The South China Sea: Re-Assessing Regional Order in Asia
DATE: September 7-8, 2012
PLACE: 2223 Fulton Street, 6th floor
The seas of East and Southeast Asia have become a flashpoint in international relations among Asian nations. With China's growing political influence, its claims to territory, resources, and access have generated not only varying degrees of resistance and conflict, but a renegotiating of relations across the region and internationally. Most recently, the South China Sea has emerged as the site of contested space. With participants from the fields of international relations, political science, history, and law, this conference explores the historical background of the South China Sea crisis; the legal issues involved, including interpreting the Law of the Sea in the current context; the South China Sea not only as a source of energy and food but in terms of strategic significance; the further complications posed by the uneasy thaw in relations between China and Taiwan; the play not only of government action but of public response; and finally what the current maneuvering signals for the future of Asia.
All sessions are free and open to the public.
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 7, 2012
9:00–10:00 am: Coffee, Refreshments
10:00–10:15: OPENING REMARKS
Wen-hsin Yeh, UC Berkeley
10:15–12:30: SESSION I: CONTEXTUALIZING LECTURES — AN OVERVIEW OF THE SOUTH CHINA SEA CRISIS
Wen-hsin Yeh, UC Berkeley (Moderator)
Untying the Gordian Knot: Complexity, Diplomacy, and the Imbroglio in the South China Sea
Donald K. Emmerson, Stanford University
Struggle without Breaking: Behind the Rising East Asian Maritime Tension
Chong-Pin Lin, Graduate Institute of Strategic Studies, Taiwan National Defense University
Roundtable and Open Discussion
Wen-hsin Yeh — UC Berkeley (Moderator)
Lowell Dittmer, UC Berkeley Penny Edwards, UC Berkeley Donald K. Emmerson, Stanford University Chong-Pin Lin, Graduate Institute of Strategic Studies, Taiwan National Defense University
12:30–1:15: Lunch Break
1:15–2:30: SESSION II — INTERNATIONAL LAW, LAW OF THE SEA, AND LEGAL PERSPECTIVES
Richard Buxbaum, UC Berkeley (Moderator)
The Impact of the Law of the Sea Convention on the Development of Maritime Disputes in the South China Sea
Yann-Huei Song, Academia Sinica
Roundtable and Open Discussion — Richard Buxbaum, UC Berkeley (Moderator)
Harry Scheiber, UC Berkeley
Alex Wang, UC Berkeley
Yann-Huei Song, Academia Sinica
2:45–5:45: SESSION III — NEGOTIATING SOVEREIGNTY AND SECURITY: NORTHEAST ASIAN PERSPECTIVES
TJ Pempel, UC Berkeley (Moderator)
The Evolution of PRC’s South China Sea Policy
Dingli Shen, Fudan University
A Hidden Explosive in the South China Sea
Xue Litai, Stanford University
Transnational Public Sphere? Historical Contentions and Dialogues in Northeast Asia
Jae-Jung Suh, Johns Hopkins University
Shifting Strategic Balance: The Rise of Chinese Influence in the South China Sea
Alexander Huang, Tamkang University
Roundtable and Open Discussion — TJ Pempel, UC Berkeley (Moderator)
Lowell Dittmer, UC Berkeley
Alexander Huang, Tamkang University
Su Lin Lewis, UC Berkeley
Dingli Shen, Fudan University
Jae-Jung Suh, Johns Hopkins University
Xue Litai, Stanford University
6:30: Reception and Dinner — Women’s Faculty Club
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 2012
9:30–10:00: Coffee Service
10:00–12:15: SESSION IV — SUSTENANCE AND THE SOUTH CHINA SEA
Micah Muscolino, Georgetown University (Moderator)
Rhetoric versus Reality: China's Commercial Capacity to Exploit Hydrocarbons and Fish in the South China Sea
Ben Purser, University of Colorado
The Zheng Family and Chinese State-building in the South China Sea
Xing Hang, Brandeis University
International Energy Conflict in the South China Sea: The First Phase, 1975–1980
Micah Muscolino, Georgetown University
Roundtable and Open Discussion — Micah Muscolino, Georgetown University (Moderator)
Xing Hang, Brandeis University
Ben Purser, University of Colorado
David Rosenberg, Middlebury College
Yann-Huei Song, Academia Sinica
12:15–1:20: LUNCH WITH GRADUATE STUDENT PRESENTATIONS (THIRD FLOOR, 2223 FULTON)
12:15–12:30: Break, retrieve lunch on 3rd floor
Crossing imperial and national boundaries: political and business networks of Taiwanese overseas in China, 1895–1945
Peiting Li, UC Berkeley
Allegiances and Patronage across the Late Nineteenth-Century Guangxi-Tonkin Border
Linh Vu, UC Berkeley
1:20–1:30: Break, return to 6th floor
1:30–3:00: SESSION V — POWER ALIGNMENTS AND FUTURE PROSPECTS
Wen-hsin Yeh (Moderator)
The Sino-Vietnamese Approach to Managing Border Disputes and the South China Sea Situation
(read in absentia by Joshua Hill, UC Berkeley)
Ramses Amer, Stockholm University
Problems and Prospects for Joint Resource Management in the South China Sea
David Rosenberg, Middlebury College
Roundtable and Open Discussion — Wen-hsin Yeh, UC Berkeley (Moderator)
Lowell Dittmer, UC Berkeley
Chong-Pin Lin, Graduate Institute of Strategic Studies, Taiwan National Defense University
TJ Pempel, UC Berkeley
David Rosenberg, Middlebury College
Dingli Shen, Fudan University
3:30–4:30: Concluding Discussion and Comments — Wen-hsin Yeh, UC Berkeley (Moderator)
5:00: Dinner — Venezia Restaurant
Click here to download a copy of the conference agenda. Updated September 4, 2012.
