Gotta love this:

The following is a copy of my recent reply to a friend's response to my original email (see below), in which he expressed fears that the danger of electing Barack Obama was installing another tax-hungry liberal in the White House :

Thanks for the response, buddy. I agree with just about all of your complaints, but don't think Obama represents the same kind of liberal logic that you may think he does. As far as I can tell, Barack's main tax proposal is to readjust the tax cuts from the wealthy toward the middle class. While that may mean that the Bush cuts may be reduced to some extent for the wealthiest Americans, he doesn't, to my knowledge, want to increase their tax to upwards of 60%. That would be political suicide. What he is proposing is that the middle tax brackets receive a greater share of income return than they currently do and that the highest bracket return to previous levels.

Research shows that the Bush tax cuts have far and away benefited the wealthiest 1% of Americans the most, resulting in further income polarization in the United States (read, for example http://www.cbpp.org/8-25-04tax.htm. ) I do not subscribe to the theory of "trickle-down economics," that when the top benefits, the rest of the country will follow suit. The greatest periods of growth, profit and employment in U.S. history (e.g. 1940s, 50s, and 90s) were all marked by a healthy middle-class. When the rich get richer, the poor get poorer, and the middle class begins to dwindle, we run into trouble (e.g. late 1920s, 2000s). Not that it is the burden of the rich to pay for the lazy, unfortunate, etc. I don't believe in handouts at the expense who've earned their wealth and I am confident Barack Obama doesn't either. He proposes job programs, education and so forth, not a massive socialized welfare system.

You are bang on about government spending, also. One of the worst aspects of the current administration is that they have decreased government income while simultaneously setting records for government spending. Even Alan Greenspan has been critical of this facet of the Bush years. Obama has some interesting ideas on the subject and seems to understand that spending needs to be much more responsible (http://www.barackobama.com/issues/fiscal/).

As far as health care is concerned, I think it is a travesty that our country, with the world's greatest economy - triple the size of the second biggest, Japan - has some 45 million people who are uninsured for health care. That means that about 15 percent of our population cannot afford to visit a doctor when they get the flu or break their arm, let alone something more serious, and these people are mostly average Americans working to make a living, or the children of those who are. Also, I don't think this has anything to do with population size. We're talking population proportions and standards of living, here. Read the following for some comparative info: http://www.pnhp.org/facts/international_health_systems.php?page=all . I think you'll find that rather than a universal health care system, or socialized system as you mentioned, Barack Obama is proposing a health insurance program with substantially more flexibility (e.g. the option of choosing any other private insurance provider) while reaching the millions who cannot afford or have not been provided one through employment. Dennis Kucinich was the only candidate, to my knowledge, that was proposing a large socialized universal health care system, and we know what happened to him in this contest. Plenty of countries find a more coordinated, less burdensome way to bring health insurance to nearly every citizen, and they are not all small, obscure, leftist-leaning European nations, either (see above photo). They are by and large, however, developed and industrialized nations that worry more about the long-term burden a high percentage of uninsured citizens would ultimately have on their society and economy, rather than on the short-term costs it might impose on private insurance companies or employers.

Well, I hope this email and some of the links I've attached to it give you adequate information to dispel the suspicions you have of Barack Obama being another heavily taxing, quasi-socialist liberal. I believe he is not. I think he's proposing sensible compromises on a number of issues that Americans across the spectrum can get on board together with to make our country better, and furthermore provides a sense of pride and inspiration in the American political process that we've long lacked. Hope you agree, buddy, and thanks for engaging in the discussion with me.

The following is a copy of an email I wrote recently declaring my support of a candidate for President of the United States :

Friends and Family -

I know it might be slightly tasteless and in several cases futile to make a mass email to encourage your support of a particular candidate for President of the United States, but you all know what a political animal I am, so it shouldn't be terribly surprising that I am doing so nonetheless. What's more, I - like a great many Americans - am more optimistic in this race about the possibility of a genuine turning point for the better in American politics than I can recall ever having been. It should also be no surprise that the candidate that gives me the most hope for the future of our country is the one who has similarly inspired millions of people in recent months and years: Senator Fred Thompson. Just kidding, it's Barack Obama.

To those of you who already support Senator Obama, don't neglect your opportunity to cast your vote for him in your state's primary or caucus, if you haven't already done so. To those who are uncertain about your choice for President, indulge me a few comments on his behalf. I believe that in Barack Obama, you will find a candidate that not only fights to eradicate lingering inequality our country, to bring opportunity, healthcare, and education to every American, and pursue forward-looking energy and environmental policy, but one who will do so through sound fiscal policy, without massive deficit spending or wholesale tax increases. I believe that through Barack Obama, gone are the days of the "tax-and-spend" paradigm in the Democratic party. He proves what I've long believed: that it's possible to be socially progressive on certain issues and be fiscally responsible at the same time.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, I feel that Senator Obama represents leadership we can be proud of in the world. The power of the United States of America dwarfs every other nation on Earth - economically, politically, militarily, and through the influence of our culture - but over recent years and decades we have squandered the opportunity to lead by example and our leaders have betrayed the trust the world once had in our ideas, our principles, and the promise of our prosperity. President John F. Kennedy once noted, "Today the eyes of all people are truly upon us--and our governments, in every branch, at every level, national, state and local, must be as a city upon a hill--constructed and inhabited by men aware of their great trust and their great responsibilities." To that effect, Barack Obama gives me hope. Hope that the world may someday grant our country respect not out of fear, but out of admiration. He gives me hope that we can live better together in our time and ensure that our children may do the same in theirs, and in doing so bear our responsibility as citizens of the city upon a hill with pride.

To those of you who tend to lean too far to the right to consider voting for a Democratic candidate, forget about the funny name (he's not a secret operative for Al Qaeda), take a leap of faith from the Dark Side and support a candidate for President who can truly bring our country together, not drive us farther apart.

