Since the democratization of Indonesia began in 1998, the country’s military has been undergoing major change. It has significantly altered or is preparing to change its organizational structure, doctrinal precepts, education and training formats, and personnel policies. Partly to acquire advanced weaponry, its budget has more than tripled in the past decade. Why? Is Indonesia preparing to become a regional military power? Answering a growing potential threat from China in the South China Sea? Compensating for the loss of military influence under democratic reform? And how will the military fare under new national leadership following this year’s elections?

Evan A. Laksmana is a doctoral candidate in political science at the Maxwell School, a researcher with the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (Jakarta), and a non-resident German Marshall Fund fellow. He has taught at the Indonesian Defense University (Jakarta) and has held research and visiting positions at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (Singapore) and the Asia Pacific Center for Security Studies (Honolulu). Journals that have published his work include Asian Security, Contemporary Southeast Asia, Defence Studies, the Journal of the Indian Ocean Region, Harvard Asia Quarterly, and the Journal of Strategic Studies. He tweets @stratbuzz.

The speculation over China’s fundamental policy shift on North Korea has been particularly feverish since last year’s Korean crisis owing to the fact that there are new leaders in Beijing and Pyongyang. Many reports suggest the two former Cold War allies did not get along particularly well. The world has lately been wondering whether China has finally lost patience with North Korea, as the rift between the duo has deepened since North Korea conducted its 3rd nuclear test, despite China’s repeated counsel against the move. Even President Obama said publicly that China was "recalculating" its stance on North Korea. However, a fundamental adjustment of the Chinese policy on North Korea is not happening currently. The prospect for such a shift in the future, Dr. Lee argues, is also very slim. This points out to the limits of cooperation between China and the U.S. in East Asia, and ultimately implies their irreconcilable differences of worldviews.

Dr. Sunny Seong‐hyon Lee is 2013-2014 Pantech Fellow at the Shorenstein Asia‐Pacific Research Center. He lived in China for 11 years mostly as a diplomatic correspondent covering North Korea and the international relations of East Asia. He served as an internal reviewer for the International Crisis Group (ICG)'s security reports on North Korea. At Stanford, he is working on a book manuscript on the China‐Korea relations. He has a master's degree from Harvard and a PhD from Tsinghua University. He is also Salzburg Global Fellow and the James A. Kelly Fellow of the Pacific Forum CSIS (non-resident).

In recent years Chinese courts, in particular those in Henan Province, have begun to place a vast quantity of court options online.  This talk examines one-year of publicly available criminal judgments from one basic-level rural county court and one intermediate court in Henan in order to better understand trends in routine criminal adjudication in China.  The result is an account of ordinary criminal justice that is both familiar and striking:  a system that treats serious crimes, in particular those affecting state interests, harshly while at the same time acting leniently in routine cases.  Most significantly, examination of more than five hundred court decisions shows the vital role that settlement plays in criminal cases in China today.  Defendants who agree to compensate their victims receive strikingly lighter sentences than those who do not.  Likewise, settlement plays a role in resolving even serious crimes, at times appearing to make the difference between life and death for criminal defendants.  These findings provide insight into a range of debates concerning the roles being played by the Chinese criminal justice system and the functions of courts in that system.  Examination of cases from Henan also provides a base for discussing the future of empirical research on Chinese court judgments, demonstrating that there is much to learn from the vast volume of cases that have in recent years become publicly available.

Benjamin L. Liebman is the Robert L. Lieff Professor of Law and the Director of the Center for Chinese Legal Studies at Columbia Law School. His recent publications include “Malpractice Mobs: Medical Dispute Resolution in China,” Columbia Law Review (2013); “A Return to Populist Legality? Historical Legacies and Legal Reform,” in Mao’s Invisible Hand (edited by Sebastian Heilmann and Elizabeth Perry, 2011); and “Toward Competitive Supervision?  The Media and the Courts,” China Quarterly (2011).

