The China and East Asia Program

The China and East Asia Program

The China and East Asia Program conducts research on the politics and foreign policy of China and its immediate neighbours in Northeast Asia: Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan and the Korean peninsula. The program is renowned for its particular focus on China’s domestic politics and how this helps to shape its external behaviour. From 2020, the Institute’s extensive research on Southeast Asia – including Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, and Myanmar – is now incorporated in a dedicated Southeast Asia Program. Each Program also commissions work by other scholars on the broader region. To complement their written research, Lowy Institute experts hold a robust series of dialogues and events on the politics of the region, independently and in partnership with other organisations.

Photo: Jung Yeon-Je-Pool/Getty Images

Experts

Latest publications

News and media

Policy Briefs

Emerging from COVID: Policy Responses to the Pandemic

Lowy Institute experts provide policy recommendations for Australia to address issues that are critical to our nation's — and the world's — successful emergence from the pandemic.

Commentary

With an ailing domestic economy, can China still pursue its global plans?

Soaring unemployment and a struggling economy must be tackled before its leaders can return to threats and bluster. Originally published in The Guardian.

Analyses

The World After COVID

How will the COVID-19 pandemic change the world? Lowy Institute experts provide their analysis.

Policy Briefs

Taiwan Flashpoint: What Australia Can Do to Stop the Coming Taiwan Crisis

Australian diplomacy could ease rising tensions across the Taiwan Strait, if Australian policymakers rediscovered an appetite for involvement in the flashpoint.

Reports

Behind the News: Inside China Global Television Network

Can China’s television network be an effective soft power tool?

Analyses

China’s Economic Choices

China’s economic growth has fallen to its slowest rate since 1990, and this deceleration looks set to continue unless China implements the kinds of deep reforms behind the…

Analyses

Foreign and Security Policy in the new Malaysia

Malaysia’s foreign and security policy faces myriad challenges, but not much is likely to change under Mahathir Mohamad’s ‘New Malaysia’ framework.

Analyses

Politics in Indonesia: Resilient elections, defective democracy

The pressures on Indonesian democracy are not likely to abate under a second-term Jokowi or a Prabowo presidency

Analyses

‘New’ Malaysia: Four key challenges in the near term

In the aftermath of Malaysia’s momentous regime change, the new government faces a number of challenges to implementing wholesale political reform.

Analyses

Reinforcing Indonesia–Australia defence relations: The case for maritime recalibration

A maritime realignment of Australia–Indonesia defence relations could shape the broader Indo-Pacific security architecture and provide an additional strategic hedge for…