It's funny to me, if I think about it, that I have spent nearly my whole life involved in education – over twenty years out of nearly twenty-eight– and that I have measured my life in academic years rather than calendar years for as long as I can remember. Another bizarre truth is that the academic year 2006-2007 marks the longest period of time that I have been away from the Republic of Korea (ROK) since 2002. This has been a source of great relief for many of you that know me who were beginning to suspect that I might never return from my adventures abroad. I’m certain that the same lot of you were also surprised to see that I returned to the United States without having gotten hastily married in some exotic location.

These concerns were not entirely without reason. Although teaching English as a foreign language never struck me as a long-term career option, it was personally rewarding in ways and the perks were incredible: I was earning more money than I could spend, traveling the world, and celebrating life with a motley rabble of fun-loving and open-minded friends. In truth, my hedonistic lifestyle was getting increasingly harder to abandon and I had met someone special. Still, with the twilight years of my twenties approaching and possessing a long-unfulfilled desire to apply my talents, whatever they might be, toward a career of greater social action, further formal education was something for which I had to aim. Furthermore, I knew from experience that I would be greatly dissatisfied with leaving Seoul for the American routine absent a larger, career-oriented purpose.

In retrospect, I now see being admitted to and enrolling in American University’s School of International Service as another embodiment of my personal maxim that fortune doesn’t always simply happen to people, it also happens by people. In other words, to some extent you make your own luck. Thus, I feel lucky to have been given the opportunity to make this career change, but also confident that I’ve earned it. My failure to make law school a reality in 2001 was partly due to circumstances beyond my control, but mostly due to situations that I created, or rather, failed to create. In the end, that turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Through work overseas I put myself on more stable financial ground and realized I had no desire to be an attorney. Given my international experience, interest in politics, and proclivities toward other languages, the Master’s degree in International Affairs for which I am now a candidate seems much more appropriate.

Living and studying in Washington, DC has consequently been a wonderful experience for me because it has served as an engaging environment in which to become assimilated back into American life and a constant extension of the classroom. For me, this has particular salience because studying international relations, formal political theory, and economics has been a marked gear shift from my undergraduate studies in English literature. I have gotten a lot of mileage out of my BA, it turns out, both in my former life as a teacher and now from the reading, writing, and analytical skills it brings me as a graduate student. However, most of my graduate school colleagues come from an educational background more tailored to discussions of such things as Keynesian economic theory, J-curves, or the history of post-communist reform in Eastern Europe. I’ve adapted fairly quickly, though, in no small measure because of the never-ending list of conferences, Congressional hearings, presentations, and politically infused happy-hours open to the public here in DC. As some of you may recall, I made my first brief appearance on C-SPAN within my first month living in “The District” just simply by attending a press conference for Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill.

In fact, one of my lamest excuses for not communicating better with others this year is the distractingly significant nature of this town. Studying politics and global issues in Washington is something akin to being a bat boy in the Big Leagues; you get so caught up in the awesome spectacle that surrounds you, it's sometimes easy to forget what a small part you play in it. Still, it’s hard not to start feeling increasingly important when your regular conversations are about nuclear disarmament or the need for more international cooperation on malaria prevention. I’ve sat in on hearings on Capitol Hill, and nearly bumped into several Senators, news anchors and entertainers. While interning this summer at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a prominent think tank, I’ve engaged in discussions with ambassadors, diplomats, and scholars from all over the globe. I’ve recently helped write a book chapter on Hong Kong for CSIS Senior Fellow Derek Mitchell . If all of this sounds unabashedly boastful, it is so for a reason.

I’m trying to make the point that while I’ve been a part of incredible events and met people who affect global problems on a systemic level, such things can be distracting and can end up merely as exercises in ego inflation. People in The District drop famous names in conversation and abuse the benefits of social contacts – i.e. “networking” – like nowhere I’ve ever lived. In this vein, I recently commented to a friend that there seemed to me several similarities between Hollywood and DC: in addition to name dropping and shallow relationships, DC and Hollywood are both full of young people aspiring to achieve fame in a very limited and peculiar field of employment. In response to my observations, my friend quipped, “Sure. Haven’t you ever heard before that DC is really just Hollywood for ugly people?” While funny and containing a reductionist truth, this argument ignores many people in Washington that work long hours and receive little pay or recognition for trying to improve the lives of others in the United States and all over the world. DC is an impassioned city where, if you can overcome partisan bickering and greed, people are trying hard to resolve important issues. To that effect, if my communication with friends and family slackens, it will hopefully be for reasons of selflessness, rather than self-promotion.

Having said that, I’m sure many of you wonder what exactly I plan to do with my degree, if it's not to become a self-aggrandizing politician. Point of fact, I have been asked that question recently too often to count. To answer in a general sense, I would most like to work on resolving critical international issues as a civil servant with the US government. Making use of my Korean language experience, and my continuing education in East Asia and international relations, I am particularly interested in contributing to the diplomatic resolution of the North Korea nuclear weapons crisis. The Department of Energy has several programs focused on nuclear weapons non-proliferation with which I would love to work, and I am also interested in work with the Department of State. Additionally, I’ve enjoyed working with a think tank where experts convene to work out sensible, moderated, and innovative solutions to difficult policy dilemmas. I am also open to other opportunities in various sectors and I’ve felt encouraged thus far by the flexibility that my degree appears to give me in that regard.

Nevertheless, I’ve had one of the most rewarding and educational years of my life in DC and at AU. I’m excited to refine my research and expertise at Korea University’s Graduate School of International Studies this fall, and again at AU in the spring as I prepare to graduate. I do occasionally have reservations about the educational choice I’ve made. I have large student loan payments looming in the distance and there is no direct connection between my course of study and a specific field of employment, as there is for law or medical schools and their respective professions. Still, my degree puts me closer to making a meaningful contribution to larger issues I care about. Put simply, it’s an investment I believe in. After all, if there is one thing in my life that has always received priority in terms of time and money, it’s education.

