Window of Opportunity Opens: Asian and American Views of the International Economic Architecture

This paper compares US and Asian views of the international economic architecture including Asia's evolving regional institutions. Lessons from the global financial crisis are used to assess reforms of the financial institutions better to prevent and manage future crises. While G-20 leaders have increased the resources of the International Monetary Fund, much work remains to restore its legitimacy and independence and to define clearly the Financial Stability Board's mandate to strengthen financial oversight and regulation. The paper critiques proposals for a global super-regulator and concludes that while the global architecture is important, the tests of its success will be fewer government actions to self-insure and the willingness to heed warnings of future problems and take timely corrective actions.     

Instability in Europe and Its Impact on Asia

In the present paper, we discuss three unintended consequences of European Integration; the division between the pro‐ and anti‐integrationists, doubts on the benefits of the free movements and the burden of the welfare state. Since 2017, Europe has regained confidence and optimism has returned due to sustained economic recovery and election victories of prointegration politicians, most notably in France. The European Union is embarking on co‐operation in defense and security, providing a new reason to support integration. Uncertainty over Brexit and immigration remain among the causes for grave concern. But Europe and Japan have taken a joint stance against protectionism, while Asia is yet to decide whether to do so as an integrated entity.     

US Credit Crisis and Spillovers to Asia

We review key highlights of the global credit crisis. We then consider how financial turmoil in the largest advanced economies might be transmitted to East Asia. The focus is on foreign trade links, international capital flows, currency market pressures and mismatches, financial sector fragilities, and countercyclical monetary and fiscal policy actions. We introduce a set of vulnerability indicators and explore whether an ordinal ranking of East Asian economies according to these vulnerability indicators seems to be related to the cross-country differences in estimated slowdowns of economic growth during the crisis. Finally, we discuss how Asian economies might encourage the adoption of a stronger regulatory and supervisory framework in the USA and whether some Asian economies and the USA might pursue a more “balanced” growth strategy after the crisis.     

Financial Crisis, “New” Industrial Policy,and the Bite of Multilateral Trade Rules

The recent Great Recession has triggered substantial government intervention – not all of it macroeconomic. This article presents evidence that the sectoral incidence and forms of government intervention appear to have changed from pre-crisis regularities. Once the commercial significance of a sector is taken into account, pre-crisis measures of trade policy intervention poorly predict the crisis-era sectoral incidence of discriminatory state measures imposed by Asian governments. Qualitative evidence focusing on three key countries in Asia – China, Japan, and South Korea – is also marshaled to sustain the contention that Asian governments have used the recent economic crisis to reinvigorate industrial policies, targeting apparent growth poles and apparently environmentally friendly technologies and sectors. Implications for the expansion of World Trade Organization rules and their effectiveness are discussed.     

The Limits of Blaming Neo-Liberalism: Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac,the American State and the Financial Crisis

Much discussion of the financial crisis has been shaped by an analytical narrative around a state versus markets antithesis of the kind that characterises many critiques of neo-liberalism. Yet in several important respects this antithesis creates a problematic lens through which to see some significant components of the financial crisis. This is particularly apparent if we sufficiently account for the role that the two privately owned but congressionally chartered American mortgage corporations, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, played in the crisis. These two huge companies were placed into conservatorship by the American federal government in September 2008. This move gave direct operational control over the corporations to the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) – an independent federal regulatory agency. At the same time, the American government took effective responsibility for the liabilities of the corporations, which totalled $5.4 trillion. Strikingly, this move was not so much a moment of discontinuity brought about by the explosion of the financial crisis in the autumn of 2008, but in an important sense the culmination of a long-standing relationship between the American state and the two corporations, which had already played its part in the development of the crisis through the subprime-boom.     