RAMSES AMER — Senior Research Fellow Center for Pacific Asia Studies (CAPS), Stockholm University
Ramses Amer — Associate Professor and PhD in Peace and Conflict Research — is Senior Research Fellow, Department of Oriental Languages, Stockholm University, Sweden, and Research Associate, Swedish Institute of International Affairs, Stockholm, Sweden. Major areas of research include a) security issues and conflict resolution in Southeast Asia and the wider Pacific Asia and b) the role of the United Nations in the international system. He is the author of The Sino-Vietnamese Approach to Managing Boundary Disputes, Maritime Briefing, Vol. 3, No. 5 (Durham: International Boundaries Research Unit, University of Durham, 2002). He is Co-editor, with Carlyle A. Thayer, of Vietnamese Foreign Policy in Transition (Singapore: Institute for Southeast Asian Studies; and, New York: St Martin's Press, 1999). He is Co-editor, with Ashok Swain and Joakim Öjendal, of Globalization and Challenges to Building Peace (London, Chicago and New Delhi: Anthem Press, 2007); of The Democratization Project: Opportunities and Challenges (London and New York: Anthem Press, 2009); and of The Security-Development Nexus: Peace, Conflict and Development (London and New York: Anthem Press, 2012). He is also co-editor with N. Ganesan, of International Relations in Southeast Asia: Between Bilateralism and Multilateralism (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2010); and with Zou Keyuan, of Conflict Management and Dispute Settlement in East Asia (Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate, 2011). He has also contributed to international journals and books and has written reports on issues of Southeast Asian Affairs and on the United Nations.
RICHARD BUXBAUM — Jackson H. Ralston Professor of International Law (Emeritus), Berkeley Law, UC Berkeley
Richard Buxbaum has been a Boalt faculty member since 1961, and took emeritus status in 2011. His specialization lies in the fields of corporation law and comparative and international economic law, and he has served on various state and national committees engaged in the drafting and review of corporate and securities legislation. He was Editor in Chief of the American Journal of Comparative Law, 1987-2003, and is a contributing editor to a variety of U.S. and foreign professional journals. From 1993 to 1999, Buxbaum was Dean, International and Area Studies at UC Berkeley. He has been a visiting professor at the Universities of Michigan, Cologne, Frankfurt, Münster and Sydney. He was appointed Honorary Professor of Law of Peking University in 1998, holds honorary degrees from the universities of Cologne, Osnabrück, Eötvös Lorand, McGill, Humboldt and the Bucerius School of Law, and in 1992 received the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Award for Humanities and Arts. Buxbaum is a member of the Council on Foreign Affairs, the American Law Institute and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He was awarded the Großes Bundesverdienstkreuz (Order of Merit), Federal Republic of Germany in 1992; and named Officier, Ordre des Arts et Lettres, France, in 1996 and Comendador, Ordem de Rio Branco, Brazil in 1998.
LOWELL DITTMER — Professor of Political Science, The Charles and Louise Travers Department of Political Science, UC Berkeley
Lowell Dittmer is Professor of Political Science at the University of California at Berkeley and editor of Asian Survey. Recent works include Sino-Soviet Normalization and Its International Implications (1992), China's Quest for National Identity (with Samuel Kim, 1993), China Under Reform (1994), Liu Shaoqi and the Chinese Cultural Revolution (rev. ed., 1997), (with Haruhiro Fukui and Peter N.S. Lee, eds.) Informal Politics in East Asia (Cambridge, 2000), South Asia's Nuclear Security Dilemma: India, Pakistan, and China (Armonk: M. E. Sharpe, 2005), (with Guoli Liu, eds.) China's Deep Reform: Domestic Politics in Transition (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2006), China, the Developing World, and the New Global Dynamic (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 2010), and many scholarly articles. His most recent book is Burma or Myanmar? The Struggle for National Identity (2010).
PENNY EDWARDS — Associate Professor and Chair, Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies, UC Berkeley
Penny Edwards is an Associate Professor in the Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies at UC Berkeley. She received her PhD in History from Monash University in 1999, an M. Phil in International Relations from the University of Oxford, 1992, and her BA from the University of London. Edwards specialises in the modern cultural and political history of Cambodia and Burma, with a focus on textual, material and visual narratives of national, religious, gender and racial identity. Her book Cambodge: The Cultivation of a Nation, 1860 -1945 (Hawai'i University Press, 2007) won the 2009 Benda Prize from the Association for Asian Studies. It explores the crystallisation of concepts of nation in and between Khmer and French secular and religious intellectual milieux. She has authored a number of academic articles and is joint editor of Pigments of the Imagination: Rethinking Mixed Race (a special issue of the Journal of Intercultural Studies, February 2007), Beyond China: Migrating Identities (Centre for the Study of Chinese Southern Diaspora, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University, Canberra, 2002) and Lost in the Whitewash: Aboriginal-Asian Encounters in Australia, 1901 to 2001 (Humanities Research Centre, Australian National University, Canberra, 2003). Edwards teaches Undergraduate Course 10A and will be offering a variety of graduate seminars on topics ranging from nationalism to gender and Buddhism.
