Perceptions of Asia in Europe

The question of how Asia is perceived by the European Union is becoming increasingly relevant for European as well as for Asian policy makers. The more successful Asia and emerging countries like China and India become, the more vulnerable the European public and all involved stakeholders are to fall victim to old and new stereotypes. A lack of knowledge may result in the EU becoming more vulnerable to developing prejudice towards Asia. The new research project “Asia in the Eyes of Europe” aims to identify, measure and compare public awareness and perceptions of Asia within the European Union. The research is to deliver an analysis of Europe’s cognitive outlook towards Asia. It tracks the existing landscape of perceptions of Asia within the EU and seeks to contribute to, deepen and enhance European–Asian understanding. A study of Asia’s image in Europe can thus help Europeans and Asians to understand in how far their interaction impacts on the shaping of institutions of regional governance that can complement structures of global governance.     

Wind energy development in East Asia and Europe

Over the last decade, wind energy has emerged as the most important non‐hydro renewables sector, contributing significantly to global efforts on developing low-carbon energy systems. In terms of grid electricity generation, its power output has increased almost 16-fold since 2000 and currently produces around 3 times that of solar photovoltaic, 4 times more than biomass and 20 times more than geothermal installations globally. Europe and East Asia have been at the forefront of wind energy development, together accounting for almost 70 % of total installed capacity and most of the world’s largest wind turbine producers. This paper begins by providing an overview of historic and recent developments in wind energy and then discusses key techno-innovation, production and internationalisation issues before looking at policy approaches taken by European and East Asian countries to renewable energy generally and wind energy more specifically. Finally, obstacles to the future development of the wind energy sector are discussed.     

Monetary policy and overinvestment in East Asia and Europe

The paper analyzes the role of monetary policy for cyclical movements of investment and asset markets in East Asia and Europe based on a Mises-Hayek overinvestment framework. It is shown how the gradual global decline of interest rates has triggered wandering overinvestment cycles in Japan, Southeast Asia, and China. Similarly, it is shown how a one-size monetary policy within the European Monetary Union has not preserved the European Monetary Union from idiosyncratic economic development and crisis because of uncoordinated fiscal policies. With monetary policy crisis management being argued to impede financial and economic restructuring, a timely exit from ultra-expansionary monetary policies is recommended for both East Asia and Europe to reconstitute economic stability and growth.     

Trade relations between Europe and East Asia

The Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) framework was created in 1996, with the primary purpose of strengthening economic, political and cultural relations among the 15 countries of the European Union and ten East Asian states. This paper examines the origins of these recent economic linkages, in a global and inter-regional context.¶The paper charts the principal elements of ASEMs economic pillar to date, assesses the influence of multilateral trading environments (notably the WTO) on the region-to-region dialogue and examines ASEMs impact on intra-regional economic developments, especially in the case of East Asia.¶The paper will focus in particular on the flagship projects of trade and investment facilitation, to discuss whether and to what extent ASEM itself can be seen to further cooperation and coordination in specific fields of activity.¶The final part of the paper aims to analyse the prospects for future economic relations between East Asia and Europe, in the wake of a devastating financial crisis in Asia, in the context of a continued war on terror which, since the Bali bombing has had an even more immediate impact on Asia, and in the changing global economic environment as regulated by the tenets of the WTO.     

Islam and politics in Europe and in Asia: Comparative reflections

This article compares the role of religion, and of Islam in particular, in politics in Europe and in South and South East Asia. It starts out with the policy dilemmas facing France, Europe's most secular country that also has Europe's largest immigrant Muslim community. After long debates nation-wide Muslim organisation is now sponsored by the state in order to strengthen moderate Islam in France. In contrast, explicit Christian parties are in decline in most of Europe. Those who are still electorally successful are Christian mostly in name only and have turned into centre-right conservative people's parties instead. Religious discourse in politics has hence vanished almost entirely in Europe. In difference in Asia Islamic opposition parties have managed to set increasingly the political agenda in the majority Islamic states. In those countries with an Islamic minority their public religious agitation serves to strengthen their ethnic minority identity. Meaningful bi-continental dialogue needs to be aware of this discrepancy in religious politics.     

East Asia and Europe—partners in global politics?

Practitioners and researchers have repeatedly portrayed the Asia–Europe Meeting as an institution that is not fully able to realize its agenda-setting potential in global negotiations or discourses. This paper argues that this assessment basically holds true even after 10 years of cooperation: Although ASEM tries to improve on this meagre balance by establishing a virtual secretariat and advancing common positions on trade, finance and environmental issues, cooperation between Asian and European states is frequently marred by the pitfalls of informality and the antagonisms of different cooperation cultures. Yet, successful moulding of common positions on climate change resulting in the adoption of a respective declaration may indicate an improved multilateral effectiveness of ASEM. Howard Loewen is senior research fellow at the Institute of Asian Studies (now part of GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies) in Hamburg.     

Lessons from the Asian financial crisis for the eurozone: a comparative analysis of the perilous politics of austerity in Asia and Europe

This paper comparatively examines diverse responses from three major actors in the global political economy (the state, civil society, international financial institutions) to the Asian financial crisis of 1997 and the current eurozone crisis. First, it analyses conditional lending policies of international financial institutions (IFIs) such as the International Monetary Fund toward countries in fiscal distress. It then critically examines how the lending policies engendered social tensions and conflicts as austerity measures such as cuts to social welfare programmes hit hard on the populace. Examining how the state and civil society in Asia reacted to and, as a result of contentious state–civil society interactions, altered the policies of IFIs, the paper draws lessons from the Asian financial crisis for the European Union and puts forwards alternative policy suggestions.     

