[eChapters]Australia's Foreign Economic Policy and ASEAN (About the Author)

In this book, Jiro Okamoto explores the development of Australia's foreign economic policy towards ASEAN. He examines in detail decisive factors such as changes in the international and regional environment and the replacement of a dominant policy coalition with another in Australia's domestic policy process. His analysis shows that the shifts in Australia's ASEAN policy have not only closely reflected changes in Australia's overall foreign economic policy orientation, but that Australia's ASEAN policy strongly drove the change at key junctures. His work also offers important insights into the prospect of an "inclusive" economic integration process in East Asia. Although Australia's foreign economic policy has been an important element in regional economic cooperation, its inclusion in the East Asian integration process still remains ambiguous.