Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Post-Cold War Order in the Asia-Pacific: Equilibrium and Its Challenges

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Japan and Asia’s Contested Order

Part of the book series: Asia Today ((ASIAT))

Abstract

This chapter analyzes three broad pillars of the Asia-Pacific regional order during the Cold War and its immediate aftermath. The first pillar involves the long-term absence of state-to-state military conflicts since 1979. The second is the increase in intra-regional economic interdependence through the combination of expanded foreign direct investment, trade, and regional production networks. The third pillar relates to the expansion of formal government arrangements that institutionalize multilateral cooperation. For nearly four decades, these three have generated a positive spiral of cooperation, however wary, among the major regional powers. The current question is whether that positive interaction can continue, particularly as China’s regional influence increases and the administration of Donald Trump systematically reduces that of the US.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 109.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 139.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 139.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    Goh, Evelyn. The Struggle for Order: Hegemony, Hierarchy, and Transition in Post-Cold War East Asia. Oxford University Press, 2013.

  2. 2.

    For example, Avery Goldstein, “First Things First: The Pressing Danger of Crisis Instability in U.S.-China Relations,” International Security, Vol. 37, No. 4 (Spring 2013), pp. 49–89; John J. Mearsheimer, “The gathering storm: China’s challenge to US power in Asia.” The Chinese Journal of International Politics 3.4 (2010): 381–396; Aaron L. Friedberg, “The future of US-China relations: Is conflict inevitable?.” International security 30.2 (2005): 7–45, Adam P., Liff, and G. John Ikenberry. “Racing toward tragedy? China’s rise, military competition in the Asia Pacific, and the security dilemma.” International Security 39.2 (2014): 52–91. inter alia.

  3. 3.

    David C. Kang, American Grand Strategy and East Asian Security in the Twenty-First Century. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2017, Chapter 1.

  4. 4.

    For example, Stein Tonnesson, “The East Asia Peace: How did it Happen? How Deep is it?” Global Asia, 10, 4 Winter 2015, available at: https://www.globalasia.org/bbs/board.php?bo_table=articles&wr_id=9073

  5. 5.

    Christensen, Thomas J. Worse than a monolith: alliance politics and problems of coercive diplomacy in Asia. Princeton University Press, 2011.

  6. 6.

    On cooperative security order, see inter alia, Cohen, Richard, and Michael Mihalka. Cooperative security: new horizons for international order. Defense Technical Information Center, Occasional Paper, no. 3 April 2001, available at: http://www.dtic.mil/get-tr-doc/pdf?AD=ADA478928. Carter, Ashton B., William J. Perry, and John D. Steinbruner. A new concept of cooperative security. Brookings Institution Press, 2010; Acharya, Amitav. Constructing a security community in Southeast Asia: ASEAN and the problem of regional order. Routledge, 2014.

  7. 7.

    Pempel, T. J. Remapping East Asia: the construction of a region. Cornell University Press. 2005; Yeung, Henry Wai-chung. Strategic coupling: East Asian industrial transformation in the new global economy. Cornell University Press, 2016.

  8. 8.

    On this see Stein Tonnesson et al., “The East Asia Peace: How it came about and What Threats Lie Ahead,” special issue, Global Asia, 10, 4 (Winter, 2015), special issue.

  9. 9.

    Etel Solingen. “Pax Asiatica versus Bella Levantina: the foundations of war and peace in East Asia and the Middle East.” American Political Science Review 101.04 (2007): 757–780. See Steve. Chan, An Odd Thing Happened on the Way to Balancing: East Asian States’ Reactions to China’s Rise. International Security Review (2010) 12: 387–412; Timo Kivimaki, “East Asian Relative Peace—Does It Exist? What Is It?” The Pacific Review 23 (4) 2010: 503–526.

  10. 10.

    Thomas J. Christensen, Worse than a monolith: alliance politics and problems of coercive diplomacy in Asia. Princeton University Press, 2011.

  11. 11.

    For example, Mastanduno, Michael. “Incomplete hegemony: the United States and security order in Asia.” Asian security order: instrumental and normative features (2003): 141–170.

  12. 12.

    Kahler, Miles. “The Rise of Emerging Asia: Regional Peace and Global Security,” Working Paper WP 13-4 Peterson Institute, May 2013.

  13. 13.

