Preface

Global uncertainties that complicate policy choices for countries—felt acutely in East Asia, located between the two superpowers of China and the United States—led to the research set out in this volume. Economic, strategic and security considerations have become enmeshed with great power competition, rising protectionism, outdated multilateral rules and climate change. This book was prepared during the COVID-19 pandemic that exacerbated those uncertainties.

Those who analyse the question of how countries balance or navigate economic, social and national security policy choices in a more contested and uncertain global environment often focus on one aspect—usually national security—without due consideration of others. An example is the framing of these issues as ‘geoeconomics’, which considers the use of economic tools for geopolitical purposes.

The support of the Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia, or ERIA, to the East Asian Bureau of Economic Research at The Australian National University for this work is recognition that economic analysis has not been prominent in academic or policy thinking as it relates to choices of national security or geopolitics. Economists have largely vacated the field as strategists and policymakers search for a framework to incorporate economic considerations into strategic policy choices.

A distinguished group of economists from East Asia who have been close to (or involved in) the policymaking processes of selected countries convened to discuss and draft contributions that shed light on how various policy communities have managed these new challenges. Southeast Asia, in particular, is organised around the idea that economic integration into the global economy, especially its major economic neighbours, is a source of national security. And their organising grouping of ASEAN helps them preserve policy options to achieve that goal.

For US allies, especially Australia and Japan, the policy choices appear more constrained with their security guarantor locked in strategic competition with China. The US is dealing with domestic problems like entrenched inequality and fraying democratic institutions. Australia and Japan and the region have China—a China that appears to be an insecure rising power that has become more assertive—as their largest economic partner.

The chapters in this volume do not provide answers to all of these challenges but they make an important contribution in understanding how some countries are managing to navigate prosperity and security. Some countries have managed to do better than others in avoiding the narrowing of their policy options: for example, some have better frameworks for bringing economic and security interests together in national interest choices. More work will need to be done to bring these lessons together and we hope this volume makes a contribution to that thinking.

We are grateful to ERIA and its Research Institutes Network (RIN) for the financial support without which this project would not have been possible. RIN participants provided feedback in developing the project. We are particularly grateful to two anonymous reviewers for suggestions as well as Hank Lim, Christopher Findlay and Gary Hawke for their sage advice.

The authors in this volume contributed much beyond writing their own chapters and we thank them for their insights, generosity and patience in completing this book.

We are indebted to Brandon Harrington for his research assistance in guiding the project to completion.

May we extend our sincere thanks to Elouise Ball, Emily Tinker and ANU Press for working so patiently with us through the production process and to Rani Kerin for her excellent copyediting.

We hope that this collection of essays may help, at this critical point in the history of the global economy, in the development of strategies about how to navigate prosperity and security in Asia.

Shiro Armstrong, Tom Westland and Adam Triggs

2023