Foreign Policy and East Asia: Learning and Adaptation in the Gorbachev Era (review)

Reviews 601 Mark, D. M. L., and G. Chih. 1982. A Place Called ChineseAmerica. Dubuque, Iowa: Kendall/ Hunt Publishing Company. Miller, S. C. 1969. The Unwelcome Immigrant: The American Image ofthe Chinese, 1785-1882. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University ofCalifornia Press. Nee, V. G., and B. D. Nee. 1972. Longtime Californ': A Documentary Study ofan American Chinatown. New York: Random House. Portes, A., and L. Jensen. 1987. "What's an Ethnic Enclave? The Case for Conceptual Clarity." American Sociological Review 52: 768-771. Sanders, J. M., and Nee, V. 1987. "Limits ofEthnic Solidarity in the Enclave Economy." American Soàological Review 52: 745-767. Sung, B. L. 1967. Mountain ofGold: The Story ofthe Chinese in America. New York: Macmillan. Wilson, K. L., and A. Portes. 1980. "Immigrant Enclaves: An Analysis ofthe Labor Market Experiences of Cubans in Miami." American Journal ofSociology 86: 295-319. Charles E. Ziegler. Foreign Policy and EastAsia: Learning and Adaptation in the Gorbachev Era. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. xii, 197 pp. Hardcover $49.95. Paperback $16.95. During the Cold War, most ofthe field ofinternational relations held to rigid structural models that, ultimately, failed to predict the radical changes seen in Soviet foreign policy under Gorbachev. Similarly, the field of Soviet studies was for years mired in an almost exclusive focus on so-called "East-West" relations between the two nuclear superpowers, with inadequate attention being paid to regional policy in areas other than Europe. Fortunately, since 1991, there has been a rapid growth in the literatures on foreign policy learning and on Soviet/Russian policy in the Asian-Pacific region. But the two fields have rarely crossed paths. Charles E. Ziegler's new book fills this gap and makes a valuable contribution that is both theoretically sophisticated and empirically well written. Ziegler's key argument in the book is that domestic factors—rather than international pressure—influenced Soviet policy change during the Gorbachev era. He uses Soviet policy in East Asia as a canvas to show evidence ofSoviet "learning " (changes in the goals, rather than simply the means ofpolicy), focusing alternatively on relations with the People's Republic ofChina, Japan, and the two Koreas.© 1995 by University A subsequent chapter looks at learning specifically in the area ofsecurity policy. ofHawai'i PressThe book emphasizes a number offactors that contributed to learning in the late Gorbachev period: generational change in the top Soviet leadership, economic stagnation, and a new Soviet openness to information. Ziegler soundly re- 602 China Review International: Vol. 2, No. 2, Fall 1995 jects arguments based exclusively on international events—such as the "hardline " policies of the Reagan Administration—showing painstakingly how the timing ofSoviet policy changes failed to follow American pressure. Instead, he argues that changes in East Asian policy had a close correlation either to Soviet domestic events or to accommodative policies by China and other countries in the region. Interestingly, one ofthe subscripts ofthe book is that the Reagan and Bush administrations often failed to learn, despite ample signs of change in Soviet politics during the 1980s. Students offoreign policy learning will be particularly interested in Ziegler's finding that certain factors in late authoritarian systems may actually be more conducive to policy innovation than the interest-group politics common in established democracies. For Gorbachev, Ziegler notes: "The transition period between systems . . . provided a 'window ofopportunity' for a leader intent on radically transforming Soviet foreign policy . . . and not yet constrained by the contradictory demands of a pluralist political system" (p. 168). Central to the reasoning behind the changes in Soviet policy in East Asia was a redefinition by the Gorbachev leadership of the notion ofpower. Where previous Soviet leaders fixated on the military dimension, Ziegler shows—through analysis ofkey speeches, economic overtures in East Asia, and military force reductions —that the Gorbachev leadership placed a high value on economic power. It was this element that made Soviet policy in East Asia unique, especially as the Soviets became interested in learning from the economic success of the NICs and other Asian powers (including China). Each of the case study chapters makes good use oftrade statistics and visits by high-level officials (as well as by academics ) to substantiate these points...