scholarly journals China’s Soft Power Diplomacy in Southeast Asia

2008 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-49 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johannes Dragsbaek Schmidt

The paper analyses the new geo-political and geo-economic strategic relationship between China and Southeast Asia. Is Chinese soft power encroachment into Southeast Asia creating greater stability, does it jeopardize US interests and what is the impact on the regime-types, economic restructuring, and the state-civil society relationship? The paper is divided into four parts. The first explores the historical and especially the contemporary changes in China’s geo-economic bilateral relationship with Southeast Asia through its bilateral trade, the role of FDI, the role of the ethnic Chinese Diaspora, and other political and economic factors. The second focuses on China’s role in the new emerging geo-political relations on a multilateral scale through new regional security, military and politico-economic institutions. The third part contains a brief exposure of shifting US bilateral and multilateral interests in the region - both geo-economic and geo-political; however the bulk of this section is devoted to a comparison of the differences and similarities of US and Chinese approaches in Southeast Asia. Finally some concluding remarks are offered.

Author(s):  
Stefan Tibuleac

This article analyzes the most current security issues for the Republic of Moldova that are part of the regional security context of Eastern Europe –the region that can be considered the epicenter of international tensions through which the„geopolitical line of fracture”passes. The geographical position of the Republic of Moldova makes this state particularly sensitive to any negative trends in theregion. Growing of international tensions creates security threats and complicates economic development. From a historical point of view, Moldova has repeatedly fallen victim by the confrontation of the great powers. Therefore, the Republic of Moldova has a vital interest in preventing a new conflict in Eastern Europe. This article is based on a number of assumptions made by changes in the European security environment, such as the „shift of weight” to the East, strategic uncertainty, increasing the role of non-state actors, the situation in eastern Ukraine, etc. Based on these assumptions, this article makes an attempt to outline the potential role of the Republic of Moldova in the Eastern European security system, taking into account the desideratum for integration of the republic into the European Union. Other relevant factors will be taken into account for shaping the role of the Republic of Moldova in the European security system, namely: the security deficit; the impact of NATO and EU security policy; the rebirth of the project to create a regional defense alliance, etc. This article will largely take into account the military aspects of security. Keywords: Republic of Moldova, national security, Eastern Europe, NATO, Intermarium, defence, threats, risks, challenges


2020 ◽  
Vol 65 (11) ◽  
pp. 45-53
Author(s):  
Thuy Le Thi Bich

The power of each nation is determined by many factors, including the role of its culture. Culture is seen as an effective tool of soft power to affirm the image of our country in the international community. As one of the originating centers of Asian civilization and one of the largest, oldest civilizations in the world, India's soft power exists naturally in its own long historical culture. The Indian epic is considered to be the source of soft power, the link between the world and Indian culture, helping Indian culture expand its influence on other countries and the world. In this article, we focus on presenting the unique features of thinking, soul, thought, and “Indian spirit” reflected in the epic - the source of Indian culture and the epic continuation in countries in Southeast Asia. Thereby, this article helps its readers have a comprehensive view of the Indian epic - the source of “soft power” of Indian culture in Southeast Asian countries to strengthen and develop the relationship between India and other countries in Southeast Asia more and more sustainably and lasting.


Author(s):  
SEBASTIAN BERSICK

This chapter returns to issues raised by other authors in this section: the contrast between European, Chinese, and US perceptions of hard and soft power in the contexts of regional and global governance. Taking the ASEM process as a case, it shows how Europeans and Asians have approached the interaction from different institutional perspectives. Despite this, it sees ASEM as a process that reflects, and promotes, the advance of regional institutionalism in East Asia, adding an important dimension to the Europe–China relationship. This is then contrasted with the US strategy of dual divergence: a divergent internal strategy that rejects institutionalism for managing regional security; and an external divergent strategy that rejects the building of shared and reciprocal institutions between the USA and Asia. The chapter concludes that Europe's ‘balancing by convergence’ strategy has advantages over the USA's ‘balancing by divergence’ strategy.


2018 ◽  
Vol 42 (2) ◽  
pp. 132-143 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gulshan Pashayeva

Abstract The term soft power, developed by Joseph Nye, is a widely popular concept used to describe efforts to attract rather than coerce as means of persuasion. Language, which is widely viewed as a traditional (not to say extremely important) component of nationhood and a symbol of identity and group consciousness, can be used as an expression of soft power resources within this context. It is apparent that in today’s globalized world, the role of international languages as global means of communication has increased considerably. At the same time, English has become the de facto lingua franca in international trade, academia, technology and many other fields. Against this background, this article examines the impact of language as a soft power resource in the case of the Republic of Azerbaijan, which is a multi-ethnic state located at the crossroads of Europe and Asia. Due to its geographic location, the constant migrations of people who have passed through its territory throughout the centuries, and it has long been a zone of active interaction of languages, cultures and civilizations.


