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December 2023 Current Topics

  

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Why North Korean Nuclear Blackmail is Unlikely, November 2023. Nuclear-armed North Korea is now expanding and diversifying its arsenal and delivery systems, including the deployment of tactical nuclear weapons. This generates fears that Pyongyang intends to use nuclear coercion to force its political agenda upon South Korea while negating the “nuclear umbrella” provided by Seoul’s ally the United States. Even the expanded nuclear arsenal, however, is unlikely to embolden Pyongyang either to demand specific concessions from Seoul during peacetime on pain of a nuclear attack, or to employ conventional military attacks more aggressively under the cover provided by North Korea’s nuclear weapons. Absent an attempt by Seoul and Washington to topple the Kim regime through invasion, nuclear threats by Pyongyang lack credibility...

  

EWC

The Evolution of the Partnership between NATO and Japan, November 2023. On July 11-12, a historic NATO summit meeting was held in Vilnius, Lithuania. In addition to 31 NATO member states, four heads of government of Indo-Pacific countries attended the meeting. Japan and South Korea signed an Individually Tailored Partnership Programs (ITPP) with NATO. This paper examines the trend and significance of the new partnership between NATO and Japan. The summit showcased the strong ties among NATO countries and partnered states 17 months after the ruthless Russian aggression against Ukraine that started in February 2022. Perhaps the most important nature of this summit was mutual recognition of the inseparability of the security of the Euro-Atlantic Zone and that of the Indo-Pacific arena...

  

EWC

Techno-Geopolitics and US Support for India’s Quantum Ambition, November 2023. Allaying obstacles that may have existed before, India and the United States have made it clear that they are entering an era of ‘techno-geopolitics.’ Amid the intensifying China-US tech rivalry, the United States, betting big on India’s long-term technological prospects and its pivotal role in Indo-Pacific geopolitics, has forged ‘a technology partnership for the future’ during the State Visit of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the United States in June 2023. The US-India Joint Statement, released at the conclusion of the State Visit, is a comprehensive iteration of all the major facets of new and emerging technologies and, therefore, rightly claims that ‘no corner of human enterprise is untouched by the partnership.’...

  

EWC

China’s South China Sea Overreach Faces Growing Obstacles, November 2023. A Chinese Coast Guard vessel blasting a smaller Philippines boat with a powerful water cannon reinforces the perception that Beijing is successfully advancing its territorial claims in the South China Sea. Several aspects of the PRC’s policy have made pushback difficult. First, with considerable success, Beijing has blocked the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) from opposing major Chinese objectives. Second, Beijing has used “gray zone” tactics to improve its position and intimidate the other claimants without incurring military retaliation. Third, China’s huge economic and industrial capacity has enabled the Chinese to fill the South China Sea with more and larger Coast Guard and Navy ships than other claimants can match, not to mention deputizing swarms of Chinese fishing boats to carry out strategic tasks...

  

EWC

Maui Wildfires: Opportunities and Lessons in Resiliency for the Pacific Region, November 2023. The August 2023 Maui Wildfires wrought catastrophic damage on Maui and revealed a range of tragic vulnerabilities facing the State of Hawai‘i. A few early lessons from Hawai‘i’s experiences provide key insights for communities across the Indo-Pacific and should be harnessed to promote action to mitigate future disasters. Maui’s tragedy demonstrates that communities and leaders across the Indo-Pacific must prepare for the new normal of extreme weather events. The aftermath of such events may include devastation akin to that experienced by the town of Lahaina on August 8, 2023...

  

EWC

Timor-Leste’s Uncertain Future, November 2023. This paper intends to start a conversation about a broad yet crucial question: what does the future hold for Timor-Leste? And in turn, what does that mean for the Indo-Pacific region? It examines key challenges confronting the country over the next decade, with a focus on how economics, governance, and the transnational issues of climate change, pandemic preparedness, and geopolitics will impact the small island nation. Timor-Leste has accomplished a great deal over the past two decades but faces headwinds that, if left unaddressed, could undo much of what it has achieved. Its future is not preordained, and decisions made by Asia’s youngest nation over the coming years will determine the direction it takes. Australia and Indonesia loom large in this equation, and they will certainly have a vested interest in the course Timor-Leste chooses to take.

  

Lowy

Australia’s Semiconductor Manufacturing Moonshot: Securing Semiconductor Talent, November 2023. Semiconductors are a critical component in all modern technologies, from personal communication devices and medical devices to weapons systems. Crucial to producing semiconductors is the availability of a highly skilled workforce, managing clean-room facilities and highly specialised equipment to execute the hundreds of unique steps needed to manufacture a single wafer, depending on the complexity of the chip. ASPI’s 2022 report, Australia’s semiconductor national moonshot, laid out the strategic reasons why Australia must embark on a capacity-building initiative to create a homegrown semiconductor manufacturing ecosystem. Every item on the Australian federal government’s List of Critical Technologies in the National Interest is dependent on semiconductors...

  

ASPI

Abandoning Neutrality, Absorbing Multipolarity: India and Sweden by 2047, November 2023. Pragmatism and polarised positioning have become the new normal in foreign policy decision making – and Sweden and India are no exception. Sweden moved away from and perhaps permanently abandoned its neutrality discourse in foreign policy by joining the European Union (EU) in 1995, more recently by applying for North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) membership and, importantly, by demonstrating a positive attitude towards the Indo-Pacific. As a rising power, India has been engaging for some time in a national interest-oriented multi-aligned strategy, moving away from its original non-aligned discourse, particularly in order to balance an expansionist China. The move away from neutrality and towards multipolarity is thus a common thread in both Indian and Swedish foreign policies, but what might their future relationship entail?...

