East Asian Security Order Research Articles

Introduction: East Asia's Contested Security Order

East Asia's security environment is changing rapidly. Over the past five years or so, the security order has become increasingly unsettled as it is buffeted by a complex array of forces. The region is entering a period of growing rivalry and animosity states are uncertain over the strategic intentions of great and rising powers, nationalism is an increasingly pervasive force, and military spending has been ramping up in many countries over the past decade. That the security environment is changing is unarguable. But what is the extent of these changes? And what are the implications of these shifts for regional states? This paper introduces the special issue “East Asia's Contested Security Order”. It begins by discussing the broad contours of the changing East Asian security order and what is at stake for regional powers. It then introduces the seven articles in this edition that challenge existing conceptualisations of the East Asian security order, articulate diverse perspectives on that order held by regional, middle and smaller powers, examine their complex and different security strategies that contribute to shaping the regional order, and consider the extent to which the regional security order may be said to be “contested”.

A Middle Power's Roles in Shaping East Asian Security Order: Analysis of Japan's Engagement from a Normative Perspective

East Asia is currently in a transitional period. Recognizing the challenges presented by China's rise to the current regional order, existing literature analyses the security situation in Asia by focusing on the material aspects of power distribution between the US and China. Few works substantively discuss the roles played by middle powers such as Japan in shaping the regional order and how they can deal with the challenges of great power competition and threats to the global rules‐based order. By employing Japan's involvement in the South China Sea issues as a case study, this article examines how a middle power attempts to shape or underpin the regional security order and if such attempts are effective. The investigation of Japan's engagement illustrates that a middle power's practical support can indirectly and gradually contribute to sustaining and defending the regional “rules‐based order”.

The Clash of Power and Nationalism: The Sino-Japan Territorial Dispute

The East Asian security order has been affected by the increasing rivalry between China and Japan in recent years against the backdrop of the evolving Sino-Japan balance of power and the renewed nationalism in both countries. These developments have emerged as powerful wild cards, reinforcing the security dilemma and undermining the prospect for building a lasting peace between these two major powers in the region. This research is designed to examine Sino-Japan relations as well as the overall security order in East Asia. In particular, it looks into how the politics of nationalism intertwined with the changing regional power dynamics could affect the East China Sea dispute by creating an environment more conducive to bilateral tensions rather than mutual trust and cooperation.

On the fungibility of economic power: China’s economic rise and the East Asian security order

China is now second only to the US as a world economic power. Its economic rise has challenged US ability to fundamentally shape the world trade order. However, the importance of the rise of the Chinese economy for international security affairs is less clear. The key analytical issue for international politics and for an understanding of the sources of power is whether economic power is fungible in international security affairs, whether it can independently determine the strategic alignments of small states. This is also the key question in assessing the implications of China’s economic rise for the East Asian security order. The political-economy literature argues that trade dependence can lead small states to realign within great power politics, regardless of the military balance. However, poor case selection challenges this prior literature. By using contemporary East Asia as a source of multiple bilateral case studies, I argue that the economic dependence of a small state on a great economic power is insufficient to influence independently small state strategic alignment preferences and that China’s rising economic power is not fungible in East Asian security affairs.

North Korea and the East Asian Security order: competing views on what South Korea ought to do

ABSTRACTThis article investigates South Korean views on how to deal with the two major security issues regarding North Korea: its nuclear threat and regime instability. In this Special Section, the article analyzes the ongoing debate in South Korea over the government's policy toward North Korea in regard to these two issues. It argues that uncertainties about these two major issues are shaping the regional order in East Asia. In particular, the different levels of cooperation between South Korea and the United States may affect the regional security order in East Asia. In analyzing policy options available to South Korea, the riskiest option would be to employ early preemptive attacks and accelerate the collapse of North Korea given the security dilemma-driven action‒reaction in East Asia. Given that the role of China has become the most crucial factor in dealing with North Korea, the most promising strategy would be to reinforce guarantees of extended nuclear deterrence and prompt a soft-landing unification.

Hedging Strategies of the Middle Powers in East Asian Security: the Cases of South Korea and Malaysia

Many middle powers in East Asia—particularly South Korea and Malaysia—are affected by the strategic relationship between the USA (hereafter the USA) and China. Therefore, I would like to examine the strategic behaviors of the middle powers in East Asia from a hedging strategy perspective. The hedging strategy extends the logic of the traditional balance of power theory while maintaining a strong emphasis on structural incentives, which critics have found lacking in the soft balance approach. Most East Asian states have calibrated their security measures and strategies in response to the changing US-China relationship. The purpose of this article is to compare the hedging strategies of South Korea and Malaysia, which are middle powers, that affect the East Asian security order. This article, thus, aims not simply to explain specific instances of the hedging strategies of middle powers but also, based on this theoretical foundation, to establish a new frame of analysis for the hedging strategies of middle powers through objective and critical assessment.