DONALD K. EMMERSON — Director, Southeast Asia Forum (SEAF), Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, Stanford University
Donald Emmerson heads the Southeast Asia Forum (SEAF) in the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center at Stanford University, where is also a senior fellow in the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and an affiliated scholar with the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law and the Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies. He is currently preparing an edited book provisionally entitled "The Deer and the Dragon: Southeast Asia and China in the 21st Century." Recent publications include "Is Indonesia Rising? It Depends" in Strategic Review (August 2012); pieces on the South China Sea in Asia Times Online (July 2012); and An American Place at an Asian Table? Regionalism and Its Reasons (2011). So far in 2012 he has spoken on these and related topics in France, Germany, and South Korea among other countries. In 2011 his keynote address to the Australian Political Studies Association convention explored "Black Swans, Fat Tails, and the Futures of Political Science." He serves on the editorial boards of Contemporary Southeast Asia, the Journal of Democracy, and the Journal of Current Southeast Asian Affairs, and is an analyst with LinkAsia on television and the web. Before coming to Stanford in 1999 he was a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he won a campus-wide teaching award. Places where he has held visiting positions include the Institute for Advanced Study and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. He has a PhD in political science (Yale) and a BA in international affairs (Princeton).
XING HANG — Assistant Professor, History, Brandeis University
Xing Hang is an Assistant Professor of History at Brandeis University. He received his Ph.D. from UC Berkeley. He has received several grants and fellowships, including the Schiff Fellowship for Faculty-Undergraduate Research at Brandeis and the Li Ka-shing Program in Modern Chinese History Fellowship. His recently completed manuscript, "China among the Waves: The Zheng Familial State in Maritime East Asia, 1623-1683" is currently under review. Other publications include the book chapter, "Profits, Power, and Legitimacy: The Zheng Maritime Empire in Seventeenth-Century Maritime East Asia," in Regions and Regionalisms in the Modern World (forthcoming 2012) and the article "A Question of Hairdos and Fashion" in Oriens Extremus (2008). Xing Hang's research currently focuses upon independent Chinese kingdoms and republics in Southeast Asia during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, a historical legacy that questions capitalist enterprise, colonization, and democracy as distinctly European developments. The project also reassesses lineage networks based upon Confucian values and native place ties, and their role in the formation of a "Chinese" identity outside "China."
ALEXANDER HUANG — Assistant Professor, Graduate Institute of International Affairs and Strategic Studies, Tamkang University; Senior Associate, Center for Strategic and International Studies
Alexander Huang is a Professor at Tamkang University. He earned his Ph.D. in Political Science from George Washington University, and also studied at the School of Foreign Service (MSFS) at Georgetown University. Dr. Huang served as Vice Chairman of Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council until 2004, and returned to Tamkang University having completed his government service. He was the director of The Institute of Strategic Studies at Tamkang before his public service, and director of the Center for American Studies at Tamkang University subsequent to his government position. Dr. Huang has been a non-resident Senior Associate at Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, DC since 2000. He was a Senior Vice President at the Foundation on International & Cross-strait Studies (FICS) in Taipei (2000-2008). In the United States, where he spent over fifteen years, he was a Senior Fellow in the International Security Program at CSIS (1999-2000) and a Visiting Fellow in the Center for Northeast Asian Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution (1998-1999). In addition, he taught Chinese Foreign Policy and U.S. Security Policy at the University of Maryland at College Park (1998-2000). Between 1993 and 1998, Dr. Huang worked as a Senior Consultant on political and security affairs for the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in Washington, DC, an institution representing the government of the Republic of China.
Dr. Huang specializes in Asian and Chinese security and defense studies. His recent publications include Chinese Warfighting: The PLA Experience Since 1949, (M.E. Sharpe, 2003) and The Dilemma of "One China" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2008). Dr. Huang has regularly contributed to Op-Ed columns in U.S. and Asian newspapers, and has been widely interviewed by CNN, BBC, Asia Wall Street Journal, Voice of America, Far Eastern Economic Review, DPA, AP, AFP and other international media. He is a member of IISS and United States Naval Institute.
SU LIN LEWIS — Mellon Post-doctoral Fellow in the Humanities
Su Lin Lewis is a Mellon Post-doctoral Fellow in the Humanities, appointed for 2011-2013 as a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies. Her research interests are in modern Southeast Asian and World History, with a particular interest in the comparative and connected histories of cities and civil society in the twentieth century. She is revising a manuscript based on her Phd thesis on cosmopolitan port-cities in Southeast Asia — namely Bangkok, Penang, and Rangoon — which focuses on various intersecting themes of urban space, sociability, education, the press, and popular culture in the 1920s and 1930s and the making of a multi-ethnic Asian middle class. Her current research explores transnational civil society networks and cultural internationalism in Southeast Asia in the 1950s, particularly in Burma, Malaysia, and Indonesia.