  

ISDP

Women’s Political Participation and Agency in Indonesia: An Interview with Raneeta Mutiara, November 2023. In the context of the upcoming Indonesian presidential elections of February 2024, ISDP’s Asia Program intern Nolwenn Gueguen sat down with PhD scholar from the Singapore University of Social Sciences, Raneeta Mutiara, to shed light on women’s political participation in Indonesia. They first discussed the role of feminism in the Indonesian context before expanding on women’s political agency within Islamist organizations and its effects on the upcoming elections...

  

ISDP

An Interview with Professor Torbjörn Lodén: EU and U.S. Relations with China in Retrospect and Looking Ahead, November 2023. The Institute for Security & Development Policy (ISDP) has for the past three years had the honor and privilege of Professor Torbjörn Lodén serving as its Head of the Stockholm China Center. With his tenure having recently drawn to a close, he sat down for an interview with ISDP Research Fellow, Agust Börjesson, to look back on how China’s relations with the U.S. and Europe have developed under his watch and to discuss what could potentially lie ahead for relations with China in the era of Sino-American rivalry.

  

ISDP

From Alipay to the Digital Yuan: China’s Fintech Revolution, November 2023. Fintech in China manifests itself in ways that are qualitatively different from its development in Western countries. The unique blend of a mobile-first consumer base, underdeveloped traditional banking services, regulatory freedom, vast economies of scale, the influence of Chinese tech giants, extensive government support, and the enthusiastic embrace of fintech by Chinese consumers, has allowed the fintech industry to grow rapidly and permeate society more extensively in China compared to the West. China’s fintech growth, transformed by the launch of Alibaba’s Alipay in 2004, benefitted from supportive government policies and pioneering companies. Tech giants like Alibaba integrated fintech services deeply into expansive digital ecosystems, ensuring widespread adoption. By 2018, China led in global fintech investment and adoption rates surpassing global averages...

  

ISDP

Trends in Southeast Asia 2023 #18: The Evolution of Madani: How Is 2.0 Different from 1.0. In 1995, then Finance Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim introduced “Masyarakat Madani” as his proposed economic framework for Malaysia. The term was heavily debated among scholars and politicians across all parties and ideologies. It was often argued that Madani was an effort to limit the rise of political Islam. Following Anwar Ibrahim’s dismissal from government in 1998, Madani came to be more narrowly redefined as “civil society”. However, Anwar’s supporters, known as the “Anwarinas”, strove to keep the spirit of Madani alive and continued to promote its ideals of social justice, democratic values and inclusivity. They were encouraged further by the fall of Barisan Nasional from federal power in the 14th General Election in 2018...

  

ISEAS

Trends in Southeast Asia 2023 #17: Post-Islamism Battles Political Islam in Malaysia. During the 15th general election (GE15) in 2022 and the state elections in 2023, the clash between Anwar Ibrahim and PAS reached new heights. This can be viewed as a battle between political Islam and post-Islamism. Political Islam as embodied by PAS pursues the establishment of an Islamic state, while post-Islamism as represented by Anwar Ibrahim is a way of balancing the ambitions of Islam with secular approaches. While PAS has been consistent in espousing political Islam since its establishment, Anwar Ibrahim’s approach to the role of Islam in politics has changed since his early days in UMNO. Evolving from an Islamist involved in state-led Islamization to a post-Islamist, he now espouses democratic values and multiculturalism...

  

ISEAS

Regulating Artificial Intelligence: Maximising Benefits and Minimising Harms, August 2023. Artificial Intelligence (AI) has made a resurgence in the last years, garnering the attention of the media, policymakers and the masses alike. The launch of free generative AI tools such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Stability AI’s Stable Diffusion have given rise to myriad concerns in different sectors like politics, business, education, arts and entertainment, and human rights. While predictive AI harnesses its training data to make complex calculations and predictions, generative AI takes what it learns from training data and examples or prompts to create new content. Generative AI can be useful in increasing productivity by providing hyperpersonalised support in various contexts. However, the technology can also easily be misused by malicious actors...

  

IPS

Public Deliberation on Singapore's Fiscal Policies and National Reserves, August 2023. What the government spends on and how they fund such spendings are fundamental aspects of a country’s fiscal policies. Situating this within the framework of Singapore, our fiscal policies play a pivotal role in the ongoing Forward Singapore initiative, which aspires to foster a rejuvenated “social compact”. This social compact refreshes and strengthens the shared understanding between all segments of society on their respective roles and responsibilities, and how they relate to one another...

  

IPS

Monetary Authority of Singapore: Macroeconomic Review, Volume XXII, Issue 2, October 2023 (Full Report). In the April 2023 Monetary Policy Statement, MAS maintained the rate of appreciation of the Singapore dollar nominal effective exchange rate (S$NEER) policy band, with no change to the width of the band or level at which it was centred. Since then, the S$NEER has broadly strengthened in line with the appreciating policy band. Global economic activity has moderated reflecting weaker growth in the Eurozone and China, even as the US economy has thus far been resilient. In the near term, global final demand is expected to soften amid elevated interest rates. Nevertheless, the risk of a sharp global downturn, precipitated by financial vulnerabilities, has receded compared to earlier in the year. Growth in Singapore’s major trading partners should gradually pick up later in 2024 as inflation continues to ease and the electronics cycle turns up modestly, although the timing and extent of the recovery is subject to significant uncertainty...

