How Turkey’s democracy might resemble Japan’s
Sunday’s parliamentary elections in Turkey laid to rest any lingering doubts about the vibrancy of the country’s electoral democracy. At the same time, the third consecutive victory for Prime Minister...
View ArticleChina’s Challenge at Sea
America’s fiscal woes are placing the country on a path of growing strategic risk in Asia. With Democrats eager to protect social spending and Republicans anxious to avoid tax hikes, and both saying...
View ArticleWhy the New “Emphasis on Asia” in U.S. Policy?
In his remarks to the Australian parliament on November 17, President Obama declared that the U. S. was making the Asia-Pacific region a top priority. While promising a continued U.S. military...
View ArticleHooked on Nuclear Power: Japanese State-Local Relations and the Vicious Cycle...
The crisis of the crippled nuclear power plant Fukushima Daiichi has continued for nine months and will continue for some time to come. One of the reasons that this has been such a protracted crisis...
View ArticleA new configuration to the East
After the Depsang Valley incursion of April 15-May 3, when Chinese patrols transgressed 19 kilometres into Indian-claimed areas in eastern Ladakh, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh announced that he will...
View ArticleThe Philippines’ Search for Strategic Partners
Tensions are growing in East Asia, driven in large part by the continued rise of China and its bid for regional primacy. In particular, Beijing’s claims to “indisputable sovereignty” over the South...
View ArticleOkinawa: the Scotland of Asia?
A new flag flies in East Asia, as the Republic of Ryukyu becomes the world’s youngest sovereign state. Riding a wave of democratic independence movements that has already seen Catalonia, Quebec and...
View ArticleJapan: ‘Playing with fire?’
In elections held on July 21, Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), led by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, convincingly won 115 of the 242 seats in the upper house of the National Diet, the national...
View ArticleTime for a little Abenomics at Asia’s development institutions
Southeast Asia, along with broader issues of development, change and the policy challenges facing the world, were very much topics for debate here on America’s Pacific Coast. At the annual Milken...
View ArticleOttoman ship Ertugrul’s Bombay linkages
Amidst the dust, noise, and crowds of the by-lanes off Mohammed Ali Road in south-central Mumbai, stands a white and green mosque, the Ismail Habib Masjid. It is an oasis of tranquillity, with a...
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