The book analyses the Asian experience from both Asian and European perspectives.

Towards Monetary and Financial Integration in East Asia is an important book. East Asia, led by China, has been and will continue to be the largest, most rapidly growing region in the world. Major global imbalances persist, with East Asia in large surplus. Yet East Asian financial and monetary integration is only in the early stages of what will necessarily be a long-run process. These 14 essays by different authors address, in six Parts, fundamental long-run issues and prospects. These include the development of a regional financial architecture, liquidity provision and crisis management, surveillance mechanisms, exchange rate arrangements, currency baskets, an Asian Currency Unit, and ultimately even a single currency. The implications of the rise of China and the role of Japan underlie much of these analyses. However imperfect, the EU is the dominant relevant experience for East Asian financial and monetary integration. It is important to understand, as the authors do, that it took 47 years from the EU s nascent founding to the establishment of the euro, and that economic integration has preceded political integration. This book importantly addresses such basic issues in this time frame and with an appreciation of the political economy difficulties of financial integration. Hugh Patrick, Columbia University, US The book edited by Professors Hamada, Reszat, and Volz gives a comprehensive overview of the current status and challenges of economic integration in East Asia. Monetary and financial integration in East Asia has proceeded gradually but steadily since the Asian financial crisis of 1997 98. The book is an authoritative cutting-edge collection of papers in respective topics which brings the reader to the frontier of the literature. Takatoshi Ito, University of Tokyo, Japan This indispensable book provides a comprehensive analysis of monetary and financial integration in East Asia. It assesses the steps already taken toward financial integration and brings forward different proposals for future exchange rate arrangements in what has now become the world s most dynamic region. With contributions from distinguished experts this timely book evaluates the economic and politico-economic arguments and conditions for monetary and financial integration in East Asia. It explores how and to what extent the countries of the region can integrate despite their heterogeneity and their underlying political tensions. Drawing on the European experiences, this book analyzes the economic logic of monetary and financial integration in East Asia and its political feasibility. This invaluable broad analysis will be of interest to academic researchers, students, policy-makers and professional economists working on matters of international economic cooperation, common currency areas, international open economy macroeconomics, and East Asian integration.

Regional economic integration has become a key force in international commercial policy in the 2000s. Europe has traditionally embraced regionalism; the United States became actively involved in preferential trading arrangements only in the 1980s. While Asia has been late in accepting formal regional economic integration accords, all Asian countries are now in the process of creating various free-trade areas and other forms of economic integration programs, and some are already in place. This volume analyzes the regionalism trend from an Asian perspective. It considers the lessons from, and the economic implications of, various economic integration programs in the OECD (mostly the EU but also NAFTA), as well as the proposals for closer economic integration in the region itself. Chapters deal with both real and financial integration issues.

The current economic crisis has called into question the long term viability of the decoupling between multinational firms and the banking system. It has also cast serious doubts on the US dollar-centred monetary system, and invited reassessment of the long term viability of US-China economic relations based on a US current account deficit absorbed by Chinese financial institutions. It is also an opportunity to analyse the rise in property prices, particularly in fast-growing economies. Long term food security is also an issue, bringing to the fore the multinational firms from emerging economies (such as China and India) and calling into question the response strategies of multinational firms from the West and Japan. This book engages these key issues within the broad theme of integration, to give an up-to-date consideration of the subject, opening debate on the future stimulating role that Asia could play vis-à-vis the West, particularly the European Union.