1978 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 881-912 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Gourevitch

The international system is not only an expression of domestic structures, but a cause of them. Two schools of analysis exploring the impact of the international system upon domestic politics (regime types, institutions, coalitions, policies) may be distinguished: those which stress the international economy, and those which stress political-military rivalry, or war. Among the former are such arguments as: late industrialization (associated with Gershenkron); dependencia or core-periphery arguments (Wallerstein); liberal development model (much American writing in the 50s and 60s); transnational relation-modernization (Nye, Keohane, Morse); neo-mercantilists (Gilpin); state-centered Marxists (Schurmann). Arguments stressing the role of war include those which focus on the organizational requirements of providing security (Hintze, Anderson), the special nature of foreign relations (classical political theory), territorial compensation (diplomatic history), and strains of foreign involvement (analysis of revolutions). These arguments provide the basis for criticism of much of the literature which uses domestic structure as an explanation of foreign policy, in particular those which (such as the strong-state weak-state distinction) tend, by excessive focus on forms, to obscure the connection between structures and interests, and the role of politics. These arguments also permit criticism of the notion of a recent fundamental discontinuity in the nature of international relations.


Babel ◽  
2001 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-34
Author(s):  
Teoh Boon Seong ◽  
Lim Beng Soon

Singapore is a cosmopolitan city in the centre of Southeast Asia. Its population is multiracial and multilingual. The majority of Singaporeans is functionally bilingual, i.e. they know English and a mother tongue of their own; an ethnic Chinese Singaporean thus can speak English and Mandarin Chinese. Translation in Singapore faces certain challenges and in this paper we highlight what some of these problems are, in the specific instance of translating into English from Malay. There is a tendency amongst Malays to write in a pseudo-spoken style and it has generally been acknowledged that spoken Malay is considerably different from written standard Malay. Often the impact of the translation may not be the same as that intended by the original and may be totally misconstrued. The paper describes some of these challenges in translating Malay.


Author(s):  
Łukasz Klimczak ◽  
Jelena Trivić

The purpose of this paper is to identify factors that had an influence on bilateral trade flows among the CEFTA countries with special emphasize: 1) on the role of CEFTA agreement and its preceding network of bilateral free trade agreements, and 2) on the role of institutions in facilitating intra-regional trade. In order to assess the impact of these variables on trade, we employed an augmented gravity model based on panel data of the CEFTA countries in fifteen years period (2000-2014). The results of the research suggest that there was a positive and statistically significant role of the CEFTA agreement on trade between its parties but the influence of the preceding bilateral free trade agreements was even higher. Results also showed that institutions can play an important role as trade facilitators, but mainly in the importing country while in the exporting country only three of six variables showed to have a positive sign.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 1401 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roman Hoffmann ◽  
Daniela Blecha

This article summarizes the growing theoretical and empirical literature on the impact of education on disaster vulnerability with a focus on Southeast Asia. Education and learning can take place in different environments in more or less formalized ways. They can influence disaster vulnerability as the capacity to anticipate, cope with, resist, and recover from natural hazard in direct and indirect ways. Directly, through education and learning, individuals acquire knowledge, abilities, skills and perceptions that allow them to effectively prepare for and cope with the consequences of disaster shocks. Indirectly, education gives individuals and households access to material, informational and social resources, which can help reducing disaster vulnerability. We highlight central concepts and terminologies and discuss the different theoretical mechanisms through which education may have an impact. Supportive empirical evidence is presented and discussed with a particular focus on the role of inclusiveness in education and challenges in achieving universal access to high-quality education. Based on situation analysis and best practice cases, policy implications are derived that can inform the design and implementation of education and learning-based disaster risk reduction efforts in the region.


2016 ◽  
Vol 5 (5) ◽  
pp. 21-25 ◽  
Author(s):  
Чупрова ◽  
I. Chuprova

The article discusses the features of intercultural communication from the point of view of the philosophy of culture. We study the problem of interdisciplinarity the concept of “communication” in scientific knowledge. As a means of studying intercultural communication is applied axiological, hermeneutical approaches. Examines the impact of the information revolution on the environment and the essence of communication, the problem of perception and understanding. Analyzes the evolution of forms and types of communication, generating a qualitative change in the semantic aspect of the culture. We are comparing the ability of verbal and non-verbal aspects of communication, taking into account features of modern international cooperation, and analyzes the role of “soft power” of musical art as a method of semantic translation of axiomatics and value foundations of culture. An attempt of philosophical analysis of the phenomenon of communication in the field of musical-performing activity of the musician-the pianist as a means of discovering the existential possibilities of the performer and the listener.


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