CHONG-PIN LIN — Adjunct Professor, Graduate Institute of Strategic Studies at Taiwan's National Defense University
Chong-Pin Lin is Adjunct Professor at the Graduate Institute of Strategic Studies, National Defense University, Taiwan. From 2004 to 2012, he taught as Professor at the Graduate Institute of International Affairs and Strategic Studies at Tamkang University. He served for eight years (1996-2004) in the government of Republic of China in Taiwan as Deputy Minister, Senior Advisor in the National Security Council, and the First Vice Chairman and Spokesman of the ministerial-level Mainland Affairs Council. From 1987 to 1995, he was Resident Scholar and the Associate Director of the Asian Studies Program at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington D.C. He taught from 1984 to 1995 as Sun Yat-Sen Chair Professor and Adjunct Professor at the Government Department and the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. He has published in 18 international journals and 11 international newspapers including China Quarterly and New York Times, respectively He authored in English China's Nuclear Weapons Strategy (Lexington Books, 1988), "Democracy in Taiwan" World Affairs (1989-90), "China's 1989 Upheaval" World Affairs (1992-93), and in Chinese, «龍威» The Power of Dragon (Changsha: Hunan Publisher, 1992), «核霸» The Nuclear Hegemon (Taipei: Student Publisher, 1999), «以智取勝» Win With Wisdom (Taipei: Global Defense Magazine Publisher, 2005), and «偶爾言中» Perchance Prescient (Taipei: Li Ming Co., 2008), «劍與花的歲月» Notes from an Earthly Journey (Taipei: Business Information Culture Co., 2009), «大災變» Global Shift: Exploring the Roots of Rising Disasters (Taipei: Reading Times, 2012). He is the editor of PRC Tomorrow (Kaohsiung: National Sun Yat-Sen University GIPS, 1996), and «廟算台海» Grand-strategic Calculus across the Taiwan Strait (Taipei: Student Publisher,2002). He co-authored «鬥而不破» Struggle without Breaking: Post-financial Crisis Relations between Beijing and Washington (Taipei: Showwe Information Co., 2012).
MICAH MUSCOLINO — Associate Professor Department, History, Georgetown University
Micah Muscolino is Associate Professor of History at Georgetown University. During the 2012-13 academic year he is Visiting Associate Professor of History at Harvard University, where he earned his Ph.D. in 2006. Muscolino's area of expertise is the environmental history of late imperial and modern China. His book Fishing Wars and Environmental Change in Late Imperial and Modern China was published in the Harvard East Asia Monograph Series in 2009. He spent 2010-2011 as a member of the School of Historical Studies at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, NJ with support from a Mellon Fellowship for Assistant Professors and the National Endowment for the Humanities. He has also been awarded fellowships and grants from Fulbright (IIE), the Center for Chinese Studies at the National Central Library in Taiwan, and the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation.
TJ PEMPEL — Jack M. Forcey Professor of Political Science for Study of East Asian Politics, The Charles and Louise Travers Department of Political Science, UC Berkeley
T. J. Pempel is Jack M. Forcey of Political Science in U.C. Berkeley's Department of Political Science, which he joined in July 2001. He earned his Ph.D. from Columbia. He served as director of the Institute of East Asian Studies from 2002 until 2006. There he held the Il Han New Chair in Asian Studies. Just prior to coming to Berkeley, he was at the University of Washington at Seattle where he was the Boeing Professor of International Studies in the Jackson School of International Studies and an adjunct professor in Political Science. From 1972 to 1991, he was on the faculty at Cornell University; he was also Director of Cornell's East Asia Program. He has also been a faculty member at the University of Colorado and the University of Wisconsin. Professor Pempel is on the editorial boards of a dozen professional journals, and serves on various committees of the American Political Science Association, the Association for Asian Studies, and the International Studies Association Council. Professor Pempel's research and teaching focus on comparative politics, political economy, contemporary Japan, and Asian regionalism. He has published over one hundred scholarly articles and chapters in books. His recent books include Remapping East Asia: The Construction of a Region (Cornell University Press), Beyond Bilateralism: U.S.-Japan Relations in the New Asia-Pacific (Stanford University Press), The Politics of the Asian Economic Crisis; and Regime Shift: Comparative Dynamics of the Japanese Political Economy. In spring of 2012 his latest book, Security Cooperation in Northeast Asia was published by Routledge. He is currently doing research on various problems associated with Asian regionalism and security, and his volume from Routledge has just come out on dismantling the developmental state.
BENJAMIN S. PURSER, III — Doctoral student, Department of Political Science at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and Associated Scholar of the U.S. Naval War College's China Maritime Studies Institute
Benjamin S. Purser, III is a doctoral student in the Department of Political Science at the University of Colorado, Boulder and an Associated Scholar of the U.S. Naval War College's China Maritime Studies Institute. His research focuses on East Asian security, maritime disputes, and the long-term implications of low-level conflict. He earned his Bachelors in Political Science and International Relations from Carleton College, graduated from the Johns Hopkins University-Nanjing University Center for Chinese and American Studies, and earned his Masters in National Security and Strategic Studies from the U.S. Naval War College. After working as a consultant in China, he joined the U.S. Navy, in which he spent approximately nine years working issues related to East Asian security.
