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121. Social Policy Responses During COVID-19 in East Asia and Beyond from a Comparative Perspective

Author:
Julia Shu-Huah Wang and Qin Gao
Publication Date:
01-2026
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
Abstract:
January 21, 2026 — Julia Shu-Huah Wang examines how Mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong responded to COVID-19 compared to other countries. Drawing on two projects, she analyzes (1) model family data from East Asia, the U.S., and Europe to trace social policy changes before, during, and after the pandemic, and (2) country-level indicators across two decades from over 140 countries using panel regression. The presentation highlights cross-national differences in the design and effectiveness of social policy responses. Speaker: Julia Shu-Huah Wang, Associate Professor, National Taiwan University Moderator: Qin Gao, Maurice V. Russell Professor of Social Policy and Social Work Practice; Acting Director of the Asian American Initiative; Associate Dean for Doctoral Education; Director of China Center for Social Policy, Columbia School of Social Work
Topic:
Social Policy, Crisis Management, Public Health, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
China, Taiwan, Asia, and Hong Kong

122. From Mao to Now: China's 20th-Century Global Development Finance

Author:
Austin M. Strange and (Zoe) Liu Zongyuan
Publication Date:
03-2026
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
Abstract:
March 25, 2026 — The nature, aims, and impacts of Chinese overseas aid and lending have attracted major policy and scholarly attention since 2000. However, the first 50 years of China's international development cooperation are often omitted from discussion. The University of Hong Kong's Austin Strange introduces a dataset on China's 20th-century development finance, including approximately 4,000 projects in over 130 countries, and shows how these data can be analyzed to enrich theoretical and empirical research on Chinese development finance in international relations.
Topic:
International Relations, International Cooperation, Mao Zedong, and Development Finance
Political Geography:
China and Asia

123. The Future of China-Russia Relations

Author:
Thomas Eder and Elizabeth Wishnick
Publication Date:
03-2026
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
Abstract:
March 26, 2026 — What does China('s leadership) stand to gain or lose by remaining close to Russia? Thomas Eder's presentation explores energy and broader economic ties, Russia's potential role in conflicts involving China in the Indo-Pacific, and the joint promotion of (global) governance ideas. It also address the realities of China’s and Russia’s presence and cooperation in the Arctic, as well as consequences of their deeper bilateral ties for China-Europe ties and China's regional security interests in East Asia.
Topic:
Economics, Bilateral Relations, Governance, Energy, and Regional Security
Political Geography:
Russia, China, and Asia

124. E-Waste as a U.S. Social Policy Challenge: Addressing Inequity, Governance Gaps, and Consumer Rights Through a Repair-Reuse-Regulate Framework

Author:
Cynthia Norgbey
Publication Date:
04-2026
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Public and International Affairs (JPIA)
Institution:
School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA), Princeton University
Abstract:
Electronic waste (e-waste) is one of the most rapidly growing waste streams in the United States, creating pressing environmental, economic, and social challenges. The United States generates over seven million tons of e-waste each year, and has a largely unregulated system, with significant amounts of e-waste burned, landfilled, or exported to countries with weaker environmental protections. The current system is fragmented and inequitable, producing pollution, depleting resources, and perpetuating environmental injustice for both domestic and overseas communities. Without a unified federal policy, structural gaps harm consumers, communities, and the environment. The United States lacks enforceable right-to-repair laws, manufacturers face inconsistent accountability for recycling and reuse, and export loopholes allow toxic e-waste to be shipped overseas with minimal transparency. In contrast, countries in the European Union are modernizing their electronics economy through comprehensive laws that establish minimum standards for repair rights, data transparency, and producer responsibility. This paper proposes a Three-Pillar Strategy for creating an equitable and circular e-waste management system in the United States.: Repair: Enhance consumer rights and equity through national right-to-repair legislation, including requirements for parts availability, diagnostic tools, and restrictions on anti-repair practices. State-level laws in Minnesota and New York provide models. Reuse: Incentivize reuse and refurbishment at the federal level by formally recognizing it as a distinct category in the waste hierarchy, building infrastructure in schools and community institutions, and collecting consistent data on secondary markets. Regulate: Enact a national Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) framework with clear standards on takeback, design-for-recycling, and export transparency. This includes updating federal regulations and aligning U.S. law with the Basel Convention. The three-pillar approach addresses socially equitable sustainability at upstream, midstream, and downstream intervention points. Using qualitative content analysis of 23 policy documents, this paper analyzes how repair, reuse, and producer responsibility instruments are distributed across U.S. federal and state governance levels, identifying structural gaps from fragmentation and contributing to scholarship on environmental governance and extended producer responsibility. Building on these findings, the paper advances a three-pillar framework: Repair, Reuse, and Regulate, that calls for a federally coordinated approach integrating national right-to-repair legislation, reuse and refurbishment infrastructure development, and a comprehensive producer responsibility system to address these governance gaps.
Topic:
Governance, Regulation, Social Policy, Waste, Electronic Waste (E-Waste), and Consumer Rights
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America

