Knowledge hubs along the Straits of Malacca

World history has known areas of relative isolation and areas of high intensity of cultural interaction. The Mediterranean Sea, the Silk Road or the Straits of Malacca can be cited as such crucial contact zones. Within these areas, centres sprung up that served as interfaces between cultures and societies. These “hubs” as we would like to call them, emerged at various points throughout the contact zones, rose to prominence and submerged into oblivion due to a variety of natural calamities or political fortunes. This paper assesses the rise and fall of trade and knowledge hubs along the Straits of Malacca from before colonialisation until today. Historical hubs of maritime trade and religiosity today increasingly establish themselves as educational and knowledge hubs. This leads us to speak of the Straits of Malacca as a chain of—not pearls—but knowledge hubs with Singapore as the knowledge hub in the region shining the brightest of all, as the data suggest. We aim to conceptually grasp this development by suggesting a model or at least a hypothesis about the rise and movement of knowledge hubs in general.

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Operational oceanography in Indonesia

In 2005 Indonesian and European institutes joined to start the first step for the implementation of an Ocean Operational System in the Indonesian archipelago. The system will support the decision making process for the sustainable use of marine resources, providing useful information and added value products as well as a service for an improved management of the sea with high business impact to targeted groups as public authorities and commercial operators (coastal managers, fishermen, shipping companies). In this paper the System is shortly described with its potential benefits and economic and social impacts.

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IMF staff: Missing link in fund reform proposals

Current IMF reform proposals are preoccupied with changing governance structures by reallocating Executive Board chairs and quota shares and with expanding and altering the Fund’s surveillance role, but not enough attention has been paid to whether organizational change at the staff level is also needed. IMF staff have intellectual dominance and discretion in the design of loan conditionality, writing of surveillance reports, and provision of technical and policy advice. There are also clear internal and external criticisms of how the Fund’s organizational culture—that is perceived to be hierarchical, technical/economistic, bureaucratic, and homogeneous/conforming—negatively affects the Fund’s policy output and relationship with borrowing members. This article suggests altering ’how things are done’ at the IMF by making changes to recruitment and organizational structure.

Regional energy cooperation in North East Asia: Lessons from the European Experience

The three major oil importing countries of Northeast Asia—China, Japan and South Korea—are concerned about future security of energy supplies to fuel their dynamic economic activity. Currently all three countries are highly dependent on imports of oil from the Middle East, a region with inherent political instability. Russia’s rich reserves of oil and gas in Eastern Siberia and the Russian Far East offer an obvious alternative. Given the geographical proximity of Russia and its desire to increase its energy exports to Northeast Asia, there is huge potential for cooperation. So far there has been no real intra-regional cooperation and no common external policy towards Russia. Despite obvious differences between Europe and North East Asia, the European model of energy cooperation, developed over the past 50 years, offers some useful lessons.

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From intergovernmental to global: UNESCO’s response to globalization

Whilst there is an ever-growing literature on the economic and political aspects of ‘globalization,’ at present there are few studies analyzing how intergovernmental organizations have reacted to this phenomenon. This article aims to fill this gap by analyzing the response to globalization of UNESCO, one of the least studied organizations of the UN constellation. Addressing the global orientation of some of the current programs, this article shows how a recent re-evaluation of scientific humanism—the main philosophical framework contributing to the creation of UNESCO—has influenced both UNESCO’s self-understanding and its understanding of globalization. Scientific humanism is a philosophical utopia that couples the advance of scientific knowledge with the diffusion of a common philosophical framework and promotes a universal system of education in order to establish a global community. Based on the philosophical appeal of a culture of peace based on science, humanism and human rights, UNESCO’s representation of globalization represents an intriguing example of how our global future may be conceived and, to some extent, realized.

Transregional security cooperation after September 11, 2001

The aim of this article is to answer the question what kind of global security architecture emerged after September 11 and what functions Europe, East Asia and the United States assumed in this triadic structure. The empirical findings reveal that the transpacific security cooperation is the strengthening link in this global security structure, the transatlantic security cooperation the weakening one and the Asia–Europe Security Cooperation is to be seen as the emerging link. In order to explain these different institutional manifestations of transregional cooperation, different theories of International Relations are applied to the three cases. It comes as no surprise that neoinstitutionalism and constructivism offer the best insights into the formation and development of international institutions.