A symbol of the current era, an embodiment of the international zeitgeist, might arguably be the World Trade Organization (WTO). Formed in 1994 as a product of the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), the WTO represents not only one of the most successful international institutions to date, but also signifies the modus operandi under which people, states, and organizations of all stripes seem to operate: put trade and business first, and the rest will take care of itself. This principle has worked wonders for many, particularly since the end of the Cold War, bringing millions of people out of poverty and revolutionizing the way in which states relate to each other. Over the past decade or so, however, the enthusiasm with which policymakers and academics sounded the drumbeat of international trade has begun to subside. Many people continue to feel marginalized as income has become more unequally distributed than in previous decades, as multi-national corporations and national leaders bind together in historic agreements to boost economic output, and as the detrimental effects of such output on the natural environment becomes more acutely obvious. Thus, lines are now being drawn by nations who feel most disadvantaged by or least powerful within the international system to demand more equitable treatment. Such a phenomenon is painfully apparent in the failure of the most recent Doha Round of WTO talks. At an impasse over discrepancies between the international haves and have-nots, the WTO now symbolizes a fanaticism for institutions gone flat. The market economic trade that began to flourish in the 1990s has not and is not likely to subside, but the confidence that many had placed in international institutions such as the WTO has. One feels inclined to ask: are the institutions through which we put trade first becoming obsolete and can the rest really take care of itself?

Theorists across a wide spectrum have spent considerable time debating how to define international institutions, what relationship individual states have to them, and whether institutions matter much at all to the international system. The theoretical base on which so much of international political analysis has rested, or to which it has stood in opposition, is the school of realism. As articulated by thinkers such as John Mearshimer, realist thought emphasizes states as the primary actors in an international system that is largely anarchic. The world is accordingly defined by the rational self-interest of states as they pursue maximum benefit in balances of international power. Institutions, Mearshimer argues, are merely reflections of states’ interests and are ultimately devoid of legitimately independent stature as external actors. Constructivist and institutionalist thinkers would argue in direct opposition to this claim. Alexander Wendt, a notable constructivist scholar, contends that institutions establish and distribute global norms, which in effect constrain state choices and make institutions more robust independent exogenous actors than realists claim.

A convincing approach that in a way synthesizes some aspects of realist and constructivist schools is that of rational design, as explained by Barbara Koremenos, Charles Lipson, and Duncan Snidal. These authors explain that institutions do operate on the basis of states’ preferences and goals, but give legitimacy to them as significant international actors based on the variety of structures that institutions have. International institutions vary greatly and as such are designed based on the myriad rational goals that states have. Rational design theory thus accepts that institutions both establish global norms and exist to further the goals of individual states. Although Koremenos, Lipson, and Snidal’s hypothesis suffers from a slightly cumbersome multiplicity of variables, their thesis is extremely helpful in viewing institutions as rational mechanisms designed for solving specific international problems. Both GATT and the WTO, under this paradigm, would be quite easily explained as the evolving collective product of many states’ goals. As the membership of GATT expanded, the institution’s design had to be adjusted, as evident in the measures implemented in the formation of the WTO during the Uruguay round. For example, agricultural protection, intellectual property and anti-dumping rules all had to be revised in order to meet the goals of member states. With such rules established and with the existence of dispute mechanisms in place, the WTO, then, was not entirely a simple reflection of states power-balancing motivations in an anarchical system as realists would claim. But neither was it entirely an independently existing outside actor imposing a set of global norms and constraints on state behavior. The WTO was a body both representing states’ individual goals and in turn spreading global norms on trade.

With the recent failure of the Doha round of WTO talks, though, we may be forced to reconsider whether the goals of member states have become so irreconcilable that the design of the institution itself has run its course. Is the WTO too severely infused with hard-law constraints or not enough? If the WTO, once one of the most highly functional legalized international institutions, has floundered, what does this mean to institutions in general? Mearshimer would argue that it directly speaks to the futility in depending on institutions as key components of the global order. Conversely, an exponent of institutions such as Robert Keohane would see the breakdown of the WTO as evidence that stronger, more binding democratic mechanisms need to be implemented in the organization for it to be effective, and for global stability at large to be maintained. While the international system would benefit from more stable and robust institutions, in order to impose such mechanisms states would be forced to abandon self-interested goals, which would be no easy task. So the fate of international institutions, like the WTO and like the net effect of global trade, remains somewhat indeterminate. As a consequence, if we are to make progress in this contentious area of global debate and if we are to keep the design of the WTO relevant, one side will have to bend and concede ground. In my view, the impetus for change rests on the developed nations of the world. It is they that have crafted the age of global trade and it is they that are most well-equipped to bear the burden of adjustment in a system in disrepair.

In recent years, China has proven persistently to be the exception to traditional theory. As Minxin Pei, a prominent China scholar, has emphasized, there exists a large amount of uncertainty present in conventional analysis of China’s reform, despite the proliferation of theory explaining non-democratic market reforms and despite the certainty with which the world seems to have accepted a dominant China.[1] Developmental state theorists demonstrated that democracy was unnecessary for aggressive economic development; South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, and others all initiated sweeping, unprecedented economic growth without legitimate democratic institutions. Granted, the developmental state model so often associated with these countries is not one that exhibits features entirely harmonious with the neoclassical market-based paradigm, but it does thrive on international markets and private economic actors, rather than state control over prices, supply, and distribution mechanisms as in a communist system. However, nearly all of the states mentioned eventually became more committed to not just economic liberalization and adoption of market principles, but also to political systems of open, democratic participation. Thus, academics and policymakers alike have been baffled as China continues to reform from a command economic model to a predominantly market-based model, maintain unprecedented growth, and simultaneously avoid wholesale democratization. There is a common feeling that sooner or later China will crack and everyone is taking bets as to when.