  

MAS

Financial Stability Review 2023. The global economy has shown resilience to the cumulative effects of monetary tightening thus far. However, growth could moderate in the coming year as major central banks maintain sufficiently restrictive monetary policy stances to achieve their inflation targets. The sharp increase in both short- and long-term interest rates over the past year has induced a tightening of financial conditions and a repricing of financial assets. While these developments are symptomatic of monetary tightening, interactions with the financial vulnerabilities and market fragilities built up during the COVID-19 pandemic could amplify the effects of interest rate increases and disrupt the functioning of the financial system. The March 2023 US bank failures exposed weaknesses in some banks’ management of duration and liquidity risks in a rising rate environment...

  

MAS
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MAS
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November 2023

  

 

 

 

  

 

An Australian Maritime Strategy: Resourcing the Royal Australian Navy, October 2023. Australia is a maritime nation. The sheer scale of our sovereign maritime territory and responsibilities, our dependence on maritime trade for our prosperity and the increasing value of activity in the maritime environment must all be recognised in our maritime strategy. In a highly interconnected world, we face fundamental vulnerabilities from the realities of our geostrategic situation. In this report, the author argues that the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) lacks the resources to adequately protect Australia’s vast maritime interests. This concern isn’t unique to our time: maritime strategists have long lamented that, despite being uniquely an island, a continent and a nation, Australia struggles to understand the central importance of a maritime strategy to our defence and security...

  

ASPI

Where Next for the Australia–South Korea Partnership? October 2023. The strategic partnership between Australia and South Korea holds great potential in an increasingly challenging time. The two nations have many common strategic interests and both can rightly claim to be regional powers. However, the relationship remains a relative underperformer compared with other key regional relationships and has suffered from inconsistency. When Canberra’s contemporary relationship with Seoul receives attention from Australian analysts, it tends to be framed largely in the context of the threats posed by Pyongyang...

  

ASPI

Building Whole-Of-Nation Statecraft: How Australia Can Better Leverage Subnational Diplomacy in the US Alliance, October 2023. Australia and the US are both federations of states in which power is shared constitutionally between the national and subnational levels of government. However, traditionally, one domain that hasn’t been considered a shared power, but rather the constitutionally enshrined responsibility of the national governments, has been international affairs (in the US Constitution through Article I, Section 10 and other clauses and in the Australian Constitution through section 51 (xxix), known as the external affairs power). For this reason, foreign-policy and national-security decision-makers in Washington DC and Canberra have rightly seen themselves as the prime actors in the policymaking that develops and strengthens the US–Australia alliance and all global relationships, with limited power held by subnational governments...

  

ASPI

‘Doing Good Deeds Quietly’: The Rise of Intelligence Diplomacy as a Potent Tool of Statecraft, October 2023. Intelligence diplomacy’ - using intelligence actors and relationships to conduct, or substantially facilitate, diplomatic relations - is a potent tool for statecraft; useful in specific circumstances to either enhance conventional diplomacy or create subtler lines of communication. Intelligence diplomacy, its increasing utility and potential hazards, is the subject of Doing good deeds quietly, the latest report from ASPI’s Statecraft & Intelligence Centre. The report finds that governments turn to intelligence diplomacy when a variety of circumstances – and critically those governments’ assessments of related capabilities and effectiveness of their intelligence services – makes use of intelligence actors or relationships attractive and advantageous...

  

ASPI

Surveillance, Privacy and Agency: Insights from China, October 2023. ASPI and a non-government research partner conducted a year-long project designed to share detailed and accurate information on state surveillance in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and engage residents of the PRC on the issue of surveillance technology. A wide range of topics was covered, including how the party-state communicates on issues related to surveillance, as well as people’s views on state surveillance, data privacy, facial recognition, DNA collection and data-management technologies...

  

ASPI

US Land Power in the Indo-Pacific: Opportunities for the Australian Army, October 2023. The US Army is undergoing its most consequential period of transformation since the end of the Cold War. The re-emergence of great power competition and a deteriorating strategic environment is forcing the US Army to rethink not just its approach to land warfare but also its future role alongside the US Marine Corps in key regions around the globe. In the Indo-Pacific, this doctrinal and structural transformation is informing a new approach to joint exercises and 'no gaps' defence collaboration to deter Chinese aggression. These developments hold important insights for key US allies and partners, including Australia and Japan...

  

ASPI

Reducing Remittance Costs in the Pacific Islands, October 2023. For Pacific Island countries, remittances — money sent home by family and friends working overseas — are a key source of national income and act as social safety nets where social security programs can be underfunded. Remittances help pay for schooling, food, housing, and healthcare, and support families during emergencies. They provide capital for business investment, especially for women. During the Covid-19 pandemic, remittances outperformed foreign direct investment and official development assistance (ODA) as a source of income for low to middle-income countries. The inflows from remittances also maintained foreign exchange reserves and were a lifeline to communities when regular income was disrupted...

  

Lowy

Revitalising the Green Climate Fund, September 2023. The Green Climate Fund, unveiled as part of the Paris Agreement in 2015, was designed as a lynchpin for global climate solidarity between rich and developing countries. Despite its laudable ambitions, the Fund faces important challenges and criticism. It has struggled to define its role in an increasingly crowded climate finance landscape and is seen as slow and difficult to work with, especially for the most vulnerable countries. The GCF is also not effectively targeting its funds towards countries with the greatest needs...

  

Lowy

Indo-Pacific Security in 2030-35: Links in the Chain, October 2023. In recent years, events like the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war have brought global supply chains squarely under the spotlight. The economic impact of these disruptive events exposed the vulnerabilities of today’s global value chains (GVCs) in the face of complex, uncertain, and fast-changing environments. In the Indo-Pacific particularly, the escalating geopolitical tensions threaten the stability of supply chains and, by extension, that of the global economy. As a major transit route for international trade – about 80% of the total global trade by volume passes through the region – the Indo-Pacific is of paramount strategic importance...