DAVID ROSENBERG — Professor Emeritus, Political Science, Middlebury College
David Rosenberg is Professor Emeritus of Political Science at Middlebury College, Vermont, and Visiting Fellow in the Department of Political and Social Change in the School of International, Political & Strategic Studies (SIPSS) at the Australian National University in Canberra. He is also editor of the South China Sea WWW Virtual Library. Prof. Rosenberg received his B.S. in Economics from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, (1963), an M.P.A. in International Development, from the School of Management, Cornell University (1967), and a Ph.D. in Comparative Government, with subfields in Southeast Asian Studies and Development Economics, from Cornell University (1972). He is the author or coauthor of numerous articles and chapters of edited volumes, including the recent publications "Governing the South China Sea: From Freedom of the Seas to Ocean Enclosure Movements" (Harvard Asia Quarterly, 2010), Piracy and Maritime Crime: Historical and Modern Case Studies, US Naval War College, 2011 (Co-author and co-editor with Bruce Ellemann, USN, and Andrew Forbes, RAN), and "Beyond the Scarborough Scare: Joint Resource Management in the South China Sea," e-International Relations, May 1, 2012.
DINGLI SHEN — Professor, Director of the Center for American Studies; Executive Vice Dean of the Insitute of International Affairs, Fudan University
Shen Dingli is a professor of international relations at Fudan University, Shanghai. He is the Executive Dean of Fudan University's Institute of International Studies, and Director of Center for American Studies. He co-founded and directs China's first non-government based Program on Arms Control and Regional Studies at Fudan. Dr. Shen has taught international security, China-US relations, and China's foreign policy, in China, US, and Semester at Sea program His research and publication covers China-US security relations, regional security and international strategy, arms control and nonproliferation, foreign and defense policy of China and the US etc. He is Vice President of Chinese Association of South Asian Studies, Vice President of Shanghai Association of International Studies, Vice President of Shanghai Institute of International Strategic Studies, and Vice President of Shanghai Association of American Studies. He received his Ph.D. in physics from Fudan in 1989 and did post-doc in arms control at Princeton University from 1989-1991. He was an Eisenhower Fellow in 1996, and advised in 2002 the then UNSG Kofi Annan for his strategic planning of second term. He is on the Global Council of Asia Society, and was appointed by Shanghai Municipality as Shanghai's Conference Ambassador. His recent publications include: "Upsetting a delicate balance," The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (Chicago: 2007); "China's Defensive Military Strategy: the Space Question," Survival (London: 2008); "Can Sanctions Stop Proliferation?" The Washington Quarterly (Washington DC: 2008), "Cooperative Denuclearization toward North Korea," The Washington Quarterly (Washington DC: 2009); "Opportunities for UK-China cooperation on nuclear and radiological security," Survival (May 2010; "Building China-India Reconciliation," Asian Perspective (Seoul: 2010); "Sino-US Collaborative Approach to Space Security," Asian Perspective (Seoul: 2011).
YANN-HUEI SONG — Research Fellow, Institute of European and American Studies, Academia Sinica
Dr. Yann-huei Song is currently a research fellow at the Institute of European and American Studies, and joint research fellow at the Centre for Asia-Pacific Area Studies, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan, the Republic of China. He received his Ph.D. in International Relations from Kent State University, Ohio, and L.L.M. as well as J.S.D. from the School of Law (Boalt Hall), University of California, Berkeley, the United States. Dr. Song has broad academic interests covering ocean law and policy studies, international fisheries law, international environmental law, maritime security, and the South China Sea issues. He has been actively participating in the Informal Workshop on Managing Potential Conflicts in the South China Sea (the SCS Workshop) that is organized by the government of the Republic of Indonesia. He convened Academia Sinica's South China Sea Interdisciplinary Study Group and the Sino-American Research Programme at the Institute of European American Studies. He is a member of the editorial boards of Ocean Development and International Law and Chinese (Taiwan) Yearbook of International Law and Affairs. He has frequently been asked to provide advisory opinions by a number of government agencies in Taiwan on the policy issues related to the East and South China Seas. Recent publications related to the South China Sea issue include "A Marine Biodiversity Project in the South China Sea: Joint Made in the SCS Workshop Process", The International Journal of Marine and Coastal Law, Vol. 26, No. 1, 119-149; "The Application of Article 121(3) of the Law of the Sea Convention to Five Selected Disputed Islands in the South China Sea. Chinese (Taiwan) Yearbook of International Law and Affairs, Vol. 27, pp. 43-66; "The Declaration on the Conduct of Parties and a Code of Conduct in the South China Sea: Recent Actions Taken by ASEAN," Asia-Pacific Forum, No. 52, pp. 1-54; and ). "Taiwan's Participation in the SCS Regional Dialogue Mechanisms: What Actions Should Be Taken by the Ma Administration?" Prospects & Perspectives, No. 15, pp. 1-4, and a forthcoming publication, "Jurisdictional Disputes in the South China Sea: Potential Conflicts between China and the United States." China Ocean Law Journal (Dec. 2012).
JAE-JUNG SUH — Associate Professor and Director of the Korea Studies Program; Academic Adviser for the U.S.-Korea Institute at SAIS, Johns Hopkins University
Jae-Jung Suh is an Associate Professor at The Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies. He also serves as an Academic Adviser for the U.S.-Korea Institute at SAIS. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in Political Science. Prior to joining the faculty of SAIS, he was a professor in Cornell University's Department of Government and a visiting professor at Seoul National University. He also spent time as a research professor at Yonsei University and as a visiting scholar at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Among numerous other awards, he has received the Fulbright-Hays Faculty Research Abroad Fellowship. His recent publications include Power, Interest and Identity in Military Alliances (2007); Rethinking Security in East Asia: Identity, Power and Efficiency (2004); American New World Order After the Cold War (1996, published in Korea); and numerous articles and book chapters on military balance on the Korean Peninsula, North Korea's weapons of mass destruction and U.S. security policies toward the Asia-Pacific region. He is currently at work on a book on the international relations of East Asia and an edited volume on North Korea.
