This study analyzes the attitudes of core policy stakeholders in South Korea to multiculturalism and immigrant integration policies, as well as the factors affecting such attitudes, and suggests theoretical and policy implications. I conducted a survey of public officials, program operators, and academics. The responses suggest that public officials, program operators, and academics in Korea have more

Bangladesh continues to face a threat from Islamic terrorism. However, the drivers of this phenomenon remain under-studied. Research has traced terrorism in Bangladesh to wider processes of Islamization; a political context marked by conflict between the country’s two main political parties and by authoritarian governance; the institutional weakness of the Bangladeshi security and justice system; and

This article examines Japan’s trade policy on significant geo-economic developments by focusing on its engagement in three large free trade agreements: the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, and the Japan–EU Economic Partnership Agreement. Under the Abe administration, Japan has produced successful outcomes in mega-FTA strategy, concluding the Comprehensive

A powerful pro-Palestinian transnational advocacy network has emerged in Malaysia since the Gaza war of 2008–09. Taking the cooperation between the Palestinian Cultural Organization Malaysia, the Islamist Hamas, and the United Malays National Organisation as an example, I analyze the network and argue that the three actors are engaging there to promote the Palestinian struggle for an independent state

It is widely believed that Pakistan’s newly demonstrated nuclear weapons capability emboldened that country to launch what became the Kargil conflict of 1999 and correspondingly restrained India in responding to the attack. This article argues, however, that decision-making on both sides was driven by non-nuclear factors.

Representation is always a dynamic relation, a tatonnement, in which the represented adjust their preferences on the basis of beliefs induced by the representatives. All rulers—those selected in clean elections, those who hold such ceremonies without putting their power at stake, and those who do not even bother to hold them—claim to have reasons to be followed, and people are willing to follow them

After the stunning victory of Pakatan Harapan (Alliance of Hope) over the incumbent Barisan Nasional (National Front) in May 2018’s 14th Malaysian General Election, 2019 was a year of political transition, with Pakatan governing, Barisan rising from its political grave, and the Malaysian people getting accustomed to a two-party coalition system. In a chaotic year of party-political and electoral fatigue

Afghanistan in 2019 was marked by advances and setbacks with respect to stabilizing the country and reshaping its relations with international partners. The year brought new presidential elections and signs of potential political dialogue, as well as hopes for expanded economic ties with neighbors. But there are still uncertainties about the prospects of US withdrawal and the country’s future.

After winning a third consecutive term as prime minister in the compromised December 2018 general election, Sheikh Hasina of the Awami League continues to consolidate one-woman rule. Throughout 2019, Hasina continued to persecute critics and opponents. Despite the deepening malaise of bad governance, Bangladesh has continued to enjoy impressive economic growth. But it remains haunted by the desperate

Sri Lanka was confronted with three interrelated crises in 2019: the unresolved gridlock of last year’s constitutional crisis; the Easter bombings and their turbulent aftermath; and the coming to a head of fiscal shortfalls and debt burdens. Growth is stalling, living costs are rising, deficits are widening, and the price of Sri Lanka’s debt is weighing heavily on the government budget. In the presidential

Climate disruptions highlighted factors likely to shape the contours of climate change in Laos. Among these, regional relationships and resource-driven development continued to be important, as did inequality within Laos. Popular dissatisfaction with the capacity of the Lao state continued, exacerbated by environmental disasters and continuing limitations on free speech.

In 2019, Japanese Prime Minister Abe grappled with domestic dilemmas and diplomatic strains, highlighted by inflamed relations with South Korea. The economy continued to grow slowly, the depopulation bomb continued ticking, and demands for gender equality grew louder. The year also brought the enthronement of a new emperor and genesis of a new imperial era.

A tumultuous year brought Indonesia from a polarizing general election to disparate waves of mass protests that tested the state’s tether and revealed frailties in democratic consolidation. Granted a second term, President Joko Widodo ratcheted up plans for infrastructure and human resource development, wooing foreign capital despite a challenging global environment.

Politically, the focus in Timor-Leste in 2019 shifted from infighting to crucial decision-making on petroleum exploitation. Contrary to international advice on risk management and the need to diversify the non-oil economy, a going-for-broke mindset with respect to a multi-billion-dollar onshore gas development appeared to have carried the day.

