Series:

CSIS Reports

16 total works

Cover of A U.S.-Indonesia Partnership for 2020
A U.S.-Indonesia Partnership for 2020 explores avenues to boost cooperation in all three of these pillars. Political and security relations between the United States and Indonesia have grown more robust in recent years. Trade and economic relations, while growing, remain contentious. This study assesses progress on these two pillars, along with the under-resourced field of people-to-people collaboration, and offers recommendations to take the partnership to the next level in each area.

Cover of The South China Sea in Focus
Satellite imagery and geospatial analysis tools offer an unprecedented opportunity to harness new technologies in order to help resolve boundary disputes. The South China Sea in Focus: Clarifying the Limits of Maritime Dispute uses these tools to provide a first and necessary step toward tackling the overlapping maritime disputes in the South China Sea: determining which waters are and are not in dispute under international law. The report opens with a set of geographic information system (GIS)-based maps that provide an easily understandable benchmark against which policymakers and academics can judge the claims and actions of the South China Sea claimants. More detailed color maps and methodological information follow for those who want to dig deeper into the claims and the report's conclusions.

Cover of Enhancing India-ASEAN Connectivity
Twenty years ago, India launched its "Look East" policy. For most of those 20 years, Myanmar's isolation, mistrust between India and its neighbors, and poor infrastructure connectivity hindered the development of links between South and Southeast Asia. With Myanmar's tentative opening and improved relations between India and Bangladesh, an opportunity exists for India to boost trade and security ties with mainland and maritime Southeast Asia. And the United States, during President Barack Obama's second term, is committed to rebalancing toward Asia, with India playing a pivotal role. With these facts in mind, CSIS presents key recommendations in the areas of diplomacy and security, infrastructure and energy, and enhancing people-to-people collaboration among India, ASEAN, and the United States.

Cover of Building a More Robust U.S.-Philippines Alliance
With elections in both the Philippines and the United States in 2016, the future of the alliance must be institutionalized to ensure that it is not diminished by a change of leadership in either country. A new Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement and cooperation in the South China Sea are important components of the new era of relations, but they are not and should not be the only defining features of the alliance. Given the long history of U.S.-Philippine relations, the alliance must be based on more robust cooperation across the spectrum of political, security, economic, and sociocultural relations. Security concerns provide an acute impetus for leaders to put more energy into the relationship, but its sustainability will require a more comprehensive focus.

Cover of Examining the South China Sea Disputes
The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) hosted its fifth annual South China Sea conference in July 2015. This compilation features papers from some of the top experts in the United States and Asia, who presented during the day's panels. Bill Hayton, Bonnie Glaser, and Wu Shicun discuss recent developments in the South China Sea; Pham Lan Dung and Tran Huu Duy Minh explore legal issues surrounding the disputes; and Ian Storey, Patrick Cronin, Renato Cruz de Castro, and Peter Jennings examine various aspects of the military balance and regional order.

Cover of A Rebalanced Transatlantic Policy Toward the Asia-Pacific Region
In 2014, the CSIS Europe and Southeast Asia Programs embarked on a two-year initiative to create a new and enduring EU-U.S. collaborative mechanism to enhance transatlantic Asia-Pacific policy coordination and understanding. This report is the culmination of this two-year study and presents the findings of the research while also offering actionable recommendations for U.S. and EU policymakers.

Cover of The Kremlin Playbook
Russia has cultivated an opaque web of economic and political patronage across the Central and Eastern European region that the Kremlin uses to influence and direct decisionmaking. This report from the CSIS Europe Program, in partnership with the Bulgarian Center for the Study of Democracy, is the result of a 16-month study on the nature of Russian influence in five case countries: Hungary, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Latvia, and Serbia.