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The awakening of the red dragon. China fills the power vacuum in the Far East

The paper analyses the basic parameters of the power of China, according to Geopolitical Theory. Even though the authors adopt a critical approach on some aspects of the geopolitical theory, the geopolitical analysis elucidates the interests of China and the United States and focuses on the way of which the American decision-making system perceives China. The article interprets the geopolitical role of China, starting from the origins of geopolitical theory to the contemporary international relations theory. In addition, it focuses on the current geo-strategic context of the Far East. It analyses Chinas' strategic thinking, China's nuclear doctrine and its military power as compared to the neighbouring countries and as a major player in the world economy.

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The coordinate plane of global governance

The ‘coordinate plane of global governance’ developed in this paper describes the trade-off between static gains and dynamic losses associated with international policy harmonization. A simple model illustrates how potential gains result from producing positive international spill-overs, whereas potential losses come from restricted systems competition between national policy regimes. The solution to this model allows identifying the cut-off level between policies suitable for global harmonization and policies which should better not be centralized. An application of the concept to selected policy fields illustrates its relevance for decision-making on global governance.

Confucianism and the concept of liberty

Liberty is a concept absent in, and alien to, Confucianism. The term “tsu-you,” (or “cha-yu,” in Korean) is a modern neologism concocted by East Asian thinkers in the 19th century struggling to translate and come to grips with Western political theory. Moreover, the term that they ultimately decided to use was a Taoist, not a Confucian, term. Hence, if this lecture was entitled “Concept of Liberty in Confucianism,” it would have been a very short one. Confucianism has no room for liberty.

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APEC and emerging regionalism in North East Asia

This paper explores what kind of regional trade agreement is most likely to emerge in Northeast Asia by tracing the trajectories of APEC. Taking into account the underlying potential of realizing cumulative causation effects between market expansion and technology cooperation among China, Japan and Korea, it reaches the tentative conclusion that a Northeast Asia Regional Trade Agreement (RTA) might take shape in the near future despite the prevalence of polarized versions in the cultural heritage and the international relations between these three countries.

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Agent permeability, principal delegation and the European Court of Human Rights

A growing body of international relations literature examines the delegation of state authority to international organizations. Delegation is a conditional grant of authority from a principal to an agent in which the latter is empowered to act on behalf of the former. This paper explores the effect of agent permeability to interested third parties on the efficacy of control mechanisms established by principals. Our central argument is that higher levels of agent permeability are likely to lead to higher levels of agent autonomy. Because of this, principals who face a potentially permeable agent are likely to delegate more cautiously—partially, in stages, or with clear limits. We illustrate our argument with a case study of the European Convention of Human Rights and its two principal institutions, the Commission and the Court. We find that principals (contracting states) historically delegated quite cautiously to the Court, clearly concerned about the Court’s autonomy. Court behavior in its first two decades reassured principals while increasing the Court’s permeability. Over time, that increased permeability increased Court autonomy in conjunction with the Court’s growing visibility and experience.

The implementation of IMF programs: A conceptual framework

IMF supported programs have conventionally been assessed by examining their effects on intermediate variables and final outcomes. More recently greater attention has been paid to their implementation, on the assumption that in order to work programs need to be implemented. Empirical studies have begun to include political economy variables in an attempt to explain implementation. They have used the concept of ‘ownership’ to provide a theoretical foundation. This paper provides an alternative and simple conceptual framework based on the marginal benefits and costs of implementation. It goes on to discuss policies that might be expected to improve implementation based on this framework.

‘Diplomatic Divergence: the Japanese and British Responses to Indonesia’s Confrontation of Malaysia 1963–1966’

While Indonesia’s policy of Confrontation towards Malaysia brought it into direct military conflict with Britain, this same event prompted Japan to pursue its first explicit postwar diplomatic initiative. Due to different strategic goals for the region, Britain and Japan’s approaches to Indonesian bellicosity were markedly different. Notably, while Britain took a hard-line stance with President Sukarno, Japan in contrast took a lenient approach eschewing economic and diplomatic isolation of Indonesia. With a latent warming in Anglo–Japanese ties beginning in this decade, this paper demonstrates that despite their antithetical approaches to this Southeast Asian crisis bilateral relations were not adversely affected.

