Proseminare und Übungen (PDF) - Institut für Politische Wissenschaft

Dr. Howard LoewenProseminar: Security Cooperation between the U.S. and East Asia - Patterns ofChange and Continuity(BA: Modul Pol 4 / LAGY 4 / LARS 4)Donnerstag, 10:15 -11:45 Uhr, KH, R. 0.024 -Beginn: 17.10.2013Anmeldung per E-mail: Howard.Loewen@nottingham.edu.myThe East Asian security landscape is quite heterogeneous and is dominated by traditionalsecurity problems such as the Korean Peninsula, the Taiwan-question and Chinese-Japanese relations in the northeastern part of the region. Southeast Asia encompasses alarger variety of security issues such as conflicts over maritime resources and seaboundaries, trafficking, proliferation etc. Moreover the rise of China and its more and moreassertive behaviour in the last years poses a significant security challenge for the wholeregion. Thus, the question how these security issues are being managed is of utmostimportance for the stability of the Southeast Asian region. Some observers argue that theregional security architecture is still being dominated by a network of bilateral securityalliances, established between the United States and some ASEAN countries in the ColdWar era. At the same time multilateral institutions such as ASEAN, ASEAN RegionalForum (ARF), ASEAN+3 and the East Asia Summit (EAS) are regarded as ratherineffective regimes due to the domination of the cooperation principle of non-intervention.Does this assessment still hold true? In order to answer this question we will cast an eye onthe current security architecture in East Asia that has actually evolved into a dynamicsystem in which bilateral and multilateral security initiatives between the United States andAsian countries exist side by side and even interact. The improved bilateral relationsbetween long-time foes US and Vietnam, the ASEAN-US-Summit-Meeting which wasinitiated in 2009, the accession of the US to the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC)and it’s membership to the EAS are cases in point.Literature:Sutter, Rober G. (2008), The United States in Asia, Lanham, MD: Rowman andLittlefield.Buckley, Roger (2002), The United States in the Asia-Pacific since 1945, New York:Cambridge University Press.