ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses on the evolution of Northeast Asian regionalism, addressing the reason for the emergence of this form of economic clustering in Northeast Asia. Following the end of the Cold War in the late 1980s, the debate on Northeast Asian economic cooperation began within academic circles. The chapter examines how the economic status of the three China-Japan-South Korea (CJK) countries has changed and how functional economic integration has proceeded among them in terms of trade and investment. Whilst overall the bilateral trade trends among CJK for the period 1990–2015 have shown growth, it varied significantly between these countries. Compared to trade, the foreign direct investment (FDI) flows of China, Japan and Korea differed significantly in many ways. The share of Korea's intra-regional imports remained relatively stable over the period 1990–2015, oscillating around 30 per cent. China-Korea have become larger export partners for Japan than the US since 2007.
