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Begin New Search Topic Economy Political Geography Asia Content Type Policy Brief Publication Year within 25 Years Publication Year within 5 Years

1. Korea's Official Development Assistance to the Philippine Education Sector: Observations and Inputs

Author:
Inero Ancho
Publication Date:
03-2023
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Korea Institute for International Economic Policy (KIEP)
Abstract:
Advocating inclusive and equitable quality education (SGD 4: Quality Education) is central to sustainable development efforts anchored on collaboration and partnership that enable the policy-to-impact synergy. Agencies and institutions in various levels need to align motivations as they work towards realizing education for sustainable development (ESD). As education fuels sustainable development, school access and completion need to be prioritized, as wealth inequality and gender gap are eliminated. Human capital investment involves the provision of relevant and responsive education systems and training. These mechanisms enable an individual to be productive and contribute to positive outcomes, improved standard of living, and potential gains. As a core element to growth and poverty reduction, human capital suggests implementing significant and concrete progress in core education indices. Further, sustained economic growth, increased productivity value, and favorable social returns are manifested outcomes at the macro level. This paper looks at the ODA from Korea to the Philippines in the context of education. The discussion will be anchored on the Philippine Development Plan and AmBisyon Natin 2040 as roadmaps reflecting the aspirations of every Filipino of having a strongly rooted, comfortable, and secured life.1 Observations and inputs will be offered to ensure effective ODA and provide focus and ways forward towards access to and quality of education, along with programs and projects that contribute into any meaningful development of the Philippine economy.
Topic:
Development, Education, Economy, Human Capital, and Sustainability
Political Geography:
Asia, South Korea, and Philippines

2. China in Sub-Saharan Africa: Reaching far beyond natural resources

Author:
Amin Mohseni-Cheraghlou and Naomi Aladekoba
Publication Date:
03-2023
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
This work empirically examines China’s growing footprint in Sub-Saharan Africa’s investment, trade, cultural, and security landscape over the past two decades. It highlights China’s increasing appetite for Sub-Saharan Africa’s natural resources and growing young labor force—identifying the region’s consumer market as an important destination for Chinese goods and services over the next few decades. The analysis identifies more than 600 Chinese investments and construction contracts in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), valued at over $303 billion, signed between 2006 and 2020. Four sectors attract 87 percent of China’s investment and construction in the region: energy at 34 percent; transport, 29 precent; metals, 13 percent; and real estate, 11 percent. This is very similar to the Middle East and North Africa Region, where the energy sector attracts close to 50 percent of China’s investment, followed by transport, 19 percent; real estate, 15 percent; and metals, 6 percent. In terms of trade, this work shows that between 2001 and 2020, China’s merchandise trade with the region increased by a whopping 1,864 percent—surpassing SSA’s trade with both the United States and the European Union. In other words, from 2001 to 2020, China’s share in total merchandise trade in SSA rose from 4 percent to 25.6 percent, while during the same period, the shares of the United States and the EU in SSA’s total trade declined by 10 percentage points and 8 percentage points, respectively. The report also takes a look at China’s arms trade with the region. Twenty-two percent of SSA’s arms imports are sourced from China, making China the region’s second-largest supplier of arms and military equipment, with Russia in the lead (24 percent). Finally, the report highlights the fact that the size of Chinese migrants in Africa is estimated at one to two million, with around one million permanently residing in the region. The largest numbers are in Ghana, South Africa, Madagascar, Zambia, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.This work is the first in a series of empirical analyses that will be conducted on China’s presence in developing economies and low-income countries.
Topic:
Natural Resources, Economy, Business, Economic Growth, Macroeconomics, Trade, and Inclusion
Political Geography:
Africa, China, Asia, and Sub-Saharan Africa

3. Course Correction: Charting a More Effective Approach to U.S.-China Trade

Author:
Clark Packard and Scott Lincicome
Publication Date:
05-2023
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
Over the past several years the U.S.-China economic relationship has soured and become subordinated to broader concerns about national security and geopolitics. After a decades‐​long reform agenda in China that lifted hundreds of millions out of grinding poverty, Chinese president Xi Jinping has increasingly turned inward—reembracing Maoist socialism and heavy‐​handed central planning. Washington’s response to these worrisome developments has been reflexively hawkish economically, scattershot, and woefully inadequate for the economic challenge that China presents.
Topic:
National Security, Bilateral Relations, Economy, and Trade
Political Geography:
China, Asia, North America, and United States of America

4. Structural Transformation and the Global Production Value Chain: Potential Impact of the Cambodia-Republic of Korea FTA on Cambodia

Author:
Shandre Mugan Thangavelu and Vutha Hing
Publication Date:
03-2023
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA)
Abstract:
This policy brief examines the structural transformation of the Cambodian economy based on the impact of the CKFTA in terms of trade, output growth, and employment. It summarises the key results of the CKFTA study that examined the impact of the CKFTA on the Cambodian economy – specifically quantitative (structural gravity model estimation and simulation) and qualitative trade policy evaluation in terms of exports, output, and structural transformation of the economy in the global and regional value chains. The policy brief also highlights the key benefits of the CKFTA to the Cambodian economy.
Topic:
Economy, Economic Growth, Investment, Trade, and Value Chains
Political Geography:
Asia, South Korea, and Cambodia