Cover of The Kremlin Playbook 2
In The Kremlin Playbook 2: The Enablers, the CSIS Europe Program and the Center for the Study of Democracy explored whether some of these jurisdictions and companies could be enabling forces that amplify Russian malign economic influence in some countries in Europe. The study analyzed the following case study countries: Austria, Czech Republic, Italy, Montenegro, the Netherlands, and Romania. The report shows that some countries facilitate or enable Russian malign economic influence, and by doing so these enablers actively participate in the weakening and discrediting of their own democratic structures.
The Kremlin Playbook 2 concludes that Russian malign economic influence and illicit finance operate in a financial gray zone that is a clear and present danger to U.S. national security as well as transatlantic security. To push back against this threat, the United States and its European allies must take decisive action to limit Russia's malign behavior in their financial systems. Only transparency and enforcement of our rule of law can guarantee trust in the system and rebuild confidence in democratic institutions.

Cover of Crossing Borders

Crossing Borders

by Heather A. Conley and Donatienne Ruy

Published 15 September 2018
In recent years, Europe has seen its largest influx of migrants and refugees in decades, with 1.9 million arrivals to the continent between 2014 and 2017. Peak arrivals in 2015, and sustained flows since then, have found the European Union and its 28 member states unable to face what has been called the "European migration crisis." Part of their response has focused on cooperation with third countries of transit or origin, by leveraging development, humanitarian, and foreign policy tools to try and reduce migrant flows to Europe, including through many funding and budgetary decisions. This report attempts to quantify, through budgetary analysis, what shifts occurred in the external dimension of Europe's migration policy following the crisis, and in three member states (Germany, Sweden, and the Netherlands). These short-term shifts, representing policy priorities, carry long-term consequences for the European Union's role as a foreign policy and soft power actor.

Cover of A New Era in U.S.-Vietnam Relations
A New Era of U.S.-Vietnam Relations examines the history of the relationship and offers concrete recommendations for policymakers in both countries to deepen cooperation across each major area of the relationship: political and security ties, trade and economic linkages, and people-to-people connections.

Cover of From Strength to Empowerment

Cover of Developing an Enduring Strategy for ASEAN
The U.S.-ASEAN Strategy Commission was organized by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) to provide useful and practical recommendations to American policymakers with the objective of developing a long-term U.S. strategy to deal with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries and the ASEAN organization. The commission's recommendations and findings are based on thorough research, including meetings in the region over the past eight months with high ranking political and business leaders and on the extensive experience that commission members have had with the ASEAN countries over many decades.

Cover of Sustainable Energy Futures in Southeast Asia
Potential sales of billions of dollars of energy equipment produced by U.S. companies are at stake in the major economies of the region. They are expected to import as much as $16 billion worth of energy products over the next few years to power their economic growth. But unless the United States launches new initiatives to snare sizable shares of this investment, U.S. companies are unlikely to be major players in all this trade.

Cover of Evaluating Future U.S. Army Force Posture in Europe
This report offers a reexamination of U.S. Army posture in Europe amid heightened tensions between the United States and Russia over the geopolitical orientation of Ukraine. This study reviews Russian military capabilities; considers alternative U.S. force posture arrangements; assesses how to determine whether assurance and deterrence goals are being met; and offers concrete recommendations in order to optimize the U.S. Army's presence in Europe to deter Russian aggression against the most vulnerable NATO members.

Cover of Contested Seas

Contested Seas

by Andrew Metrick and Kathleen H. Hicks

Published 19 March 2018
Operations in littoral waters present numerous challenges for modern navies, challenges that are especially acute in the waters of the Baltic Sea and around Northern Europe. Russia's increasing menace above, on, and under the waves-combined with its deployment of new and upgraded maritime capabilities and considerable commercial and civilian activity in the region-calls for enhanced vigilance from the United States and its allies and partners. This report explores the changing nature of maritime domain awareness (MDA) in the Baltic Sea and Norwegian Sea and offers recommendations for establishing effective MDA in these basins. Ultimately, the challenges in these regions necessitate multilateral, networked, and cost-effective solutions that leverage advancing technology and enhanced operational concepts.

Cover of The Kremlin Playbook 3