  

ISDP

Contemporary Hong Kong-Taiwan Relations in China’s Shadow. October 2023. On November 25, 2022, the Institute for Security and Development Policy (ISDP) arranged a webinar titled “Contemporary Hong Kong-Taiwan Relations in the Shadow of the People’s Republic of China”. The basic idea behind this webinar was to explore in some depth the relations between the Hong Kong democracy movement and Taiwan. To this end, seven distinguished speakers—scholars, commentators, and activists—were invited from Hong Kong and Taiwan to discuss these relations against the background of Beijing’s tightening control over Hong Kong and its aspiration to bring Taiwan under its rule, by means of military force if necessary.

  

ISDP

A New Spring for Caspian Transit and Trade, October 2023. Major recent shifts, starting with the Taliban victory in Afghanistan and Russia’s war in Ukraine have led to a resurgence of the Trans-Caspian transportation corridor. This corridor, envisioned in the 1990s, has been slow to come to fruition, but has now suddenly found much-needed support. The obstacles to a rapid expansion of the corridor’s capacity are nevertheless considerable, given the underinvestment in its capacity over many years.

  

ISDP

Russia-DPRK Space Cooperation: It’s Politics, Not Science, October 2023. The recent Vostochny summit between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Russian President Vladimir Putin has attracted much international attention. The fact that both leaders pledged to strengthen bilateral ties but did not release a joint statement invites speculation about the nature of their agreement. One area that did emerge as a clear priority in Moscow’s and Pyongyang’s future engagement is space and satellite technology. This issue brief looks at the motives behind Putin’s offer to help North Korea build satellites. It argues that Russia perceives its offer as a “win-win situation” that capitalizes on the opportunity to offer Pyongyang something of key strategic interest while reasserting its own self-understanding as a global space power. Still, providing technical assistance to the regime in Pyongyang is a low-hanging fruit, and will not serve to strengthen Moscow’s space capacity or international perception thereof.

  

ISDP

Human Capital, Amenities and Trade: The Case of Malaysia, September 2023. Human capital plays an increasingly important role in economies undergoing structural transformation that involves technological upgrading and sustained trade competitiveness. Both production and consumption amenities are essential to develop, attract and support a workforce with high human capital. Different types of production and consumption amenities are relevant for different kinds of activities at various locations. As human capital growth is likely to be accompanied by worsening inequality, complementary policies are needed to promote inclusiveness without dampening human capital development.

  

ISEAS

Trends in Southeast Asia 2023 #16: The Labour Politics of App-Based Driving in Vietnam. The platform economy consists of three broad categories of companies: those that “provide digital services and products to individual users, such as social media”; those that “mediate exchange of goods and services, such as e-commerce or business-to-business (B2B) platforms”; and digital labour platforms, which “mediate and facilitate labour exchange between different users, such as businesses, workers, and consumers”. Digital labour platforms can be classified into two main types: “gig work platforms”3 or “location-based platforms”4 which refer to work that is done in a specific location (e.g., driving or domestic services)...

  

ISEAS

Trends in Southeast Asia 2023 #15: Indonesia’s Moderate Muslim Websites and Their Fight against Online Islamic Extremism.  The Indonesian Anti-Terrorism Agency (Badan Nasional Penanggulangan Terorisme, or BNPT) argues that Islamist terrorists had previously focused on “hard power”, such as bombings of Western-related targets, or suicide bombings, to attain their objectives. But in recent years, due to state repression and dwindling public support, terrorists have abandoned this strategy, and now resort instead to “soft power”.  Soft power here refers to the use of non-violent means to achieve one’s interests. Terrorists now use the Internet, including social media, or join community organizations which they utilize later on, to gain support for their cause...

  

ISEAS

Trends in Southeast Asia 2023 #14: Terrorism in Indonesia and the Perceived Oppression of Muslims Worldwide. Existing scholarship on terrorism has pointed out various motives underlying violent acts. Notably, Kruglanski, Bélanger, and Gunaratna (2019) argue that such intent could stem from perpetrators’ unfulfilled basic needs, their exposure to violent and extremist narratives since they were young, and the outreach by terrorist networks to them. Additionally, an insightful study by Putra and Sukabdi (2013, p. 84) provides a more region-specific example. Through conducting in-depth interviews with forty religious terror activists in Indonesia...

  

ISEAS

Trends in Southeast Asia 2023 #13: A Review of Data, Policy and Transparency in Reducing Methane Emissions in Malaysia. There is no clear national plan for methane action yet. Since signing the Pledge in 2021, there has been no demonstrable government initiative focusing on joined-up methane action at the national level. Malaysia does not have a methane strategy or policy, and sector-specific regulations focusing on methane emissions are either not present, vague, or publicly inaccessible. There are indications emissions are falling due to positive corporate action. Effective methane reduction initiatives exist in Malaysia’s top two methane-emitting sectors, oil and gas and palm oil, and key players have committed to net zero pathways with methane reductions central to progress to 2030. Emissions should be expected to rapidly fall further if action can be scaled across all industry players..l

  

ISEAS

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APEC
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ADB
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ADB

Asian Development Review, Vol. 40, No. 2, September 2023 (Full Report). This issue looks at various challenges related to COVID-19 and explores diverse topics that include health reform, the benefits of bank-based financial development, and priorities for strengthening revenue sources:

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October 2023

  

 

 

 

  

 

High Frequency Macroeconomic Forecasts Current Quarter Model: 2023Q4, October 2023. The full resumption of normal travel between Hong Kong and the Mainland provided impetus to travel-related service exports. Hong Kong’s economy has recovered to grow by 2.2% in the first half of 2023. It is expected to accelerate and grow by 4.7% in 23Q3. Brought by a series of economic stimulating activities by the government, Hong Kong’s tourism industry continues to improve in 23Q4, simultaneously driving up local consumer sentiment. The job market has already recovered to pre-pandemic full employment levels, and the unemployment rate has registered a new low in 25 years. The unemployment rate is expected to drop slightly to 2.7% in 23Q4 from 2.8% in 23Q3. Hong Kong’s real GDP is expected to grow by 6.2% in 23Q4, partly due to a lower base of comparison. Hong Kong’s economy is projected to rise by 3.8% for the year 2023 as a whole, a downward adjustment of 0.8 percentage points compared to our previous forecast, reflecting the adjustment for the unexpectedly slower growth in 23Q2.

