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Begin New Search Topic Economics Content Type Policy Brief Publishing Institution East-West Center

1. Beyond Manufacturing: Developing the Service Sector to Drive Growth in the PRC

Author:
Wei Wang, Gemma Estrada, Jurgen Conrad, Sang-Hyo Lee, and Donghyun Park
Publication Date:
05-2016
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
As demand from global markets declines, slowing exports of manufactured goods from the People's Republic of China means the country must increasingly rely on domestic markets for growth. Unlike manufactured goods, services—those "intangible" products that include everything from transportation to scientific research to real estate services—are geared more toward domestic markets. Services, then, will be key to the rebalancing process. However, while the service sector has grown rapidly in the PRC, it continues to lag behind other countries at similar stages of development. In addition, the sector is dominated by traditional low-end types of services, rather than knowledge-intensive services. Heavy regulatory burdens, barriers to trade in services, and an unfavorable policy environment have been major obstacles to upgrading the sector and improving its competitiveness. Policy reform should focus on strengthening competition to raise productivity, with the goal of increasing not only the number of jobs and contribution to GDP, but also of positioning the service sector to compete internationally and spur export growth.
Topic:
Economics, Markets, Reform, and GDP
Political Geography:
China

2. Unconventional Monetary Policy, Spillovers, and Liftoff: Implications for Northeast Asia

Author:
Marcus Noland
Publication Date:
11-2015
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
Unconventional monetary policy (UMP) has had predictable effects. How exit plays out is scenario-dependent. Quantitative easing has had the predictable effect of encouraging currency depreciation and some partner countries may have attempted to offset these exchange rate effects. Korea presents a particularly interesting case: it is relatively small and relatively open and integrated, in both trade and financial terms, with the United States and Japan, two practitioners of UMP. Authorities have acted to limit the won's appreciation primarily against the currency of China, not the US or Japan. Nevertheless, Korea's policy is a source of tension with the US. Under legislation currently being considered, the currency manipulation issue could potentially interfere with Korean efforts to attract direct investment from the US and create an obstacle to Korea joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, Political Economy, Monetary Policy, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
Asia

3. Alternative Waste Solutions for the Pacific Region: Learning from the Hawai’i Experience

Author:
Jordan P. Howell
Publication Date:
11-2015
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
With limited space and ever-growing trash, the islands of the Pacific share unique challenges managing their solid wastes. The traditional approach has been to collect waste in open dumps and landfills. But overwhelmed sites and unsanitary conditions are driving governments to seek alternative solutions. Hawai'i has implemented "resource recovery" systems in past decades to deal with waste, including an innovative energy-from-waste project on O'ahu, and a recycling/composting program on Maui that focuses on diverting material from landfills. While both have been successful in reducing waste and generating products, the programs have also endured unexpected delays and problems. Despite differences in scale and capacity, the Hawai'i experience offers insights for other Pacific islands into how to tackle their own solid waste management issues, and create systems and policies that deliver the greatest ecological and economic benefits.
Topic:
Climate Change, Economics, Energy Policy, Governance, and Climate Finance
Political Geography:
Hawaii and United States of America

4. China’s Hidden Obstacles to Socioeconomic Rebalancing

Author:
Boy Lüthje and Christopher A. McNally
Publication Date:
10-2015
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
The global financial crisis of 2008-09 led to a policy consensus in China that its socioeconomic development model needed rebalancing. China's rapid development has been based on extensive growth reliant on exports, low wages, environmental exploitation, and the manufacturing of cheap products. China's current plans identify paths to economic rebalancing through intensive growth driven by rising investment in new technologies and manufacturing processes, improved wages and skills, and improved worker and environmental protections. Two industries, automotive and information technology, demonstrate the experience of and opportunities for rebalancing. Both offer improved employment conditions with better wages, but continue to incorporate large swaths of low-wage employment with little protection for workers' health and the environment. Economic rebalancing in China, therefore, has so far only appeared in pockets. Institutional safeguards for wages and labor standards remain constrained by powerful alliances among multinational corporations, Chinese state-owned/private enterprises, and the Chinese state.
Topic:
Economics, Political Economy, Labor Issues, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
China