Predictive indicators that China’s economic prowess may not outlast the need for democratization are bountiful, ranging from empirical examples taken from China’s neighbors in East Asia to theoretical discussions regarding the economic reform of post-communist states. One of the foremost such discussions is Joel Hellman’s, which dispels the once commonly accepted principles of J-curves, as they relate to transitions to capitalism. The J-curve concept regarding the transition from a command system to a market system adheres to an intuitively sensible logic. According to this model, it was traditionally argued that the primary opponents to reform would be the short-term losers, and thus states should work to protect against potential backlash of the losers until reforms gained enough popular support. Hellman turns this argument on its head, demonstrating convincingly that in post-communist countries, genuine economic reform is often stalled by the short-term winners of reform policies, rather than the losers. Critical to understanding the relationship between political and economic reform, then, Hellman contends that politically inclusive systems are necessary to prevent short-term winners from stalling continued progress. Democracy, in sum, ensures that economic reform will endure and benefit a larger number of actors.

Considering Hellman’s argument and the evidence on post-communist states that he provides, it is difficult to reconcile China’s success in implementing market reforms with its persistent lack of genuinely participatory political processes. If post-communist states with more open political systems have enjoyed robust continued reform and those without have been mired in more stagnant partial reform, as Hellman asserts, then how is China able to remain committed to economic reform? There are at least several clues. For one, China has been much more successful at co-opting both the potential short-term losers and short-term winners in its reform processes. As Yan Sun has pointed out, “China’s gradualism has allowed officials to retain some of their old powers and to acquire new powers over the economy.”[2] Though Sun’s observation is more specifically in reference to the nature of corruption in China’s reform process and though there is disagreement on just how gradualist China’s reform has been, the author’s insight helps explain China as a potential exception to Hellman’s rule. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has been quite deft at ensuring that those who benefited from the previous economic system gain a stake in the new one as well. Gennadi Kazakevitch and Russell Smyth also illustrate how through measures such as rapid agricultural liberalization, market reforms were implemented in China at times with lightning speed and created new opportunities for many different actors to benefit from the new system. Consequently, China has been able to avoid the political instability that would be caused by democratization while also avoiding getting stuck in Hellman’s partial reform conundrum.

Furthermore, it is worth considering that Hellman makes his assertion about the necessity of democracy to genuine market reform without acknowledging any states that have pursued market liberalization without political liberalization. China is proof that such states can exist, and moreover, that their market reforms can be quite successful. Nonetheless, we should not dismiss Hellman’s conclusions entirely due to China’s rather unique circumstance. Chinese leaders continue to tread largely uncharted waters. The post-communist countries, those of Hellman’s study, by and large committed to some form of democratic reform either prior to or during economic reform. Hellman’s conclusions thus offer a compelling explanation of simultaneous reform toward both a democratic political and market economic system. His model demonstrates that although the political costs may be high, once democratic reforms are initiated it is most beneficial to democratize aggressively, if the gains from market reforms are also to be maximized. And perhaps that is precisely why leaders of the CCP have suppressed democratization; they fear losing both the Party’s grip on power and the country’s ability to maintain economic growth. Yang Dali has shown that China now faces increasing societal pressures brought on by the great economic growth it has achieved. From environmental degradation to growing income inequality, Chinese leaders have a gathering storm of problems to address. Although it seems unlikely China will be able to stave off democratization indefinitely as these pressures build, for now the country seems miraculously able to remain the exception to an otherwise reliable rule.

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[1] Minxin Pei, “China: Can Economic Growth Continue Without Political Reform?” Strategic Asia 2006-07: Trade, Interdependence, and Security (Seattle: The National Bureau of Asian Research, 2006), 303.

[2] Yan Sun, “Reform, State, and Corruption: Is Corruption Less Destructive in China than in Russia?” Comparative Politics (Vol. 32 No. 1 Oct. 1999), 4.

[The following is a slightly condensed and amended version of a recent research paper I composed on Chinese, Indian, and American energy policy.]

Because countries are economically linked more intensely than ever before, as energy resources run increasingly scarce, and demand continues to escalate, it is becoming clear to many states that energy diversification through cooperation is the key to survival and economic prosperity in the coming decades. Nowhere, perhaps, is this statement more true than in Asia, where China and India draw sizable attention for what many see as a looming energy crisis fueled by the two nations’ seemingly unstoppable economic growth. Ashley Tellis notes, “during the next twenty years, the demand for energy is projected to expand by more than 50 percent, and Asian demands will account for the bulk of the increase," (2004). It would be naïve to argue that China and India are destined for overt conflict, but likewise would it be premature to assume that the two potential giants have set a course toward major collaboration. As such, examination of India and China’s growing energy needs and limited resources reveals both significant opportunity for cooperation and competition. This dynamic has significant implications for American policymakers. The United States has considerable strategic political interests in Asia and through its own control of energy resources can assert some influence, limited in some instances though it may be, on how growth in China and India proceed in the coming years.

India, like so many other nations around the world, would desperately like to diversify its sources of energy. However, India possesses huge coal reserves, the world’s fourth largest with approximately 92 billion tons, or roughly 200 years worth, available (Wall Street Journal – Eastern Edition 7/11/2005). However, for numerous reasons coal is not the most appealing of energy resources. As one analyst has summarized, “coal has low energy utilization efficiency, low economic benefits, especially in energy intensive industries, and low product competitiveness. It also has serious environmental impacts," (Xu Yi Chong, 2006). Also, current Indian infrastructure is poorly equipped to produce domestic coal. Unfortunately, though, India has paradoxically little chance to wean itself off of coal as its primary energy resource in the near future; it would not be economically viable to do so for likely another 15 to 20 years (Pachauri, 1999).

