Overview

The rise of populism and authoritarianism worldwide has caused friction to established orders and tested institutional strengths. In the Asia-Pacific the increasingly potent competition between major powers poses significant challenges to the stability and security of states and societies. The region has also witnessed the realignment and restructuring of middle powers’ alliances and foreign policies. The rising politicization of diaspora has affected domestic politics across the region. Competition in the South China Sea has the potential to fracture the status quo regionalism in Southeast Asia and create new coalitions and clubs of states. Climate change and disasters can make or break governments in the Asia-Pacific. Cyber-security has highlighted a new theatre of international security discourse. New developments in long-standing issues on the Korean peninsula have rekindled hopes for peace. Internal conflicts remain unresolved with significant regional implications. State capacities and human development have grown more significantly in the Asia-Pacific than elsewhere. The regional security architecture is multiple and overlapping with contested leadership roles for states but now more pronounced as avenues to articulate traditional and non-traditional security concerns. These strengthened capacities have challenged dominant global narratives to rethink the ways and means of international relations. Often gone unheard are the voices of states and societies in the Asia-Pacific and their understandings and conceptualizations of world affairs and the prospects and challenges for peaceful sustainable development in the region. This ISA Asia-Pacific Regional Conference 2019 seeks to explore and debate world affairs engaging scholars and practitioners active in the Asia-Pacific but encouraged to think about the broader implications of their research and scholarship.