5. The ASEAN Economic Community: What Stands in the Way?

Author:
Jon Dorsch
Publication Date:
09-2015
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
At the end of 2015 the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) will announce the establishment of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC). In theory, this agreement should produce an association-wide economic integration. However, following the announcement, and for the foreseeable future, ASEAN member states will continue in significantly less than full regional economic integration. Why? Some observers believe that the AEC plans involve an "overly ambitious timeline and too many ill-thought-out initiatives." Others point to ASEAN's traditional aversion to legally binding agreements. While progress has been made in reducing or eliminating intra-ASEAN trade tariffs, substantial non-tariff barriers to trade persist. However, for most member states, the ASEAN market is relatively small while external markets, especially China, are growing rapidly. Given this outward-orientation for ASEAN trade, is the lack of an unhindered regional market really a problem?
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, and Markets
Political Geography:
China and Asia

6. Creating Korea's Future Economy: Innovation, Growth, and Korea-US Economic Relations

Author:
Sean P. Connell
Publication Date:
01-2014
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
The Korean government's "creative economy" agenda reflects growing consensus that Korea's future growth and prosperity depends on its ability to become a global leader in developing and commercializing innovative new products, services, and business models. To succeed, the Korean government must address regulatory, structural, educational, and cultural obstacles that have constrained Korea's ability to fully utilize its innovative capacities. This new emphasis on innovation brings Korea into closer alignment with the United States, which has long focused on innovation in its growth strategies. Moreover, it comes during the early stages of implementation of the US-Korea Free Trade Agreement (KORUS), which intersects with important areas of Korea's innovation framework policies. Policymakers, businesses, and researchers in both countries should examine potential new opportunities to increase cooperation around initiatives aimed at fostering innovation and growth, both within the bilateral context and at a global level.
Topic:
Economics, Industrial Policy, International Trade and Finance, Treaties and Agreements, and Bilateral Relations
Political Geography:
United States

7. Democratic Change and Forest Governance in the Asia Pacific: Implications for Myanmar

Author:
Stephen McCarthy
Publication Date:
02-2014
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
While signs of democratization in a country may raise hopes of better natural resource governance, especially of forests, evidence from the Asia Pacific region in countries such as Indonesia and Cambodia demonstrates no significant relationship between a country's transition toward democracy and better forestry governance. Myanmar's transition to democracy is unlikely to counter this trend. Deeply vested interests operate within democratizing countries that outweigh the support inside governments or civil society for improving forestry conservation. Incumbents also stand to benefit directly from initiatives that promote free trade and further investment in the forestry sector at the expense of the environment and the most vulnerable in society. International organizations returning to Myanmar must fine-tune their policies to accommodate the local political economy of deforestation and should engage with elements on the periphery, dissenting voices inside the government, and a broad range of local civil society organizations. Failure to do so may exacerbate current trends and lead to future conflicts in the already volatile cease-fire areas.
Topic:
Agriculture, Civil Society, Development, and Economics
Political Geography:
Southeast Asia

8. Upgrading India's Electronics Manufacturing Industry: Regulatory Reform and Industrial Policy

Author:
Dieter Ernst
Publication Date:
02-2014
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
India faces a fundamental puzzle. The country is a leading exporter of information-technology services, including knowledge-intensive chip design. Yet electronics manufacturing in India is struggling despite a huge and growing domestic market and pockets of world-class capabilities. To examine this puzzle the World Bank commissioned this study in May 2013 on behalf of the Chief Economic Advisor, Government of India, Raghuram Rajan (now the governor of the Reserve Bank of India). Drawing on extensive survey questionnaires and interviews with key industry players (both domestic and foreign) and relevant government agencies, this study identifies major challenges India-based companies face in engaging in electronics manufacturing. The analysis culminates in detailed policy suggestions for regulatory reform and support policies needed to unblock barriers to investment in this industry and to fast-track its upgrading through innovation.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Globalization, Industrial Policy, International Trade and Finance, and Science and Technology
Political Geography:
South Asia and India

9. ASEAN Centrality and the ASEAN-US Economic Relationship

Author:
Peter A. Petri and Michael G. Plummer
Publication Date:
03-2014
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
ASEAN has become a focal point of the rapidly changing economic architecture of the Asia-Pacific region. ASEAN members are increasingly stable and politically confident, and constitute an emerging economic powerhouse. The region is dynamic, with 600 million citizens and a gross domestic product (GDP) that exceeds $2 trillion and is expected to grow 6 percent annually for the next two decades. (The Appendix at the end of this paper reports detailed output and trade projections to 2025.) Through deeper internal integration via the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) and external initiatives such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), ASEAN is becoming a driving force in regional cooperation and a much-courted economic partner. The AEC and the RCEP projects are globally significant: the AEC could generate powerful demonstration effects for other developing regions, and the RCEP could become an important building bloc of the multilateral trading system.
Topic:
Security, Economics, International Trade and Finance, and Markets
Political Geography:
United States, East Asia, Asia, and Asia-Pacific

