INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF CHINA STUDIES

Introduction: Southeast Asia and Taiwan’s New Southbound Policy (NSP)

Karl Chee Leong LEE — 2023-12-31

Welcomed to the December 2023 Issue of International Journal of China Studies (IJCS) in 2023. Unlike the previous June 2023 Issue, this is the first Special Issue published under the watch of the new Editorial Board of IJCS. As part of IJCS’ agenda to feature current and pressing issues revolving around the Greater China region, we are encouraged by the great interests surrounding Taiwan and its international roles to run a Special Issue pertaining to the island nation’s relations with Southeast Asia.

Reporting Public Diplomacy at Home: Taiwanese Media News Coverage of the New Southbound Policy

Tonny Dian EFFENDI — 2023-12-31

Public diplomacy is about attracting foreign public attention; however, domestic public support is no less critical. The domestic public's support and understanding are equally essential to diplomatic activities abroad, and it depends on the information they receive about the policy. When the Taiwanese government claims that NSP (New Southbound Policy) received positive support from the public, how do they make those claims? What kind of information about the NSP is received by the Taiwanese public? This study analyzes the NSP-related news in Taiwanese media to answer this question. It focuses on Liberty Times Network (LTN) and United Daily News (UDN) coverage of the NSP since 2016. The text and sentiment analysis of their reports show that although they have different political orientations, overall, both LTN and UDN are generally positive in their reporting on NSP, although UDN is more critical. These results indicate that media polarization occurred in the report, sentiment analysis shows that the difference was insignificant. This situation may indicate that in the case of the NSP case, media polarization in Taiwan is not in effect for shaping public opinion.

Taiwan’s New Southbound Policy and Disaster Preparedness Cooperation: The Cross-Sectoral Partnership in Practice

Alan H. YANG — 2023-12-31

Natural disasters are common challenges faced by Asian countries and seriously threaten people’s lives and social stability. Therefore, more adequate regional cooperation is needed to jointly respond. As Taiwan has actively promoted the people-centered New Southbound Policy (NSP) since 2016, various initiatives and plans to strengthen social resilience and common interests have been implemented one after another. Among them, the NSP cooperation with specific focus on disaster prevention and HADR
is of specific importance. The initiative is a positive and pragmatic move to promote partnership between Taiwan and its neighboring countries. This article delineates the common challenges and threats facing the Asian region - natural disasters. It - with the analysis of how the NSP serves as a facilitator for Taiwan’s cooperation with partner countries in disaster prevention thereby fostering forge resilient partnerships. In fact, academic research on this critical topic remains relatively scarce. Since the NSP’s cooperation on disaster preparedness encompasses the cross-sectoral partnership, mirroring the essence of the identical to the P-P-P-P modality.
This aspect merits thorough investigation and deeper exploration, it is indeed worthy of in-depth investigation. Hence, this article is structured into four parts. The first part works as the introduction, the second part delves into introduces the rationale behind the NSP, focusing on that is, the P-P-P-P cross-sectoral partnership., while the third part addresses how theNSP facilitates disaster prevention cooperation and what are outlines its defining characteristics? Finally, the article concludes by offering insights and prospects for the NSP.