Russian Thinking about CSTO Peacekeeping: Central Asia, China, and the Ukraine War

When Putin defined his vision of a Eurasian regional order on June 17, 2016, at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, he called it the Greater Eurasian Partnership […]

Russia “Turns to the East” yet away from Japan (2012-2022)

On March 7 2022, the Russian government included Japan in an official list of countries and regions labelled as “unfriendly.” This was followed on March 21 by the […]

Tracking Japanese Thinking toward Asia: Early Abe, the Korean Peninsula, and Australia

This Special Forum approaches Japanese foreign policy from three angles. First, it tracks the momentous shift in thinking that occurred during the first four years of Abe Shinzo’s […]

Tracking the Big Shift in Japan’s Foreign Policy Thinking toward Asia, 2013-2016

Tracking the Big Shift in Japan’s Foreign Policy Thinking toward Asia, 2013-2016 Gilbert Rozman Taking office at the end of 2012, Prime Minister Abe Shinzo set Japan’s foreign […]

Tracking the Downswings in a ‘Virtual Alliance’: Japan’s Policy toward the Korean Peninsula over a Decade

This year, 2022, could be critical for Japan-ROK relations. The relationship has been in free fall for a decade—although there were a couple of moments at which the […]

Tracking the Pathway to a ‘Quasi-alliance’: Japan’s Policy toward Australia from 2013 to 2022

The Way to a “Quasi-ally”: Japan’s Policy to Australia, 2013-2022 Satake Tomohiko As Japan’s alliance with the United States drew closer in the post-Cold War era, two US […]

Introduction

The period 2013-2015 in South Korean foreign policy was transformative for three reasons: (1) it exposed the fallacies in Seoul’s assumptions about the future of Northeast Asia more […]

A Trustpolitik approach to denuclearization and unification

Ever since the Korean War, North Korea has posed the most menacing and intractable national security challenge to the South. Every South Korean leader has tried to reduce […]

Trustpolitik, middle power diplomacy, and partisan narratives

On the heels of Park Geun-hye’s election—and the introduction of her “trustpolitik”—there was a sense that South Korean foreign policy was undergoing a sea change. After a dizzying […]

Managing four great powers

Succeeding another conservative, President Park Geun-hye was intent on seizing the initiative despite the difficult environment she faced as four leaders geared up for more active regional policies. […]