Though natural gas accounted for only 7% of primary energy consumption in 1997-98, it is estimated to increase to 20% by 2025, thereby becoming a preferred fuel in future Indian power generation (Pandian, 2005). These estimates, however, are contingent on India’s current natural gas pipeline and other import projects coming to fruition. The most significant of all of India’s gas pipeline projects is the now much-publicized Iran – Pakistan – India (IPI) pipeline. As pleased as leaders in the United States might be from increased stability in south Asia brought about by further rapprochement between Pakistan and India, they are certainly not enthusiastic about the prospect of a potentially lucrative deal for Iran, such as the IPI pipeline, that might help further fuel that country’s nuclear ambitions through increased national revenue. Ironically, it is the nuclear ambition of India which sets the balance with the contentious IPI pipeline proposal. One of the most celebrated and scorned, but nonetheless surprising energy developments in recent memory has been the historic nuclear energy agreement between Washington and New Dehli on July 18, 2005. In what C. Raja Mohan calls “the deal of the century,” the second administration of President George W. Bush agreed to help fully develop India’s lagging civilian nuclear program, in exchange for separation of its civilian and military nuclear programs and opening up of its facilities to international safeguards and regulations

In sum, India’s energy needs are enormous and will continue to grow dramatically as the Indian economy itself does. Leaders in India will continue to pursue energy resource diversification, but will be in many ways reined in by the limits of their developing economy and the geopolitical interests that still dictate the acquisition of resources throughout the world. While U.S. congress passed the India civilian nuclear agreement this past December and all indications are that the IPI pipeline is merely a few months away from construction, it seems possible that India may not be able to have its cake and eat it, too. Indian leaders may be forced to decide, at least in the short-term, which energy resource project to invest more stock in, as American leaders continue to put pressure on the international community to censure Iran. This is not the only tough decision that Indian policymakers will face in the coming years regarding energy, either. Although India has great potential for expanding its use of renewable energy sources such as hydropower, biomass, biofuel, and solar power, developing and producing technology for such sources is far beyond India’s current economic capability. In view of these limitations, India’s immediate energy future will continue to be dominated by coal and oil.

Very much like its up-and-coming neighbor to the south, India, China has and will continue to have well into the future, a dominant dependence on coal. China is now the world’s largest coal producer and consumer, possesses almost 12 percent of the world’s total reserves and used coal for 69 percent of its primary energy consumption in 2005 and 75 percent of total electricity generation (Yanli, 2007). However, due to increasingly onerous environmental concerns and rising automobile use in China, Chinese demand for oil and gas will continue to rise faster than for coal, although coal use will still continue to increase commensurate with the country's continuing economic growth . The switch from coal toward other resources is part of a newly emerging strategic energy policy calculus on the part of Chinese leaders. China has been for some time been without a national government agency to direct energy resource policy, but creating an energy strategy became a government priority in the new millennium and a national energy working group was formed in May 2005.

While it is clear that the new direction of Chinese energy policy is toward securing a diversity of resources from multiple locations in order to accommodate economic growth and avoid constraints imposed by increased urbanization, it is also clear that China has also placed a certain amount of strategic and diplomatic weight to the processes involved in energy resource acquisition. This is especially evident in China’s agreements and projects to obtain access to foreign oil. China became a net importer of oil in 1993, and with the continuing escalation of automobile ownership and use in China, Chinese leaders have come to see oil acquisition as increasingly linked to national security and tied to its competitive and cooperative arrangements in the international community (Ziegler, 2006). Because Middle East oil is so heavily linked to the protection of the U.S. Navy, central Asian energy has become much more attractive to China, and thus Beijing has become involved in numerous energy projects closer to home, such as building pipelines from Kazakhstan to Shangai (Blank, 2006). Even though China lacks influence in central Asia, as compared with other major actors such as Russia and the United States, its projects in the area have given the country more of a strategic position in the region and add at least in some degree to the overarching strategy in Beijing of energy variegation.

To summarize, China has an intense need to diversify its energy sources, which are currently and into the near future dominated by coal consumption. Access to foreign oil and natural gas, however, is gaining importance to China and leaders have strategically pursued deals to obtain these resources with continued doggedness in a variety of regions, most notably and perhaps promisingly in central Asia. While central Asian holdings and projects represent a relatively insubstantial contribution to China’s overall energy requirements, they do represent a strategic maneuver on the part of the CCP to avoid becoming too entirely entangled in the U.S.-dominated and frequently volatile Middle East. Chinese leaders, in general, are also quite aware of the need to both curtail the heavy environmental costs of its energy consumption caused by rapid industrial growth, and of the need to make energy usage more efficient. Recent measures to toughen penalties for energy waste reflect leaders’ goal to cut Chinese GDP by 4 percent in 2006 and by 20 percent by the end of 2010 (Hydrocarbon Processing, 2006). This is a tall order, given that Chinese energy consumption in 2006 outpaced economic growth. Still, such strategic goals, however legitimate or realistic they might be, emphasize the weight energy policy and resource usage now carries with leaders in China.

Although it may be far too simplistic to weigh all of China’s moves in the region as one or another attempt to balance power against the U.S., this calculus is certainly relevant to the discussion of energy resource acquisition in Asia. China has expressed a definite desire to expand its sources of energy to states considered unappealing or antagonistic to the United States and has sought to utilize its more dominant role in Asia by coopting other states in bilateral energy agreements. Particular to the discussion outlined here, India has proved recently to be no exception to this rule. Man Shankar Aiyar, India’s minister of oil and natural gas, has repeatedly said that India needs to cooperate with China on energy, not compete with it. One might reasonably argue that such similarity of interests and goals might lead to contention or even conflict. Tellis surmises that if India and China continue to seek “privileged access” to different markets, their strategies would inevitably collide and escalate tension, as the countries would feel compelled to increase defense mechanisms to protect their interests.

However, such analysis ignores several perhaps noteworthy factors. For one, Sino-Indian rapprochement has excelled in recent years, as China has continued to build multilateral and cooperative relations throughout Asia. Furthermore, both India and China’s economic interdependence with each other and with other states throughout the region have made the costs of outright conflict and intense competition much more costly than before. As a corollary, there is sizable evidence that parallels in India and China’s energy needs are in fact spurring cooperation. To that effect, in April 2005, the Indian and Chinese premiers announced a Sino-India Joint Declaration to launch cooperation in the fields of energy safety and energy conservation. An example of such collaboration is evident in the 25% share purchased by India Petroleum and Natural Gas Corp. in Sudan’s Nile oil field, in cooperation with China’s CNGC, which operates the field.