5. Governing the Global Commons: Challenges and Opportunities for US-Japan Cooperation

Author:
Kristi Govella, John Bradford, Kyoko Hatakeyama, Saadia M. Pekkanen, Setsuko Aoki, James Lewis, and Motohiro Tsuchiya
Publication Date:
12-2022
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMFUS)
Abstract:
The global commons—domains beyond the sovereign jurisdiction of any single state but to which all states have access—are essential to the stability and prosperity of the international order. In addition to the high seas, outer space, the atmosphere, and Antarctica, which are defined as global commons by international law, analysts have also suggested that other domains such as cyberspace may also qualify as potential commons. These domains provide essential public goods such as trade routes, transportation and communication networks, fish stocks, satellite imagery, global positioning, and e-commerce infrastructure that benefit countries around the world. To successfully manage the resources of the global commons and ensure open access to their spaces, effective governance structures must exist to accommodate and integrate the interests and responsibilities of state and non-state actors. Consequently, states have tried to come to agreements in each domain about how to enable broad access, avoid conflict, and enable cooperation. Over time, these discussions have resulted in the creation for each domain of a “regime,” a set of implicit or explicit principles, norms, rules, and decision-making procedures around which actors’ expectations converge (see Box 1). These regimes can take shape in the form of international law, national law, local regulations, private standards, and institutional bodies. They differ dramatically in maturity and complexity: the governance regime of the oceans has developed over the course of centuries, while the rules and norms of cyberspace have only had a few decades to coalesce. However, all these regimes attempt to solve similar dilemmas surrounding shared access and resources.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Science and Technology, Democracy, Economy, Trade, and Defense Cooperation
Political Geography:
East Asia, Asia, United States of America, and Indo-Pacific

6. China: An Economic and Political Outlook for 2022

Author:
Kevin Rudd
Publication Date:
01-2022
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Asia Society
Abstract:
In recent years, Xi Jinping has taken China to the “left” politically and economically, but to the “right” with his deeply nationalist narratives at home and a more assertive foreign and security policy abroad. More recently, this has contributed to a slowdown in the Chinese economy and an increase in the level of political and policy reaction against Xi’s anti-market measures. Now, with last month’s Central Economic Work Conference, the Communist Party appears to have now acknowledged a number of Xi’s measures have indeed gone too far, especially as Xi himself seeks to maximize economic stability ahead of his bid for reappointment to another term in office at the 20th Party Congress this November. But whether these corrective measures will be enough to restore economic growth in the short term given the Chinese private sector is now “once bitten, twice shy” is another question altogether. In China: An Economic and Political Outlook for 2022 – Domestic Political Reaction to China’s Economic Slowdown ASPI President and CEO Kevin Rudd tackles these questions and provides an analysis of how China’s economic challenges are likely to shape its politics and policies in the year ahead.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Politics, Economy, and Xi Jinping
Political Geography:
China and Asia

7. 2022, Xi Jinping’s Annus Horribilis: Or is it?

Author:
Christopher K Johnson
Publication Date:
08-2022
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Asia Society
Abstract:
The year 2022 is proving to be a difficult one for China and for President Xi Jinping. Choices like Xi’s embrace of Russia and the zero-COVID policy have prompted sporadic outbursts from the Chinese public and a backlash abroad. Unsurprisingly, this has spawned speculation that Xi is facing political difficulties at home that could hamstring or even disrupt his plan to remain China’s top leader after the 20th Party Congress later this year. Despite the real challenges Xi and the party have faced in 2022, however, this paper will argue that such narratives rest on a series of faulty assumptions about the impetus for Xi’s consolidation of power, the presence of powerful opposition voices within the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) system, and the judgment that Xi’s policy approach amounts to a series of blunders that may help his critics as they try to diminish him at the party congress.
Topic:
Economy, Domestic Politics, Olympics, Xi Jinping, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
Russia, China, and Asia

8. China’s Global Vision Vacuum: An Opportunity and Challenge for Europe

Author:
Tim Rühlig
Publication Date:
08-2022
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP)
Abstract:
China seems to strive to redefine the global order around sovereignty and a strong state. Yet is China engaging in a constitutive process shaped by the global economy; or is it an imperial power pursuing national sovereignty at any cost? In the West, there are very different answers to this question. This ambiguity is not by design but rather indicates that China lacks a coherent vision for the world. If the EU is to exploit this, it needs to understand why.
Topic:
Sovereignty, Economy, and International Order
Political Geography:
China, Europe, and Asia

9. Memo on an "Economic Article 5" to Counter Authoritarian Coercion

Author:
Ivo H. Daalder and Anders Fogh Rasmussen
Publication Date:
06-2022
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Chicago Council on Global Affairs
Abstract:
The world's democracies need a way to fight back against coercive economic actions by authoritarian governments, argue Ivo Daalder and Anders Fogh Rasmussen. Increasingly, authoritarian countries are using economic coercion against democracies. In recent years, China’s economic coercion of Lithuania and Australia stands out as a prominent example. Russia uses economic levers to achieve geopolitical aims, notably by weaponizing its natural resources. The aim of such coercion is to bend the will of democratic countries. This is a test for the free world. In response, we propose an Economic Article 5 among democracies to counter authoritarian coercion.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Authoritarianism, Economy, Business, and Trade
Political Geography:
Russia, China, Asia, North America, and United States of America

10. Japan’s National Economic Security Strategy and Implications for Korea

Author:
Gyu-Pan Kim
Publication Date:
03-2022
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Korea Institute for International Economic Policy (KIEP)
Abstract:
This paper defines the concept of economic security strategy as “acts that deviate from the rules of the market economy by using economic power as a source of power in the perception that the state or national economy is threatened.” The scope of Japan's economic security strategy is divided into five categories: first, economic statecraft; second, securing of safety and trust in “critical infra-structure”; third, reinforcement of supply chains in critical materials; fourth, public-private R&D cooperation of critical technologies; and fifthly, cooperation in strengthening global supply chains with “like-minded partners.”
Topic:
International Cooperation, Economy, Supply Chains, Economic Security, and Public-Private Partnership
Political Geography:
Japan, Asia, and South Korea