    Much of this movement came from the demonstration effect of the phenomenal economic success of Japanese development efforts. And for countries in Southeast Asia, there was an additional impetus coming from the subsequent successes of South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore.

  14. 14.

    Solingen, “Pax Asiatica versus Bella Levantina” 760.

  15. 15.

    A considerable literature exists on this subject but one of the earliest and more influential analyses was Mitchell Bernard and John Ravenhill. “Beyond product cycles and flying geese: regionalization, hierarchy, and the industrialization of East Asia.” World Politics 47.02 (1995): 171–209. See also Yeung, Strategic Coupling.

  16. 16.

    Sven W. Arndt, and Henryk Kierzkowski, eds. Fragmentation: New production patterns in the world economy. Oxford, OUP 2001; Dennis Tachiki, “Between foreign direct investment and regionalism: the role of Japanese production networks.” Remapping East Asia: The construction of a region (2005): 149–169; Henry Wai-chung Yeung. “Regional development and the competitive dynamics of global production networks: an East Asian perspective.” Regional Studies 43.3 (2009): 325–351; Yeung, Strategic Coupling: East Asian Industrial Transformation in the New Global Economy. Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 2016.

  17. 17.

    Avery Goldstein and Edward Mansfield, eds. The nexus of economics, security, and international relations in East Asia. Stanford University Press, 2012. Also Goldstein and D. Mansfield. “When Fighting Ends.” Global Asia 6.2 (2011): 8–17; T.J. Pempel (ed.) Remapping East Asia: The Construction of a Region. (Ithaca, Cornell UP, 2005).

  18. 18.

    G. John Ikenberry, After victory: Institutions, strategic restraint, and the rebuilding of order after major wars. Princeton University Press, 2009.

  19. 19.

    Walter LaFeber. America, Russia and the Cold War 1945–2006. McGraw-Hill Humanities/Social Sciences/Languages, 2008, Chapter 3.

  20. 20.

    Charles Meier, “The Politics of Productivity,” in Peter J. Katzenstein (ed.) Between Power and Plenty: The Foreign Economic Policies of Advanced Industrial States. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1977. Pp. 23–49.

  21. 21.

    Pempel, T.J., 2010. Soft balancing, hedging, and institutional Darwinism: The economic-security nexus and East Asian regionalism. Journal of East Asian Studies, 10(02), pp. 209–238; Calder, Kent, and Min Ye. The Making of Northeast Asia. Stanford University Press, 2010; Aggarwal, Vinod K., and Min Gyo Koo. “Beyond network power? The dynamics of formal economic integration in Northeast Asia.” The Pacific Review 18.2 (2005): 189–216, inter alia. For an extensive data base of some 2800 regional bodies (not exclusively those focused on Asia) see Saadia Pekkanen, Asian Designs: Governance in the Contemporary World Order. Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 2017.

  22. 22.

    The East Asian Summit might be offered as a partial exception.

  23. 23.

    Pekkanen, “Introduction,” in Asian Designs, p. 3.

  24. 24.

    For example, see Alastair Iain Johnston. “Treating international institutions as social environments.” International Studies Quarterly 45.4 (2001): 487–515; Amitav Acharya. “Ideas, identity, and institution-building: From the ‘ASEAN way’ to the ‘Asia-Pacific way’?” The Pacific Review 10.3 (1997): 319–346.

  25. 25.

    T.J. Pempel, “The Race to Connect East Asia: An Unending Steeplechase,” Asian Economic Policy Review 1 (2006): 239–254; Pempel, “Soft Balancing, Hedging, and Institutional Darwinism: The Economic-Security Nexus and East Asian Regionalism,” Journal of East Asian Studies 10 (2010), 209–238; Andrew MacIntyre, T.J. Pempel and John Ravenhill, (eds.) Crisis as Catalyst: Asia’s Dynamic Political Economy (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2008), Aggarwal, Vinod K., and Min Gyo Koo, eds. 2008. Asia’s New Institutional Architecture: Evolving Structures for Managing Trade, Financial, and Security Relations. (Berlin: Springer-Verlag Aggarwal, 2006); Dent, C. M. 2003. “Networking the Region? The Emergence and Impact of Asia-Pacific Bilateral Trade Agreement Projects.” Pacific Review 16, 1: 1–28. Hamilton-Hart, Natasha. “Financial Cooperation and Domestic Political Economy in East Asia.” In Advancing East Asia Regionalism, ed. Melissa G. Curley and Nicholas Thomas, 116–136. New York: Routledge; 2008; Grimes, William W. 2006. “East Asian Financial Regionalism in Support of the Global Financial Architecture? The Political Economy of Regional Nesting.” Journal of East Asian Studies 6: 353–380; Grimes 2009. Currency and Contest in East Asia: The Great Power Politics of Financial Regionalism. Ithaca: Cornell University Press., inter alia.

