ABSTRACT
This chapter explains why Northeast Asia has not taken a path to regional integration. It focuses on the many moralisation gaps from history that divide China, Japan, South and North Korea. Nationalism, memory politics and contested apologies about issues such as comfort women, war crimes and abductions poison bilateral relations. The chapter reviews territorial disputes (Dokdo/Takeshima, Diaoyu/Senkaku) and the limits of international law to settle them as several international treaties themselves are disputed. This chapter dispels the misperception that trilateral cooperation is a precursor to regionalism. However, trilateral cooperation provides a mechanism to meet, avoiding politically even more difficult bilateral formats, and focuses on technical and functional cooperation.