ALEX WANG — Visiting Assistant Professor of Law, Berkeley Law, UC Berkeley
Alex Wang is a Professor at Berkeley Law whose primary research and teaching interests are environmental law, China law, and comparative law. Prior to coming to Berkeley Law in 2011, Mr. Wang was a senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) based in Beijing and the director of NRDC's China Environmental Law & Governance Project for nearly six years. In this capacity, he worked with China's government agencies, legal community, and environmental groups to improve environmental rule of law and strengthen the role of the public in environmental protection. He helped to establish NRDC's Beijing office in 2006. He was a Fulbright Fellow to China from 2004-05. Prior to that, Mr. Wang was an attorney at the law firm of Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP in New York City, where he worked on mergers & acquisitions, securities matters, and pro bono Endangered Species Act litigation. He was selected to the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations' Public Intellectuals Program 2008-10, and is a member of the Advisory Board to the Asia Society's Center on U.S.-China Relations. Mr. Wang is a regular speaker on issues related to China and environmental protection, and has been an invited speaker at various institutions, such as the Council on Foreign Relations and the Asia Society. His commentary has appeared in such places as the New York Times, Huffington Post, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Bloomberg News, China Daily, Global Times, Time Magazine, National Public Radio, Marketplace, and CCTV. Mr. Wang's recent publications include a guest edited volume of Chinese Law and Government entitled "Environmental Courts and Public Interest Litigation in China" (with J. Gao) (2010), "Environmental Courts and the Development of Public Interest Litigation in China" in the Journal of Court Innovation (with J. Gao) (2010), and "The Role of Law in Environmental Protection in China" in the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law (2007).
LITAI XUE — Research Associate, Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Stanford University
Xue Litai is with Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. Since 1984 he has worked on the Project on Peace and Cooperation in the Asian-Pacific Region at CISAC. Xue has co-written the following books: China's Strategic Seapower: The Politics of Force Modernization in the Nuclear Age, with John Lewis (Stanford University Press, 1994); China Builds the Bomb, with John Lewis (Stanford University Press, 1988); and Uncertain Partners — Stalin, Mao, and the Korean War, with Sergei Goncharov and John Lewis (Stanford University Press, 1993). His articles include "Evolution of China's Nuclear Strategy" in John C. Hopkins and Weixing Hu ed., Strategic Views from the Second Tier: The Nuclear Weapons Policies of France, Britain, and China (University of California at San Diego, 1994); "China's Military Modernization and Security Policy" in Korean Journal of International Studies 24 (4) (Seoul University, Winter 1993); "Chinese Strategic Weapons and the Plutonium Option (U)," co-authored with John W. Lewis, in Critical Technologies Newsletter (U.S. Department of Energy, April/May, 1988); and "Strategic Weapons and Chinese Power: The Formative Years," co-authored with John W. Lewis, in The China Quarterly, December 1987). His research focuses on global and regional factors that could cause armed conflicts across the Taiwan Strait and the impact produced by the crisis upon the security and stability of the Northeast-Pacific region. He has frequently exchanged points of view with foreign security specialists and has participated in academic conferences on Northeast Asian security issues.
WEN-HSIN YEH — Walter and Elise Haas Chair Professor in Asian Studies; Richard H. and Laurie C. Morrison Chair in History; Director, Institute of East Asian Studies, UC Berkeley
Wen-hsin Yeh is Walter and Elise Haas Chair Professor in Asian Studies and Richard H. and Laurie C. Morrison Chair in History. She is also an Honorary Professor of History at Peking University. She has served as Director of the Institute of East Asian Studies since January 2007. A leading authority on 20th century Chinese history, Yeh is author or editor of eleven books and numerous articles examining aspects of Republican history, Chinese modernity, the origins of communism and related subjects. Her work has been supported by numerous prestigious extramural and UC awards, including an ACLS Senior Scholar Fellowship, a Freeman Foundation grant, a multi-year Chiang Ching-kuo Senior Scholar Research Fellowship, as well as the UC President's Humanities Research Fellowship. Her books include the Berkeley Prize-winning Provincial Passages: Culture, Space, and the Origins of Chinese Communism (University of California Press, 1996) and The Alienated Academy: Culture and Politics in Republican China, 1919-1937 (Harvard University, 1990). Her most recent publication, Shanghai Splendor (University of California Press, 2007) is an urban history of Shanghai that considers the nature of Chinese capitalism and middle-class society in a century of contestation between colonial power and nationalistic mobilization.
Ramses Amer — The Sino-Vietnamese Approach to Managing Border Disputes and the South China Sea Situation
The proposed paper will examine the Sino-Vietnamese approach to managing their border disputes and in particular the approach in relation to the South China Sea issues. The paper will first provide an overview on how China and Vietnam manage their border disputes in the period since full normalisation of their relations. The overview will include both progress made in terms of conflict management and challenges faced in terms of tension. In relation to the South China Sea the Sino-Vietnamese approach will highlight how the two countries deal with their differences and manage them. This will be followed by a discussion relating to two factors: first, the relevance and the possible implications of the Sino-Vietnamese experience; and second, the lessons drawn from it on the broader situation in the South China Sea. The paper will be concluded by a summary of the main findings.
