Nicholas Szechenyi - Böcker

Asia stands out as the world’s most vibrant region, where rivalries and confrontation coincide with increased economic cooperation and community building. How should we interpret these two dynamics, and what are the implications for U.S. policy? With the support of the MacArthur Foundation, Asahi Shimbun, Joongang Ilbo, and China Times, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) collaborated with Opinion Dynamics Corporation on a survey of strategic elites in eleven Asia Pacific economies. This report presents key findings on the strategic landscape in Asia with respect to questions of power, norms, and regional institutions.

In this volume, a distinguished group of scholars examine the national experiences of six major twentieth-century powers-- the United States, Japan, Turkey, China, India and Germany—to discern the centuries’ legacies for today and the lessons for tomorrow. They explore core themes including anticolonialism, democracy, socialism, nationalism, industrialization, nuclear weapons, and globalization and provide their own personal interpretations of the century, as well as their respective nation’s experiences and historical memory of the era. Together, they provide a broad historical context of the forces that shaped the twentieth century that will be of interest to scholars and students of history as well as policymakers.

This collection of essays addresses the interplay of democratic norms and cultural identity within Asia. The overall question for the volume is how the dueling identities of Asianism (regional exceptionalism) and universalism (democratic norms) are shaping state discourse and behavior in Asia. This is based on a dialogue of scholars organized by CSIS to examine national perspectives on Asianism and universalism across the region, as well as the role of regional democracies in developing a common understanding of rules and norms as the foundation for a more stable regional order. The introduction provides context for these normative debates in the region and addresses the potential to prioritize democracy promotion in foreign policy strategy as segue to essays analyzing normative debates in Japan, South Korea, India, Indonesia, and the United States.

This study builds on a report CSIS published in 2020 on ways the United States can partner with allies and partners to enhance democratic partnership in the Indo-Pacific region. This follow-on effort includes case studies on the democracy support efforts of Australia, Japan, India, Indonesia, South Korea, and Taiwan; comparisons of democracy support strategies; data on official development assistance (ODA) funding related to democracy broadly defined; and recommendations for ways the United States can coordinate democracy support initiatives in the region with like-minded partners as well as regional networks and institutions.

As economic strategy and national security become increasingly intertwined, Japan and the United States are aligned on the importance of protecting critical and emerging technologies to manage strategic competition with China. As the technology policy debate advances rapidly in both countries, there is great potential for bilateral cooperation to enhance competitiveness and coordinate approaches with other regional allies and partners. This edited volume is an anthology of nine essays from Japanese and U.S. scholars examining the technology policy landscape with an eye toward developing recommendations for bilateral cooperation in the years ahead. Topics include U.S. and Japanese technology strategy, economic security, and rulemaking for the digital economy. The conclusion synthesizes the authors’ recommendations and outlines an agenda for a U.S.-Japan technology alliance to manage competition in new domains and underwrite norms for economic security in the digital economy.