  

HKU

Asian Development Outlook, September 2023 (Full Report, Highlights)  The economic outlook for Asia and the Pacific remains upbeat, with the region’s developing economies expected to grow 4.7% in 2023, and 4.8% in 2024, but risks remain elevated. According to the latest edition of the Asian Development Outlook, growth will remain resilient, supported by domestic demand, recovering tourism, and stable financial conditions. Decelerating inflation across the Asia and the Pacific is also a positive. However, these prospects are tempered by weaker global demand weighing on exports and softening domestic demand in the People’s Republic of China (PRC). A particular worry is whether the PRC’s property market will weaken further. The region faces other challenges. High interest rates have elevated financial stability risks. A looming El Niño and restrictions on food exports could challenge food security. And geopolitical tensions and the fracturing of global production could disrupt trade. These risks are considerable and varied, and policymakers will need to closely track them...

  

ADB

Community Driven Development, Climate Change, and Resiliency: Lessons from Solomon Islands, September 2023. Between 2009 and 2022, the Rural Development Program (RDP) built 663 small scale infrastructure projects chosen by communities across Solomon Islands. As RDP closed, the author visited 68 projects to assess a) the utility of the Community Driven Development (CDD) methodology, and b) how CDD may have been used by communities to ameliorate climate and disaster impacts. He surprisingly found that communities used CDD to replace water sources damaged by logging. Overall, CDD proved robust and adaptable, and was used by communities to build needed climate- and disaster-resilient infrastructure. However, the ability for communities to respond to climate risk was limited due to the scale of sea level rise. This paper concludes with recommendations to make community-led interventions more resilient to climate and disaster risk.

  

EWC

Developing Australia’s Critical Minerals and Rare Earths: Implementing the Outcomes From the 2023 Darwin Dialogue, September 2023. Critical minerals and rare earths are the building blocks for emerging and future technologies, inseparable from the supply chains of manufacturing, clean energy production, medical technology, semiconductors, and the defence and aerospace industries. Despite their criticality, their supply chains are exposed to numerous vulnerabilities – threatening the production and development of vital technologies. This report—based on closed-door, invitation-only discussions at ASPI’s new Darwin Dialogue, a track 1.5 meeting between Australia, Japan and the US—makes 24 recommendations for government and the private sector to support the development of viable, competitive alternative markets that offer products through supply chains secure from domestic policy disruptions and economic coercion...

  

ASPI

COVID-19: Implications for the Indo-Pacific, September 2023. As we approach four years since the first cases of Covid-19 in the Chinese city of Wuhan, the world seems relatively familiar again, albeit an increasingly scary place because of war in Europe, accelerating climate change, and the unhealthy nexus between new technologies and authoritarian coercion by Beijing and others. Within this ‘polycrisis’, Covid-19 now feels like a secondary concern. But the world remains unprepared for the next pandemic, which the Director-General of the World Health Organization, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, has warned could come soon and be even more deadly...

  

ASPI

Trends in Southeast Asia 2023 #11: New Chinese Migrants in Thailand and the Perceived Impact on Thai People. The Chinese Open Door Policy implemented in the late 1970s resulted in new patterns of Chinese migrations. Following the Going Out Policy (1999) and the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) (2013), around 688,000 new Chinese migrants had emigrated to Southeast Asia by 2020. The characteristics of new Chinese sojourners differ from those of traditional Overseas Chinese in that they come as more well-educated middle-income earners and adapt well to the relocation. The US-China trade war in 2018 and the Coronavirus outbreak in late 2019 aggravated anti-Chinese sentiments in many nations. Xenophobia against Asians rose in Europe and the United States, and along the BRI routes, resistance to the Chinese became more obvious in the domestic politics of host countries...

  

ISEAS

Trends in Southeast Asia 2023 #12: Indonesia’s COVID-19 Infodemic: A Battle for Truth or Trust?. On 30 December 2022, many Indonesians breathed a sigh of relief, as their government lifted all remaining COVID-19 measures that day, including restrictions on social gatherings, mandatory mask-wearing indoors, and mandatory use of the COVID-19 tracking app PeduliLindungi (“to care and protect”) in public venues. According to President Joko Widodo (“Jokowi”), the situation was now “under control”, and the Indonesian population had built sufficient immunity to the virus. Indeed, a study from July 2022 conducted by the Health Ministry and the University of Indonesia found that 98.5 per cent of the population had antibodies against COVID-19, either from vaccination or past infections...

  

ISEAS

The French Connection: India-France Partnership for the Indo-Pacific Zeitgeist, September 2023. India’s bilateral relationship with France has been a robust one, and a test case for maintaining a distinct trajectory of its own allowing enough elbow room to both countries to practice their respective strategic autonomies. This issue brief after delving into the multi-dimensional convergences of the India-France strategic relationship contends that the partnership between New Delhi and Paris is one of equals based on complementariness of interest and congruence of intent. The complex geopolitics and geo-economics of the Indo-Pacific would require navigating areas of competition, cooperation, and confrontation...