10. Global Trends of Multi-Factor Productivity

Author:
Jeong Yeon Lee
Publication Date:
03-2014
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
Multi-factor productivity (MFP) compares the growth of gross domestic product with the growth of combined capital and labor inputs. The growth rate of MFP assumes theoretical significance because it represents the slope of the steady-state growth path, and hence is a major determinant of the long-term growth trend. This paper offers the balanced panel of the estimated growth rates of MFP for 24 OECD countries over 1986-2011. Based on the estimates of MFP growth, a number of notable trends in productivity growth are identified for the entire OECD area as well as three major economies – the United States, the Eurozone and Japan – within the OECD.
Topic:
Economics, Industrial Policy, International Trade and Finance, and Labor Issues
Political Geography:
United States, Japan, and Europe

11. Flexible Implementation: A Key to Asia's Transformation

Author:
Luke Simon Jordan and Katerina Koinis
Publication Date:
04-2014
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
Despite the region's economic growth over the last few decades, countries across Asia still face the complex challenge of structural transformation. Low-income economies must build formal industrial and service sectors from agricultural and informal bases; middle-income economies must move up the value chain; and high-income economies must continually generate new capabilities at the frontier of innovation.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Industrial Policy, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
Asia

12. See No Evil: South Korean Labor Practices in North Korea

Author:
Marcus Noland
Publication Date:
04-2014
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
Economic engagement between South and North Korea is often justified as a means of encouraging economic and social evolution in North Korea, with the ultimate goal of national unification. The South has invested heavily in the North, and firms have employed more than 50,000 workers. Yet expectations of a transformational impact rest on unexamined assumptions. The North recognizes the Trojan horse nature of the engagement policy: results of an original survey of South Korean employers show that the North Korean government has largely circumscribed the exposure of its citizens to both South Koreans and market-oriented economic practices, in the process violating labor rights defined by covenants to which both countries belong. The problem seems intractable, given that South Korea's diplomatic commitment to engagement with North Korea trumps labor rights concerns and South Korean firms perceive that the North Korean status quo confers benefits. As the experience of labor rights movements elsewhere shows, conditions will likely improve only if an aroused citizenry—here, the South Koreans—demands change.
Topic:
Diplomacy, Economics, Human Rights, Bilateral Relations, and Reform
Political Geography:
Asia, South Korea, and North Korea

13. The Asia-Pacific Cooperation Agenda: Moving from Regional Cooperation Toward Global Leadership,

Author:
Charles E. Morrison
Publication Date:
10-2014
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
In the past quarter-century Asia has seen vast changes, including increased economic growth, integration, and liberalization. The Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) process, now marking its 25th anniversary, facilitated these changes through its institution of the first regular meetings of ministers and then leaders. But what role should APEC play in the future? With a continuing diffusion of power, what was once hailed as an imminent "Asian century" is much more likely to be a global one. This international system, however, will have a trans-Pacific core with much of the economic power and potential to provide global leadership for the further development of international norms, rules, and cooperation. Thus, we may be able to refer to an "Asia-Pacific century." Two questions arise: Is North America, with a relatively small share of global population and a declining share of global world product, still relevant? Will the nations on the two sides of the Pacific really be able to use their power effectively to assume global leadership? The answer to the first of these is "yes," and to the second, "it depends."
Topic:
Economics, International Cooperation, International Political Economy, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
Asia

14. Micronesians on the Move: Eastward and Upward Bound

Author:
Francis X. Hezel
Publication Date:
09-2013
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
Is out-migration an admission of a Pacific Island nation's failure to fulfill its economic promise and provide the jobs that its citizens seek in a modernized society? Or is it a legitimate alternative strategy for development, through the export of surplus labor, in lieu of the more conventional methods recommended by donor nations and international financial institutions? In this paper, Francis X. Hezel, SJ, reviews the 30-year history of migration from one Pacific Island nation, the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM), and examines the current status of its migrants with an eye to shedding light on this question.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Migration, and Immigration
Political Geography:
United States, Israel, and Australia/Pacific