The major development in India in 2019 was the national election which returned Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party to power with a larger majority and which, along with post-election ideological assertiveness, poses the question of whether India’s party system is a new one-party hegemony, this time of the Bharatiya Janata.

In 2019, Singapore celebrated its bicentennial and reflected on its journey from a British colony engaged in entrepot trade to a successful sovereign state anchored in ASEAN. The ruling party announced that Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat will be Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s successor. Presumably, Heng will play a key leadership role for his party in Singapore’s upcoming general election.

The Duterte administration has facilitated a new autonomous arrangement in Muslim Mindanao, and congressional allies passed some popular laws. In the midterms, Duterte-backed candidates dominated both national and local elections. However, the promised charter change has floundered, economic growth has been tempered, and the drug war has not succeeded.

Myanmar’s international pariah status has deepened with the filing of three separate international lawsuits against the country in November 2019 regarding atrocities against the Rohingya people. Economic forecasts indicate that the economy is on the right track but local business progress remains sluggish. The peace process has stalled, and armed conflict continues in some major cities, with increasing

In 2019, Thailand held its first election in eight years, crowned a new king for the first time in nearly 70 years, and hosted the ASEAN summits for the first time in a decade. It was an eventful year for Thailand, filled with controversy and attempts to restore stability and the democratic legitimacy lost after the coup of 2014. Progress was marred by missteps and irregularities, leaving both stability

The two biggest stories of 2019 in South Korea were a series of meetings between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un to discuss the denuclearization of North Korea in the first half of the year, and the trade war with Japan in the second half. President Moon Jae-in’s income-led growth policies still have not stimulated the economy. In fact, South Korea’s macroeconomic performance

One of the main focuses of the Abe administration’s foreign policy is overseas infrastructure development assistance. Evidence suggests that Japan has returned to its traditional approach to foreign aid, the “Japan model,” after an interval of a few decades. This article analyzes the international and domestic contexts behind the recent changes in Japan’s aid policy.

The rise of India presents Pakistan with a stark choice between seeking accommodation and maintaining the conventional rivalry that has largely defined the relationship between the two countries. The national and international climate is less favorable to Pakistan than it was a few decades back. The gap in performance between India and Pakistan in vital areas of national life has greatly widened.

Candidate voters are a significant percentage of the electorate in Pakistani Punjab. Consideration of the last three National Assembly elections shows a consistent attitude: Punjabi voters care more about candidates than they do about political parties. Political parties attract voters in urban districts, but they rely on “electables” (candidates with strong personality and loose party affiliation)

The widening gap between water supply and demand is the biggest threat and challenge before Pakistan. Of the available water, much is polluted. Both scarcity and pollution threaten the agriculture sector, on which the country’s economy depends.

In the late twentieth century, the Chinese communities in Indonesia and Malaysia were politically repressed. But recent events have prompted optimism that the Chinese communities in both countries could move forward and claim their rightful place as equal citizens. But while the Indonesian Chinese community appears to have made some headway, the situation in Malaysia has not improved, and in some ways

This paper examines South Korean media coverage of migrant workers from 1990 to 2015 and analyzes how multiculturalism is intertwined in discussions of migrant workers. I find that South Korea, once an avid supporter of multiculturalism, is slowly retreating from it, like other countries, but not in the same direction.

This study explores the relationship between special economic zones and regional integration in ASEAN countries, and identifies how to leverage the attributes of SEZs to deepen regional integration for regional development. The key argument is that SEZs can play a vital role in promoting regional integration if ASEAN member nations join hands to craft a visionary strategy.

It is widely predicted that East Asia’s conservative governments will lose political power for managing socioeconomic crises under neoliberal globalization and find no way out of their legitimacy problem. However, Korea’s and Japan’s conservative governments have recently constructed a new model of crisis management—compassionate paternalism—in a highly discretionary manner.

This paper shows how a series of institutional reforms since 1994 have transformed the Japanese prime minister’s relationship with other actors in the Japanese parliamentary system and expanded his power. It further discloses that his power has grown even more since the formation of the second Abe administration in 2012.

This paper examines a century of contentious politics in South Korea. I argue that there have been three distinctive eras of contention in modern Korea. The first two eras saw institutional arrangements limit the success of contentious campaigns. However, expanded repertoires in the third era allowed movements to succeed. I end by examining the role of social media in future movements.