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The US-Japan alliance is the longest, most stable, and most indispensable alliance in the modern history of East Asia.  It has served as the foundation for the region's security structure for well over a half-century.  However, with China's emergence as a rising economic and military power, and given territorial disputes involving China, Japan, and South Korea, and with escalating nationalistic rhetoric and fundamental disagreements over historical interpretations of the Pacific War, the United States and Japan are now facing worrisome tensions and strains that could undermine the solidarity of the US-Japan alliance.  Is the time-tested US-Japan alliance capable of managing both the shifts in the regional balance of power, and the threat of conflict over disputed territories, and the rising thermometer of nationalistic sentiments?   

Ambassador Ryozo Kato, former Ambassador of Japan to the United States from 2001 - 08, the longest tenure of any Japanese Ambassador to the United States, and former Commissioner of Nippon Professional Baseball from 2008 - 2013, has had a long and distinguished career in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Japanese Government. A graduate of Tokyo University Faculty of Law and Yale Law School, he served his country in Australia, Egypt, and the United States, in addition to multiple global assignments within the Ministry in Tokyo.

Positions which Ambassador Kato served in the United States include the Third Secretary in the Embassy (1967–1969), Minister in the Embassy (1987–1990), and Consul-General in San Francisco (1992–1994). He returned to Japan to serve as the Director-General of the Asian Affairs Bureau (1995–1997) and the Deputy-General of the Foreign Policy Bureau (1997–1999). After serving as the Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs (1999–2001), he was appointed the Ambassador of Japan to the United States of America from 2001 to 2008. He has been recognized and respected on both sides of the Pacific for his outstanding understanding of the issues and his clarity in direction to resolve them.

Mr. Rudd served as Australia’s 26th Prime Minister from 2007 to 2010, then as Foreign Minister from 2010 to 2012, before returning to the Prime Ministership in 2013. As Prime Minister, Mr. Rudd led Australia’s response during the Global Financial Crisis. Australia's fiscal response to the crisis was reviewed by the IMF as the most effective stimulus strategy of all member states. Australia was the only major advanced economy not to go into recession. Mr. Rudd is also internationally recognized as one of the founders of the G20 which drove the global response to the crisis, and which in 2009 helped prevent the crisis from spiraling into a second global depression.

As Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, Mr. Rudd was active in global and regional foreign policy leadership. He was a driving force in expanding the East Asia Summit to include both the US and Russia in 2010. He also initiated the concept of transforming the EAS into a wider Asia Pacific Community to help manage deep-routed tensions in Asia by building over time the institutions and culture of common security in Asia. On climate change, Mr. Rudd ratified the Kyoto Protocol in 2007 and legislated in 2008 for a 20% mandatory renewable energy target for Australia. Mr. Rudd launched Australia's challenge in the International Court of Justice with the object of stopping Japanese whaling in the Southern Ocean. Mr Rudd drove Australia’s successful bid for its current non-permanent seat on the United Nation’s Security Council and the near doubling of Australia's foreign aid budget.

Mr. Rudd remains engaged in a range of international challenges including global economic management, the rise of China, climate change and sustainable development. He is on the International Advisory Panel of Chatham House. He is a proficient speaker of Mandarin Chinese, a Visiting Professor at Tsinghua University and funded the establishment of the Australian Centre on China in the World at the Australian National University. He was a co-author of the recent report of the UN Secretary General's High Level Panel on Global Sustainability – “Resilient People, Resilient Planet" and chairs the World Economic Forum's Global Agenda Council on Fragile States. He also remains actively engaged in indigenous reconciliation.

In the next 20 years, the middle class in Asia is projected to swell from 600 million to 3.2 billion.  If managed successfully, this could not merely be the single largest reduction in poverty in human history, but it could also substantially improve the fortunes of many non-Asian nations, especially the U.S.   Ambassador Bleich’s remarks will discuss the planning of America’s economic, diplomatic, and security rebalance to Asia, its progress to date, and the challenges that will ultimately determine whether Asia rises peacefully and successfully or whether it fails to meet its promise or worse.  Ambassador Bleich will address in particular the choice of Australia as the focal point for the rebalance, and how the U.S. alliance with Australia and leveraging of that relationship with other allies and partners in Southeast Asia are critical elements of ensuring a successful Indo-Pacific century.

