generation hence. Read more…
Author: Shiro Armstrong, ANU
Australia at last is taking up the challenge of comprehensively thinking through its new strategic circumstance in Asia, and taking Asia seriously.
On 28 September, Prime Minister Julia Gillard gave a timely and important speech to launch a new White Paper on Australia in the Asian Century. Read more…
Author: Shiro Armstrong, ANU
China briefly stopped exports of rare earth elements to Japan last year following a maritime collision near Diaoyu/Senkaku islands and the subsequent political fallout.
The reaction from Japan and other major buyers was alarm and protest as the metals are crucial to high-tech industries and China supplies over 90 per cent of rare earths globally (holding an estimated 37 per cent of the world’s reserves).
Author: Philippa Dee, ANU and Shiro Armstrong, ANU, Columbia University
The Doha Development Round of World Trade Organisation trade negotiations is in deep trouble and could become the first Round to fail.
What will happen if Doha fails? Read more…
Author: Shiro Armstrong, ANU and Columbia University
The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) aims to be a high quality, 21st Century economic agreement among its nine members. It is also supposed to encourage others to join in. Led by the United States, there is a strong push to deliver TPP this year in time for the APEC meeting in Honolulu in November.
But rushing a quick deal on the TPP should not be at the expense of a good economic agreement. Read more…
Author: Shiro Armstrong, ANU
The Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) that Taiwan and China signed on June 29 this year is a milestone in relations across the Straits. It normalises economic relations between Taiwan and the Mainland. Up to this point, Taiwan has had discriminatory trade and investment policies towards China under the guise of political-security concerns that severely limited economic engagement across the Straits. These measures meant that Taiwan had effectively cut itself off from participating fully in the East Asian production networks.
Taiwan is now free to institutionalise economic relations with other important trading partners such as the US, Japan, EU, ASEAN and Australia. Is it in Taiwan’s best interest to now join the FTA game with partners around the region and around the world?
Authors: Shiro Armstrong and Peter Drysdale, ANU
The elevation of the G20 to a leaders’ summit represents a change to the international system of an order that can be compared with the establishment of the great postwar international institutions. The G20 is now the premier forum for global economic governance following its elevation to leaders’ level meetings after the global financial crisis. The United States has led a smooth transition in the locus of power from the G7/8 to the G20.
The membership of the G20 is recognition of the importance of Asia in the global system. Now Asia has this global platform can it deliver on its global responsibilities? Read more…
Author: Shiro Armstrong, ANU
It is now less than a month until the G20 Summit in Seoul. The agenda is firming up but unlike in the Toronto Summit, which was less ambitious and the coverage of which focused on protests in Toronto, Seoul is set to be a real test of what the G20 can deliver.
US Treasury Secretary, Tim Geithner, has delayed publishing a US Treasury report on Chinese currency manipulation until after the Summit. This intensifies the focus on the exchange rate issue at the G20. Read more…
Author: Shiro Armstrong, ANU
As the G20 Summit in Seoul and the APEC Summit in Yokohama fast approach, how can Asia, a force for stability and dynamism in the fragile global economy, connect regional initiative to global governance? With China, Japan, Korea, Indonesia, Australia and India in the G20, Asia has new responsibilities and opportunities to influence global economic governance and contribute positively to the international economic system in the region’s, as well as the world’s, best interest.
In this week’s feature essay, based on his keynote speech to the 12th East Asian Economic Association conference in Seoul last week, Peter Drysdale argues that Asia can no longer expect a free ride on global public goods in trade or finance and that the time is past due to deliver on its global responsibilities. Read more…
Author: Shiro Armstrong, ANU
The Japanese economy is frozen and faces large challenges (with an externally-led expansion from 2001 to 2006 just saving it from two lost decades of economic growth). Deflation is back due to over capacity and depressed domestic demand – a hangover from the rapid expansion and bubble period in the 1980s – and public debt is close to 200 per cent of GDP and rising.
The structure of the debt (95 per cent of which is domestically held) and the low interest rate being paid on the bonds to finance them means this problem may not be so bad as it looks. Read more…
Author: Shiro Armstrong and Peter Drysdale, ANU
The success of East Asian economies has been a story of openness to trade and investment that has allowed them to welcome foreign capital along with the know-how it brings, and specialize in production where they have a comparative advantage. Specialisation in industrial manufacturing has become finer as the trade in parts and components, along the production chain, can be produced wherever they can be produced for least cost and traded due to the low trade and communications costs and efficient logistics. Foreign investment has been an important driver of trade in East Asia and has been associated with the growth of efficient production networks.
Despite its ‘look East’ policy, India has not been able to join in these production networks. Read more…