Using original survey data, we test the level, distribution, and demographic patterns of populist attitudes in Indonesia. Populist attitudes are widely spread across the political spectrum; disproportionately high in the middle and upper classes; and particularly robust when coupled with other primary ideologies, such as Islamism and secularism.

The Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan insurgency seriously challenged the Pakistani government’s writ of state in FATA from 2004 to 2008. However, by 2017, the insurgency collapsed. This paper argues that Pakistan’s counterinsurgency campaign after 2009 caused the decline of the Taliban insurgency by targeting the TTP through a true counterinsurgency operation, rather than the conventional warfare tactics

South Korea faces a shortage of highly skilled labor, but with a low tolerance for diversity, it lags behind in its global competitiveness to retain mobile skilled talent. Using data on foreign students and professionals, we demonstrate the potential of skilled migrants as both human and social capital for Korea and suggest that the country is poised to adopt a study-bridge-work framework to compensate

This study examines international students in Korea as skilled labor migrants, specifically for small and medium-sized enterprises. It suggests that strengthening the study–work pathway as in other advanced countries represents a viable, future-oriented strategy in addressing the complications associated with hiring foreigners from abroad.

The economic voting literature argues that economics matters to democratic leaders. We argue that it matters to authoritarian leaders, too, and its influence is stronger there than it is in democratic countries. Using data on four Asian countries from the Asian Barometer Survey, we find substantial support for our theory.

Korea’s migrants have diversified in recent decades. This special section gathers articles that address this development by examining issues of class as an analytical lens in addition to ethnicity and citizenship, and also by considering the contributions of migrants from both human and social capital perspectives. By doing so, we aim to provide a better understanding of the varied experiences, realities

The Greater Mekong Sub-Region is threatened by illicit drug production, consumption, and trafficking. I review the trends in these concerns and also assess regional cooperation in drug control. I analyze some of the main barriers to combating drug trafficking, before suggesting a set of priorities for bilateral and multilateral cooperation.

This article examines the peripheral experiences of skilled return migrants in their homeland and the wider social implications of global knowledge transfer. Through a case study of Korean New Zealander returnees, I argue that the process of skill transfer is not easy, as shown by the returnees’ difficulties and social alienation. Korean New Zealander returnees have a more alienated experience than

This article investigates the capacity and willingness of women from English-speaking countries, married to Korean men, to integrate into South Korean society, via examination of the expression of national identity in everyday life and the negotiation of relationships across socio-cultural boundaries.

This article explores who among the citizens in the former Federally Administrated Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan is in favor of democratic reforms. Empirical analyses reveal that the government’s wartime service provision politicized citizens and framed their attitude toward the issues of FATA’s jurisdiction and the Frontier Crimes Regulation.

In the 14th general election in Malaysia, the opposition coalition overturned the ruling coalition’s entrenched incumbency of over six decades. The ruling coalition suffered from a legitimacy deficit and corruption scandals. The election witnessed four coalitions of parties, but these coalitions have been ephemeral, and Malaysian politics continues to be based on racial arithmetic.

This article discusses the involvement of Muslim organizations in disseminating political education and legal pragmatism in India. Drawing on qualitative fieldwork between 2011 and 2015, this study contributes to a better theoretical understanding of how Muslim organizations engage in democratic processes, rather than being perceived as opposed to notions of democratic participation, by examining the

An assessment of Modi’s economic policies (“Modinomics”) shows that the gap between intentions and outcomes remains wide because Modinomics has been too cautious and contradictory to overcome the unusual structural challenges facing India’s economy. Moreover, the contradictions of Modinomics, which privileges trade protectionism and selective financial-sector liberalization, limits the potential gains

Since the September 2016 attack in Uri, Indo-Pak relations have steadily gotten worse. India cites Pakistan-sponsored terrorism in Kashmir as the major reason for this deterioration, with the 14 February 2019 bombing at Pulwama as the most recent dramatic example; Pakistan blames Indian atrocities in Kashmir. But after every attempt to initiate dialogue, there is a return to hostility. This paper analyzes

Marriage in Hindu communities is caste-endogamous. Any transgression leads to violence against the men and women who move toward inter-caste unions. A few inter-caste/interfaith couples manage to enter conjugality despite the familial and social pressures. This paper explores the caste and gender politics that operate within inter-caste marriages.