동아시아 안보질서 변화에 따른 한국의 동아시아 외교안보정책 과제

동아시아 안보질서 변화에 따른 한국의 동아시아 외교안보정책 과제

The Hedging Strategy of Great and Middle Powers in the East Asian Security Order

The Hedging Strategy of Great and Middle Powers in the East Asian Security Order

How Japan matters in the evolving East Asian security order

This article argues that Japan matters crucially in the evolving East Asian security order because it is embedded both in the structural transition and the ongoing regional strategies to manage it. The post-Cold War East Asian order transition centres on the disintegration of the post-Second World War Great Power bargain that saw Japan subjecting itself to extraordinary strategic constraint under the US alliance, leaving the conundrum of how to negotiate a new bargain that would keep the peace between Japan and China. To manage the uncertainties of this transition, East Asian states have adopted a three-pronged strategy of: maintaining US military preponderance; socializing China as a responsible regional great power; and cultivating regionalism as the basis for a long-term East Asian security community. Japan provides essential public goods for each of these three elements: it keeps the US anchored in East Asia with its security treaty; it is the one major regional power that can and has helped to constrain the potential excesses of growing Chinese power while at the same time crucially engaging with and helping to socialize China; and its economic and political participation is critical for meaningful regionalism and regional integration. It does not need to be a fully fledged, ‘normal’ Great Power in order to carry out these roles. As the region tries to mediate the growing security dilemma among the three great powers, Japan's importance to regional security will only grow.

Changes in the US-China Relations and East Asian Security Order

Changes in the US-China Relations and East Asian Security Order

Asian Security Architecture in the Growth of U.S.-China Strategic Competition in the 21st Century

Recognizing that the broader structure of East Asia`s regional order is going to change, this paper assumes that there are three major factors to drive and facilitate the East Asian order: (1) An existing security architecture comprised of various bilateral and multilateral mechanisms; (2) the role of America in adjusting the current security multilateralism to lead to it remaining cooperative and/or competitive; and (3) the bilateral relationship of the two powers, the United States and China. The paper argues that East Asian order has been and will be determined by the changing state of Sino-U.S. relations. Then it explores what relationship the United States and China engage in and where it is directed. The next section discusses what effect the Sino-U.S. relationship has on the security order in East Asia focusing on the major multilateral security arrangements as seen in Figure 1. To do this, the two distinct multilateral security mechanisms, the U.S.-Japan-Australia Trilateral Strategic Dialogue (TSD) and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), will be analyzed. Additionally, as a bridge between the United States and China for security cooperation, the Korea-China-Japan Tripartite Cooperation Dialogue (TCD) will be explored. The future of both Sino-U.S. relations and its relations with the East Asian security order are dealt with in the conclusion. Since the current state of U.S.-China relations is a more complicated, lovehate relationship in locked interdependency, the East Asian order is characterized as a foggy, complex hybrid system. Until a power transition between the United States and China comes close to the threshold, the order will be led more by U.S. chosen bilateralism than Chinese preferred multilateralism. As the Obama administration came into office signaling greater enthusiasm for a multilateral enterprise, Washington`s concern over multilateral security architecture in the region will increase. The viability of a multilateral security institution in East Asia, supported by and with the participation of the United States, will become critical as a non-confrontational way to tame China`s rising power. As a result the Tripartite Cooperation Dialogue (TCD) among South Korea, China and Japan, and the Six-Party Talks will probably become influential as multilateral institutions in which the United States and China both share common strategic interests in East Asia. This development would lead the TCD to become a pivotal security mechanism. This then would contribute to freeing East Asian order of a hybrid and complex system.

Hierarchy and the role of the United States in the East Asian security order

To construct a coherent account of East Asia's evolving security order, this article treats the United States not as an extra-regional actor, but as the central force in constituting regional stability and order. It proposes that there is a layered regional hierarchy in East Asia, led by the United States, with China, Japan, and India constituting layers underneath its dominance. The major patterns of equilibrium and turbulence in the region since 1945 can be explained by the relative stability of the US position at the top of the regional hierarchy, with periods of greatest insecurity being correlated with greatest uncertainty over the American commitment to managing regional order. Furthermore, relationships of hierarchical assurance and hierarchical deference help to explain critical puzzles about the regional order in the post-Cold War era.