Mutual Security In The Asia Pacific

Myriad challenges to regional stability and security threaten East Asia’s burgeoning growth and prosperity. Mutual Security in the Asia-Pacific: Roles for Australia, Canada and South Korea addresses the economic and security challenges that loom in the region and the role that these three countries can play to ensure a stable, predictable political environment.

In the turbulent decade since the ending of the Cold War in Europe, a new element of the international relations of Asia and the Pacific has been the emergence of multilateral security dialogues. Both in governmental arenas such as the ASEAN Regional Forum and numerous "track two" channels including the Council for Security Co-operation in Asia-Pacific, it has been a decade of creative interaction and new thinking. The Asia-Pacific Security Lexicon identifies the key phrases and ideas that have been the foundation of these dialogues, looking at their origins in international diplomacy and tracing their specific adaptation and modification to the conditions of a trans-Pacific setting. Of interest to both theoreticians and practitioners, the Lexicon is at once a handbook for regional diplomacy and an assessment of the factors that have shaped regional discussions.

The ending of the Cold War opened a new debate across the Pacific about the meaning of security and the new regional multilateral institutions that were beginning to emerge. The first edition of the The Asia-Pacific Security Lexicon, published in 2002, identified and defined the key concepts and ideas central to security discourse in the region. This second edition updates all of the entries and examines the origins and meanings of some of the new terms in common usage in a different historical setting, among them "e;terrorism"e;, "e;pre-emption"e;, "e;preventive war"e;, "e;a la carte multilateralism"e;, "e;coalition of the willing"e;, and China's "e;peaceful rise"e;. And it looks at how concepts such as "e;human security"e; and "e;non-traditional security"e; have evolved and found new adherents. Both a diplomatic handbook and theoretical exploration, the Lexicon is based on the analysis of more than 3,000 books, articles, conference reports, and speeches. It does not aim to resolve the disagreements about how words are used. Rather, it makes their evolution clearer for academics and practitioners seeking consensual knowledge.

We cannot expect in East Asia over the foreseeable future to see the sort of conflation of sovereign states that has occurred in Europe. We must anticipate that, for the foreseeable future, the requirement will be for the sensible management and containment of competitive instincts. The establishment of a multilateral security body in East Asia that includes all the key players, and which the major powers invest with the authority to tackle the shaping of the regional security order, remains a critical piece of unfinished business.

First Published in 2005. This is Adelphi Paper 299 and discusses a strategy for the Unites States of America for the continued stability of the Asia-Pacific region. Looking at ways in which the US-dominated system of Asia-Pacific security that evolved during the Cold War must be fundamentally transformed to determine its security in the future.

New Approaches to Human Security in the Asia-Pacific offers a distinctly Asia-Pacific-oriented perspective to one of the most discussed components of international security policy, human security. This volume of regional experts assess countries that have either spearheaded this form of security politics (Japan and Australia) or have recently advanced to become a key player on various aspects of human security in both a domestic and global context (China). The authors provide an interesting investigation into the continued relevance and promise of the human security paradigm against more 'traditional' security approaches. Accordingly the book will appeal to readers across a wide band of the social sciences (international relations, security studies, development studies and public policy) and to practitioners and analysts working in applied settings.