125. Piloting a Preventive Mental Health Assessment Intervention for Left-Behind Families in the Philippines

Author:
Do Minh Anh, Pragya Prachi, Anne Marie Teodosio Rey, and Wu Xiao
Publication Date:
04-2026
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Public and International Affairs (JPIA)
Institution:
School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA), Princeton University
Abstract:
The negative psychosocial impacts of parental migration on left-behind children (LBC) presents an urgent opportunity for preventive care and systemic reform. In high-migration countries such as the Philippines, LBC face heightened risks of emotional distress, attachment disruption, and poor academic performance. The substitute caregivers, often extended family members, are frequently ill-equipped to provide consistent supervision and emotional support offered by parents. Despite growing concern, programmatic gaps persist due to limited data reporting and analysis on LBC and their caregivers. This paper recommends a scalable Mental Health Assessment and Screening Tool (MHAST) for LBC and their caregivers, integrated into the existing digital infrastructure of the Philippine Department of Migrant Workers (DMW). The intervention builds on the DMW Mobile Application platform to embed mandatory caregiver arrangement and link school-aged LBC (ages 5-17) to well-being assessments administered through schools. Using two standardized screening instruments from the Child and Youth Resilience Measure Revised (CYRM-R) and the Zarit Burden Interview (ZBI-22), these tools identify flags in emotional distress, psychological risks, and caregiving capacity to triage families into four tiers of need to activate interventions ranging from informational resources to referrals for specialized care. In partnership with schools, NGOs, and government agencies, this tool has the potential to operate at both service delivery and policy planning levels. It provides targeted support for LBC and caregivers while generating standardized, large-scale data on caregiving quality and child well-being. This data infrastructure strengthens evidence-based policymaking across child protection, labor migration, education, and public health domains. Its digital-first design and interagency implementation model ensure phased deployment and make the intervention replicable across various migration-affected contexts.
Topic:
Migration, Children, Mental Health, Resilience, Well-Being, and Digital Infrastructure
Political Geography:
Philippines and Southeast Asia

126. Transgressive Sexual Politics, Structural Homophobia: Wilders and Milei in the Global Populist Radical Right

Author:
Luca Ghislandi
Publication Date:
04-2026
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Public and International Affairs (JPIA)
Institution:
School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA), Princeton University
Abstract:
This article examines how sexuality operates as a strategic instrument within the ideological configurations of the Populist Radical Right (PRR) by comparing Geert Wilders in the Netherlands and Javier Milei in Argentina. Both leaders appear to challenge the PRR’s traditional sexual conservatism: Wilders by portraying himself as a defender of LGBT rights and Milei by performing a libertarian, sexually transgressive persona. Yet, both ultimately reproduce structural forms of homophobia. Drawing on discourse analysis, frame analysis, and process tracing, the paper argues that these seemingly divergent stances constitute localized rearticulations of the PRR’s core triad of nativism, authoritarianism, and populism. Wilders’ “civilizational liberalism” weaponizes queer rights to define Dutch identity against a racialized Muslim “Other,” enacting conditional inclusion and rendering migrant and Muslim queer subjects invisible. Milei’s “libertarian anti-statism” fuses sexual libertarianism with anti-gender politics, using anti-elitist and market-oriented rhetoric to dismantle the state infrastructures that sustain gender and sexual equality, a form of institutional subtraction. Despite opposite performances–Wilders as celibate guardian, Milei as transgressive iconoclast–both mobilize sexuality to police the boundaries of citizenship, legitimize masculine authority, and reinforce exclusionary national imaginaries. The analysis situates these cases within broader global trends in the PRR, demonstrating that contemporary far-right sexual politics no longer depend on explicit moral conservatism but instead on the modernization of homophobia: maintaining inequality through the languages of freedom, tolerance, and civilization.
Topic:
Politics, Populism, Ideology, Radical Right, and Homophobia
Political Geography:
Europe, Argentina, South America, and Netherlands

