Asia Pacific

29 September 2016

A wave of political activism has animated East Asian politics: Taiwan’s Sunflower Student Movement in 2014, South Korean 2015 street protests against President Park’s new labour law, and protests in Japan in 2015 against Prime Minister Abe’s security bills. Youth activism was common to all these movements. Facing challenges...

Featured Articles

2 August 2015

The Logistical Challenges of a Bouganvillean Election

Bougainville went to the polls in May 2015 for the third Autonomous Bougainville Government election since the signing of the Bougainville Peace Agreement in 2001. The election was a significant political milestone for the region, marking the beginning of a...

3 June 2015

Close Ties between Australia and Japan are Good for the Region

Japan–Australia security ties are now stronger than ever. Both countries have a long history of cooperation in multilateral contexts such as peacekeeping missions or regional institution building but recently this has been strengthened to include more direct bilateral and trilateral...

20 April 2015

Australia and Vietnam Forge a Stronger Relationship

Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung’s visit to Australia in mid-March 2015 has highlighted how Australia–Vietnam relations relate to the broader strategic picture in the Asia Pacific. While much attention is paid to ‘the rise of China’, the ‘Pacific pivot’...

7 April 2015

What Happened to China’s Hong Kong Promises?

On 19 December 1984, amidst great fanfare, the United Kingdom and China signed the Sino–British Joint Declaration on the Question of Hong Kong. It contained extensive guarantees of Hong Kong’s autonomy, rule of law, and fundamental rights — all of...

6 April 2015

Pacific Island Women are Making Their Mark

Dame Meg Taylor is no ordinary woman. The first woman to be appointed to the position of Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum has a proud track record of breaking boundaries on behalf of Pacific women. As PNG’s first...

30 March 2015

ASEAN Would Benefit from Indonesia’s Leadership

ASEAN would benefit from stronger leadership however, Indonesia, the country best placed to take up that role, appears unwilling.  Indonesia could be the leader that ASEAN needs, but it intentionally refrains from asserting its influence over the association. This is...

24 March 2015

China’s Infrastructure Investment Bank

Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) has been much in news ever since China showed interest in forming a bank that focused on infrastructure projects in the Asian region. Established in 2014, the Asian lending institution has a target of $100...

23 March 2015

Maritime Disputes and Vital Trade Routes Define Asian Waters

Some are calling for a new institution to manage Asia’s maritime disputes. ‘The physical contours of East Asia’, leading geopolitical analyst Robert Kaplan recently wrote, ‘argue for a naval century’. Given the significance of the maritime realm in the region...