Economics, Politics and Public Policy in East Asia and the Pacific
Authors: Jochen Prantl, NUS, and Petr Blizkovsky, Consilium
Asia and Europe have no choice but to listen carefully to and learn from each other in dealing with the repercussions of the European sovereign debt crisis.
There is much at stake. Read more…
Authors: Arvind Subramanian and Martin Kessler, PIIE
China might already be the number one economy in the world on a purchasing power parity basis, but, so far, this position has only been translated very partially into a strategy of currency internationalisation.
Author: Yiping Huang, Peking University and ANU
Growth of Chinese GDP decelerated to 7.8 per cent in the first half of 2012 from 9.6 per cent a year ago.
But the government has remained relatively calm, taking only measured steps to stabilise growth. Read more…
Author: Huw McKay, Westpac Bank
In the post-float era the Australian dollar has built a reputation as a volatile currency by developed country standards. It was prone to sharp bouts of depreciation when investor sentiment toward global growth was weak and commodity prices were low. But since the end of the Great Crash of 2008 the Australian dollar has become noticeably more resilient during phases of risk aversion and more responsive during risk seeking phases.
Author: Vikram Nehru, Carnegie Endowment
Indonesia’s economic performance is deservedly attracting a lot of praise these days.
Its economic growth has been the highest in Southeast Asia, its inflation has been low, its fiscal policy has been prudently managed, the sovereign debt burden has declined, and its external payments have been broadly in balance. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
When the global financial crisis hit the US and European economies in 2007–8, the emerging economies in Asia, with their high rates of growth, huge current account surpluses and export-oriented growth strategies, were an easy target for those in the industrial world who had difficulty coming to terms with the mess they had made of managing financial markets in an era of seemingly unlimited supplies of cheap international capital.
Authors: Kemal Derviş and Homi Kharas, Brookings Institution
As G20 leaders prepare for their seventh meeting in Los Cabos, Mexico, strengthened hopes are struggling against renewed fears in the world economy.
The stronger hopes are due primarily to the more rapid output and employment growth in the US economy that have come in better than expected in late 2011. Read more…
Author: Stephen Grenville, Lowy Institute
The 2008 global financial crisis revealed glaring deficiencies in the financial regulatory frameworks of a number of countries and regions, notably the US, the UK and Europe.
Four years later, much has changed. In the US, the regulatory framework has been reorganised and the 2000-plus pages of the Dodd-Frank legislation has been passed. Read more…
Author: Ren Xiao, Fudan University
A reform-minded status-quo power sits somewhere between rigid and anti-status quo powers.
A status-quo state accepts the existing rules of the game and does not seek to change them because it is generally satisfied with the current situation. China has benefited from the existing international system, and has risen to become the world’s second-largest economy. Logically, it would not aspire to overthrow this system within which it is rising to new heights. In this sense, China is a status-quo power. Nevertheless, China is not simply looking to rigidly adhere to this existing system. Read more…
Authors: Brad Glosserman, CSIS, Peter Walkenhorst and Ting Xu, Bertelsmann Foundation
The most recent sign of the global order’s age and obsolescence was the BRICS summit held in New Delhi on 29 March 2012. Even though the group of countries that make up BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) will not reorder global politics, their determination to articulate the grievances of emerging states should not be ignored.
Take, for example, their call for a new development bank to complement the World Bank by placing greater emphasis on the needs and priorities of developing economies as those nations themselves see them. Read more…
Author: Andrew Sheng, Fung Global Institute
Former Australian Prime Minister John Howard was first attributed as likening his country to America’s deputy sheriff in Asia back in 1999.
This observation may have been true during the Cold War — when Australia was the Anglo-Saxon outpost near the Bamboo curtain — but with Australia’s trade and investment with Asia now outweighing that with America and Europe, the geopolitical landscape has changed profoundly. Read more…
Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
China’s economy grew at its slowest pace in three years, with growth at an annual rate of 8.1 per cent in the first quarter of 2012, hit by slowing exports and a weak property market.
There are those that see the deceleration of GDP growth over the past year as a significant turning point in Chinese economic fortunes.
Author: Ashima Goyal, IGIDR
Banks in emerging markets are normally considered high risk, while banks in developed countries are generally thought to be robust and well regulated — but the 2008 global financial crisis suggests the opposite.
Financial markets should have recalibrated their scales for measuring risk following the crisis, but this has not yet happened. Read more…
Author: Vikram Nehru, Carnegie Endowment
Some Chinese astrologers have pronounced that 2012, the year of the dragon, will be particularly volatile.
But you do not have to believe in the Chinese zodiac to know that Southeast Asia is likely to have a tumultuous year. Read more…
Author: M. Govinda Rao, NIPFP
India’s economy was one of the earliest to stage a turnaround after the global financial crisis.
The decisions taken in early 2008 to increase public-sector wages, forgive loans for farmers who had borrowed from the banks, and massively expand the rural-employment guarantee scheme assisted the economy before the global financial crisis unfolded in the last quarter of the year. Read more…