Early Sunday morning after a marathon session, Congress put a blue ribbon on the immense hog known as the defense budget and declared it a winner. Just before going on their August vacation, the House approved the 2008 defense appropriations bill of $459 billion. The vote was 395 to 13. With the nearly full support… Continue reading Whole Hog
At the YouTube-CNN debate with the Democratic presidential candidates, Barack Obama boldly said that he would, in his first year as president, speak with the leaders of Cuba, North Korea, Syria, Venezuela, and Iran “without preconditions.” Rival Hillary Clinton pounced on the answer by declaring Obama’s approach “irresponsible and frankly naive.” Forget liberal vs. conservative… Continue reading Talk to the Hand
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s first visit to the United States comes at a time of great uncertainty for both Japan and Asia. The North Korean nuclear crisis remains suspended between crisis and resolution. The free trade agreement between the United States and South Korea, still unratified, will have an unclear impact on the rest… Continue reading China Remains Main Concern for U.S.,Japan
Before the age of colonialism, India was a world power. Now, like China, it is returning to the global stage. With economic growth topping 9 percent in 2007, an acknowledged nuclear capability, and a growing role in international relations, it has attained the status of “emerging power.” What still remains unclear, however, is India’s capacity… Continue reading India: Modest Global Power
According to Starbucks, all the world’s a cafe, and all the men and women merely imbibers. “Geography is a flavor,” the conglomerate proclaims. In the store, customers can choose coffee beans from three regions of the world: Africa/Arabia, Asia-Pacific, and Latin America. It is part of a marketing strategy designed to educate consumers to treat… Continue reading Geography Is a Flavor
Far East Economic Review, June 2007
International Politik, Winter 2007
<p><b>Just in time for Valentine’s Day, the United States and North Korea bridged their differences and produced a preliminary agreement to resolve their outstanding conflicts. The accord is not exactly a declaration of love. It’s not even a bunch of roses and big box of chocolates. But it’s the friendliest the two countries have… Continue reading North Korean Nuclear Agreement: Annotated
Although only 4 percent of its territory lies in Europe, Turkey has long been anchored in the West. It is a major U.S. military ally and pivotal member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). It has been a full member of the Council of Europe since 1949 and an associate member of the… Continue reading Long Anchored in the West, Turkey Looks East
Review of Hyejin Kim, Jia, A Novel of North Korea (San Francisco: Midnight Editions, 2007) During the famine that struck North Korea in the mid-1990s, thousands of hungry refugees poured into northeast China in search of food and work. They often brought with them little more than the clothes on their backs. But they… Continue reading Jia: A Novel of North Korea (Review)
Japan was not the first country to realize the strategic importance of Central Asia. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, it took Tokyo three years to open embassies in the region. Several more years passed before Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto inaugurated a new “Silk Road” diplomacy. Today, however, Japan has engaged the five… Continue reading After Slow Start, Japan Engages Central Asia
This year the Association of Southeast Asian Nations celebrates its 40th birthday, and it has big plans. After four decades of being largely a political and security alliance, ASEAN is accelerating its plans for economic integration. The ASEAN leaders are so eager to pull together into an economic community that they recently decided to move… Continue reading South-East Asia: Democratic Deficit Growing
After an intense round of six-sided talks, negotiators are bringing home a deal on North Korea’s nuclear program. Of course the plan has flaws. It’s only the first step in stuffing North Korea’s nuclear genie back into the bottle and ending six decades of hostility between Washington and Pyongyang. It’s way too early for champagne… Continue reading Promising Start with North Korea
<p><b>China is everywhere you turn: the label on your sweater, every second item on the shelf at Wal-Mart, the computer on which you read this essay, the weather satellite zapped out of the sky in January by a ballistic missile. Unlike Britney Spears, however, China is not merely ubiquitous. It is an essential part of… Continue reading China the Indispensable?
