June 07,2018 Country Reports

Country Report: Japan (June 2018)

Kawakami Takashi in Kaigai Jijo No. 3-4, linked Trump’s chaos to America’s decline, leading to a breakdown in the world order. Giving rise to this is the power shift between Washington and Beijing, which is accompanied by a civilizational transfer from the West. US fatigue from the fight against terrorism has accelerated this shift. Instead of ideology, civilizational elements a..

Editorial Staff
Abe-Trump summit , BRI , China-Japan-Korea summit , Deal diplomacy , free and open Indo-Pacific , RCEP , trade war
May 21,2018 Country Reports

Country Report: South Korea (May 2018)

From March to May, South Korean news editorials continued to focus on inter-Korean and US-Korean relations, albeit with a new player in the picture: China. On China, analysts assessed its trade relations with the United States and Kim’s two summits with Xi, which took place before and after the inter-Korean summit. On inter-Korean and US-Korean relations, analysts discussed the announce..

Eun A Jo
CVID , inter-Korean summit , John Bolton , Kim-Xi summit , Libya model , Max Thunder , Trump-Kim summit
May 21,2018 Open Forum

Synopsis of the 2018 Asan Plenum: “Illiberal International Order”

The agenda of the 2018 Asan Plenum included a keynote address, a book launch, four plenary sessions, and fourteen panels meeting simultaneously in groups of two or three. My intention is not to be comprehensive but to reflect on commentaries about challenges to the international order: the fall of the order, Sino-Russian relations and the order, the impact of sharp power, and the liberal orde..

Gilbert Rozman
"Belt and Road" Initiative , America First , Asan Plenum , illiberalism , Indo-Pacific strategy , Liberal international order , Trumpism
May 01,2018 National Commentaries

A View from South Korea

Kim Jong-un’s New Year’s Address, and the surge of diplomatic overtures that followed, came as a shock to many. The preceding year had been marked by the North’s heightened efforts toward completing its nuclear program, demonstrating a significant technological leap and leading it to more confidently declare itself a “nuclear state.” Combined with Donald Trump&rs..

Eun A Jo
inter-Korean summit , Kim Jong-un , Panmunjom Declaration , Pyeongchang Olympics
April 30,2018 Open Forum

Washington Insights: April 2018

The pace of change was overwhelming in the final weeks of winter and the first month of spring. Moon Jae-in appeared to be in the driver’s seat, but he was counting on Kim Jong-un to keep the momentum building. Abe Shinzo was desperate to shore up relations with Donald Trump, rushing to visit the United States in mid-April, and succeeded at last in arranging the China-Japan-South Kore..

Editorial Staff
China-Japan-South Korea summit , inter-Korean summit , Kim-Xi summit , Pax Sinica , Trump-Kim summit
April 24,2018 Special Forum

Introduction

This issue’s Special Forum consists of four articles on individual cases—New Zealand, Australia, Canada, and South Korea. This introduction covers the single-country articles, comparing the four cases, while it also looks broadly at the nature of such interference, reaching beyond Chinese intrusive activities to focus on them as examples of “sharp power,” a contrast to &ld..

Gilbert Rozman
hard power , Sharp power , Smart power , soft power , United Front , Xi Jinping
April 24,2018 Special Forum

South Korea

Despite the announcement on October 31, 2017 to improve South Korea-Chinese bilateral relations,1 and the summit between presidents Moon Jae-in and Xi Jinping in December 2017, South Korea is still under China’s economic and trade retaliation over the THAAD issue. China has not been shy about using its economic tools to coerce South Korea in the past, i.e., the garlic war in 2000 and t..

Choi Kang*
BRI , Confucius Institutes , Qi Guohong , Sharp power , THAAD
April 19,2018 Alternative Scenarios

Negative Scenario II

Jennifer Lind has sketched positive prospects for South Korean-Japanese relations and the history issue. She broadly finds that geopolitical pressures will overwhelm historical narratives of animosity or re-write them in such a way as to be useful for current geopolitical needs. This is a realist and instrumentalist approach to historical disputes. The substance of the disputes may be genuine..

Robert Kelly
anti-Japanism , comfort women , Dokdo/Takeshima , Park Geun-hye
April 19,2018 Alternative Scenarios

Positive Scenario II

Those hoping for progress in historical reconciliation between Japan and South Korea would have been disappointed by Seoul’s recent commemoration of the March 1 independence movement. Such holidays provide moments in which leaders contribute to national narratives about the past: narratives that can help or hinder reconciliation with former adversaries. President Moon Jae-in chose the l..

Jennifer Lind
anti-Koreanism , comfort women , Dokdo/Takeshima , Flying Tigers , March 1 address
March 19,2018 Country Reports

Country Report: Japan (April 2018 with Focus on Korea)

Not only was Abe battered by a domestic scandal, his foreign policy was rocked by diplomacy, history, and trade shocks. The North Korean presence at the Winter Olympics saw Japanese media warning about Seoul turning soft and breaking away from the “maximum pressure” approach of Tokyo and Washington, which was reinforced by warnings in early March about North-South plans for a su..

Editorial Staff
“smile diplomacy” , comfort women , Dokdo/Takeshima , Pyeongchang Olympics , Six-Party Talks , Yasukuni