127. An Indo-Pacific Lifeline? Outcomes of Canada’s Free Trade Agreements amid North America’s Economic Pull

Author:
Tito Almeida
Publication Date:
04-2026
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Public and International Affairs (JPIA)
Institution:
School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA), Princeton University
Abstract:
Rising global protectionism has renewed Canada’s strategic imperative to diversify its trade beyond the United States, given its longstanding export dependence. While the Indo-Pacific remains central to Canada’s foreign policy and trade diversification ambitions, there remains limited consensus on whether the Canada-Korea Free Trade Agreement (CKFTA) and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) have meaningfully increased Canada’s exports to partner countries. This study addresses this gap in the literature by estimating the impact of these agreements on Canada’s exports, and identifying which types of firms have driven these outcomes. Using a panel dataset of bilateral goods exports from 2010 to 2024 and estimating two-way fixed effects and difference-in-differences regressions, the article examines the short-term effects of Free Trade Agreement (FTA) implementation, while controlling for macroeconomic and institutional conditions in partner economies. Although statistically insignificant, this study found that Canada’s exports to high-income Indo-Pacific partners rose modestly after FTA entry, with SMEs recording the strongest gains. In contrast, it estimates Canada’s exports to middle-income partners declined across all categories of firms. With Canada aiming to double non-U.S. exports over the next decade, this article suggests that future studies on free trade agreements should continue to investigate partner countries’ levels of industrialization and the role of firms as drivers of export growth.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Economics, Exports, Protectionism, and Free Trade Agreements
Political Geography:
Canada, North America, and Indo-Pacific

128. Sovereignty in Exile: Deterritorialized Statehood and Adaptive Governance for Climate-Displaced Pacific Island Nations

Author:
Valerie Chua
Publication Date:
04-2026
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Public and International Affairs (JPIA)
Institution:
School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA), Princeton University
Abstract:
For millennia, Pacific Island communities have thrived in profound interdependence with their natural environment, relying on the ocean and ecosystems for sustenance, cultural identity, and economic vitality. Today, climate change disrupts this delicate balance. Rising sea levels and extreme weather events accelerate ecosystem degradation and undermine the physical and economic sustainability of ancestral homelands. As land becomes uninhabitable, communities face mass displacement, forced to leave their homes—and even their countries—in search of safety. Because international statehood remains predicated on land possession, this loss of territory threatens to erase the legal standing, sovereign rights, and collective cultural identity of Pacific Island communities. This article advocates for the international recognition of deterritorialized statehood—a model in which nations retain their legal sovereignty, international recognition, and cultural-political identity without basing their legal claims on territorial possession. This model offers a pragmatic path forward for Pacific Island nations by addressing the realities of climate-induced displacement without compromising the sovereign self-determination of its people. To achieve this vision, the international community must work alongside Pacific Island governments to implement three key policy transformations: (1) legal reforms to secure sovereign recognition post-territorial loss, (2) institutional reforms to govern dispersed populations, and (3) community preparedness initiatives to ensure cultural continuity and political participation across diasporas.
Topic:
Climate Change, Sovereignty, Governance, Exile, and Climate Governance
Political Geography:
Pacific Islands

