74573 - POLITICS OF CONTEMPORARY ASIA

Conoscenze e abilità da conseguire

This course is an overview of international relations of the East Asian region, which aims at broadly exploring the economic and political issues surrounding the Asia-Pacific rim. At the end of the course students will be able to examine topics related to historical and contemporary patterns of state relations in East Asia, US security alliances in East Asia and the new Asian Pivot, the rise of China, nuclear crise in the Korean Peninsula, territorial disputes, regional multilateral institutions, East Asian development models and economic integration, environmental challenges, energy security, and other related issues.

Contenuti

Il corso prenderà in esame alcune delle principali questioni internazionali che coinvolgono il continente asiatico, avendo come obiettivo l'analisi delle issue economiche e politiche che circondano la regione dell'Asia Pacifico. La prima parte del corso si focalizzerà sul background teoretico e storico dei paesi della regione (in particolare Giappone, Corea del Sud, Taiwan, Cina, e brevemente sul Sudest asiatico) con un focus sullo sviluppo politico ed economico durante il periodo precedente e successivo alla Guerra fredda. La seconda parte coprirà varie questioni che impattano sulla regione, ad inclusione dell'industrializzazione, globalizzazione, interdipendenza economica, proliferazione nucleare, sicurezza, regionalismo, nazionalismo, e dispute territoriali.
Alcuni dei temi centrali con i quali il corso si confronterà verteranno sulle sfide che la regione deve raccogliere in relazione all'ascesa cinese nel quadro economico e di sicurezza, le crescenti tensioni territoriali che pongono una seria minaccia al commercio e alla cooperazione tra i paesi della regione, la rivalità economica riflessa nelle dinamiche commerciali, gli interessi economici e di sicurezza degli Stati Uniti nella regione, le due Coree e la questione dell'unificazione, le ricadute dettate dai cambiamenti al vertice avvenuti nei paesi dell'Asia del Nordest, la natura delle relazioni Asia-Europa.

Testi/Bibliografia

Letture richieste:

Libri di testo:

M. Yahuda, The International Politics of Asia-Pacific, Routledge, 2019 (pp. 1-138).

The Korean Peninsula:

D. Kang and V. Cha, “The Debate over North Korea,” in Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 119, No. 2, 2004

Y. Kim, "North Korea’s Threat Perception and Provocation Under Kim Jong-un: The Security Dilemma and the Obsession with Political Survival," in North Korean Review, Vol. 9, No. 1, 2013.

J.K. Choi, "Sunshine over a Barren Soil: The Domestic politics of engagement Identity Formation in South Korea" in Asian Perspective, Vol. 34, No. 4, 2010.

B. Howe & KM. Lee, "Trustpolitik: The Failure to build Trust in Inter-Korean Relations," in Journal of Peace and Unification, Vol. 6. No. 2, 2016.

N. Kim, "Candlelight and the Yellow Ribbon: Catalyzing Re-Democratization in South Korea," in The Asia-Pacific Journal, Vol. 15, No. 5, 2017.

U. Heo and S. D. Hahm, "The First Female President in South Korea: Park Geun-hye's Leadership and South Korean Democracy," in Journal of Asian and African Studies, 2017.

The People's Republic of China:

A. Nathan and A. Scobell, "Who Runs Chinese Foreign Policy" in China's Search for Security by the same authors, New York: Columbia University Press, 2012.

S.V. Lawrence and M.F. Martin, "Understanding China’s Political System," CRS Reports for Congress, 2013.

U.S.-China Business Council, "China's 2017 Communist Party Leadership Structure and Transition", June 2017.

H. Yang and D. Zhao, "Performance Legitimacy, State Autonomy and China's Economic Miracle", in Journal of Contemporary China, Vol. 24, No. 91, 2015.

Y.N. Cho, "Continuity and Change in China’s Elite Politics at the 19th Party Congress: Is Xi Jinping’s “One-man Rule” Established?", in The Korean Journal of Defense Analysis, Vol. 30, No. 1, 2018.