15. Pacific Island Nations: How Viable Are Their Economies?

Author:
Francis X. Hezel
Publication Date:
01-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
The Pacific is receiving a fair share of attention today from many quarters. Even as the parade of economic consultants continues, others are coming to explore concerns that have more recently claimed the attention of western nations. These concerns cover a broad range, including food security, global warming, elimination of illegal drug traffic in the region, prevention of AIDS or even drug-resistant tuberculosis, protection from spouse abuse, and public-school improvement. These are legitimate interests, but none of them addresses the central concern that vexes each of the island nations of Micronesia, and perhaps the islands elsewhere in the Pacific: How will the country grow its economy to ensure its survival in the future?
Topic:
Development, Economics, Poverty, and Foreign Aid
Political Geography:
Asia, Australia, and Island

16. False Hopes for Chinese Economic "Integration"

Author:
John Lee
Publication Date:
04-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
In a recent online article in Foreignpolicy.com, regular columnist and head of the Economic Strategy Institute, Clyde Prestowitz, argued that the next president of the World Bank should be Zhou Xiaochuan, Chairman of the People's Bank of China. For Prestowitz, it was not just Zhou's excellent credentials that made him ideal for the position, but also the fact that he is Chinese. China is accurately accused of “gaming” the global economic liberal order through its currency policies, restricted market access for outside firms and governments, and internal intervention in the economy to the detriment of foreign firms. But Prestowitz believes that such an appointment would significantly encourage China to behave as a “responsible stakeholder.” Behind this thinking is the argument that the more power, prestige, and authority China accumulates within the existing order, the more liberal Chinese economic policies will become.
Topic:
Democratization, Economics, International Trade and Finance, Markets, and Monetary Policy
Political Geography:
China

17. US Agricultural Exports to ASEAN Grow - But Face Competition

Author:
Michael McConnell
Publication Date:
03-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
ASEAN countries have long been an important international market for US agricultural exports. The United States, in 2011, exported almost $9.6 billion of agricultural products to ASEAN, making it the sixth-largest export destination for US farmers, ranchers, and agribusinesses—behind Japan ($14 billion) and just behind the European Union ($9.6 billion), but well ahead of South Korea ($7 billion). Moreover, the value of agricultural trade between the United States and ASEAN almost doubled between 2007 and 2011, with the top four ASEAN markets in 2011 for the United States being Indonesia ($2.8 billion), the Philippines ($2.1 billion), Vietnam ($1.7 billion), and Thailand ($1.3 billion). With a population of 614 million and strong economic growth, it is expected that ASEAN will continue to be an important market for US agricultural products. However, the United States is likely to face increasing competition, particularly from China, Australia, and New Zealand, all of which have free trade agreements (FTAs) with ASEAN.
Topic:
Agriculture, Demographics, Economics, International Trade and Finance, Markets, and Food
Political Geography:
United States, China, Europe, East Asia, South Korea, Australia, Southeast Asia, and New Zealand

18. India, Thailand and the Burma Connection

Author:
Sasiwan Chingchit
Publication Date:
02-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
Burma's ongoing democratic and economic transition has created an unprecedented opportunity for India and Thailand to cooperate and strengthen economic links between South and Southeast Asia. It was therefore no coincidence that the Indian government invited Ms. Yingluck Shinawatra, Thailand's prime minister, to be the chief guest at the country's annual Republic Day parade on January 26. Even more symbolic was that the Thai premier's visit to New Delhi overlapped with that of Burma's foreign minister, Mr. Wanna Maung Lwin, who came to discuss progress on economic and security relations and extended an invitation to India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to visit his country.
Topic:
Democratization, Economics, Government, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
South Asia, India, New Delhi, Burma, Thailand, and Southeast Asia

19. The Foundation of China's Future Stability

Author:
Peter Mattis
Publication Date:
02-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
The recently ended standoff between the villagers of Wukan in Guangdong province and local government officials has refocused attention on China's future stability. The more than 100,000 officially reported incidents of unrest each year gives observers the false impression that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in Beijing barely holds the country together. Pressure may be building, but China's stability is like a champagne bottle. Until the cork pops, the bottle and its contents are stable. The question is how much pressure is building and how much wine is spilt when the cork flies out.
Topic:
Communism, Democratization, Economics, and Government
Political Geography:
China

20. U.S.-China Competition in Asia: Legacies Help America

Author:
Robert Sutter
Publication Date:
02-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
As Sino-American competition for influence enters a new stage with the Obama administration's re-engagement with Asia, each power's legacies in the region add to economic, military and diplomatic factors determining which power will be more successful in the competition. How the United States and China deal with their respective histories in regional affairs and the role of their non-government relations with the Asia- Pacific represent important legacies that on balance favor the United States.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Arms Control and Proliferation, Diplomacy, Economics, International Trade and Finance, and Bilateral Relations
Political Geography:
United States, China, America, and Asia