  26. 26.

    Gregory T. Chin. “Remaking the architecture: the emerging powers, self-insuring and regional insulation.” International Affairs 86.3 (2010): 693–715.

  27. 27.

    Natasha Hamilton-Hart, “Banking Systems a Decade after the Crisis,” in MacIntyre et al. Crisis as Catalyst, p. 46.

  28. 28.

    T.J. Pempel and Keiichi Tsunekawa (eds.) Two Crises; Different Outcomes: East Asia and Global Finance. Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 2015.

Bibliography

  • Acharya, Amitav. Constructing a security community in Southeast Asia: ASEAN and the problem of regional order. Routledge, 2014.

    Google Scholar 

  • Amitav Acharya. “Ideas, identity, and institution-building: From the ‘ASEAN way’ to the ‘Asia-Pacific way’?” The Pacific Review 10.3 (1997): 319–346.

    Google Scholar 

  • Aggarwal, Vinod K., and Min Gyo Koo. “Beyond network power? The dynamics of formal economic integration in Northeast Asia”. The Pacific Review 18.2 (2005): 189–216.

    Google Scholar 

  • Aggarwal, Vinod K., and Min Gyo Koo, (eds.) 2008. Asia’s new institutional architecture: Evolving structures for managing trade, financial, and security relations. Berlin: Springer-Verlag, 2006.

    Google Scholar 

  • Arndt, Sven W. and Henryk Kierzkowski, eds. Fragmentation: New production patterns in the world economy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bernard, Mitchell and John Ravenhill. “Beyond product cycles and flying geese: Regionalization, hierarchy, and the industrialization of East Asia”. World Politics 47.02 (1995): 171–209.

    Google Scholar 

  • Calder, Kent, and Min Ye. The Making of Northeast Asia. Stanford University Press, 2010.

    Google Scholar 

  • Carter, Ashton B., William J. Perry, and John D. Steinbruner. A new concept of cooperative security. Brookings Institution Press, 2010.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chan, Steve. “An odd thing happened on the way to balancing: East Asian States’ reactions to China’s rise”. International Security Review 12 (2010): 387–412.

    Google Scholar 

  • Chin, Gregory T. “Remaking the architecture: The emerging powers, self-insuring and regional insulation”. International Affairs 86.3 (2010): 693–715.

    Google Scholar 

  • Christensen, Thomas J. Worse than a monolith: Alliance politics and problems of coercive diplomacy in Asia. Princeton University Press, 2011.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cohen, Richard, and Michael Mihalka. Cooperative security: New horizons for international order. Defense Technical Information Center, Occasional Paper, no. 3 April 2001, available at: http://www.dtic.mil/get-tr-doc/pdf?AD=ADA478928

  • Dent, C. M. “Networking the region? The emergence and impact of Asia-Pacific bilateral trade agreement projects”. Pacific Review 16.1 (2003): 1–28.

    Google Scholar 

  • Friedberg, Aaron L. “The future of US-China relations: Is conflict inevitable?” International security 30.2 (2005): 7–45.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goh, Evelyn. The struggle for order: Hegemony, hierarchy, and transition in Post-Cold War East Asia. Oxford University Press, 2013.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goldstein, Avery, and Edward Mansfield. “When fighting ends”. Global Asia 6.2 (2011): 8–17.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goldstein, Avery, and Edward Mansfield, (eds.) The nexus of economics, security, and international relations in East Asia. Stanford University Press, 2012.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goldstein, Avery. “First things first: The pressing danger of crisis instability in U.S.-China relations”. International Security 37.4 (Spring 2013): 49–89.

    Google Scholar 

  • Grimes, William W. “East Asian financial regionalism in support of the global financial architecture? The political economy of regional nesting”. Journal of East Asian Studies 6 (2006): 353–380.

