East-West Center Research

📣 Interested in learning more about current or emerging issues in the Asia Pacific region? Check out these #AsiaPacificIssues analyses published through the East-West Center Research Program so far in 2024! 👉 Decoding Social Media’s Role in Taliban 2.0 and its Implications for Afghan Youth: https://lnkd.in/gzdWkh3J 👉 Revisiting the Cambodia-Thailand Maritime Dispute: International Law, Politics and Nationalism: https://lnkd.in/g4b4NHxe 👉 Smallholder Cash Cropping Expansion and the Privatization of Communal Forestland in Southeast Myanmar: https://lnkd.in/dePAvt37 👉 Commodities and Global Climate Governance: Early Evidence From the EU Deforestation-free Regulation (EUDR): https://lnkd.in/gqNbJHHG 👉 Korea-US Cooperation on Climate Change in the Pacific as Part of the Indo-Pacific Strategy: https://lnkd.in/g2CYt2QV 👉 Drought, Flood, and Rice Security in Central Thailand: https://lnkd.in/gFAGdpMh 👉 Human Rights in Afghanistan: https://lnkd.in/gQbsMj9m Papers in the series address topics of broad interest and significant impact relevant to current and emerging policy debates. These eight-page, peer-reviewed papers are intended to be accessible to readers outside the author's discipline. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/gaSdTY_x

From Oct. 14-17, East-West Center Research Fellow Keri Kodama attended the Cooperative Institute for Research to Operations in Hydrology (CIROH) at The University of Alabama Annual Science Meeting in Tuscaloosa, AL. Dr. Kodama presented her research progress and met with collaborators to discuss ways to improve flood forecasting in Hawaiʻi and the USAPI. CIROH provides valuable funding support for Dr. Kodama's research on EWC projects such as the Hawaiʻi Climate Data Portal (HCDP), which provides accessible climate data to inform climate change adaptation and environmental resilience strategies. Learn more about the HCDP project here: https://lnkd.in/g_EugpDC

✍ Senior East-West Center Fellow Denny Roy has published a new article in the Asia Times discussing "Why China will blockade, not invade Taiwan" and China's recent Joint Sword 2024B military exercise. ☝ Dr. Roy writes: “If there is a positive glimmer from Joint Sword 2024B, it might be that the exercise seemed mostly a rehearsal for a blockade. . . . A blockade is an awful prospect. It would bring misery to Taiwan and might result in a US-China war. The scale of the violence and mayhem unleashed by an attempted invasion, however, would be much worse. If Beijing has quietly moved toward ruling out an invasion, this would be a significant and welcome step even if genuine relief for Taiwan still remains far away.” Dr. Roy provides similar analysis in another new article for The Straits Times, stating: “The Oct 14 exercise was not a reaction to [Taiwan President Lai’s] National Day speech. . . . The large military exercises in 2022 (after US Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan) and 2023 (after then-President Tsai Ing-wen’s meeting with US Congressman Kevin McCarthy in California) appeared to be reactive. If so, the message was that China will take dramatic steps towards preparing for war against Taiwan if the US or Taiwan take what Beijing interprets as dramatic steps toward Taiwan independence. By implication, if the US and Taiwan demonstrated restraint, China would be correspondingly less warlike. That expectation, however, now seems unwarranted.” 📖 Read Dr. Roy's full piece in the Asia Times here: https://lnkd.in/gSwibXZC 📖 Read the full article in The Straits Times here: https://lnkd.in/g-gm_MTm

📢 Hot off the press - Our latest #AsiaPacificIssues titled "Nusantara: Climate Dilemmas of a 'Green' Capital City in Indonesia" has just been published! 👉 Construction of Indonesia’s new capital, Nusantara, is already underway in East Kalimantan province. 👉 The authors' findings suggest that under the project’s current course, emissions are likely to increase significantly, worsening vulnerabilities in Jakarta and creating new ones in East Kalimantan. 👉 Nevertheless, the future remains unwritten, with many crossroads and opportunities to change direction. The paper is authored by East-West Center Adjunct Fellow Micah Fisher and Research Fellow Ryan Longman, along with their collaborators Ahmad Maryudi and Dwi Laraswati from Universitas Gadjah Mada (UGM). This study comes out of the East-West Center's Vulnerable Deltas in Southeast Asia initiative, supported and funded by the Henry Luce Foundation Inc. Read the full article here: https://lnkd.in/giB-n_6q