In light of these commonalities and trends in India and China’s drives to obtain multifaceted and increasing shares of the global energy resource market, it would be easy to conclude that much stands in opposition to many of the United States’ interests and strategies in the region. As a cooperative regional leader, China offers for India what so many other nations in the region have found appealing in Chinese proposals for trade and development over the past decade: common regional interests, a lack of ideological judgmentalism, and reverence for the principle of non-interference. It is clear, particularly after the fallout from the U.S. incursion into Iraq, speculated by many to be fueled by energy resource interests, that these aspects of U.S. preeminence in the international system have only encouraged states to seek an alternative powerful partner. However, one should note that in spite of their statements of anti-hegemony and pro-multilateralism, even Chinese leaders have repeatedly emphasized the importance of cooperation with the US.

The United States, with its influence on Gulf oil, and unparalleled economic and military dominance, is most certainly an undeniable partner for most of the world. The surprisingly swift and powerfully sweeping change that the United States can bring to any issue is most apparent, specifically with regard to India and China’s quest for more reliable, independent, and diverse sources of energy, in the emerging U.S. – India civilian nuclear deal. Though Washington has largely claimed to have based the renaissance in India – U.S. relations on shared values such as democracy and common global interests, there should be little doubt that members of the Bush administration saw great strategic political and regional security significance in supporting India’s growth ambitions. Knowing that China’s multilateralism and expanding sphere of influence was not poorly received by many states throughout Asia, leaders in the U.S. realized that providing India with such a game-changing source of energy would do much toward leveling the economic playing field in Asia and to bring a potential great power further under the American wing.

Still, American leaders would do well be cautious about creating a regional posture that pegs policy toward one country (India) to its larger strategy toward a third (China). The perils of such a strategy are manifest in the exceptionalism through which the U.S. had to forge the India civilian nuclear deal; U.S. leaders essentially had to assent to break American law and the provisions of the Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) to offer the kind of support that India called for in their agreement. Not only does such an exceptional policy further strain future efforts by American leaders to invoke international norms and standards, which they are often inclined to do, but it also subtracts legitimacy from censure of economic interaction with rogue or pariah states. As noted in a recent Washington Report on Middle East affairs, “It is rather difficult for the White House to signal criticism of China’s involvement…and ignore the parallel Indian role.” This is not to suggest, however, that the United States shouldn’t see through its promise to help develop India’s civilian nuclear program. Safely increasing India’s use of nuclear power will help maintain growth in India and throughout in the region, while simultaneously helping to curb use of inefficient greenhouse gas emission-heavy fuels such as coal. The primary assertion here is rather that if primary goals such as these also happen to be in line with the interests of the United States, as it often claims, then American leaders should work harder to promote them without bias throughout Asia. Furthermore, the evidence examined here suggests that increased energy cooperation between China and India is likely due to common strategies for a common problem.

Propping up India as a major Asian power in denial of areas where convergent thinking between India and China exist will make increasing regional security by balancing India against China a difficult task. Although many factors add to U.S. attitudes with regard to China, by forging a policy which helps develop such energy related projects as cleaner coal use technologies, gas pipelines, and transport infrastructure related to both India and China, the United States can play a vital role in supporting growth that is sustainable and contributes to long-term stability in Asia. It is clear that the United States can have dramatic effect on how countries set and exact their energy policy, and that American leaders are unafraid of involving energy strategies in an effort to achieve foreign policy and international security goals. Helping both of the world’s two largest up-and-coming economies, those of India and China, to diversify their resources and find cleaner, more efficient ways to power their growth, will help bring down the price of oil and in the end do much more to foster regional stability than will lopsided a policy which only encourages the dangerous battle over petrochemicals from unstable places (Friedman, 2006).

Returning to my hometown for Christmas, I brought with me two and a half feet of snow and NBA superstar Allen "The Answer" Iverson. Denver, Colorado, is a spectacular place to live in many ways and hopefully Iverson comes to appreciate that fact well. However, as A.I. landed in an airport flanked with five foot snow drifts and creeped along through the blanketed city in his limousine, arrived to his new home arena, donned a Denver Nuggets jersey for the first time, and hastily passed a requisite physical examination just in time to make the active roster for last Friday's game against the Sacramento Kings, he might have been thinking, "What the hell am I doing?"

Having attended that game, I witnessed a hallmark moment of professional sports. Indeed, although the exuberant and welcoming crowd flattered Iverson with a roaring standing ovation upon his entrance and cheers virtually every time he touched the basketball, I couldn't help but notice that he was playing a little reservedly at times. He still posted 22 points, but I was expecting a more selfish player to debut that night. Iverson was working hard to make plays for his teammates and spread the ball around; he earned 10 assists for the game and would have had more, had the Nuggets shooting percentage from the field not been so abysmally low (.371). My expectation was likely the result of the sports media's tendency to dwell on the controversial side of players such as Iverson, who has certainly had his share of melodrama in the league. However, the A.I. that played in a Denver uniform on Friday was magnanimous and relatively humble, even while displaying the characteristic daring and skill on the court that has made him a star. Iverson himself admitted that he was more nervous for the game than he had been in years. But was his selfless play and gracious demeanor just a product of nerves? I think not.

What many people, media-types included, seem to often forget is that although professional athletes like Allen Iverson are extraordinarily gifted and have unusually lucrative high-profile jobs, they are, first and foremost, just people. Iverson is world-famous and skilled in a way few have been or ever will be, but he is after all just a man. He dreams, hopes, fears, laughs, loves, hates, and desires just like any of us and his arrival in a new town, to a new job, and even a new home signals for him likely a time of reflection, anxiety, and promise. This is nowhere more evident than in not only his self-professed nervousness and his generous play, but also in how genuinely touched he seemed by the warm reception he was given in Denver. Allen Iverson is uprooting from Philadelphia, where he thought he would spend his career, and making a new start on a team with more talent than he has played with since starting on the U.S. Olympic team. He could not reconcile differences with the management of the 76ers, where he began his professional career, but has been given a new start on a team seemingly determined to achieve excellence. Denver fan support for Iverson is something of a warm pat on the back at the beginning of his promising but somewhat lonely new journey.