金融与经济危机对欧美企业研发战略的影响

全球正在经历二战以来最严重的金融和经济危机，给各行各业企业的生存和发展带来挑战。本文综述了有关危机对企业研发影响的文献，分析了危机中欧关企业的研发战略调整，特别是危机中生物制药企业和能源企业研发战略的调整，探讨了危机中政府应该采取的干预措施。     

Trade patterns and institutional change in East Asia

We investigate how trade patterns – institutionally intensive exports (IIX) – affect institutional quality in East Asia compared to the rest of the world, and whether the effect changed due to the Asian financial crisis. To examine this, we use panel data of 117 countries for the period 1988–2007. Our fixed effect model estimation reveals that the effect of IIX on institutional quality is negative and significant for East Asia, while the effect is insignificant for the rest of the world. The negative effect in East Asia is more pronounced for the five East Asian countries that were strongly affected by the crisis – South Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand – than for other East Asian countries. Furthermore, our results reveal that the negative effect for East Asia does not change significantly after the crisis, both in the short and long term, and that improvement in institutional quality after the crisis is not different from that of the rest of the world. This suggests that the crisis had no significant impact on East Asia's institutional quality or on the effects of IIX on institutional quality.     

美国次贷金融危机对中国经济的影响

美国次贷危机以次级贷款危机为起点,迅速蔓延到美国的金融、股市、房地产市场乃至整个美国经济,并且随着全球经济链条进一步扩展到世界各地,进而演变成为全球性经济危机。基于美国处于世界经济的核心地位和中国经济、产业、金融、外汇的特殊性,中国政府必须进一步结合自身经济特点,采取积极、合理的政策应对美国次贷金融危机对中国经济带来的消极影响。     

The Southeast Asian Economies in the Age of Discontent

This paper investigates the effects on and responses of five middle‐income Southeast Asian economies to the current global environment of authoritarian populism, the retreat from economic liberalism, and the appeal of anti‐globalization movements. While the political histories and institutional capabilities of the five – Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam – vary greatly, these economies have a history of at least moderately fast economic growth for extended periods, and of increasing regional and global economic integration. We argue that most of the factors behind the discontent with globalization in the rich economies are not present to the same degree in these countries, and that there has therefore been no major retreat from the economic policy settings that have underpinned their past economic success. However, there are no grounds for complacency. Economic growth is slowing in some of the countries, economic insecurity remains widespread, and the development of durable independent institutions has lagged economic growth.     

Innovation and Economic Growth in East Asia: An Overview

East Asia has been one of the most dynamic regions of economic growth and development. The past two decades have seen tremendous economic and technological catching up in the region. Using South Korea as a case to illustrate the process of technology catching up, we find that the process of graduating from imitation to innovation is a nonlinear one, and requires conscious efforts to invest in research and development and other technological capability‐enhancing activities. Successful technology upgrading also calls for policies and institutions that are relevant to technological innovation to evolve and adapt as an economy goes through the different stages of economic and technological development.     

The Future of East Asia’s Trade: A Call for Better Globalization

This paper is about how East Asia should respond to the challenges of the external environment. The first challenge is the current slowdown in trade, which has been due to cyclical and structural factors such as the decline in productivity and the maturation of global value chains. The rise in protectionism as measured by rising trade restrictiveness has not impacted on trade, but political and policy uncertainty regarding the direction of trade policy seems to have begun to impact on trade growth. The policy stance of increased protectionism and a retreat from the multilateral rules‐based trading system is linked to the pockets of the population who have not seen their incomes improve and who have blamed their plight and increased inequality on globalization. In fact, the issue is more about the lack of effective responses to manage the costs of trade liberalization. East Asian economies need to respond to these challenges by upholding the multilateral rules‐based trading system, continuing the various pathways to regional economic integration, and ensuring better globalization through effective capacity building and policies to address the negative effects of trade liberalization.     

US and East Asian Security under the Obama Presidency: A Japanese Perspective

The most important factor determining the structure of East Asia will continue to be the strategic relationship between the USA and China. It is the key component of the six party talks on the North Korean problem as well as nuclear nonproliferation. Japan is obviously a lesser strategic player, which is in a position to encourage middle-power security cooperation among the East Asian countries breathing between the USA and China. There is a conceptual, if not geopolitical, competition between Japan and China over an ideal future of East Asian regionalism, which the East Asian countries and the USA should join in a constructive manner.     

