In The News

Letting Foreign Workers Past the Gate

March 29, 2004
If Japan is to play a leading role in the economic development of Asia – one of the world’s fastest growing regions – it must embrace globalization, which includes opening its borders to foreign labor. As this editorial in The Japan Times points out, foreigners are becoming increasingly vital to the Japanese labor force. Immigrants work in factories, hospitals, fish ports, and farms. Yet as...

Containerized Trade Imbalance Set to Worsen

Beth Jinks March 25, 2004
A third of all shipping containers that land in Singapore are empty, according to recent surveys. This trend is set to continue throughout Asia, as more manufacturing shifts to the region. But shipping empty containers is costly – and worrisome to operators of shipping lines. The current imbalance, say observers, is partly due to the rise of countries like China, whose cheaper labor constitutes a...

Keep the Ban on Arms for China

Roger Cliff March 22, 2004
15 years ago, in the wake of the Tiananmen Square violence, the US and nations that now make up the EU agreed to an arms embargo towards China. Until their human rights record improved, China should not be supplied with weapons technology, argued the European and American states. Now, EU nations are facing a call from China to eliminate the "outdated" embargo in order to cement their...

Unification Can Only Follow Democratization

Orville Schell March 19, 2004
Taiwan may have been its own country for seven out of the last eleven decades and claim that it has the right to decide for itself its sovereign status, but that does not prevent China from pressing for unification. . In recent years, China and Taiwan have come closer due to increased economic interactions, but why does China still point 500 missiles on the island? A large part of the answer can...

Chin Chin Choo!

Pallavi Aiyar March 18, 2004
Despite producing the largest number of films in the world, India's movie industry has yet to make a dent in the Chinese market. Relations between Beijing and New Delhi have warmed over the past few years, but the benefit of better ties has accrued almost entirely to trade in other products. China's strict quota on imported films, coupled with the strong appeal of American culture to...

Taiwan's Challenge to China and the World - Part II

Linda Jakobson March 15, 2004
Beijing claims that 'the Taiwan issue' is an internal political affair, but many in Taiwan beg to differ. In the second installment of a two-part series, Linda Jakobson, co-author of the International Crisis Group's recent Taiwan Strait IV report, suggests a possible way out of the present imbroglio. On March 20, Taiwanese will take to the polls to vote for the next president and...

With Mexico FTA Set, Japan Turns Toward Asia

Mayumi Negishi March 12, 2004
After completing only its second Free Trade Agreement (FTA) ever, Japan is looking towards Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, and South Korea for new prospective partners. The newly-inked Mexico FTA will provide much-needed agricultural imports to a country that imports 60% of its food stuff; however, it took some work to overcome the voices of the powerful Japanese agricultural lobby. With...