In this way, Iverson's move is a bittersweet reminder of the decisions that we all face, especially in this, the Christmas and New Year's season. I reflected on Iverson's performance and his comments, as I too battled the elements and the uncertainty of a new life to come home for the Holidays. It's been several years now since I graduated from University and began adventuring around the world, taking risks, betting on my own skill, luck, determination and positive spirit to find a better fulfillment in this life. My sisters also now both live outside of our home state and this was the first Christmas I spent in my father's home without them. I think we all are looking for The Answer in our own way, trying to find a path to achieve something more, oftentimes at the expense of that which means the most to us: our loved ones. Time inexorably pushes forward and we must make the best of the turns that life takes, or in a leap of faith we must turn our lives in a different direction ourselves. We cannot all be as blessed in ability or fortune as Iverson, but we can remember to treasure those that are most dear to us and to embrace new opportunites, rebirth, the promise of a New Year and a new start. In taking a new adventure, we can push through to be something better than we might have ever been, and hopefully, if we're lucky, those that mean the most to us will be along for the ride.

So it's been awhile since my last post and that should be no surprise, given my historical inability to maintain any kind of personal journal. This time around I blame midterm examinations and essays; they definitely have had me frazzled. In timely conjunction, I've been grudgingly settling into the diminished social life that seems to accompany graduate school. My recent life as an expatriate in Seoul is a fairly extreme lifestyle by which to gauge social activity, so I've certainly been trying to keep the adjustment in perspective.

Despite the sullen effects of reverse culture-shock, being up to my eyeballs in reading, writing, and research, and the realization that my days of weekday evenings spent swilling back draft beer and throwing darts are essentially long gone, I've managed to remain pretty upbeat. Sure, I wake up some days with less than a full tank of motivation, and find myself subject to bouts of grumpiness from time to time, but I'm getting an advanced education in a subject I'm passionate about and live a blessed and lucky life, so who am I to complain? I'm not, is the answer, so I try to keep a pretty even keel about things and not let little things rile me up, lest I forget my overall good fortune and health. What's bothered me nonetheless, is my perception that I tend to deal with my little feelings of discomfort in a different fashion than many Americans seem to.

I can't help but notice, these past three or four months since I returned to the US, a regularity of people flipping their lid in public over what appear to be relatively minor grievances. Ultimately, why do people argue over position in line at fast-food restaurants, berate others for not trying to make more room on the bus when there clearly is no more room to make, or nitpick over miniscule rules of conduct in inconsequential situations? What is it that makes people soil their figurative shorts and come to unpleasant public confrontations over such trivial things? This, what one might call, road-rage effect has me fascinated and repulsed. "Don't stand in the doorway!" "Walk on the right!" "Don't you think your girlfriend's skirt is too short?!" "Excuse me, I ordered this with extra lemon!" It's everywhere. But is it just America? Do Parisians come to blows over the size of their camembert wheels? Do Indians in Bangalore scuffle over spilled Vindaloo? Are there shoving matches in Johannesburg over parking spaces? What happens if this phenomenon extends to gangs, to racial groups, or even to nations and states?

To find the answer to this question, one needn't look very hard. The conflict over a group of islands called Dokdo to Koreans and Takeshima to Japanese demonstrates that this human trait extends all the way to the international political level. The Koreans have been claiming for years, although the disagreement has gained prominence recently, that these territorially worthless islands have historically been Korean, pointing to maps centuries-old that dilineate them thus. The Japanese took possession of the islands near the turn of the 20th century in their post-industrial Mejii Restoration expansion on the road to a subsequent annexation of the Korean peninsula in 1910. This dispute is by no means an anomaly. Japan has been locked in a similar heated debate over the Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands with both China and Taiwan. The most intriquing case of all might be the Spratly and Paracel Islands, a long chain of rocky, naturally uninhabitable specks in the South China Sea that have been alternately claimed in part or in total by Brunei, Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines, China, and Taiwan. These Islands collectively cover no more than 13 km sq. of land, and yet many have suggested that they may be the greatest possible flashpoint for international military conflict in Southeast Asia.

So the question comes again: why so much, as the great bard penned, "ado about nothing?" For the Spratlys and Paracels, it's resources and strategic positioning. Oil reserves are said to lie around the islands, and fishing is certainly an industry that would prosper in these waters. More importantly, however, the South China Sea is one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world, connecting the oil-rich Persian Gulf states through the Indian Ocean, between the Straits of Malacca, to the devouring economies of Japan, China, and North America. Whoever controls this stretch of sea controls a great deal more than just a few scant rocks in tropical waters. Strategic power interests also dictate the tone of the Diaoyu/Senkaku dispute, as Japan and China vie for dominance in East Asia, although historical and cultural issues surrounding Japan's wartime aggression and the split of Taiwan from the mainland also figure a key role. Dokdo/Takeshima is a disagreement almost entirely based on this kind of historical issue, although fishing rights play a nominal part. Despite Japan's steps, which many in the region deem insufficient, to apologize for its aggression in WWII, Korea often invokes this history to counter Japan's claims to the islands. Japan, for its part, seems more and more content to stray from its diplomatically passive post-war strategy and assert its interests regardless of history.

One is left to wonder, then, why states risk so much on the premise of so little. Are such conflicts, between both people and states, more evidence of Hobbes' State of Nature, further proof that left to our own devices, we will inevitably engage in a "war of all against all?" Peaceful relations between countries seems too great a wager to stake on territory which no person would ever wish or be able to live. But as with two moms who shout obscenities at each other over their children's soccer match, there is much more to the conflict underneath the surface. It's just, as the saying goes, the tip of the iceberg (or in this case, the island). All too often, it seems that we forget who we are, what we stand for, and how we would really like to interact with the world when a build-up of angst and frustration over personal issues is finally set off by a disagreement so peripheral, it seems almost comical in hindsight. Comically trivial though it might seem, I shudder at the thought of a war in the South China Sea, or the oft predicted final showdown over Taiwan, sparked by controversy surrounding the paltry crags of Diaoyu/Senkaku.

