United States
Moon Jae-in’s foreign policy reorientation
South Korean President Moon Jae-in is changing South Korean foreign policy. He has allowed Seoul’s relationship with the United States and Japan to deteriorate while betting…
Time with Trump: Australia and Southeast Asia compared
Over the last two years, US President Donald Trump has made two trips to Southeast Asia and none to Australia. Despite this, according to White House media notifications, Prime…
China-US trade war: For all the bark, not much bite
It is now nearly 17 months since the Trump administration began collecting 25% tariffs on the first tranche of Chinese imports to the US – time enough to evaluate the economic…
Book review: China, the US, and the big break
Book review: Paul Blustein: Schism: China, America, and the Fracturing of the Global Trading System (CIGI Press, 2019)
Paul Blustein has produced an enviable bookshelf of…
Erdoğan’s treachery can’t sway Trump’s affections
Even by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s standards, the diplomacy – if you can call it that – on show at his meeting with US President Donald Trump last Wednesday was brazen…
Australia and immigration: Lessons from Reagan’s 1986 US amnesty law
Last week, as the world’s attention fixed on the United States Capitol and the presidential impeachment inquiry, across the road in the US Supreme Court, another hugely…
Trade war: From a phase one deal to perpetual peace
After a roller-coaster ride spanning 18 months, the trade war between the United States and China is finally showing signs of abatement, with the two sides confirming that they…
Autocrats Anonymous
The filmmaker Martin Scorsese recently got into trouble for an off-the-cuff remark he made about the differences between Marvel superhero movies and cinema as an art form…
Connecting the dots on the Blue Dot Network
The US, Australia, and Japan have joined together to establish a trilateral “Blue Dot Network” to help develop infrastructure “in the Indo-Pacific and around the world”. The plan…
North Korea’s deadline logic
Ever since Chairman Kim Jong-un issued the end-of-year deadline in April for nuclear negotiations, North Korea has displayed a stubborn attitude. From launching a series of new…