Asia & the Pacific Policy Studies最新文献

In the 21st Century, geopolitical confrontation between the Eurasian continental powers and the sea powers works to divide Asia. The US-Japan alliance has transformed itself from Japanʼs asymmetrical security dependence of the Cold War period into a mutual and more integrated partnership today. Japan is doing more in collective security to ensure US commitment to the alliance through its own enhanced utilities to the United States. Japan leads emmeshing of the US-Japan bilateral alliance into the growing network of security partnerships, transforming the “hub-and-spoke” security architecture of East Asia at least partly into a NATO-like multilateral security arrangement. Yet Asian economic dependence on China and the uncertain prospects of the US commitment to Asian security and geopolitical realignment at the level of international system allow Japan to pursue hedging on its own and Asian behalf.

We investigate whether having more classmates with ECE experience affects junior high school studentsʼ non-cognitive/socio-emotional skills. We draw on panel data from the China Education Panel Survey (CEPS) and leverage the exogenous variation in classroom ECE experience composition brought by the random assignment of students when they entered junior high schools. Results from a quasi-experimental research design show that having more classmates with ECE experience helps to improve studentsʼ non-cognitive/socio-emotional skills. Possible mechanisms underlying these relationships include having more classmates with ECE experience is associated with improved classroom peer environment, the enhanced parent and teacher behaviours. Heterogeneity analyses indicate that the positive spillover effects of ECE are more prominent among girls, students without ECE experience, those with better-educated parents, those in classes with lower ECE enrolment or smaller size, as well as those in urban or public schools.

Cocoa is Papua New Guineaʼs (PNG) third-largest agricultural export, supporting about two million smallholder farmers. Despite integrated pest and disease management (IPDM) systems to improve yields, adoption remains low. We surveyed two cocoa-growing households—one near Balima (Madang Province) and the other near Manetai (Bougainville)—and combined these data with expert knowledge and published data to model revenue, labour, and capital inputs for dry bean cocoa production under different IPDM input levels, assessing financial viability. Results show profitability depends on unpaid labour; monetising labour costs eliminates or reduces returns. When labour is not paid in cash—as is common in Indigenous exchange economies in PNG—the increased cost and effort required for dry bean production is justified by potential returns. Excluding labour costs significantly improves benefit cost ratios, peaking at medium IPDM input levels. While higher IPDM inputs increase long-term returns, they reduce short-term profitability. Finally, potential hourly net incomes remain below PNGʼs minimum wage, raising sustainability concerns. Policy priorities include raising farmgate prices and access to fermentaries and dryers.

Kaczmarski, Marcin. 2026. ‘China-Russia Partnership: An Axis of Revisionism?’ Asia & the Pacific Policy Studies: e70066. https://doi.org/10.1002/app5.70066.

The following reference ‘Fong, B. C. H. (2026). “Alliance Politics in the 21st Century Great Power Competition: A Power-Balancing Coalition Framework”, Asia & the Pacific Policy Studies.’ was included in this article without page number and DOI. This has been corrected as follows ‘Fong, B. C. H. 2026. “Alliance Politics in the 21st Century Great Power Competition: A Power-Balancing Coalition Framework,” Asia & the Pacific Policy Studies: e70063. https://doi.org/10.1002/app5.70063.’

We apologize for this error.

This study examines how international tourism affects Vietnamʼs bilateral trade flows with major partners, framing the analysis within a structural gravity model of trade. Using system-GMM estimation on panel data from 20 countries (2008–2022), the analysis disaggregates trade flows by direction (exports vs. imports) and by category (goods vs. services, with tourism-related service trade excluded to avoid tautology) to capture tourismʼs varied effects. The results show that tourist arrivals significantly enhance Vietnamʼs trade performance even when travel service exports are excluded from the trade measures. FTAs, GDP per capita, consumer prices, and population positively influence bilateral trade flows, while distance creates expected barriers. Exchange rate movements show asymmetric effects—boosting imports while having mixed impacts on exports. Tourism emerges as a robust facilitator of trade, indicating that policies fostering inbound tourism can stimulate greater exports and imports. The findings provide empirical support for integrated tourism-trade strategies, viewing tourism development as a catalyst for trade expansion. Coordinating tourism and trade policies can yield benefits beyond traditional tourism receipts, with investments in tourism integrated with export promotion strategies to support sustainable economic growth.