Comparing functions of transnational city networks in Europe and Asia

Transnational city networks (TCNs) are organisations that facilitate information exchange, cooperation and lobbying activities of cities from different countries—independent of the national level. This paper compares the aims and goals of European and Asian city networks, asking if there are significant differences between the two regions or if certain global patterns of urban international relations can be identified. The analytical concept draws on the literature on European TCNs and identifies specific functions they provide to their membership. By way of a comparative analysis, this concept is extended to the Asian TCN cases. It is shown that in both regions, cities cooperate independently across national borders, circumventing the nation-state. Furthermore, sustainable development with a strong focus on environmental issues, and in particular climate change policy, is the most important policy goal in both Europe and Asia. The TCNs show major differences, however, in the areas of representation of and lobbying on behalf of their memberships. This leads to the conclusions that cities emancipate themselves from the higher tiers of government and that the Westphalian nation state loses coherence in both Europe and Asia, even though to specific degrees.     

A comparative study on corporate sponsorships in Asia and Europe

This article gives a brief introduction to the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) movement in Asia and Europe with special reference to the range of sponsoring activities offered by the multinationals in both regions. 46 firms¹ were chosen from two Asian countries and five European countries respectively. Their sponsorship activities were compared by category, funding format as well as publicity. All of the sampled companies showed their social commitment by sponsoring a wide range of community, national and international projects. Environment is the key subject here, while differences of sponsoring category do exist between Asian and European firms. Research Method – Review of corporate website, brochures, annual reports to assess their sponsoring events, organisations and other programmes.Forbes Global 500 list: http://www.fprnes. com/2003/07/07internationaland.html.     

Civil society,political stability,and state power in Central Asia: cooperation and contestation

This article develops a concept of civil society in Central Asia distinct from that which emerged from the East European communist societies of the late 1980s. Kazakhstan presents a case study of a civil society that conceptually can be located between the vibrant civil society of the Baltic democracies and the civil society of the strongly repressive environments of Belarus or Uzbekistan. Kazakhstan's authoritarian structures and cultural traditions make it difficult to develop strong independent civic organizations – cooperation tends to mark state-civil society relations more than contestation, which shaped much of Eastern Europe's experience. Even in a context of relative affluence where civil society organizations are allowed some space to engage in critical activities, contestation tends to be minimized. This is only partially related to state suppression and cooptation; a political culture that views democratic processes as potentially destabilizing is also a significant factor. Kazakhstan represents a distinct Central Asian model of civil society, comparable to Russia but qualitatively different from that found in either Eastern or Western Europe, where civil society is less willing to confront the state, more cooperative with the authoritarian system, and wary of the potential for civic activism to degenerate into instability. Differentiating types of civil society is important because a key component of Western democracy assistance programmes has been providing assistance to build and strengthen civil societies. By refining our understanding of distinct civil society patterns in Central Asia, we can enhance our knowledge of political processes in this critical region, and we may improve the effectiveness of democracy assistance programmes. The study is grounded in field research, interviews, civil society workshops, survey research, and government documents.     

Monetary and financial cooperation in Asia: taking stock of recent ongoings

Ever since the currency crisis of 1997–98, there has beena great deal of interest in enhancing regional economic cooperationin Asia. It is important to keep in mind that economic regionalismis of multidimensional nature. The focus of this paper is onpolicy initiatives underway in Asia to enhance monetary andfinancial regionalism and the analytical bases for these initiatives,rather than on examining the de facto level of financial andmonetary links that already exists (which may or may not havebeen facilitated via regional policy mechanisms). There aremany gradations of monetary and financial regionalism, rangingfrom the weak form involving regional policy dialog and surveillance,on the one hand, to exchange rate and monetary coordination,on the other. To maintain focus, this paper concentrates morenarrowly on ‘medium forms’ of monetary and financialregionalism, broadly defined as the development of regionalliquidity arrangements and regional financial markets.     

The solar power policies and markets of Asia and Europe

This article examines and compares the design and roll-out of solar policies of three major markets in Asia and Europe in 2012. The photovoltaic (“PV”) and concentrated solar power (“CSP”) policies of India, Thailand, Malaysia, in Asia and Germany, Italy and Spain in Europe are analysed on the basis of policy documents publicly available on web portals of the relevant government authorities in the respective countries in addition to independent reports and studies. The aim here is to measure and compare the form and quantum of state support extended to the solar power generation sector in these six fairly comparable countries in Asia and Europe, provide an overview of the design and deployment of solar power policies and estimate the costs of carbon mitigation through solar power in the six countries. The countries were chosen on the basis of available information and data in English from primary sources such as government policy documents, announcements and reports, and the scale of solar power policies and their relative maturity.     

Region-building and critical juncture: Europe and Northeast Asia in comparative perspective

China, Japan, and Korea have begun to engage one another vigorously since the 1997 crisis. As intraregional economic ties have further deepened and broadened, interconnectedness in cultural and political aspects has risen rapidly in a variety of forms. Decision-makers and intellectuals in China, Japan, and Korea have been floating ideas and interests for establishing various types of Northeast Asian community formation. New security dialogues and co-operation frameworks also emerge. Accordingly, the rapidly growing Northeast Asia is likely to emerge as an identifiable regional community. With the incipient emergence of regional community in Northeast Asia, Northeast Asian region-building becomes a salient issue of major academic and policy debates. Yet, in spite of the recent mushrooming of research in and attention to the region-building, the questions regarding within what surrounding and under what situation regional community can be built, as well as what motivates people to choose region-building, and when and how state system can be transformed into a regional community remains only partly resolved. In order to solve this puzzle, this paper will compare the current Northeast Asian region-building with the early stage of European region-building, arguing that while there are important differences in evolution, format, and kind of region-building in Europe and Northeast Asia, critical juncture is influential in region-building.