Democracies with Preexisting Conditions and the Coronavirus in the Indo-Pacific

Around the globe, democracy is ailing. In the past 15 years or so, an increasing number of democracies worldwide have suffered from gradual erosion and decay. According to […]

Soft Power and Sharp Power: The View from Australia

Australians of late have been shocked by the unravelling of US soft power globally and China’s offensive use of sharp power targeting their country. At issue is the […]

Hedging in Post-Pandemic Asia: What, How, and Why?

As the US-China rivalry intensifies amid the COVID-19 crisis, more observers have opined that the “hedging” by smaller states—widely interpreted as a “middle position” between being fully aligned […]

Country Report: Japan (June 2020)

The spring of 2020 saw a downturn in Sino-Japanese relations, which were now embroiled in the pandemic war of words, with little else on the foreign policy radar. […]

Country Report: Russia (May 2020)

One message stood apart in Russian coverage of international relations in the Indo-Pacific in the early spring of 2020: what is the impact of the pandemic on China […]

The Launch of an Ideological Cold War in 2020: The US Perspective

Today’s US response to China that suggests a cold war mentality: first, blaming problems in the Sino-US relationship, China more generally, and the pandemic’s origin and response on […]

China’s “Wolf Warrior” Diplomacy in the COVID-19 Crisis

COVID-19, a black swan event, altered the planned trajectory of China’s domestic politics and its engagement with the rest of the world. The public health crisis from COVID-19 […]

The Coronavirus Pandemic and the Russo-Chinese Border

The pandemic has already changed the course of world history, and its future consequences, such as how and when it finishes, remain unknown to us amidst a dynamic […]

Washington Insights, Vol. 8, No. 2

Unlike previous Washington Insights based on attendance at panels and person-to-person contacts, this one draws from a mixture of Zoom meetings and articles from Washington-based think tanks. Extracting […]

Country Report: China (April 2020)

As 2020 began, Chinese authors were busy not only summing up the far-reaching results of 2019 but also putting them in broad analytical perspective. China’s other bilateral relations […]