Introduction

The articles in this special forum examine Japan’s foreign policy from three angles. The first provides an overview with a year-by-year breakdown for 2020-23. This is followed by […]

Japan’s Fulsome Embrace of Bipolarity, 2020-2022

A sea change occurred in Japanese foreign policy between 2020 and 2022. When Abe Shinzo resigned as prime minister in September 2020, Japan was struggling with uncertainty about […]

Japan’s Economic Turn to Europe

Economics was at the heart of Abe Shinzo’s project for Japan. For all the attention to constitutional revision or security and foreign policy reform, his agenda for national […]

Southeast Asia Tests the Allure of Japan’s Global Vision

Southeast Asia Tests the Allure of Japan’s Global Vision Shihoko Goto Southeast Asia is a familiar region for the Japanese, where both political leaders and corporate executives feel […]

Introduction

What made South Korean foreign policy different in the early 2020s? The balance between conservatives and progressives was little changed; a leader from one party gave way to […]

South Korea Confronts the New Missile Age: 2020-2022

For South Korean policy toward North Korea, the 2020-2022 period proved to be a watershed. Ever since the Sunshine Policy launched in 1998, leaders in Seoul had envisioned […]

Edging toward Bipolarity: South Korea’s Regional Reorientation, 2020-2022

The Moon to Yoon transition drew South Korea closer to the United States and even to Japan, while seeing a marked falloff in relations with Russia and looming […]

South Korea in the Crosswinds: Battling Partisan Narratives

The second half of Moon Jae-in’s presidency was marred by diplomatic deadlock, as talks between North Korea and the United States collapsed, tensions between China and the United […]

Introduction

Toward the end of 2022, as the Ukraine war was settling into an expected winter slowdown, the conundrum into which Russia had put itself had become shockingly obvious […]

The Ukraine War in the Context of Russian Thinking about China

The Ukraine war would have been inconceivable without high confidence in Russia that it could capitalize on a strong Sino-Russian relationship and the war would serve as a […]