Bundle: Southeast Asia and China

Because of rising tensions in “water diplomacy” around the Mekong River, the region could become another geopolitical hotspot along the South China Sea. China’s clutch of hydropower dams control the water flow to downstream countries, leaving them vulnerable to drought and political blackmail. The lack of external major-power involvement from ...

Though Washington sees China as trying to supplant the U.S. as the global superpower, what Beijing really wants is to carve out a sphere of influence in Eurasia and parts of Africa. Whether it can attain this role of “junior superpower” will depend greatly on the success of the Belt ...

There are no longer any illusions that the U.S. sees any potential in partnership with China. The two countries have entered into a strategic competition that in the worst case, could quickly become a cold war-style confrontation. Negotiation on the biggest economic sticking points could ease tensions, but only for ...

In the huge geopolitical shifts happening in East Asia and the Indo-Pacific, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has been conspicuously absent. Split over Chinese activity in the South China Sea, the organization is unready to face these new challenges. If ASEAN becomes irrelevant, it will impact the big ...