Ambassador Jeffrey Bleich served as United States Ambassador to Australia from 2009-2013. His tenure in Australia was marked by a commitment to expanding Australia and the United States’ broad alliance by promoting security, advancing free trade, promoting human rights and expanding collaboration in education, space, energy and technology. He recently received the State Department's highest award for a non-career ambassador, the Sue Cobb Prize for Exemplary Diplomatic Service. Immediately prior to his nomination for ambassador in 2009, Ambassador Bleich served as Special Counsel to President Obama in the White House.

Ambassador Bleich recently rejoined Munger Tolles & Olson as a partner resident in the San Francisco office and will focus on international and domestic litigation and counseling, with a particular focus on privacy and data security, investigations, trade and cross-border disputes.

Ambassador Bleich received his law degree in 1989 from the University of California at Berkeley, Boalt Hall School of Law, where he was editor-in-chief of the California Law Review and Order of the Coif. He graduated from Amherst College magna cum laude with a B.A. in political science and holds a masters degree from Harvard University’s School of Government. He has also been awarded honorary doctorates from both U.S. and Australian universities.

As in the United States, over the decades Korean domestic politics developed in dynamic ways that helped to shape the country’s foreign policy. In particular, Korea-U.S. relations have been influenced by changing political environments in both countries. Seoul and Washington have come to learn through hard experience that the domestic dimensions of foreign policy cannot be ignored if the alliance is to be managed well and unnecessary conflicts avoided. On the divided Korean Peninsula, North Korea continues to pose the primary challenge to the alliance, and in the eyes of South Koreans the achievement of Korean unification may be the ultimate test of the Korea-U.S. alliance. Few people are as qualified to address these complex issues as Dr. Jin Park, a former three-term member of the National Assembly, where he served as Chairman of the Foreign Affairs, Trade and National Unification Committee.

Dr. Jin Park is currently Chair Professor at the Graduate School of International and Area Studies, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. He is also working as the Executive President of Asia Future Institute, an independent policy think-tank. The purpose of the institute is to research on the future development of Asia and to promote Korea’s role in the region. Dr. Park served in the 16th, 17th, and 18th Sessions of the National Assembly, representing the Grand National Party (renamed to Saenuri Party) in the central Jongno District in Seoul. While in politics, he served as the Chairman of Foreign Affairs, Trade and National Unification Committee of the National Assembly between 2008-2010. He graduated from the College of Law, Seoul National University, Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, New York University Law School and received a doctorate degree in politics from St. Antony’s College, Oxford University. He is the Vice President of Korea-America Association, a member of the New York State Bar, and is a regular member of the Seoul Forum for International Affairs. Dr. Park received Honorary Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE) from Queen Elizabeth II. He speaks Korean, English, Japanese, and conversational Chinese.

There are four serious island disputes in East Asia: from north to south, the Southern Kurile dispute (Russia vs. Japan), the Liancourt dispute (two Koreas vs. Japan), the Pinnacle dispute (Japan vs. two Chinas) and the Paracel-Spratly dispute (two Chinas vs. Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei). All of these territorial disputes involve a perception of historical injustice by one of the parties. Japan's territorial claim against Russia is closely linked to the rancor over the Siberian Deportation (1945-56); Korea's territorial claim against Japan reflects the rancor over Japan's colonization (1910-45); Chinese territorial claims against Japan are rooted in the response to Japan's major invasion of mainland China going back to the Manchurian Incident (1931-45); and Vietnamese passion for the territorial claim against China is linked to the Sino-Vietnamese War (1979-89), among other things.

In this talk, the speaker will argue that the four territorial disputes over relatively unimportant islands in East Asia have persisted for such a long time not because of the contest for natural resources or the inherent importance of those territories but because of perceived historical injustice. If these disputes are to be settled now, the solutions therefore have to be political, taking perceived justice and injustice in consideration

Tetsuya Toyoda, has been teaching international law and constitutional law at Akita International University since 2007. Before that he was a project researcher at the University of Tokyo (2006-2007) and an official of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (1994-2000). He graduated from the University of Tokyo (Faculty of Law) and obtained his Diplôme d’Etudes Approfondies from the University of Paris II-Panthéon-Assas. He is also a Visiting Professor at the Far Eastern Federal University, Vladivostok, Russia.