S. Zhao, "Chinese Foreign Policy as a Rising Power to Find Its Rightful Place", in Perceptions, Vol. XVIII, No. 1, 2013.

J. Zhang, "China’s new FP under Xi Jinpijng: towards Peaceful rise 2.0”? in Global Change, Peace & Security, vol. 27, 2015.

S. Biba, "It’s status, stupid: explaining the underlying core problem in US-CHN relations” in Global Affairs, Vol. 2, No. 5, 2016.

Y. Huang, “Understanding China's Belt & Road Initiative: Motivation, Framework and Assessment”, in China Economic Review, N. 40, 2016.

R. Rich & S. Recker, "Understanding Sino-African Relations: Neocolonialism or a New Era?", in Journal of International and Area Studies, Vol. 20, No. 1, 2013.

B. Sverdrup-Thygeson, "The Chinese Story: Historical Narratives as a Tool in China's Africa Policy", in International Politics, Vol. 54, No. 1, 2017.

H. Rønning, "How much 'Soft Power' does China have in Africa?" Paper presented at the international conference "China and Africa Media, Communications and Public Diplomacy", September 10-11, 2014.

N. Casarini, "Is Europe to Benefit from China's Belt and Road Initiative?," IAI Working Papers, 15/40, 2015.

J. Yu, "The belt and road initiative: domestic interests, bureaucratic politics and the EUChina relations," in Asia-Europe Journal, 2018.

Nationalism:

K.B. Pyle, "Nationalism in East Asia", in Asia Policy, No. 3, January 2007.

Yangmo Ku “Irreparable animosity? Centripetal versus Centrifugal force in South Korea-Japan mutual perceptions 1998-2015” in Asian Journal of Peacebuilding, vol. 4, no. 1, 2016.

Jinyun Kim “The clash of power and nationalism: The Sino-Japan territorial dispute” in Journal of Asian Security and Int.l Affairs, vol. 5, no. 1, 2018.

Japan's Domestic and Foreign Policy:

C.W. Hughes, "Japan's foreign security relations and policies," in S. Pekkanen, J. Ravenhill, R. Foot (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of the International Relations of Asia, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014

J. Nilsson-Wright and K. Fujiwara, "Japan’s Abe Administration Steering a Course between Pragmatism and Extremism," Research Paper, Chatham House, 2015.

S. Smith, "Contending with China" and "Diplomacy and Domestic Interests", in Intimate Rivals. Japanese Domestic Policy and a Rising China, New York: Columbia Un. Press, 2015 (Chapters 1 and 2).

K. Nakano, "Contemporary Political Dynamics of Japanese Nationalism", The Asia-Pacific Journal, Vol. 14, no. 20, 2016.

J.D.Brown, "Japan's Security Cooperation with Russia: Neutralizing the threat of a China-Russia United Front", in International Affairs, Vol. 94, No. 4, 2018.

Students who cannot attend the course must add to the above mentioned list of readings one of the following books:

D. Roy, Return of the Dragon, New York, Columbia Un. Press, 2013;

S. Tsang & H. Men, China in the Xi Jinping Era, Palgrave MacMillan, 2016;

V. Cha & D. Kang, Nuclear North Korea, New York, Columbia Un. Press, 2005;

S. Smith, Intimate Rivals: Japanese Domestic Politics and a Rising China, Columbia University Press, 2015.

Metodi didattici

Lezioni frontali e discussione plenaria.

Modalità di verifica e valutazione dell'apprendimento

L'esame finale sarà orale. La partecipazione attiva e la lettura attenta e costante dei documenti che verranno di volta in volta indicati dal docente sono fortemente apprezzate.

Strumenti a supporto della didattica

Power point e brevi filmati esplicativi.

 

Orario di ricevimento

Consulta il sito web di Antonio Fiori