129. Resisting Digital Colonialism and Protecting Subaltern Agency in Africa

Author:
Sylvia Ayesu
Publication Date:
04-2026
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Public and International Affairs (JPIA)
Institution:
School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA), Princeton University
Abstract:
As African states accelerate digital transformation, they do so within a global political economy of data, artificial intelligence, and surveillance technologies dominated by foreign corporations and external regulatory norms. This article examines how contemporary forms of digital colonialism, characterized by asymmetrical data extraction, technological dependency, and externally imposed governance frameworks, constrain political autonomy and reproduce historical patterns of domination. Moving beyond narratives of victimhood, the article foregrounds subaltern agency by analyzing how African governments and civil society actors actively resist, negotiate, and reconfigure these power relations. Focusing on three illustrative cases in Kenya—the implementation of the Data Protection Act, the diffusion of Chinese-built smart city projects, and the rise of civil society-led data justice movements—the article analyzes how power asymmetries are negotiated within contemporary digital governance. It argues that prevailing global Artificial Intelligence (AI) and data governance frameworks inadequately incorporate African political priorities, thereby reproducing dependency rather than enabling sovereignty. It concludes by proposing policy pathways to strengthen African digital self-determination, including regulatory capacity enhancement, safeguarding transparency in technology procurement, and promoting civic oversight.
Topic:
Political Economy, Science and Technology, Transparency, Self-Determination, Extractivism, Agency, and Digital Colonialism
Political Geography:
Africa

130. A Tight Spot: Challenges Facing the Russian Oil Sector Through 2035

Author:
Sergey Vakulenko
Publication Date:
03-2026
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
Since the beginning of the war in Iran and closure of the Strait of Hormuz, oil prices have soared into triple digits, a state of affairs which will make life easier for Russia’s state finances and oil industry. The duration of this unexpected crisis is, of course, unknowable as of this writing, but the reversal of fortune has also brought to the fore several lingering questions about the outlook for the Russian oil sector that are all too often overlooked. Russian oil production grew steadily in the wake of the post-Soviet trough from 1996 until 2016, when it joined forces with other leading oil producing countries and created an arrangement that is now known as OPEC+. Production levels following the creation of OPEC+ have not followed a simple linear path, due to the COVID-19 pandemic and other headwinds facing the global economy.1 Russia tracked its quota reasonably closely, except for 2022, when it had troubles placing its volumes in the market, while rearranging its export flows from Europe to Asia as a result of the European embargo imposed for the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Notably, Russian production has been declining since late 2025, and the gap between quota and actual output has widened. This has happened against a backdrop of extremely low official prices for Russian crude, which had been approaching the lows of past crisis years: 2009 ($41.27/bbl in January), 2016 ($40.20 annual average), and 2020 ($40.17 annual average). Is the production decline linked to the fact that a significant proportion of Russian fields have become uneconomic at $40/bbl? In other words, has Russia’s upstream breakeven threshold been reached under economic conditions caused by the war in Ukraine, and if so, where exactly is this threshold? And what are the long-term prospects for Russian oil production under these circumstances? It is worth noting upfront that the production decline in December 2025 through January 2026 was almost certainly driven by exceptional circumstances rather than a deep systemic crisis. In all likelihood, the production dip was caused by the shutdown of Lukoil’s cluster of offshore fields in the Caspian Sea following Ukrainian drone strikes on three production platforms. Taken together, these three platforms accounted for more than 200,000 barrels per day: a figure that broadly matches the observed production shortfall. Nevertheless, the questions that this decline has prompted are worth exploring. In the near term, the abrupt rise of oil prices caused by the Iran war, some of which might persist after the end of hostilities, will bring a windfall both to the Russian oil companies and the state. Some of the windfall might translate into increased drilling expenditure and an associated production spike. But it would not change the long-term outlook and fundamentals of the Russian oil industry. The focus of this paper, therefore, is on the factors shaping the long-term trends, including: the oil revenue split between the Russian state and Russian oil companies; the cost of oil production in Russia, both operating costs and the cost of sustaining production levels; and the technical capabilities of Russia’s oil industry relative to its global peers. Both the current state and possible future trajectories of the Russian oil industry are path-dependent. Therefore, this paper will also examine the circumstances that shaped it. The central conclusion is that Russian oil production will soon begin to decline—slowly but steadily—and that this decline will be relatively insensitive to oil prices, which are likely to decrease as the world transitions to a low-carbon energy system. Russian output is remarkably resilient to significant price reductions; the country has the geological resources, technology, equipment, and expertise to sustain or even increase production. But the decline is driven by state policy, the investment climate, and OPEC+ constraints.
Topic:
Economics, Oil, Governance, Trade, and Energy
Political Geography:
Russia and Eurasia