As disastrous as this would be, regionally and globally, the scenario is for the moment forestalled by the auspices of international agreements and non-state actors. It is in these arrangements that Hobbes' prediction begins to fade. After more than two decades of Spratly's skirmishes, China and its ASEAN counterparts have forged a tentative agreement to share the administration and exploration of resources around the islands. This may indeed point to a trend in Asia toward regionalist cooperation, with the understanding that as a collective, everybody wins. In conflict, no one does. With patience and keeping an eye on the bigger picture, it benefits everyone for you not to punch the guy next to you because he wouldn't stop humming aloud. I suppose I desperately cling to the hope that it is not merely an imposed social contract that prevents us from acting on angry impulses, but that it is the logical extension of the natural human state to quell these impulses so as to focus on larger, mutually beneficial goals. Now if this woman sitting next to me would just stop talking so loudly on her cell phone so I could focus on what I'm writing...

Me during more peacefully reflective times in Vietnam...

So last week was a hell of a week - not that it was all that extraordinary in terms of weeks of personal events in my life. The week I spent on White Beach on Boracay in the Philippines was more sublime. My fraternity initiation week was more demanding (and absurd). I had several weeks in Paris that were certainly more spellbinding, and I'm sure that any number of weeks during my parents' divorce were more confusing. No, what makes this past week unusual was the high number of encounters I had with critical global issues. As a master's student of international affairs in Washington, DC, I'm sure this won't be the last one of these I'll have.

On Tuesday, I attended a free screening of Al Gore's film, "An Inconvenient Truth" for American University students, which I hadn't yet seen (I know I'm late in the game on this one, but give me a break; my first time setting foot on U.S. soil in 2006 came late July). I was impressed with Gore's personal conviction, knowledge, and delivery of the material he presents in his neverending, worldwide, and highly-paid speech circuit slideshow on the looming ecological crisis facing homo sapiens on planet Earth. It's clearly evident that Gore is using the facts to advance a personal agenda. But good on 'im. It would be nice if we could see all of our politicians with the candor and unabashed passion that Gore displays for his cause, and surely our opinions of them would change severely for the worst in too many cases if that were so. Furthermore, in the end, I'm convinced Gore's right: containing global warming is a moral issue, and the implications for our personal responsibility as citizens of the planet are undeniable.

On Wednesday, I attended the inauguration of SAIS's U.S.-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins. All of the current living former ambassadors to S. Korea were in attendence as speakers on a guest panel, and I made my first appearance as an audience member on C-SPAN. What were more remarkable than this, though, were keynote speaker Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill's hard-edged assertions on North Korea. He announced that, among other things, North Korea "can have a future or it can have [nuclear] weapons. It cannot have both." In the audience, I was impressed with Secretary Hill's resolute words, particularly as they marked a stark contrast from his lighthearted nature at the outset of his speech. The Washington Post called it "the toughest response yet [to N. Korea] from the Bush administration, coming two days after Pyongyang announced plans to conduct its first nuclear test." However, I didn't appreciate the weight that Hill's words would carry until they ran through the news cycle, whereupon I quickly learned a basic DC lesson : if an event is free and open to the public, show up. Policy is made everyday at these kind of events in Washington, and you never know when you'll witness something significant (and what's more, they're usually catered). Anyhow, as a nuclear North Korea now appears to be a reality, Hill's message keeps coming back to me as I wonder how far such a hardline U.S. position can hold, or if it ever could.

Later on Wednesday evening, one of my class discussions centered on of the historical divergences in Islamic thought, the shari'a law tradition, and international conceptions of human rights. More progressive literature on the concept of an "Islamic State" suggests that the relationship drawn by more conservative and fundamentalist Muslim leaders between shari'a, the Quran, and the concept of Islamic government is tenuously substantiated at best. Bassam Tibi, among other Muslim authors, has demonstrated capably that the connection between politics and Islam is primarily rooted in historical context, not scripture. The assertion that the Quran prescribes for the creation of an Islamic system of governance is misleading. The tradition for shari'a, Tibi contends, stems from the period following Mohammed's provincial governance of Medina, but not specifically from the core revelations of the prophet while in Mecca. He writes, "In fact, shari'a is a post-Quranic construction, initiated basically to regulate, as a kind of civil law dealing with affairs of inheritance, marriage, and the like...Today, fundamentalists invent the tradition of shari'a, as an Islamic consititution of the state."

This is troubling, essentially, because radicals' promotion of an Islamic state allegedly based on shari'a allows them to marginalize international conceptions of human rights and further legitimize militant diametric opposition to non-Islamic systems of governance and law. To compound this issue, the fundamentalist position is actually continuing to gain support not only in the Middle East, where the U.S.-Iraq debacle continues to polarize Muslims against the West, but also in Southeast Asia, home to the world's most populous Muslim nation, Indonesia. I should clarify, the expansion of Islam is not the concern here, but rather the widespread propagation of a branch of any religion that seeks to divide cultures and promote violence, be it Islamic, Christian, or of any other faith. Moreover, it seems to me that the creation of a state along such lines should be disconcerting to anyone.

To summarize, I felt rather rudely awakened by this trifecta; the continuing spriral toward a planetary ecological crisis, the ever-escalating tensions over the North Korean nuclear standoff, and the proliferation of radical religious fundamentalism all pose major obstacles toward human progress and growth and taken in sum seem almost insurmountable. Yet, I'm still optimistic, probably because my goals demand that I be; if I didn't see the potential for change, I wouldn't be a student of international affairs. If major changes can be made soon in carbon emission standards and toward alternative fuel sources, perhaps we can stave off irregular climate change. If North Korea can be engaged carefully instead of provoked, then perhaps the Korean peninsula can be denuclearized (again). And if the U.S. and others can begin to retract their negative and contradictory presence in the Middle East and begin pursuing a more positive dialogue with Muslim leaders, stability can be pursued more realistically in the region, giving less ammunition for radicals who offer only disorder and betray the peaceful tenets of Islam. This all, however, depends on a change of leadership in the U.S., a subject about which I'm sure to have plenty more words come November....