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Quo vadis Japanese ODA? New developments in Japanese aid policies

Japan positioned itself in a special situation among the aid donor countries. This paper presents the trends in Japanese Official Development Aid policies in the new Millennium, provides an overview and discussion of the characteristics of Japanese ODA, and examines the different views and critiques that have arisen regarding Japan’s development aid policies. The paper’s goal is to highlight and interpret the latest developments and reforms of Japan’s ODA administration and strategies, its strengths and weaknesses, and to understand how ODA is becoming a more strategic, a stronger political, diplomatic and foreign policy tool in the hands of the Japanese government.

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Potential Benefits from a Deep EU–India Free Trade Agreement

Both parties to an eventual EU India FTA have agreed that it should not merely address tariff barriers but should also go further into what is known as deep integration, originally developed in the 1990s by R.Z. Lawrence. This relates to the removal of all obstacles to cross border business whether actual trade barriers or domestic regulations. We distinguish deep institutional integration from the deep integration of markets. We ask the question how one may support the other. There are potential market failures that can be addressed by trans-national rules on standards and technical regulations and services, but we conclude that the biggest impact of a deep RTA would be on the domestic economy of India if it provides an opportunity for reform. It should be noted that the paper draws on a study undertaken by the authors for DG Trade, but it represents only the views of the authors.

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Chinese medicine in an occidental perspective

This article treats the relationship between the Westerners and Chinese medicine. Firstly, the purpose is to comprehend how young Westerners have come to practice Chinese medicine in their lives and, secondly, to learn the eventual consequences of that practice on their lives and attitudes towards this medicine.

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Ownership and conditionality in IMF-supported programs: Back to Per Jacobsson’s time

Using a historical case study this article provides an example of how heterogeneity of interests within a government may affect the interplay between country ownership of reforms and conditionality in IMF-supported programs. The case study also highlights how pro-reformers’ preferences may be conditional on reforms advancing their personal agendas. This suggests a new issue to be addressed by formal models of conditionality. Two main themes emerge from the analysis: (a) the importance of a clear hierarchy to unify heterogeneous interests among decision makers; and, (b) a flexible country-tailored approach to conditionality can contribute to domestic ownership of reforms.

A note on the feasibility of a monetary area in the East Asia

After the constitution of the European Monetary Union (EMU), a new scope for monetary coordiantion is emerging in other regional areas. The standard approach to theoretically analyse the feasibility of a monetary union is the optimum currency areas (OCA) approach. Although this approach has been claimed to be non-operative, recent studies using synchronisation measures have shown a high potential applicability. This paper provides an empirical application of the OCA theory to a hypothetical East Asian monetary union centred on Japan’s currency. We find that despite the increasing synchronisation of macroeconomic determinants of a monetary area during 1980–2001, the perspective of an Asian currency union is still not economically feasible.

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Building a strong nation, how does China perform in science and technology

A common perception is that China has relied on the expansion of labour-intensive industries and flooded the world market with cheap but low to medium level technology products. Although it has become the third largest exporting nation, China has failed to create a large number of big businesses that can compete with the world’s leading multinational companies (Nolan (2004)). The Chinese government has long been aware of the weakness of its development strategy and has been trying to improve its own technological capacity through investments in basic research, innovations and the application of new technologies, utility models and designs. China’s strategy on science and technology can be best described by the so-called ‘walking with two legs’ principle. The first leg is based on building up domestic research and innovative capacity. This is through investments in research institutes, universities and LMEs. China’s second leg has been to build up its technology capacity through its open policy and attracting FDI and technology. China has made significant advances in the following areas regarding science and technology.

Future targets for Asian regional integration

The central framework of Asian integration is ASEAN+3 and, since its first Summit meeting in 1997, it has advanced regional integration in East Asia. Based on the direct experience of the author, this article presents a critical assessment of the progress made over the past ten years and argues that the ‘Singapore Declaration’ of 2007 is not ambitious enough for the future. An East Asian customs union (EACU) and common regional market should be the next targets for trade integration. In terms of monetary integration, Asia should aim for de-dollarisation and to achieve this it is crucially important to create a regional Asian monetary system (AMS).

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