ABSTRACT
The Korean peninsula remains a troubled area. While old rivalries have either disappeared or at least evolved in the past twenty years, state relations on the Korean peninsula remain essentially unchanged. The most salient and enduring security issue on the peninsula remains how to deal with North Korea and its nuclear programs. The past fifteen years have seen almost as much failure as progress, and the issue itself remains basically the same: North Korea continues to pursue a nuclear weapons program, but offers to disarm if the outside powers-in particular the U.S.—can credibly reduce the North’s fears for its survival. The outside powers themselves have moved between engagement and coercion in dealing with the North, leading to policies that both occasionally contradict each other and lack consistency. Territorial disputes and unresolved historical tensions do not have the same potential
to burst into actual military confrontation, but they also remain an obstacle to stable and institutionalized security relations among the other states in the region. Although economic relations in Northeast Asia have flourished, security relations are marked by barely concealed suspicion of each others’ intentions. Despite periodic calls by states for “resolving history” and “looking forward,” disputes over national memory and territorial claims just as quickly render cooperation difficult. A third, less immediate issue is how to adjust to the rise of China. While all states in the
region are adjusting their expectations and policies as China continues to grow, and while some are more wary than others, no state has yet decided that China represents an unquestioned threat, and all states are moving closer to China, rather than farther away. Despite cooler relations, China remains North Korea’s closest ally, and South Korea-China relations have grown increasingly warm on many dimensions over the past fifteen years. A final key issue for the Korean peninsula is how and whether the U.S. can maintain
its leadership role on the peninsula. The U.S. is the most powerful and important actor in regional relations, and all states want closer relations with the U.S. But the U.S. is preoccupied with events in the Middle East and has also undergone a leadership change. While the U.S. remains important, states in the region are also moving forward with their own relations, as well. How and whether the U.S. continues to provide leadership will thus have a significant impact on how security in Northeast Asia evolves. Neither realism nor liberalism provide a comprehensive explanation for the relative
salience and importance of these issues. With its focus on relative power, realists would argue that China’s rising power and its potential regional and perhaps even global hegemony should be the primary concern among states, and that it would create fear on the part of its neighbors, and that this would lead to clear expectations for state behavior. For example, John Mearsheimer confidently argues that, “China cannot rise
peacefully … Most of China’s neighbors, including India, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Russia, and Vietnam, will likely join with the U.S. to contain China’s power.”1 The implications are clear: as Richard Betts asks, “Should we want China to get rich or not? For realists, the answer should be no, since a rich China would overturn any balance of power.”2 Yet China is not foremost on policymakers’ minds; other issues such as North Korea and territorial disputes are more salient to policymakers. Furthermore, South Korea appears to be accommodating, rather than fearing, China’s rise. Realism not only has difficulty explaining this situation, it also does little to explain the enduring importance of issues such as historical disputes. As for liberals, their emphasis on the pacifying effect of domestic and international
institutions and increasing levels of economic interactions has not dampened concerns about Japan’s intentions nor resolved historical disputes, despite over half a century of Japan’s economic integration with its neighbors.3 Although interdependence is part of the explanation for East Asian stability, by themselves economic interests do not explain the variation in threat perceptions in East Asia. In fact, increased economic relations between China, South Korea, and Japan have not had a noticeable impact on their political relations.4 As John Ikenberry writes, “Economically, most East Asian countries increasingly expect their future economic relations to be tied to China. … Can the region remain stable when its economic and security logics increasingly diverge?”5 Furthermore, South Korea and Japan are both advanced industrial democracies with deep economic ties to each other and the U.S., but this has not helped the two sides resolve their long-running disputes about history and territory. This essay will address four main issues: the North Korean problem, the question of
history, how South Korea is responding to China’s rise, and the future role of the U.S. on the peninsula. I argue that identities and interests are central to explaining both the sources of stability and potential instability in East Asia, and that relative capabilities and economic relations, while important, do not provide a clear picture of the fundamental dynamics in the region.6 What states want is more important than how powerful they are, and it is the question of state intentions, and how they view their own position in the world and their relationship to their neighbors, that will ultimately determine whether Northeast Asia continues to move toward stability or slides into instability.