  

ISDP

Amid Reports on Chinese Expansion of Bases, Sri Lanka Unveils SOP: Need for a Reality Check? September 2023. India has realized it cannot possibly balance China’s growing influence on its own, nor can it afford to have the U.S. leave the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) given China’s significant presence in the island littorals. New Delhi requires the island nations much more than in the past to collectively balance Indian Ocean security. Sri Lanka is pivotal in this equation. Reports published by Aid Data and RAND have identified the Sri Lankan port Hambantota as a highly probable PLA military base. This issue brief attempts to analyze the US research reports and further draws attention to the geopolitical trends in the IOR, where India, China, and the U.S. are entangled in a great power competition...

  

ISDP

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Key Indicators for Asia and the Pacific 2023 (Full Report):
  • Part I: Sustainable Development Goals
  • Part II: Regional Trends and Tables
  • Part III: Dollar Price Wedge between Nominal and Real Global Value Chain Participation
  • Part IV: Stories Behind Data—Using Price Data and Statistics to Track Socioeconomic Development

Key Indicators for Asia and the Pacific covers 49 economies: Afghanistan, Armenia, Australia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, China, Cook Islands, Fiji Islands, Georgia, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kiribati, Republic of Korea, Kyrgyz Republic, Lao, Malaysia, Maldives, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nauru, Nepal, Niue, New Zealand, Pakistan, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Samoa, Singapore, Solomon Islands, Sri Lanka, Taipei, Tajikistan, Thailand, Timor-Leste, Tonga, Turkmenistan, Tuvalu, Uzbekistan, Vanuatu, and Viet Nam.

  

ADB

South Korea’s Indo-Pacific Strategy, Atmanirbhar Bharat, and the IPEF: Convergence and Commonality, August 2023. For some time now, the existing multilateral networks such as those of the United Nations (UN) system have been largely ineffective in providing good global governance and helping create resilience, especially among the emerging and developing economies. The latest example that highlights the inefficacy of the current system is the collapse of the Black Sea grain deal despite genuine UN efforts. As a result, the world order is experiencing a precarious transition. This has necessitated countries across the world to create newer cooperative multilateral mechanisms that are in tune with the times and can potentially give rise to a resilient strategic landscape, such as providing favorable conditions for economic security...

  

ISDP

Pivotal States, Global South and India-South Korea Relations, August 2023. In recent years, the term “Global South”—largely spanning countries in Africa, Central and Latin America, Asia, and the Caribbean—has gained tremendous geopolitical currency. One of the most salient drivers of this reclamation of the so-called emerging and developing world as a symbolic power has been India’s rising strategic and diplomatic prominence. As a vocal member of the community of diverse states, India has refocused its efforts to place the South and its concerns at center stage by coalescing with “like-minded” partners, which was effectively reflected during the 2023 G20 presidency. South Korea is an integral aspect of this global aim...

  

ISDP

Assessing the Development of Taiwanese Identity, August 2023. The subject of contemporary Taiwan inevitably evokes controversy concerning its political, national, and cultural identity, especially the fervent dispute regarding its sovereignty and global recognition. Should Taiwan be recognized as a sovereign and independent state under the name of the Republic of China (ROC), or should it be seen as an “inseparable part of one China,” as claimed by the People’s Republic of China (PRC)? Should the people in Taiwan be considered culturally Chinese, or should they be seen as a separate cultural entity? A compelling underpinning of Taiwan’s assertion of separate nationhood and statehood derives from its emphasis on a distinct historical narrative that diverges from that of the PRC...

  

ISDP

EU-U.S. Convergence on China Chip Sanctions: On Brittle Ground? August 2023. The United States unveiled new wide-ranging restrictions on China’s semiconductor industry in October 2022, unprecedented in scope and intent. Abandoning the Trump years’ erratic approach to individual Chinese tech companies, the Biden administration comprehensively targeted the entire semiconductor supply chain, including allied exports. Not only did the sanctions cut off access to advanced components containing U.S. technologies, but they also sought to end China’s access to the manufacturing equipment needed to produce such components in the first place. The European Union has since sought to find a balance in the new Sino-American tech war, culminating in the EU’s Economic Security Strategy of June 2023. This issue brief examines the motivations and impacts of the U.S. chips sanctions and how they have impacted transatlantic relations and European semiconductor priorities.

  

ISDP

Geopolitical Flux and the Future of International Relations, August 2023. The international political system is undergoing significant geopolitical and economic shifts brought about by fluctuations in the distribution of power among states. This brings into question the future of international cooperation amidst the continuous depletion of global resources and the proliferation of conflict. With the rise and strengthening of potential great and regional powers of the Global South, it is inevitable that the nature of multilateralism will also continue to evolve. However, such an evolution will not only be reliant on material power, but also on the variations in perceptions among states. While multilateralism will remain an undeniable component of international affairs, this issue brief posits that its characteristics will undergo significant reconfigurations based on the growing importance of the Global South and the coinciding interests of developing states to address international issues beyond traditional discourses and methods.

  

ISDP

North Korea’s Grey Huddle: A Reverse Perspective of its Analog Military, August 2023. Defense reform has been the keyword for South Korea’s military strategy for over 20 years and recently the country upgraded its strategic defense plan with the new name ‘Defense Innovation 4.0’ under the Yoon Suk-yeol administration. The core logic behind the reform is smaller but stronger manpower through technical advancement. However, there have been unprecedented drawbacks of fully automated weapon systems revealed in public recently and the fathers of Artificial Intelligence have warned about their errors against mankind. On the other hand, technically disadvantaged adversaries, especially North Korea, have honed their defense strategy with their old-fashioned analog military for decades. This issue brief analyzes the gap between the two sides—technically advanced and technically disadvantaged—in order to refine our technical prowess in the right direction with minimal reform.

