Suchergebnisse

Numerous factors are undermining strategic stability in the contemporary world, making the prospects of nuclear war more dangerous. This article reviews the concept of strategic stability and provides an overview of the nuclear forces of the United States, Russia, and China to offer some understanding of the nuclear hardware that shapes strategic stability. It next explores new challenges to strategic stability. These include uncertainty about the reasoning behind China's nuclear buildup and the strategic challenge this buildup presents to the United States, the shift to a tripolar nuclear "balance" as China's nuclear forces continue to grow, Russian threats to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine, enhanced Russian-Chinese ties overall and specifically in the nuclear arena, and challenges posed by smaller nuclear powers. The article concludes by discussing important implications of changes in the strategic environment and hence strategic stability. These include pressures on the United States to upgrade its nuclear posture, greater challenges for the US in convincingly providing extended deterrence to its allies, and the need to shift focus in arms control from limiting the number of weapons to more modest but achievable goals.

China's growth has brought important benefits to Southeast Asia. China's "new diplomacy" has accommodated many of the region's political concerns and its economic expansion has been an engine of growth for Southeast Asia. However, China's rise brings challenges as well. China's rapid naval build-up, more intensified disputes in the South China Sea, environmental problems and questions over China's ultimate goals create concerns in the region. Southeast Asia's strategy has been to accommodate China's rise while striving to maintain the American position in the region. Southeast Asia has been successful in this strategy, although this balance will be increasingly difficult as China's power increases. (CIJ/GIGA)

Throughout the second half of this century, many forces have come to erode the autonomy and sovereignty of states, both at the supranational and the subnational levels. At the supranational level, transnational organizations, both official and non-governmental, exert pressure on states to conform to their collective policies and standards. Multinational growth triangles also reject the nation-state as a fundamental economic unit. At the subnational level, the state faces the challenge of managing various regions in a manner that allows regional governments the flexibility to form policies corresponding to local conditions while the center continues to maintain sufficient power to deal with national problems.

Though less than those of Hong Kong and of Taiwan, Singapore's investments in China have been increasing rapidly in the 1990s, with encouragement from Beijing. China has been expanding its economic activities in Singapore as well. The study traces the expansion of Sino-Singaporean economic ties from China's opening in 1978 until the 1990s, when economic exchanges and social interactions began to increase rapidly. (DÜI-Sen)