Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
China’s vice president, Xi Jinping, is set to make a hugely important visit to the US next week, prior to succeeding President Hu Jintao as China’s next president later this year.
The visit will set the stage for interaction between the next generation of Chinese leaders and American political leadership and help to shape how the most important bilateral relationship in the world will be managed over the medium-term future. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
The whirlwind visit of President Barack Obama to Australia on the way to the East Asia Summit in Indonesia last November, many believe, forever changed the Asia Pacific strategic landscape with a re-assertion of American primacy and power in Asia.
What was the thinking behind the moves that Obama announced in Canberra and how will it shape Southeast Asia’s strategic future? Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
In the latest episode in Pakistan’s unfolding political drama, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani appeared before the Supreme Court on Thursday over the failure to prosecute corruption charges against his political patron, President Asif Ali Zardari, who came to power after the assassination of his wife, Benazir Bhutto.
This is no simple one-plot play about a contest over political corruption between the Supreme Court and the civilian government of Pakistan. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
One of the more momentous changes in Asia that heralded in the New Year was the sudden death of North Korean leader, Kim Jong-il, and the succession by his son, Kim Jong-un.
Kim Jong-il’s death had long been seen by some outside observers as portent for the collapse of the North Korean regime and the announcement encouraged much comment that reflected these forebodings, including calls for calm from political leaders who should have been in the know. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
As Europe continues its desperate struggle to salvage the euro and monetary union, the spotlight of regional cooperation is shifting to Asia.
In December, European leaders retro-fitted the union with fiscal disciplines which impose binding limits on national budgets and borrowing. All but Britain opted in; the UK, Prime Minister David Cameron argued, was not prepared to yield such fiscal sovereignty. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
A great deal in the international economy is riding on what happens to the Chinese economy in the new year.
China’s 9 per cent plus growth since the global financial crisis has been a central element in Asia’s bucking the global recessionary trend. With Europe still in trouble and the United States struggling to keep recovery on track, is China too now destined for a hard economic landing?
Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
The dramatic increase in recent years of trade and foreign direct investment (FDI) in sub-Saharan Africa by firms from Asia — notably China and India — has become an emotionally charged and controversial issue.
For China, as Luke Hurst has written, Africa would seem an excellent complement to its resource- and market-seeking global agenda. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
The death toll from Thailand’s worst floods in more than half a century is more than 600, millions of hectares of farmland have been inundated, 20,000 factories and plants have been damaged, some that are not likely to reopen, leaving at least 1.5 million unemployed.
As the clean-up continues, accusations of incompetence and corruption in the management of the crisis and the allocation of relief, have dominated the media and the Parliament. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
In Washington and Beijing last week there were important meetings that are likely to be influential in where the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations on regional trade arrangements lead down the track.
In Washington, the US administration called in ambassadors from the eight negotiating partners to up the ante on an early deal. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
China’s spectacular industrial growth has been associated with equally spectacular growth in Chinese energy and resource consumption.
While Chinese energy efficiency (the amount of GDP produced per unit of energy consumed) has risen steadily, except for a few years early this decade, aggregate energy consumption has been lifted by a hugely energy-intensive phase of industrialisation and the spread of motorised transportation on a scale and at a speed that is unprecedented anywhere. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
As they struggle to escape the global financial crisis, the prospect of China’s continued, powerful growth both excites and challenges the established economic powers in Europe and North America.
US President Obama’s trip to Australia and the East Asia Summit last week was dominated by American strategies to deal with the challenge of China. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
The whirlwind visit of President Barack Obama to Australia and Indonesia last week has, many believe, forever changed the Asia Pacific strategic landscape with a re-assertion of American primacy and power in Asia. Prudence might recommend a more cautious assessment.
American power is already well entrenched in Asia and the Pacific. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
With the APEC Summit in Honolulu, US President Obama has launched a week of regional summitry that is set to lift America’s engagement in Asia and test new directions in regional diplomacy.
After APEC, Obama flies to Australia for a long heralded bilateral summit in Canberra, and then on to Indonesia, to take part — the first time for an American leader — in the East Asia Summit (EAS) in Bali. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
Last week the world was reassured by the thought that Europe had done a deal which avoided default by Greece, the threat to its southern members and to the euro zone itself.
All that unravelled as Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou surprised European leaders and world markets with his referendum plan — just as the G20 meeting got under way in Cannes. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, ANU
Whatever is done to re-position Asian regional architecture, it needs to take account of Asia’s new role in global economic governance.
It needs to attend to the implications of Asia’s rise for political and security affairs. Read more…