  

ISDP

Australia’s North and Space, August 2023. This report examines opportunities for the development of sovereign space capability in the Northern Territory, Queensland, and Western Australia. Given that those northern jurisdictions are closer to the equator, there’s a natural focus in the report on the potential opportunities offered by sovereign space launch, particularly in the Northern Territory and Queensland. However, I also consider the potential for other aspects of space besides launch, including space domain awareness, the establishment of satellite ground stations, and space industry. I explore the potential for the co-location of space industry—domestic and international—within or close to launch sites, which would result in the development of ‘space hubs’ in strategic locations in Australia...

  

ASPI

Getting Regulation Right: Approaches to Improving Australia’s Cybersecurity, Published 2023. As well as having a global impact, Cybersecurity is one of the most significant issues affecting Australia’s economy and national security. On the one hand, poor cybersecurity presents a risk to the interconnected digital systems on which we increasingly rely; on the other hand, well-managed cybersecurity provides an opportunity to build trust and advantage by accelerating digital transformation. Cyber threats can originate from a diverse range of sources and require a diverse set of actions to effectively mitigate them. However, a common theme is that much better cyber risk management is needed to address this critical threat; the current operation of the free market isn’t consistently driving all of the required behaviours or actions...

  

ASPI

Incels in Australia: The Ideology, the Threat, and a Way Forward, August 2023. This report explores the phenomenon of ‘incels’—involuntary celibates—and the misogynistic ideology that underpins a subset of this global community of men that has become a thriving Internet subculture. It examines how online spaces, from popular social media sites to dedicated incel forums, are providing a platform for not just the expansion of misogynistic views but gender-based violent extremism. It raises key questions regarding Australian efforts to counter misogynistic ideologies within our nation. If there’s a continuum that has sexist, but lawful, views on gender at one end and gendered hate speech at the other, at what point does misogynistic ideology tip into acts of gendered violence? What’s needed to prevent misogynistic ideologies from becoming violent? And how do we, as a society, avoid the epidemic levels of violence against women in Australia...

  

ASPI

Trends in Southeast Asia 2023 #10: Consuming Digital Disinformation: How Filipinos Engage with Racist and Historically Distorted Online Political Content. Many current counter-disinformation initiatives focus on addressing the production or “supply side” of digital disinformation. Less attention tends to be paid to the consumption or the intended audiences of disinformation campaigns. A central concept in understanding people’s consumption of and vulnerability to digital disinformation is its imaginative dimension as a communication act. Key to the power of disinformation campaigns is their ability to connect to people’s shared imaginaries. Consequently, counter-disinformation initiatives also need to attend to these imaginaries...

  

ISEAS

Unbundling Regimes and Structural Transformation in Malaysia, August 2023. Technological changes have significant transformative effects on economic activities. The waves of technological innovations in transport and ICT have provided opportunities for globalisation. Malaysia has levied the first unbundling - enabled by lowering of transport costs - to industrialise for five decades. The ICT-driven second unbundling is proving to be more challenging for the country’s manufacturing competitiveness. Weaknesses in the linkages within the technology-services-GVC nexus is a structural weakness that needs to be overcome. This is crucial for effective participation in the third-unbundling.

  

ISEAS

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US Trade Policy Options for Pacific Islands States Require Washington’s Political Commitment, July 2023. The Pacific Islands have emerged as a zone of contestation in the ongoing rivalry between China and the United States. While the US has long been the dominant military power in the region, China is raising its profile through activities like port visits, military exercises, and establishing diplomatic and security ties with regional states like Kiribati and the Solomon Islands. In 2018, Chinese leader Xi Jinping visited Papua New Guinea for the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit. President Biden was supposed to visit PNG in May 2023, in the first ever visit of a sitting US president to the Pacific Islands, but that trip was scuttled due to the debt ceiling fiasco in Washington...

  

EWC

Sustaining Congressional Engagement with Southeast Asia, June 2023. As a representative institution whose members can outlast presidential administrations, Congress plays a vital role in sustaining long-term US foreign policy commitments. The perception of long-term commitment is particularly important in Southeast Asia, where most states seek to maximize their strategic autonomy by balancing relations among great powers. Thus, expectations about the future behavior of great powers can significantly affect foreign policy choices. Congress speaks through the exercise of its formal powers but also in more subtle ways. Congressional actions on foreign relations operate along three channels. The first channel is support for policies initiated by the executive branch, e.g., passing appropriations, making requested statutory changes, or, at the very least, not obstructing what an administration seeks to do...

  

EWC

Multiculturalism, Identity and Influence Project 2020–2023 Summary, July 2023. The Lowy Institute’s Multiculturalism, Identity and Influence Project (2020–2023), funded by the Department of Home Affairs, comprised three nationally representative surveys of the Australian population of Chinese heritage and three Lowy Institute Analysis papers. A key aim of the Project was to investigate the sentiments of Chinese-Australian communities in the context of growing tensions in bilateral ties between China and Australia. The cornerstone of the Project was the annual Being Chinese in Australia: Public Opinion in Chinese Communities survey report — with all three editions housed on a dedicated online platform. The three surveys conducted from 2020–2022 provide the most comprehensive study on public record of the perspectives of more than five per cent of the Australian population...

 

Lowy

De-risking Authoritarian AI - A Balanced Approach to Protecting Our Digital Ecosystems, July 2023. Artificial intelligence (AI)–enabled systems make many invisible decisions affecting our health, safety and wealth. They shape what we see, think, feel and choose, they calculate our access to financial benefits as well as our transgressions, and now they can generate complex text, images and code just as a human can, but much faster. So it’s unsurprising that moves are afoot across democracies to regulate AI’s impact on our individual rights and economic security, notably in the European Union (EU). But, if we’re wary about AI, we should be even more circumspect about AI-enabled products and services from authoritarian countries that share neither our values nor our interests. And, for the foreseeable future, that means the People’s Republic of China (PRC)...