Interested in finding out more about just energy transitions in Indonesia? Check out this blog post "Indonesia's Just Energy Transition Must Not Just Be More of the Same" from the Wilson Center | China Environment Forum, published as part of the East-West Center's Vulnerable Deltas in Southeast Asia initiative funded by the Henry Luce Foundation Inc. 🔋 Indonesia is the global leader in mining nickel, which is vital for EV batteries and other low-carbon technologies. ⚡Clean energy is a priority for Indonesia, which is Southeast Asia’s leading greenhouse gas (GHG) emitter. The country has goals to reach net-zero targets by 2060, and President-elect Prabowo Subianto aspires to build on Jokowi’s desire to make Indonesia a green energy superpower. 📜 To ensure the country’s build out of its nickel supply chain protects both people and planet, Indonesia’s new administration must improve regulations and increase community participation at all stages of the supply chain. Read the blog post: https://lnkd.in/eE6ud6in Read more about the Vulnerable Deltas initiative: https://lnkd.in/gJAt9HAX

✍ In a new article for The Diplomat, East-West Center Senior Fellow Denny Roy writes about the potential implications of China's test-launch of an ICBM into the South Pacific: "All the parts of the [Chinese] bureaucracy may not be on the same page regarding the ICBM test. Although some officials in Beijing would have seen the test launch as beneficial, either for technical or political reasons, the incident clearly undermines important Chinese foreign policy goals." 👉 A brief statement by the Ministry of National Defense in Beijing called China’s September 25 test launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) into the South Pacific Ocean near Tahiti “routine.” But the last time China fired a missile into international waters was in 1980. 👉 If Beijing did indeed use the missile test for political signaling, an especially plausible explanation is the recent U.S. deployment of the Typhon mid-range missile system to the Philippines. 👉 This might have been another case of lack of coordination among different parts of the Chinese government, with an incoherent outcome subject to misinterpretation by foreigners. Read Dr. Roy's full article here: https://lnkd.in/gBCBzKUK

The East-West Center (EWC) is pleased to welcome Research Fellow Dr. Viann-Marie (Harmony) Yomai to the team. Harmony Yomai is from Chuuk, Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) and has a research background in evolutionary biology, island biogeography, and invasion biology. She received her PhD from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology before working on a postdoctoral appointment at Virginia Tech studying the cascading effects of Brown-tree snake invasion in the Mariana islands. A major focus of her work has been elevating the importance of weaving together Traditional Knowledge and Western Science practices. Harmony is now working on the Pacific Drought Knowledge Exchange (PDKE), specifically to analyze how participatory climate change scenario planning can be used to inform management plans while also working with local partners and community leaders in Hawai‘i and USAPI to develop climate knowledge products using a previously demonstrated co-production approach. Learn more about the PDKE on the EWC Project Page: https://lnkd.in/g3JEAU6X

Commenting in Asia Times on Ukrainian President Zelensky’s request for permission to use US-supplied missiles to strike targets inside Russia, East-West Center Senior Fellows Charles E. Morrison and Denny Roy write that “Helping Ukraine fight better will get us closer to a just peace than will accommodating Putin’s bluffs.” Read the opinion piece here: https://lnkd.in/gMSUTr2H #Ukraine #Russia #War

Thank you Stephanie K. Kim, Ph.D. for sharing your insights at the #EWCResearchSpeakerSeries this week! Dr. Kim's talk delved into the historical evolution of Asian Studies Centers from their Cold War origins to their engagement with foreign governments, and how the blocking of foreign funding for such centers in American higher education has negative implications for the regional expertise needed for America's engagement with Asia. Watch Dr. Kim's talk here: https://lnkd.in/gmaWiUh4

The Pacific Islands Development Program (PIDP) launched Week 2 (focused on The Environment) of their Pacific Islands Leadership Program (PILP) on September 23rd. Oceania Research Fellow, Dr. Ryan Longman, led the cohort on a field trip to the Lyon Arboretum to visit a Hawaiʻi Mesonet Station. Climate scientist Dr. Tom Giambelluca, the lead researcher on the Hawaiʻi Mesonet, provided an overview of the various instruments at the station and discussed the challenges his team has encountered in monitoring the climate in Hawaiʻi. Improved data monitoring and curation are significant challenges across many Pacific Island nations. The hope is that lessons learned in Hawaiʻi can be shared with colleagues throughout the Pacific. This year's PILP cohort consists of 21 professionals from 10 Pacific Island nations. Later this week they will be learning about writing “bankable” project proposals to access climate financing to meet adaptation needs in the Pacific. Learn more about the PIDP here: https://lnkd.in/g8tP_s6W Learn more about the Hawaiʻi Mesonet here: https://lnkd.in/d7vQJBEb