Asia Europe Journal最新文献

Although it never formally participated, the British government described the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and relations with China more broadly in strikingly positive terms between 2015 and 2019. Nonetheless, by late 2019 and amidst a sharp deterioration in relations, the prospect of the UK joining the BRI had more or less disappeared from the government’s agenda. This article argues that there was not a ruptural policy break. While there was a turnaround, there were also significant numbers of short-run policy zigzags. The principal reason for this instability, the article argues, lies in the relatively weak character of the UK-China policy regime which was an amalgam that sought to accommodate and integrate three different ideational clusters. Such amalgams are inherently unstable and policies drawn from them are likely to change quickly in response to internal tensions as well as exogenous events and developments. Given this, British policy towards China moved quickly and erratically between a “golden era”, a repudiation of this as “naïve”, and the designation of China as a “systemic challenge”. Within this context, expressions of enthusiasm for the BRI were displaced by uninterest or scepticism.

Regional integration changes domestic decision-making structures, relations among social forces, and power distribution in different ways. China influences Turkey’s domestic dynamics through involvement in economic cooperation, geostrategic alliances, and factional alliances. Concurrent and conflicting decision-making processes and foreign policy informality shape Turkey’s engagement with China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). This research conceptualizes political informality as an authoritarian governance tool within the legal boundaries but outside of bureaucratic rationality. Turkey’s attempts to be involved in the BRI have contributed to informalization as an authoritarian strategy of the ruling party (AKP). This research concerns a case study on the now Chinese-owned Kumport to demonstrate how informalization of state-business relations shapes Turkey’s transnational relations. The findings point out to the negative consequences of this informalization on the Chinese investments in Turkey’s logistics sector. The decrease in the power of the relatively Weberian bureaucracy of Turkey under the new presidential system led to the marginalization of Kumport in global shipping routes.

Commemorating the 60th anniversary of diplomatic ties, the article analyzes public health governance during the COVID-19 pandemic in the EU and South Korea. Shifting focus from traditional national security to a more people-centered understanding, the article employs the human security framework to examine nuances of the global health crisis. Through this theoretical lens, the research empirically compares and contrasts the EU’s and South Korea’s differing strategies battling COVID-19 from the pandemic’s inception to the mass vaccination rollouts. While the EU’s early approach was initially marked by slower responsiveness and border closures, South Korea stood out for its swift counter-epidemic measures, leveraging technological innovations and public–private partnerships. Yet once vaccination campaigns started, South Korea had to catch up with Europe. The article chronologically presents its findings, identifying a mutual convergence in approaches with the Omicron’s emergence. In conclusion, the article distills seven key lessons from the pandemic management: the significance of independent public health institutions, the role of digitalization and transparency in fostering public trust, the shared responsibility to bridge the vaccination gap and invest in robust public health systems, and the paradigm shift towards human security combined with the resurgence of state which has to be balanced with safeguarding individual liberties and a collective global action. In addition, the article underscores potential avenues for a strengthened EU-South Korea collaboration to enhance global health governance beyond the confines of major geopolitical rivalries.

Trade has long been the foundation of relations between the Republic of Korea and the European Union, and the conclusion of a comprehensive free trade agreement between the two sides in 2011 was both a recognition of the value of economic exchange and a catalyst for deeper cooperation in subsequent years. This paper discusses in some detail the governance of trade relations and other aspects of economic cooperation between Korea and the European Union, highlighting the multilayered nature and the expanding scope of legal ties between the two sides. The positive bilateral cooperation occurs however against the background of a changing and increasingly challenging global context. The failure of the Doha Round, the limitations of the World Trade Organization, and the growing concerns about de-coupling between the USA and China are all developments that complicate efforts towards trade liberalization and indeed threaten to disrupt global trade significantly. These adverse trends contain particular risks for Korea and the EU, both close allies of the USA and also both economies that are deeply integrated with the Chinese economy. Managing Korea-EU trade relations is therefore becoming both more complicated but also more important, and in conclusion, the paper provides an outlook on these future challenges.

Following the Paris Agreement, the European Union (EU) and South Korea became active in their pursuits of low-carbon energy solutions marked by substantial renewable energy growth and reforms in the mobility, power, and industrial sectors. Policy initiatives, such as the European Green Deal (2019) and Korean Green New Deal (2020), demonstrated their ambitious decarbonization commitments. However, their sustainable energy transitions have encountered two major challenges. First, the energy crisis due to the Russo-Ukrainian war accounts for the reduced supplies of Russian oil and gas, global price spikes, and a renewed focus on energy security; second, the US-China strategic competition exposed the over-reliance on China for the production of rare-earth materials that are essential for renewable energy technologies. The intersection of energy security and transition has emerged as a pivotal concern for both parties. In response, the EU introduced the “REPowerEU” plan to accelerate energy transition, whereas South Korea strategically expanded its nuclear power usage and recalibrated its energy mix. Both the EU and South Korea have augmented their investments in renewable energies while ensuring stable supplies of rare-earth materials and navigating new regulatory pressures from the USA. This study first represents a comparative survey of the energy-transition initiatives of both parties, including a comprehensive assessment of the European and Korean Green Deals and their measures for energy security. Further, the potential EU–Korea cooperation toward overcoming the energy crises, recognizing their shared values and opportunities to synergize bilateral- and multilateral-level energy transition, was explored.

The EU-South Korea cultural relations have intensified in the past few decades. Since the signing of free trade deal between two parties in 2010, the Korean public perception of the EU has positively evolved. Both parties initiated a protocol on cultural cooperation under the EU-RoK free trade agreement where particular emphasis was placed on the collaboration of audio-visual sector. The main part of this paper has three sections. The first section refers to EU cultural policy and diplomacy. In order to explain the EU’s cultural presence in South Korea, this paper addresses European cultural exports to South Korea and the South Korean perception of the EU. The following part discusses South Korean policy orientation and diplomacy regarding culture. By introducing the statistical data on Hallyu contents export to Europe, one can understand the current situation of Hallyu expansion in Europe. Also, the European perception of Hallyu is included. Since EU cultural diplomacy worldwide still has a national dominance, the following section discusses four national EU cases―France, Poland, Sweden, and Italy―to illustrate the types of EU-South Korea ICR.

The post-World War II experience of conflict and regional cooperation in (Western) Europe and East Asia has been very different. Despite their differences in terms of receptiveness of, and preferences for, regional cooperation, regional cooperation and/or integration still remains one of the most promising avenues for achieving or at least institutionalising peace. Against this backdrop, we aim to assess the scope for EU–Korean collaboration in regional integration, outlining the European and the Korean perspectives on regional integration and conflict resolution, their similarities and differences in this process, and prospects of cooperation amid the intensifying US–China rivalry. We argue in this paper that although confronted with the spectre of global power politics heading for a new Cold War, both the EU and Korea have normatively and practically sought to pursue a policy of ‘hedging’, and that integration may be a testament to the power of integration in the peaceful transformation of international order than undermining its rationale. The paper thus argues that the future trajectory that regional cooperation for conflict transformation would be bound up by the spectre of power politics by the geostrategic rivalry between the US and China would not necessarily be the only one expected.