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Asia Pacific Book Reviews Governance & Law Security & Conflict

Review: Sugata Bose and Ayesha Jalal (Eds.) Kashmir and the Future of South Asia

Kashmir and the Future of South Asia edited by Sugata Bose and Ayesha Jalal examines the Kashmir crisis from a people-centered approach using a framework of state sovereignty and national security. The authors use the Kashmir crisis to illustrate how internal wars of partition continue to haunt South Asia as a result of its colonial […]

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Asia Pacific Governance & Law Middle East Policy & Politics Security & Conflict

Towards an ASEAN Model for Cooperation in Central Asia

ASEAN provides a working framework for Central Asian states to engage in comprehensive regional cooperation to neutralize internal conflicts and survive great power competition. A New Saigon After years of fighting a rural insurgency, a rushed American withdrawal leads to the collapse of a Washington-backed government and the desperate, mass evacuation of former American allies. […]

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Asia Pacific Governance & Law

On Its Pivotal Turning Point: The Prospect of Global Governance Forged by Chinese AI under the Rule of Law

Artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming how states worldwide address their domestic issues. China’s prowess is growing in the AI arena, which the United States currently leads. The utility of Chinese AI technology received further validation during the COVID-19 pandemic. On the bright side, its precision and efficiency proved essential to many public health programs funded […]

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Asia Pacific Policy & Politics Security & Conflict

The United States Needs India and Taiwan to Counterbalance China: Will the “Milk Tea Alliance” Work?

The White House declassified one of its most sensitive operational policies, the “U.S. strategic framework for the Indo-Pacific,” as part of the final maneuvers of Donald Trump’s presidency in early January 2021.[1] That decision bewildered diplomats, policymakers, and scholars at home and abroad. After all, it was not only a mystery as to why this national security document […]

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Asia Pacific Book Reviews Civil Society Governance & Law Special Content

Dapiran Observes a City on the Edge

In the waning days of Hong Kong’s 2014 student-lead Umbrella Movement, a hanging black banner read a prophetic message: We’ll Be Back. In 2019, those words came to fruition. The controversial introduction of a proposed extradition bill, allowing individuals in Hong Kong to face trial in Mainland Chinese courts, rocked the city and drew hundreds […]

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Asia Pacific Europe Security & Conflict

The Future Arenas of Great Power Competition

For two decades, US military leaders have focused almost entirely on training and equipping the force for counter-insurgency operations. With politicians now intent on drawing down the United States’ involvement in the Middle East, the military has shifted its focus to meeting the next major challenge: conflict with another great power. From a security perspective, […]

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Asia Pacific Security & Conflict

Bias and the Perceived China Threat

The health of Sino-American relations will be an important bellwether of American economic and national security success in the years to come. Because China is so important to America’s future, the United States must get it right with how it understands the threat (or lack thereof) from China. Getting it wrong could pose dire consequences […]

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Asia Pacific Regional Security & Conflict

A Rendezvous with Destiny for Two Unsinkable Aircraft Carriers

Since the Trump administration designated China a “strategic competitor,” Sri Lanka and Taiwan have increasingly become plausible geopolitical flashpoints in the Pacific and Indian Oceans. How could Taiwan and Sri Lanka dictate the post-coronavirus endgame for China and the United States?

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Asia Pacific Civil Society Topical

Toolkit for a Successful Movement: Digital Tools in Taiwan’s Sunflower Movement

In 2014, hundreds of thousands took to the streets of Taipei to protest the Cross-Strait Services Agreement—a free trade agreement between Taiwan and Beijing—believing it would give the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) too much political and economic control over the island. The protesters wielded social media and the internet to communicate, inform and mobilize. These tools did not work in a vacuum, however, and understanding their interactions with conventional media and offline associations becomes crucial. This paper demonstrates how, through one-way and interactive communications, the participants of the Sunflower Movement used digital tools to realize their demands.

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Asia Pacific Economics Policy & Politics Regional

The RCEP minus India: Reasons and Implications

The RCEP was to be a potent vehicle to support the spread of global production networks and reduce the inefficiencies of the multiple prior Asian trade agreements. Yet India still pulled out. Why?