Donald K. Emmerson — Untying the Gordian Knot: Complexity, Diplomacy, and the Imbroglio in the South China Sea
The interlocking disputes over sovereignty in the South China Sea are nothing if not complex. In different ways and to different degrees, they directly implicate seven different littoral jurisdictions. Of these, six are states de jure (Brunei, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam), one is controversially de facto (Taiwan). Of the seven, all but Indonesia are considered "claimant" states. But that homogenizing label ignores the diversity of referents and justifications that motivate and warrant the different rights and entitlements that these governments assert.
Xing Hang — The Zheng Family and Chinese State-building in the South China Sea
Zheng Chenggong (1624-1662), or Koxinga, and his son and successor, Zheng Jing (1642-1681) forged a powerful state that dominated maritime East Asia from 1650 to 1683. During this period, their organization flexibly anticipated and adapted to the rise of a Eurasian framework of exchange centered upon the South China Sea that would characterize international commerce in the following centuries. After seizing Taiwan from their fiercest competitor in the sea lanes, the Dutch East India Company (VOC), in 1662, Koxinga and his son transformed the island into a natural resource base, and planned, on three occasions, to expand their realm by seizing the Spanish Philippines. During the 1670s, Zheng Jing forged new ties with Southeast Asian kingdoms and the English East India Company (EIC), providing him unprecedented access to the Indian Ocean network. Ultimately, the inability of the Zheng family's pro-Ming organization to institutionalize its autonomy led to the collapse and surrender of its base at Taiwan to the newly established Manchu Qing Dynasty of China in 1683. Nonetheless, the Zhengs left behind a profound legacy that would impact the South China Sea littoral up to the twentieth century, including a massive wave of Chinese immigration, the rise of Guangzhou as the preeminent port, and the emergence of Britain as the region's dominant maritime power.
Alexander Chieh-cheng Huang — Shifting Strategic Balance: The Rise of Chinese Influence in the South China Sea
Disputes in the South China Sea have been a mixture of long standing security, legal, and resources competitions. Maritime security has involved freedom of navigation, but commercial shipping lanes have rarely been disrupted by occasional naval clashes. Multilateral efforts in peaceful management of maritime disputes have been in progress for decades, but none of the claimants of maritime territories and waters have backed away from their legal positions. Abundant maritime resources have been estimated, but exploitations have not been concentrated in highly disputed areas.
Three decades of rapid economic development has enabled China to exert greater influence over regional economy, to build a powerful navy to back up its maritime claims, and to alter the strategic map in the region where the U.S. has dominated since the end of World War II.
Either for national prestige or for maritime resources, in recent years, China has taken proactive steps in multilateral and bilateral diplomacy, in solidify its legal claims, and in using its maritime forces in the South China Sea. The rise of Chinese maritime power has heightened regional tension, escalated anxieties of other claimants, increased probabilities of maritime dispute, and renewed the world's attention in the South China Sea.
In the South China Sea issue, Taiwan maintains the same position as China in territorial claims in the South China Sea, and for that, has been caught in double dilemmas: sharing Beijing's territorial claims while facing tremendous security threat from China; hoping to be included in all regional dialogue mechanisms while knowing the difficulties of defending a common position with China.
With its long-term control of the largest island —l Taiping in the South China Sea, Taiwan is a part of the game. In pursuit of peaceful management of the disputed waters, smaller power can play a unique role in promoting a better usage of the maritime common in East Asia.
Chong-Pin Lin — Behind the Rising East Asian Maritime Tension
By early 2009, China had been improving or having stable relations with almost all countries in the world. Then curiously, Beijing turned growingly assertive in East Asia which began to trigger a chain reaction leading to the current heightened maritime tension in the region. Domestic political dynamics both in the PRC and the US are examined in search for possible explanations. The hedging behaviors of China's East Asian neighbors are viewed in light of pragmatic necessity. Factors are explored that may prevent the eruption of uncontrollable conflicts. A few case studies of Beijing's Asian Pacific foreign policy highlight an ongoing guideline for three decades, and some recent characteristics.
Micah Muscolino — International Energy Conflict in the South China Sea: The First Phase, 1975-1980
China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, and the Philippines assert competing territorial and jurisdictional claims in the South China Sea, especially over rights to its (possibly) extensive oil and natural gas reserves. Conflict has recently flared between China and the Philippines in particular over exploration of and oil natural gas deposits believed to exist in the disputed Reed Bank area, a rocky shoal 250km west of the Philippine island of Palawan. The Philippines holds Reed Bank is within its 200-nautical mile exclusive economic zone (EEZ); the PRC sees it as part of the Spratly Islands, which are claimed in their entirety by China (as well as by Taiwan and Vietnam). The recent tow between China and the Philippines over Reed Bank's oil resources has heightened anxieties about a potential conflict over energy resources in the South China Sea, but not for the first time. Analogous international disputes over the Reed Bank emerged during the 1970s oil crisis, when the discovery of crude oil transformed it into a major point of contention. As in recent years, oil exploration undertaken by multinational corporations on behalf of the Philippines during the 1970s led to heated disputes over Reed Bank's oil and gas resources. Protests from China and other nations that claimed this territory prompted the Philippines to assert its own jurisdictional claims and strengthen its military presence. Diplomatic tensions flared, but outright military confrontation failed to materialize. Based on an analysis of this initial round of tensions surrounding oil exploration, this paper seeks to shed light on contemporary international competition over the region's energy reserves by critically engaging Michael Klare's influential prediction of impending "resource wars" in the South China Sea.
