Published in March 2023

In the Pacific Island region, the movements of people, companies, and international organizations in and out of the region have had a major impact not only on the island nations in the region but also on the politics, economy, and society of countries outside the region, including Australia and the United States.
This book examines how borders and immigration policies have affected the lives of people who have experienced “movement” in the Pacific Island region, and how these have been both tools and obstacles. It also explores the effects of these policies on the immigrants and the political economy of their home countries. While shedding light on the reality of immigrants facing various vulnerabilities, the book also considers immigrants as resilient beings who are striving for self-actualization while adapting their strategies in response to changes in various regulations and restrictions.

Published in March 2023

As “late-comer public policies,” resource and environmental policies had to form relevant government organizations and institutions in the presence of already existing public policies, such as industrial and public health policies. As many environmental problems had existed in the past and then changed their forms and become apparent as social problems, they were already addressed in existing public policies. The formation process of resource and environmental policies needs to be analyzed from a long-term perspective because it tends not only to be influenced by other policies, but also to be path-dependent due to the order of relevant historical events and long-term historical trends. This book is a product of the research group on “causal relationships and social agreement in the process of environmental and resource policy formation”, which conducted research in 2020 and 2021. At the Institute of Developing Economies, research groups of almost the same members have conducted collaborative research projects since 2010, sharing a common perspective of "late-comer public policy." Their results have been published in five publications (IDE Research Series No. 605 (2013), IDE Research Series No. 614 (2015), IDE Research Series No. 638 (2019), the EPUB and on-demand publication (2021), and the English publication from Edward Elgar Publishing (2021)). This book is the sixth and final publication. In comparison with the previous five publications, this book is characterized by analyses that take into account factors of “ideas”, in addition to “interests” and “institutions”, in the policy formation process, and by examination of discussions on the “authoritarian environmentalism”. The Introduction contains further details.

Published in March 2023

In the Philippines, the Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) system was restructured in the late 1990s to strengthen human resource development and provide lifelong educational opportunities. The inclusion of TVET programs in the public scholarship system and reform of the basic education system (commonly known as “K to 12”), which took effect in the mid-2010s, have led to TVET becoming a part of the educational curriculum. The current TVET system, which was expanded to cover a total of approximately 2.5 million graduates in 2019 just before the COVID-19 crisis, is now taking shape. But this change also reflects the policy orientation of past administrations, which were forced to pursue the twin goals of “reducing the difficulties faced by young people in their initial job search” and “the continuous upgrading of domestic human resources.”

Published in February 2023

The international division of labor involving East Asia has been forced to significantly change due to US-China conflicts. With regard to production, global value chains centering on China have been rapidly restructured. As for research and development, technological decoupling is underway, and the previously open innovation system is becoming a closed system. Furthermore, skepticism is growing about the feasibility of international division of labor among countries with disparate economic systems, affecting the basis of their economic activity. With contributions from experts in economics, international politics, and area studies, this book analyzes the impacts of US-China economic conflicts on East Asia, which plays the central role in the international division of labor, and explains the responses of relevant countries and regions.

Published in February 2023

IDE-JETRO conducts research in the field of disability and development from the perspective of the social model of disability rather than the medical model of disability. The social model indicates “disabilities” as the social barriers faced by people with disabilities and considers what kind of society they see as well as what kind of relationships they have built with the state, the community, and other people with disabilities. This book investigates the relationship between people with disabilities and society. First, it looks at the present situation surrounding the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities as well as the enforcement of disability laws in the Middle East. Next, it reviews the concept of disability in traditional Islamic thought. Then, it examines policies regarding persons with disabilities as well as the present state of organizations for people with disabilities in Lebanon, Iran, Israel, and Turkey. Finally, it reviews international cooperation for and by people with disabilities in the Middle East facilitated by the Japanese International Cooperation Agency.

Published in February 2023

Ten years have passed since the start of the Kim Jong-un regime in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. As the final product of the study group on the eighth congress of Workers' Party of Korea and its new strategy—a study group within the Institute of Developing Economies—this book sheds light on the characteristics of economic reforms and foreign policies over the ten years under the Kim Jong-un regime and discusses future developments. Though the study group initially planned to analyze the situation surrounding the eighth congress, the study group faced unprecedented difficulties in gathering information, such as the fact that the full text of a project summary report was not published after the eighth congress. The study group therefore focused on gathering fragments of facts, such as those contained in official reports, actual measures taken, and descriptions of local research papers, as well as on deducing policy intentions and directions from those facts.

Published in December 2022

Moon Jae-in, who campaigned under the slogan “clearing up accumulated evils,” was elected president in the March 2017 presidential election following the impeachment and ouster of President Park Geun-hye. Against a backdrop of intensified confrontations between conservatives and progressives in South Korean politics, the election result marked the arrival of the first progressive government in nine years following the conservative Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye administrations. The process leading up to the impeachment of President Park Geun-hye intensified criticisms of collusion between politicians and chaebols and of widening and lasting social and economic disparities. Progressive politicians and intellectuals therefore strongly called for changes in economic policy. Questions then arise as to what challenges the South Korean economy has faced according to progressives, what kind of policies the Moon Jae-in administration planned and tried to implement in response, and whether the administration’s policies achieved positive results. Based on these questions, this book sheds light on the background, implementation process, results, and limitations of South Korea’s economic policies during the five years of the Moon administration, focusing on areas such as labor, chaebols and large corporations, small and medium-sized companies and startups, the external economy, and social security.

Published in October 2022

This publication is the final report of the study group on advanced applications of East Asian econometric models at the Institute of Developing Economies (FY 2019-21), which follows The Foundation and Practical Use of East Asian Econometric Models (2018) and East Asian Econometric Models: Use and Application (2020). It provides readers who have a general understanding of the content of the two previous publications with explanations on macroeconometric models and on applied general equilibrium (AGE) models and vector autoregressive (VAR) models, which complement, or are used in combination with, macroeconometric models, and thereby contributes to utilization of economic models in investigations of various phenomena.