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| Srl | Item |
| 1 |
ID:
143910
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| Summary/Abstract |
In July 2014, Australia's new Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, and his Japanese counterpart, Shinzō Abe, elevated the status of bilateral ties to a ‘special strategic relationship'. Both sides also agreed on intensifying their defence technology cooperation, including in the submarine space. As well, Prime Minister Abbott called Australia a ‘strong ally’ of Japan. Yet, the prospect of a further strengthening of Australia–Japan defence relations has led to criticism by Australian strategic commentators. In particular, critics argue that closer strategic relations with Japan could damage Australia's ties with a rising China. In a worst-case scenario, Australia might even become ‘entrapped’ in a Sino-Japanese conflict. However, this argues that a closer defence relationship is in Australia's strategic interests in the face of China's increasing challenge to the rules-based order in the region. China's uncompromising position in the South China Sea and its more assertive behaviour have led to a greater congruence of threat and risk assessment between Australia and Japan. Indeed, Australia and Japan are increasingly facing a security dilemma vis-à-vis China, albeit to varying degrees. Therefore, for Australia, promoting Japan's ‘security normalisation’ contributes to regional stability. As well, the article points out that closer strategic ties with Japan do not automatically come at the expense of Sino-Australia relations. China's leverage to ‘punish’ Australia for unwanted strategic behaviour is limited, and concerns about ‘entrapment’ in a Sino-Japanese war are exaggerated. However, the more China exerts coercive diplomacy, the closer Australia–Japan defence relations are likely to become.
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| 2 |
ID:
150539
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| Summary/Abstract |
The US rebalance to the Asia Pacific is consistently interpreted as a response to China’s material rise. While not entirely incorrect, this assumption – derived from an overriding faith in the explanatory significance of relative state capabilities – fails to explain why rapidly rising others, most notably India, remain absent from regional US security discourse, and why a heavy US presence in Asia predates China’s ascent of the 1970s onwards. To address these problems and offer an improved explanation of what the rebalance is, how and why it has come about, and what it is designed to achieve within the context of China’s rise, this analysis draws from critical geopolitics and postcolonial theory. It argues that the rebalance is best conceived as the (re)articulation of historical discourses which construct certain foreign Others like China as challenges to the ontological American self, making the rebalance an attempt to pacify a particular rising identity as much as a rising state actor. The analysis is motivated in part by the question of how the rebalance is enabled in its current form. From here, the article addresses an increasing yet regressive tendency of International Relations theory to deny studies of the ‘how possible’ explanatory value, encouraging their marginalisation in favour of examinations into ‘why’ political decisions are made.
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| 3 |
ID:
141279
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| Summary/Abstract |
This article examines how, in a global strategic context presided by the rise of Asia and the US rebalance towards that region, Europeans are contributing to transatlantic burden-sharing—whether individually or through the EU/NATO. As Asian powers reach westward and the US shifts its strategic priorities eastward, classical geostrategic delimitations become gradually tenuous. Particularly important are the ‘middle spaces’ of the Indian Ocean, central Asia and the Arctic, in that they constitute the main avenues of communication between the Asia–Pacific and the European neighbourhood. The article seeks to understand how evolving geostrategic dynamics in Europe, the ‘middle spaces’ and the Asia–Pacific relate to each other, and how they might impinge on discussions on transatlantic burden-sharing. It is argued that the ability of Europeans to contribute to a more equitable transatlantic burden-sharing revolves around two main tenets. First, by engaging in the ‘middle spaces’, Europe's key powers and institutions are helping to underpin a balance of power in these regions. Second, by stepping up their diplomatic and economic role in the Asia–Pacific, strengthening their security ties to (US) regional allies and maintaining an EU-wide arms embargo on China, Europeans are broadly complementing US efforts in that key region. There are a number of factors that stand in the way of a meaningful European engagement in the ‘middle spaces’ and the Asia–Pacific, including divergent security priorities among Europeans, the impact of budgetary austerity on European defence capabilities and a tendency to confine foreign policy to the immediate neighbourhood. The article discusses the implications of those obstacles and outlines some ways in which they might be overcome.
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| 4 |
ID:
124460
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2013.
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| Summary/Abstract |
This article explores perceptions and reactions across Southeast Asia towards the Obama administration's "pivot" or "rebalance" to Asia. The US approach has been dismissed as more rhetorical than substantive grand strategy, its credibility under renewed scrutiny following President Obama's cancelled visit to Southeast Asia in October 2013. Nonetheless, the rebalance has expanded from its origins in 2010-11, acquiring diplomatic and economic "prongs" with a particular focus on Southeast Asia, broadening the bandwidth of US engagement beyond military diplomacy and force realignment. However, the US "pivot" has had to contend with entrenched narratives of the US role in the region oscillating between extremes of neglect or over-militarization. The US-China strategic dynamic weighing over the region, itself central to Washington's strategic calculus across Asia, has also coloured the lens through which Southeast Asians have viewed the re-balance. Varied reactions to the US rebalance at the national level in Southeast Asia are further suggestive of a sub-regional divide between "continental" and "maritime" states that to some extent predisposes their perspectives and orientation towards the Great Powers.
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| 5 |
ID:
140411
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This article assesses Southeast Asian views of the US “rebalance,” examining reactions to US military deployments, military assistance to partners, and support for Southeast Asian diplomacy on South China Sea conflicts. Although not ostensibly designed to contain China, the rebalance provides Southeast Asia with hedging options against more assertive PRC actions in the South China Sea.
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