With China's deployment of its first oil rig as a "strategic weapon" in its maritime disputes — and with seasonal fishing moratoria expiring — this spring and summer saw a rise in rhetoric over the South China Sea. Both regional and global media began to pay increasing attention to the non-military might that Beijing brought to bear in the contested waters of the South China Sea. Yet, there remained questions about the degree to which China was prepared to exploit the associated, contested hydrocarbons and fisheries. This project seeks to answer those questions by examining the breadth and depth of Chinese commercial capacity. It examines the relevant assets and processes in order to differentiate the rhetoric from the reality. By providing such context, this research seeks to shed light on whether or not recent developments in Chinese non-military might ought be seen as escalatory or not.
David Rosenberg — Problems and Prospects for Joint Resource Management in the South China Sea
Tensions over territorial disputes in the South China Sea have been rising in recent years, due to two major factors. One factor is the growing competition for scarce resources, especially hydrocarbons and fisheries. The other factor is the seemingly intractable disputes over sovereignty claims in the South China Sea. Given the high degree of regional economic inter-dependence, it is not surprising there have been numerous incidents and conflicts involving survey vessels or fishing boats on the seas. There are still no routine or well-tested ways to resolve these low-level but frequent conflicts. This presentation considers these issues, as well as the problems and prospects for joint resource management.
Shen Dingli — The Evolution of PRC's South China Sea Policy
From the beginning, the PRC inherited ROC's 11-dash-lines drawn in 1947 (that was later cut to 9-dashed-lines) and made clear that all islands and islets within the lines on the PRC side should belong to Beijing. Such drawing was much echoed by its neighbors and major powers at the time. All six Constitutions of the Philippines before 1997 had accepted that Huangyan Island didn't belong to Manila. In 1958 the PRC stated its expansion of territorial water to 12 nm per the then international law, detailing its applicability to the entire South China Sea based-islands and islets, including all Spratly and Paracel islands, which was subsequently officially accepted by North Vietnam. However, with the introduction of the UNCLOS in 1982, there emerged overlapping areas between PRC's 9-dashed-lines and the EEZ area of those ring-South China Sea ASEAN states — Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia and the Philippines. Presently, there are a couple of sovereign issues at stake — beyond PRC's EEZ, what is the nature of other area of the South China Sea? How PRC's present interpretation of those overlapping areas between its dashed-lines and its neighbors' EEZs reconcile with its earlier claim? How Beijing will handle those islands and islets, used to be recognized as China's by some of its neighbors such as North Vietnam, but now under occupation by them? This talk will address recent Chinese reported assertive rhetoric and subsequent official statements which respond to international concerns. It will also suggest the trend of these developments with the background of South China Sea Code of Conduct in the making.
Yann-huei Song — The Impact of the Law of the Sea Convention on the Development of Maritime Disputes in the South China Sea: 2009-2012
Different interpretations and applications of the rules under international law, particular the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (LOS Convention), between the United States and China, as well as the approaching deadline set by the LOS Convention and its 11th Meeting of States Parties (SPLOS/72) for the outer continental shelf submission triggered the long lasting maritime disputes in the South China Sea. In March 2009, China and the United States were at odds over the right to conduct military-related activities in waters beyond the territorial sea of another state without prior notification or consent, including in an exclusive economic zone (EEZ) of another country. In May the same year, disputes over sovereignty, sovereign rights and jurisdiction in the maritime zones claimed by the South China Sea countries were escalated becasue of the submission of continental shelf measurements to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (CLCS) by Vietnam and Malaysia jointly and by Vietnam separately in May 2009. China considered the claims and submissions seriously infringed its sovereignty, sovereign rights and jurisdiction in the South China Sea and therefore asked the CLCS not to consider the submissions. In response, China submitted a Note Verbale to the UN Secretary-General, stating, inter alia, that "China has indisputable sovereignty over the islands in the South China Sea and the adjacent waters, and enjoys sovereign rights and jurisdiction over the relevant waters as well as the seabed and subsoil thereof." A map of the U-shaped claim, with its 9-dashed line in the South China Sea, was attached to the diplomatic note. These claims and counter-claims have made the existing South China Sea disputes become even more complicated and difficult to manage. Clearly the LOS Convention exacerbates these disputes by encouraging conflicting claims. This paper examines the impact of the LOS Convention on the development of maritime disputes in the South China Sea during the period of time between 2009 and 2012.
President Myung-Bak Lee of Korea recently visited a small rock island and had a monument established there. This, and his demand that Japan's Emperor apologize for the past wrong doings during the colonial rule, irked many Japanese and led the Kan government to take a stern response. As a result, the bilateral relationship, which had seen some of the best days, quickly deteriorated to a low where the Japanese Ambassador was recalled. This is not an isolated incident in the region. Korea, Japan, and China have been entangled in various disputes and dialogues about their common past since the end of the Second World War. Rather than focusing exclusively on the recent example, I situate it in the post-war history of the region. I examine various incidents of historical contentions to assess whether these disputes condemn the region to a future of conflicts or whether they hold a future possibility of a transnational public sphere in Northeast Asia.
The South China Sea: Re-Assessing Regional Order in Asia will be held at the Institute of East Asian Studies – 2223 Fulton Street, 6th floor conference room
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