This study takes a cultural approach to examine the unstable and contentious nature of Korean democracy. Analyzing an original nationwide survey conducted in 2015, we find that the democratic and participatory culture of the Korean people underlies Korean democracy. This finding suggests substantial tension between the participatory orientation of the public and Korean representative democracy.

While the Singapore government has sought to construct the elected presidency as an institution critical to Singapore’s political system, the result in fact forces the institution to contradict itself. This paradox has important implications for politics in a post–Lee Hsien Loong Singapore.

Central Asia is anticipating a transformation related to the need for further multifaceted modernization. However, different conditions dictate different strategies. The development model of Uzbekistan was mostly defined by Islam Karimov, whose death marked the beginning of profound changes associated with the transformation of the sultanistic regime.

Timor-Leste entered 2018 with a political crisis that kept a minority government without the confidence of parliament. President Lu-Olo tried to resolve the situation by calling early elections, but the incumbency effect did not materialize, and the opposition won the polls. Timor-Leste celebrated an important treaty with Australia on their maritime borders in the Timor Sea.

New and old domestic issues challenged the Abe government, while “Trump shocks” rattled Japan’s foreign relations. Domestically, Abenomics produced mixed results, the depopulation bomb continued ticking, and Abe’s reelection presaged a possible attempt at constitutional amendment.

Two and a half years into the Duterte administration, the country is facing high inflation rates, weak political institutions, and political uncertainty. While there are efforts toward political reform as well as peaceful settlement of conflicts, the country remains divided, with no clear strategy for reforms or nation-building being offered.

After decades of rule by the Barisan Nasional, spearheaded by the United Malays National Organisation, 2018 witnessed a change in government when the Pakatan Harapan opposition secured a stunning victory in the general election. The incumbent prime minister, Najib Razak, was defeated by his political nemesis, Mahathir Mohamad. Malaysia’s economy was stable but sluggish, growing slower than expected

Like the previous year, 2018 was marked by a series of vigilante attacks and gruesome acts of violence against women. The Supreme Court passed important gender-related progressive judgements, yet the institution and other public bodies witnessed unprecedented infighting, scandal, and politicization. The Indian economy showed increased growth. The year witnessed the first major electoral setback since

The biggest story of 2018 was a series of summit meetings between US President Donald Trump, South Korean President Moon Jae-in, and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un to discuss the denuclearization of North Korea. The income-led growth policies of the Moon Jae-in administration have not stimulated the economy.

Parliamentary elections in July 2018 brought the right-wing Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaaf, headed by former cricketer Imran Khan, to power. The PTI finished short of the 137 seats needed to form a government. But it emerged as the single largest party in parliament. Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was sentenced in absentia to 10 years in prison for owning assets disproportionate to his income.

In June, Singapore captured the global spotlight when it hosted the summit meeting between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. The regional political environment prompted anxiety, given the leadership transition in Malaysia. Domestically, political leadership transition and the opposition Workers’ Party’s lawsuit over allegations of mismanagement of town council funds were

While Thailand’s military government has attempted to postpone a general election, it is inevitable. In preparation for elections, the junta founded a pro-junta party and propped it up vigorously while continuing to impose restrictions on anti-junta parties.

In 2018 Indonesia looked ahead to legislative and presidential elections, and heads of major parties, including the incumbent president, lined up allies. As host of the 18th Asian Games, the nation celebrated in style. But with economic growth flatlining and natural disasters taking their toll, it was also a year of introspection.

The highlight of Maithripala Sirisena’s presidency came in its very beginning when he ended a decade of autocracy by restoring democracy. And when rivalry with his own prime minister, Ranil Wickremesinghe, devolved into a constitutional crisis, Sirisena was forced to abide by the democratic norms he had restored.

Three aspects symbolize the state of affairs in and around Afghanistan in 2018: the fragmentation of domestic political actors, the increasing desecuritization of rhetoric with respect to Afghanistan by neighboring countries, and the diversification of Afghanistan’s global partners. While the US strategy showed signs of stalling amid increasing violence and the fragmentation of local actors, there