This article examines system- and unit-level drivers that create a lattice work of Indo-Pacific alliances and security partners. Consequently, these developments are leading to a multilateral security network that is comparable to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO). It observes the emergence of an Asian-style NATO in the Indo-Pacific region, which is gradually replacing the Cold War-era hub-and-spoke system of alliances. It argues that this type of security architecture has emerged as a result of Chinaʼs rise as a great power in the Indo-Pacific region, with a focus on expansion in the South and East China Seas, as well as Washingtonʼs decision to engage Beijing in strategic competition. The following variables indicate the formation of this Asian-style NATO: a changing US grand strategy vis-à-vis China, the creation of mini-laterals, and US alliesʼ efforts to confront Chinaʼs expansion and aggression by strengthening their alliance with the US. In conclusion, the article argues that this Asian-style NATO is still in its formative stages compared to the time-tested, well-established, and highly institutionalised Euro-Atlantic NATO.

This editorial introduces a special issue that examines the drivers, pathways, and policy implications of inclusive rural transformation (RT) across Bangladesh, China, Indonesia and Pakistan. Drawing on the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) multi-country project, the issue advances a stage-based analytical framework—grounded in Huang Segmentation—to understand how institutions, policies, and investments (IPIs) shape long-term structural and livelihood changes in rural economies. The collected articles provide new empirical evidence on RT measurement, stage segmentation, and the role of targeted public interventions, complemented by comparative analyses of irrigation, gender inclusion, infrastructure, water governance, and engagement with global value chains. Together, they highlight that RT is a multi-decade, path-dependent process that requires adaptive, stage-specific facilitation prioritising inclusiveness and sustainability. Insights from diverse country experiences, as well as Australiaʼs productivity-driven transformation, underscore the importance of strong institutions, gender-responsive policies, and integrated approaches to water and resource management. This special issue contributes a coherent diagnostic and policy toolkit for accelerating equitable and sustainable RT in developing economies, offering guidance for both researchers and policymakers navigating the challenges of structural transformation in the Asia–Pacific region.

The Shanghai Co-operation Organisation (SCO) has emerged as a viable intergovernmental organisation with a vibrant security portfolio. With its recent expansion it now boasts ten members, including rising great powers Russia, China, and India, as well as nuclear-armed Pakistan, and regional power Iran. However, the organisation is beset with internal inconsistencies and regional rivalries (Pakistan-India, India-China in particular) that may preclude its viability. Despite this, the SCO, led by China and Russia, has set itself up as a major counterweight to NATO and other security organisations in Eurasia. This article examines the feasibility of the SCO in forming its own concert of powers in Eurasia in the new multipolar system, with three powers—China, India, and Russia balancing in Eurasia. The research will feature a multi-methods design, based on the aggregate capabilities model, and using statistical analysis of arms trading and defence budgets amongst the SCO powers, that will enhance the specific case studies. This includes examining what system- and unit-level factors are pushing the member states towards a regional concert, including internal and external, and what unit-level factors may, or will, prevent a concert from forming.

The “Future of Governing” has been discussed for over 20 years. Many scholars agree that the transformation of government is prevalent; however, questions remain unanswered regarding the direction of these changes and how they have unfolded differently across countries. By analysing all the press releases of the US federal departments (including large agencies such as the SSA and EPA) and the corresponding ministries of the South Korean government, this study responds to those questions. Since the primary function of press releases is to announce and inform the public about the administrative actions of the departments, they are suitable for analysing changes in perspectives in practice. We mapped each press release in embedding space using downstream tasks of a pre-trained language model and clustered them into market, participative, flexible, deregulated governance, or traditional hierarchy model. Identifying trajectories of these changes through dimension reduction and clustering analysis, this study found a significant shift toward participative models in the US, while South Korea exhibited a gradual and incremental movement toward market models. This study contributes to the extant literature on governance by tracking evolving governance perspectives and offering several insights into administrative reforms.

This article analyses AUKUS through the theoretical lens of neo-offensive realism, with its distinctive emphasis on the articulation between system-level and unit-level variables for understanding alliance formation and dynamics. In so doing, it examines both system-level, geostrategic developments that pre-dispose the AUKUS partners to collectively balance against China, and the unit-level national politics of those countries, which differentially shape engagement with and enthusiasm for AUKUS. Empirically, the article charts systemic changes in relative economic and military power between China and the AUKUS partners, drawing on data from the World Bank and the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. This is followed by an examination of those contradictory unit-level forces that tend towards the consolidation of AUKUS, while simultaneously generating political opposition. Here official documents from the defence agencies of all three participants are examined. Finally, the article considers the future of AUKUS.