East Asian countries were notably uninterested in regional monetary integration until the late 1990's, when the Asian financial crisis revealed the fragility of the region's exchange rate arrangements and highlighted the need for a stronger regional financial architecture. Since then, the countries of East Asia have begun taking steps to explore monetary and financial cooperation, establishing such initiatives as regular consultations among finance ministers and central bank governors and the pooling of foreign exchange reserves. In this book Ulrich Volz investigates the prospects for monetary cooperation and integration in East Asia, using state-of-the-art theoretical and empirical tools to analyze the most promising policy options. --

This book reviews and analyses East Asian economic integration by looking at China-ASEAN economic relations and the China-ASEAN Free Trade Area (CAFTA). The book explores the economic relations between China and ASEAN after the Cold War ended, investigates China's motives to establish the CAFTA (China-ASEAN Free Trade Area) and evaluates economic integration in East Asia, in which both China and ASEAN hold key roles. Much of the research is based upon interviews which the author conducted with key policy makers in China.After providing a theoretical framework and discussing methodology the author provides a background on economic cooperation between China and ASEAN from the 1980's onwards. China's role in trade and investment cooperation before and after 2001 is also analyzed as are China's shifting motives for cooperating with ASEAN. The author also looks at the features and the future for East Asian economic integration. Much of the research is based on Chinese language sources which are not usually referred to in western works in this field.

This comprehensive Handbook provides an in-depth analysis of the nature of East Asian economic integration alongside thoughtful insights into contemporary issues, such as agricultural development, structural transformation and East Asian trade, alongside skills and human capital development policies of ASEAN. Contributors also provide detailed explanations on trade, poverty and Aid for Trade, institutional reforms, regulatory reform and measuring integration.

This interdisciplinary book analyses the regional economic integration and its institutionalisation that has been pursued in East Asia since the late 1990s and its far-reaching impact for the entire region and beyond. It presents the specificity and evolution of East Asia’s economic integration as well as its outcomes in the form of an impressive number of FTAs concluded by East Asian countries. The book also addresses the region’s institutionalised regionalism of the 21st century, embodied by the recent establishment of two mega-regional institutions for trade and investment facilitation – Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) and Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), analysing their economic potential and impact on East Asian economies as well as on regions, including Europe. Additionally, the book offers a comprehensive analysis of integration theories, providing political and economic theories of integration and related conceptual discussions, which may help understand the uniqueness of the East Asian model of integration. The book will be useful for students and researchers in economics, international relations and political science, as well as government administrations and private businesses developing long-term strategic plans towards the region of East Asia.

International production networks in manufacturing, particularly in machinery industries, have rapidly developed over the last two decades, resulting in dramatic increases in intra-regional and intra-industry trade, providing a key source of regional growth, integration and development in East Asia. This book provides a better understanding on how to effectively further increase SME participation in East Asian production networks, and in doing so identifies key challenges and issues that they need to address. This book aims to not only fill the theory-practice gap, but also to lay solid foundations for designing national arrangements and a regional institutional frameworks to further encourage and support SME engagement and participation in regional and global production networks. The book contains several country case studies and by drawing upon individual country experiences, at various stages of economic development, this book demonstrates the varying difficulty faced by SMEs in ASEAN member countries attempting to participate in regional production networks and highlighting differences in needs and policy priorities. This book offers both a more focused theme on the assessment of globalization and a rather unique approach by focusing upon the particular importance of SMEs, and by utilizing micro-level data at the firm or plant level. Its policy insights and the richness and uniqueness of the empirical findings will make the book an invaluable contribution to understanding East Asian production networks.

Throughout North Korea’s history, it has regarded external relations with suspicion and as a potential threat to its regime. With North Korea working towards denuclearization, there is now hope for an economic opening. This book examines the external economic strategies that North Korea may consider for its reforms and development, which are related to the East Asian economic integration process. This book emphasizes that considering theoretical factors as well as conditions of the North Korean economy, economic opening and integration should have high priority, anteceding or at least being parallel to economic reforms and transformation. Also, among various alternative strategies for achieving the goal of economic reform and development based on economic opening, the utilization of East Asian regional economic integration framework would be the best option for North Korea, because this framework can provide an opportunity for North Korea to overcome structural problems in its external economic relations and to circumvent political conflicts, thus leading to a smoother rapprochement towards economic opening. This book is timely as it shows how a new economic recovery strategy on the Korean Peninsula may be accomplished.