Session	Dates	Price
Fall Semester 2008	August 28 - December 18, 2008	$8,995
Academic Year 2008-2009	August 28, 2008 - May 28, 2009	$16,995
Fall Semester 2009	Late August - Mid December 2009	TBA
Academic Year 2009-2010	Late August 2009 - Late May 2010	TBA

Full Description

COURSE DESCRIPTION

This course examines the national interests, issues, conflicts, relations, and influence of domestic politics in interstate relations in East Asia, defined here as the countries of China, Japan, Taiwan, Russia, and the two Koreas, with U.S. interests as the primary focus in the mix. We will look at current issues in East Asia such as the new U.S. strategy for dealing with China (“congagement,” or a mixture of the old strategy of “military containment” and the ongoing policy of “economic engagement”), the China-Japan-South Korea imbroglio over Japan’s wartime memorial shrine (Yasukuni), look at the dynamic rise of China regionally and globally and ask ourselves what this portents for the future of regional security and stability, especially when Taiwan is added to the mix, and finally, look at the potentially destabilizing issue of North Korea’s nuclear program (on July 4, NK launched seven missiles, creating an international flap that is still ongoing).

However, today, focusing primarily on five countries in East Asia excludes the dynamic interaction of this region with other countries and major political and economic organizations in the Asia Pacific region.

In June 2001, Russia, China, and four other Central Asia countries formed the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), which, became “the largest security-related international organization in the world in which the U.S. was not directly involved…the SCO’s mandate was expanded to include drug trafficking and terrorism…(Dittmer, in Liu, p. 210).” In time, India, Iran, Mongolia, and Pakistan were given observer status. The military implications were not lost on the U.S., giving U.S. policymakers one more issue to confront in this region, particularly since it involves China in a leadership role, Iran with observer status, and the U.S. with no voice at all.

In 2005, East and Southeast Asian countries overtook Japan as the region’s second largest economy. Thus, the influential growth of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), in which China, Japan, and South Korea are unofficial members (the so-called 10+3, or ASEAN plus Three - APT), will require close scrutiny. In 2005, ASEAN held its inaugural East Asia Summit, which some members of ASEAN see potentially as the driving force for the creation of an “East Asia Community,” something comparable to the European Union (EU) or the North America Free Trade Association (NAFTA).

We will also look at the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation group (APEC), the lone organization in which the U.S. still plays a major role in Asia Pacific. To be sure, a new political and economic order is forming in Asia, one in which Russia wants in, the U.S. is in danger of being excluded (the U.S. was not invited to the latest meeting of ASEAN), and, to a lesser degree, the roles of Australia and New Zealand in the new political and economic configuration of the Asia Pacific.

In a larger sense, this course should be aptly renamed, “The International Relations of the Asia-Pacific,” not coincidently close to the title of one of the texts strongly recommended for this course.