    Google Scholar 

  • Grimes, William W. Currency and contest in East Asia: The great power politics of financial regionalism. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2009.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hamilton-Hart, Natasha. “Financial cooperation and domestic political economy in East Asia”. In Melissa G. Curley and Nicholas Thomas (eds.) Advancing East Asia regionalism, 116–136. New York: Routledge, 2008.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hamilton-Hart, Natasha. “Banking systems a decade after the crisis”. In MacIntyre et al. Crisis as catalyst.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ikenberry, G. John. After victory: Institutions, strategic restraint, and the rebuilding of order after major wars. Princeton University Press, 2009.

    Google Scholar 

  • Johnston, Alastair Iain. “Treating international institutions as social environments”. International Studies Quarterly 45.4 (2001): 487–515.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kahler, Miles. “The rise of emerging Asia: Regional peace and global security”. Working Paper WP 13-4 Peterson Institute, May 2013.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kang, David C. American grand strategy and East Asian security in the twenty-first century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kivimaki, Timo. “East Asian relative peace—Does it exist? What is it?” The Pacific Review 23.4 (2010): 503–526.

    Google Scholar 

  • LaFeber, Walter. America, Russia and the Cold War 1945–2006. McGraw-Hill Humanities/Social Sciences/Languages, 2008.

    Google Scholar 

  • Liff, Adam P., and G. John Ikenberry. “Racing toward tragedy?: China’s rise, military competition in the Asia pacific and the security dilemma”. International Security 39.2 (2014): 52–91.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mastanduno, Michael. “Incomplete hegemony: The United States and security order in Asia”. Asian security order: Instrumental and normative features, 141–170, 2003.

    Google Scholar 

  • MacIntyre, Andrew, T.J. Pempel, and John Ravenhill (eds.). Crisis as catalyst: Asia’s dynamic political economy. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2008.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mearsheimer, John J. “The gathering storm: China’s challenge to US power in Asia”. The Chinese Journal of International Politics 3.4 (2010): 381–396.

    Google Scholar 

  • Meier, Charles. “The politics of productivity”. In Peter J. Katzenstein (ed.) Between power and plenty: The foreign economic policies of advanced industrial states, 23–49. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1977.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pekkanen, Saadia. Asian designs: Governance in the contemporary world order. Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 2017.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pempel, T. J. Remapping East Asia: The construction of a region. Cornell University Press, 2005.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pempel, T.J. “The race to connect East Asia: An unending steeplechase”. Asian Economic Policy Review 1 (2006): 239–254.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pempel, T.J., “Soft balancing, hedging, and institutional Darwinism: The economic-security nexus and East Asian regionalism”. Journal of East Asian Studies 10.02 (2010): 209–238.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pempel, T.J., and Keiichi Tsunekawa (eds.) Two crises; Different outcomes: East Asia and global finance. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2015.

    Google Scholar 

  • Solingen, Etel. “Pax Asiatica versus Bella Levantina: The foundations of war and peace in East Asia and the Middle East”. American Political Science Review 101.04 (2007): 757–780.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tachiki, Dennis. “Between foreign direct investment and regionalism: The role of Japanese production networks,” In Pempel (ed.) Remapping East Asia: The construction of a region, 149–169, 2005.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tonnesson, Stein. “The East Asia peace: How did it happen? How deep is it?” Global Asia 10.4 (Winter 2015), available at: https://www.globalasia.org/bbs/board.php?bo_table=articles&wr_id=9073

  • Tonnesson, Stein, et al., “The East Asia peace: How it came about and what threats lie ahead”. special issue, Global Asia 10.4 (Winter, 2015).

    Google Scholar 

  • Yeung, Henry Wai-chung “Regional development and the competitive dynamics of global production networks: An East Asian perspective”. Regional Studies 43.3 (2009): 325–351.

    Google Scholar 

  • Yeung, Henry Wai-chung. Strategic coupling: East Asian industrial transformation in the new global economy. Cornell University Press, 2016.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Political Science, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA

    T. J. Pempel

Authors
  1. T. J. Pempel
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to T. J. Pempel .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Graduate School of International Studies, Yonsei University, Seoul, South Korea

    Yul Sohn

  2. Department of Political Science, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA

    T. J. Pempel

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Pempel, T.J. (2019). Post-Cold War Order in the Asia-Pacific: Equilibrium and Its Challenges. In: Sohn, Y., Pempel, T.J. (eds) Japan and Asia’s Contested Order. Asia Today. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-0256-5_3

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation