Introduction

Abstract

For half a century East Asian regional order has been built around the mutual strategic embrace of America and its Asian partners, most importantly Japan. The region has undergone dramatic transformations over the decades, marked by war, political upheaval, democratization, and economic boom and crisis. Yet the most basic reality of postwar East Asian order has stayed remarkably fixed and enduring—namely, the American-led system of bilateral security ties with Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Australian, and countries in Southeast Asia. This “hub-and-spoke” security order today remains the single most important anchor for regional stability. Around it has grown a complex system of political and economic interdependencies. East Asian countries get protection, geopolitical predictability, and access to the American market, and the United States gets frontline strategic partners, geopolitical presence in the region, and (in recent years) capital to finance its deficits. Remarkably, the cold war ended and yet this basic pattern of institutional relations remains intact.