Courtiers once collected special tastes for the infamous banquets of the Roman emperors “in every corner of the Empire from the Parthian frontier to the Straits of Gibraltar.”[1] The Chinese emperors, too, demanded a succession of unusual and exotic treats from the far-flung lands opened up by the Silk Road. Today, this tradition still lives… Continue reading Global Tastes
They don’t look alike. One is tall and thin, the other short and pot-bellied. If they ever meet for a summit, they could pose for photos as the Blues Brothers of international relations. But it’s not likely that George W. Bush and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il will face the cameras together any time… Continue reading George and Jong
Advocates of eating locally grown food argue that you can save the world by buying tomatoes from a local garden, cage-free eggs from a nearby farm, and locally baked bread. The eat-local movement has been very popular in Europe for some time. Locavores – as these eaters are also called – are gaining strength in… Continue reading Eat Local, Think Global
Northeast Asia is a high voltage environment. In other words, an enormous gap in power separates the strongest and the weakest countries currently negotiating in the six-party process. Over the last two decades, this gap in power has sustained the Cold War in the region. It has both justified the maintenance of the huge U.S.… Continue reading South Korea Can Play the Role of Transformer
Two years ago, the ‘Tulip Revolution’ pushed Kyrgyzstan off the path of dictatorship. The subsequent direction the small Central Asian country has taken, and whether the revolution can serve as a model for the region, remain controversial. And now, with the opposition gearing up for mass demonstrations in April, the most politically lively country in… Continue reading Kyrgyzstan: Exporting the Tulip Revolution
People power does not just trouble the sleep of dictators. It can also introduce an element of unpredictability and uncertainty into the security debate in pluralist societies. People, to put it bluntly, can be a problem for the military because civilians frequently come between a military and its objectives. “In the short term, making governments… Continue reading People Power vs. Military Power in East Asia
Americans have an almost fetishistic attitude toward leadership. Like a magic wand, “leadership” is to be waved over the problems that affect the body politic as well as the seemingly intractable flaws of U.S. foreign policy. We search the horizon for a magical leader in the same way that the hapless clowns of Beckett’s play… Continue reading Picturing the President
Southeastern Europe is bracing for one final aftershock from the break-up of former Yugoslavia. The largely Albanian enclave of Kosovo is poised to declare its independence from Serbia after multi-party talks failed to reach a compromise by the UN deadline of December 10. Around the epicenter of Kosovo, the tectonic plates of geopolitics threaten to… Continue reading A Return to Diversity in the Balkans
At the center of East Asia lies the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) on the Korean peninsula. The DMZ has been called the most dangerous place on earth. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers face one another across this divide. And yet, the DMZ is also the lifeline between North and South Korea. It connects the two countries… Continue reading The Paradox of East Asian Peace
If I want to command the attention of my friends at a bar or a restaurant, I don’t say, “Hey, I’ve got this great analysis to share with you.” I don’t ask, “Have I shown you this amazing data set?” I don’t say, “Check out these killer citations.” No, I say: “You won’t believe what… Continue reading What Happens Next
With their new high-speed train system, South Koreans can travel the full length of their country, from Seoul in the north to Pusan on the southern coast, in under 3 hours. In the next phase of construction, new tracks will cut this travel time in half again. The KTX train (pictured to the left) puts… Continue reading Postcard from Pusan
If you’re going to throw rocks at the government, you’d better dress up for the occasion. That’s the take-away point from the media coverage of the protests in Pakistan. Splashed across the front page of newspapers last week was a picture of a Pakistani lawyer in a suit launching a projectile at the police. The… Continue reading Fashion Statement
This year marks the 20th anniversary of the ending of martial law in Taiwan. But don’t expect any major global celebrations of Taiwanese democracy. For all the vibrancy of Taiwanese politics and the high performance of Taiwan’s economy, the island is something of an embarrassment to the international community. Taiwan looks like a state. It… Continue reading The Taiwan that Roared
The Kaesong Industrial Complex is a veritable Rorschach test for those who follow developments on the Korean peninsula. Everyone who looks at the special economic zone located in North Korea just north of the DMZ sees something very different. And these interpretations often reveal more about the viewer than the viewed Unification advocates in the… Continue reading The Kaesong Industrial Complex
Immigration is one of the top election-year issues. When the Bush administration tried earlier to push through a comprehensive immigration reform bill, anti-immigrant groups unleashed a grassroots protest over the proposed amnesty measures and helped to defeat the bill. Last week, the Senate refused to consider a bill that would have allowed the children of… Continue reading A Modest Proposal
“The glory of Our Empire shines on this universe with brilliance,” a ruler once declared in a letter to courtiers in London. “Not one single person or country is excluded from Our kindness and benevolence.” He had good reason to be pleased. His country sat astride the global economy. His army was large, his domains… Continue reading Big Red Checkbook