East Asian Policy

The Chinese Communist Party passed a reform plan to build the “rule of law”, vowing to lessen local officials' authority over the legal system, promote legal professionalism and affirm the Party's domination in legal issues. These initiatives reflect Xi's effort to institutionalise his anti-corruption campaign. Yet the rule of law goes counter to the country's Confucian or Legalist traditions, the weak law-making and judicial system and other structural factors.

Thousands of corrupt officials have fled the country to safe havens in countries, taking with them billions. The government-pioneered “persuasion” method accounted for 40% of the corrupt officials repatriated in 2014. Considerable challenges remain in political reforms; excessive concentration of power and the pervasive guanxi networks effectively neutralise rules, laws and institutional safeguards, allowing crooks to amass a fortune and to escape the country.

China's shadow banking is intimately related to commercial banks, local government debt and real estate development. The major expansion in local government debt is the result of a boom in shadow banking and worsened by real estate developers. The growth of the Chinese economy largely lies on the continuous rise of land prices. The imposition of proper regulation is for shadow banking to serve the function of supplementing the current financial sector.

China has taken a series of proactive measures to prevent and control air pollution. The Air Pollution Prevention and Control Action Plan (2013) includes main policy initiatives to improve national and regional air quality. Fiscal reforms are needed to fund clean-air technology and incentivise firms and households to reduce pollution and economise energy use. The War on Smog requires high-level coordination of governments at different levels and various local jurisdictions.

Chongqing is the latest and largest municipality directly under the administration of the central government and the only one in China's vast inland regions. Sun Zhengcai, a new Politburo member at the 18th Party Congress, became Chongqing's party secretary in November 2011. The former minister of agriculture and later party secretary of Jilin, Sun has demonstrated a down-to-earth working style. Policy-wise, he continues but refines what Chongqing has been doing, with possible breakthroughs in some areas.

Based on a public opinion survey in 10 major cities in 2013, this study analyses the relationships between satisfaction of public policy and various geographic, demographic and social factors. It shows that urban Chinese citizens are generally satisfied with national policies, and less satisfied with local and life-related policies. The Chinese government needs to focus on Chinese urban residents' political activism and establish better formal institutions to improve its governance and deal with social instability.

China has become more assertive on its sovereignty claims. Such a change has long been campaigned by the People's Liberation Army (PLA), illustrating PLA's role in South China Sea (SCS) affairs. Beijing tries to strike a subtle balance between confrontation-aversion and being firm on China's core national interests embodied in its sovereignty claims. Under this civil-military convergence in Beijing's SCS policy, the PLA is supportive of pre-emptive measures within well pre-designed “red lines”.

The United States' involvement in the market-driven regional economic integration began with the promotion of trade interdependence between East Asian economies after World War II as a way to counterbalance Communist expansion. Its incorporation of China into the regional economy since the end of the 1970s has indirectly created a potential competitor for itself. The United States' active promotion of Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement shows America's anxiety about its declining influence in the region.

Southeast Asia remains one of the worst-hit regions in maritime piracy; pirates adopt new tactics and anti-piracy security governance presents inefficiencies, particularly sovereignty sensitivity in Southeast Asian waters. This article explores the context-sensitive policy options in the foreseeable future. Private security companies could be an alternative solution to maritime piracy for China and the most critical variable would be the China National Security Council.

A 2011 earthquake damaged the Fukushima nuclear reactor and provided a galvanising point for anti-nuclear resistance groups in Japan. Their public cause slowly faded from the political arena after the Democratic Party of Japan fell out of power and anti-nuclear politicians lost the 2014 Tokyo gubernatorial election. The current Liberal Democratic Party Prime Minister Abe holds a pro-nuclear position and urges the reactivation of Japan's nuclear reactors after all safeguards have been satisfied.