Programs & Projects

The North Asia Program

The China and East Asia Program

The China and East Asia Program conducts research on the politics and foreign policy of China and its immediate neighbours in Northeast Asia: Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan and the Korean peninsula. The program is renowned for its particular focus on China’s domestic politics and how this helps to shape its external behaviour. From 2020, the Institute’s extensive research on Southeast Asia – including Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, and Myanmar – is now incorporated in a dedicated Southeast Asia Program. Each Program also commissions work by other scholars on the broader region. To complement their written research, Lowy Institute experts hold a robust series of dialogues and events on the politics of the region, independently and in partnership with other organisations.

Photo: Jung Yeon-Je-Pool/Getty Images

Experts
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News and media
Will Aung San Suu Kyi be president? Odds are lengthening
A year ago, a Lowy Institute panel was asked whether Aung San Suu Kyi would become president of Burma (Myanmar). The question was also raised on The Interpreter. The answer on…
Indonesian election: More on the Prabowo surge
The Interpreter has been flooded with traffic since we published Aaron Connelly's analysis of the Indonesian presidential race on Tuesday afternoon. Aaron said Prabowo Subianto…
Japan-ROK relations: History debate a dangerous indulgence
The Korea-Japan dispute over history is back yet again, with the Japanese Government this week releasing a 'review' of the drafting of the 'Kono Statement.' That statement is the…
China links: Gender inequality, foreign forces, climate change, media restrictions and more
Shadow Foreign Minister Tanya Plibersek's speech on China's rise. She made her first ever trip to China a couple of weeks ago.  Li Shuo of Greenpeace China on what China should…
Indonesian election: Prabowo now the favourite
New polling data on Indonesia's presidential election — and the lack of it from certain critical quarters — suggests that Jakarta Governor Joko Widodo's 38-point lead of…
China links: DPRK, big data, South China Sea, Red Guards, portly PLA recruits and more
Chinese-style reform and opening? Not for North Korea, which is reportedly telling top party cadres to 'abandon the Chinese dream.' Chinese military to allow more 'portly'…
China: Why Pu Zhiqiang's arrest matters for all of us
It took me about a month in Beijing, and my first investigative story in the adjacent hills, to realise that the question of 'human rights in China' was not a concern only for…
Australia will miss SBY. America won't.
Tony Abbott's meeting earlier this month with Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono will likely be his last, with only four months left in SBY's second term. Reading the…
China links: PLA spying, India, gay marriage, South China Sea, Tiananmen and more
A second PLA unit has been publicly implicated in online spying. This could just be the tip of the iceberg — the NSA is investigating more than 20 hacking groups in China, over…
Don Sahong Dam: A dim ray of hope
In a Bloomberg story published yesterday, the chief executive officer of the Mekong River Commission (MRC), Hans Guttman, is quoted as saying that 'there is still an opportunity…