  

ASPI

Informing Australia’s Next Independent Intelligence Review: Learning From the Past, June 2023. The Australian Government commissions a review of its intelligence community every five to seven years. With July 2023 marking six years since release of the last review’s report and, with funding already allocated in this year’s federal budget, the next one is likely to commence shortly. The best starting place for the forthcoming review is the work that precedes it, so reflection on 2017’s Independent Intelligence Review proves valuable. This report, Informing Australia’s next independent intelligence review, reflects on the experiences of the 2017 review and the implementation of its recommendations, and draws lessons to inform the terms of reference, approach and suggested focus of the next review...

  

ASPI

China in Eurasia: Revisiting BRI Amidst the Russia-Ukraine Crisis, July 2023. This paper discusses China’s trade and connectivity plans under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in the Eurasian region and the impact of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on Chinese plans. The world order is once again in flux with the rather unpredictable geopolitical moves of Russia, Europe, the U.S., and the rest of the world, leading to a dynamic set-up for nations to evolve their foreign and regional political choices. Most significant of this has been the Russian invasion of Ukraine which has profoundly reconfigured global geo-economics. Geo-economics is the intersection of the global economy and geography that impacts the world in more than one way. One of the examples of this is also the infrastructure-based connectivity initiatives including China’s BRI. The economic impact of the Russia-Ukraine crisis is making analysts question the stability of BRI.

 

ISDP

AUKUS, Advanced Capabilities and Defense Integration in the Indo-Pacific, July 2023. Nearly two years on from the inception of AUKUS in September 2021, the contours of this strategic partnership have begun to take a more concrete shape. Specifically, the roadmap for Pillar I, which aims to equip Australia with conventionally armed, nuclear-powered submarines (SSN) and develop a new class of SSN, has been released, and there have been further discussions on Pillar II, advanced capabilities. While both pillars support the overarching objective of AUKUS, which is to integrate the defense industrial bases of Australia, the UK, and the U.S., Pillar II in particular reveals its deeper motivation in competing for global pre-eminence in emerging technology. This issue brief examines the aims and strategic rationale of AUKUS, focusing on its pursuit of collective deterrence vis-à-vis China. In doing so, it evaluates some of the opportunities and challenges AUKUS faces moving forward, paying attention to its attempt to develop and equip partners with leading-edge military technologies under a minilateral institutional arrangement.

 

ISDP

EU-Japan-Taiwan Cooperation: Building a Blue Supply Chain, July 2023. The COVID-19 pandemic, the escalating trade war between the United States and China, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have exposed vulnerabilities and weaknesses in the global China-centric economic supply chain as democratic states have experienced significant economic pressures stemming from these external geopolitical occurrences. In this context, democratic states are increasingly falling victim to Chinese economic coercion and trade weaponization as the geopolitical stakes increase. This issue brief discusses the need to reduce dependence on the China-centric global supply chain and explores avenues and challenges that key democratic stakeholders like the EU, Japan, and Taiwan must acknowledge and consider to build a blue supply chain as an alternative to the authoritarian-centered red supply chain.

  

ISDP

South Asia’s Dual Dilemma: Climate Impacts Heighten Conflict Vulnerability, July 2023. South Asia has been confronted with a conflictual crisis for decades now. The arch of vulnerability that this region faces ascends from its long-rooted history of colonialism that left it with a traumatic past and is lingering to date. The conflicts created at that juncture and fortified over time have made this region vulnerable to any internal or external influence. The already declined state of South Asia’s security landscape has been further compromised under the looming climate emergency. With rising temperatures, melting glaciers, and depleting natural resources compounded by South Asia’s internal instability and external intimidations, the region is subject to a mounting dual dilemma. This issue brief looks into two areas of heightened vulnerability for the region—climate-induced migration coincided with conflict escalation and development-induced migration along with the rising energy crises that could become a potential hotspot for conflict in the region.

 

ISDP

Japan’s Indo-Pacific Strategy: The Link with Iran, July 2023. Japan’s “Free and Open Indo-Pacific Strategy” is linked to the Persian Gulf region. Energy resources, concerns about China’s influence on the region’s energy and transit corridors, and the suitable consumption market have made this region and Iran have a special place in Japan’s Indo-Pacific policy. This issue brief discusses how Iran plays an important role by creating a delicate balance and maintaining a suitable distance from China. In addition to providing the energy needed by Japan and creating investment opportunities in the oil, gas and petrochemical industries and ports, Iran can obtain its technological needs from Japan and diversify its corridor routes by creating the North-South Corridor and connecting India to Central Asia and Europe as well. Such a move would ensure that India does not lag behind in the competition with China’s corridors; a move that is also welcomed by Tokyo.

 

ISDP

China’s Pursuit of Food and Energy Security in the Indian Ocean: Consequences for India’s Development, June 2023. China and India are still predominantly rising powers. They are strongly inclined to achieve food and energy security, two priority areas for any nation with a vast population. The possibility of geopolitical flare-ups has been highlighted by China’s ruthless pursuit of all kinds of resources. China’s engagement in the Indian Ocean is not just to have a strong foothold in the region but also to fulfil its domestic demands for energy, food, raw materials, minerals, crude oil, and other essential commodities. This issue brief discusses whether a relentless pursuit of food and energy security in the Indian Ocean and Indo-Pacific regions by China will be a cause of concern for New Delhi and how it poses a strategic hindrance to the national and maritime security of India.

 

ISDP
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