Chiang Mai Initiative Multilateralization: Origin,Development, and Outlook

This paper discusses the Chiang Mai Initiative Multilateralization (CMIM) – its origin, development, and outlook. The experiences of the 1997–1998 East Asian financial crisis that led to the creation of the Chiang Mai Initiative (CMI), the evolution of the Chiang Mai Initiative to become the CMIM, and the setting up of the ASEAN+3 Macroeconomic Research Office (AMRO) to support CMIM are reviewed. Proposals are made on how to make the liquidity support role of the CMIM more effective. These involve changing the International Monetary Fund link from that based on using more than a certain percentage of a country's CMIM quota to that based on the number of times the 90‐day CMIM swap needs to be rolled over, supplementing the size of the CMIM through linked bilateral swaps, allowing “contributing partners” beyond the current CMIM members, and developing the effectiveness of AMRO and its evolution into an East Asian monetary organization.     

Financial Crisis,Capital Outflows,and Policy Responses: Examples from East Asia

Financial crises seem to have become the norm rather than the exception since 1992. The author examines the impact of a crisis of confidence and resultant capital outflows from a small and open economy and the possible policy options in response to such outflows, using simple tools and definitions that will be familiar to any money and banking or intermediate macroeconomics student. Examples are drawn from the East Asian crisis of 1997-98 (Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, and Thailand), although the analysis remains pertinent to emerging economies in general.     

International and Regional Cooperation: Asia's Role and Responsibilities

Asia has emerged from the global financial crisis as an important stabilizing force and an engine of global economic growth. The establishment of the G-20 gives Asian economies the global forum that they need to both represent their interests in global governance and deliver on responsibilities concomitant with their growing weight in the global economy. The region has a host of cooperation arrangements in APEC, ASEAN+3, and EAS (East Asian Summit), all with ASEAN as the fulcrum. They are huge assets, but they need to be repositioned to relate effectively to the G-20 process and other global arrangements. They also need to comprehend the politics of the changing structure of regional power. This paper discusses the challenges that Asia faces in aligning regional and global objectives in financial, trade, and other areas of cooperation, such as climate change and foreign investment. It argues that Asia is now a critical player in the global system and has a central contribution to make in strengthening global governance and international policy outcomes. The paper sets out ways to fill gaps in regional cooperation and link the agenda for regional cooperation more effectively to Asia's new role globally. This is essential to sustain Asia's superior growth performance, correct imbalances, and support the global economic system.     

Politics of Trade in the USA and in the Obama Administration: Implications for Asian Regionalism

Over the next four years, the Obama administration will face a series of strategic choices in forging policies to respond to a growing momentum for advances in Asian regional structures. Though faced with domestic political challenges; not least from within his own Democratic party – President Obama and his advisers will need to set a course for the reassertion of US leadership in constructing a trans-Pacific vision, through new US-based free trade agreements, signing on to existing agreements such as the P-4 (Singapore, New Zealand, Brunei, the Philippines), or consolidating existing free trade agreements among Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) nations. In pursuing this vision, the US should take advantage of the fact that the next three APEC leaders meetings are in Singapore (2009), Japan (2010), and the USA (2011); a sequence ripe for synergistic teamwork.     

Escaping the Middle‐Income Trap in Southeast Asia: Micro Evidence on Innovation,Productivity, and Globalization

Microdata studies on innovation, productivity, and globalization are relatively new to the Southeast Asian region. Evidence from microdata studies in middle‐income countries provide valuable evidence for policymaking aimed at graduating these countries to high‐income status. Globalization via trade and foreign direct investment should continue to be important development strategies. A more nuanced approach focusing on exporters and potential exporters, especially SMEs, are likely to be needed. The extent of foreign participation is also likely to have important implications for technological spillovers.