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The bio-medical model of 'mental health' and 'mental illness' that relates to the relationship between wellbeing and distress informs psychopathology and dominates conceptualisation in many Western Educated Industrialised Rich Democratic (WEIRD) populations. This paper aims to critique the model, questioning the appropriateness of psychopathology as a conceptual framework when working as a Western trained clinician with populations such as in China, Japan, Asia, the Middle-East and Africa. The paper also considers the cultural appropriateness of western notions of psychopathology when working inter-culturally in relation to the Inter-Agency Standing Committee (IASC) Guidelines on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in Emergency Settings, and the Review of the Implementation of the IASC Guidelines on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in Emergency Settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the ties between Latin America and Asia by moving beyond the homogenisation of the two regions through elevating the importance of opposition to a third party, in this case an "imperialist" and developed North. In contrast to normative analyses based on outmoded conceptions of world history, it proposes an intellectual exercise that problematises the interregional bond by placing the emphasis on heterogeneities rather than broad bush approaches that ignore the complex and diverse national and regional realities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The analysis of international and collaborative publication trends in prominent behavior‐analytic journals has been a topic of interest for behavioral researchers. This paper focuses on publication trends from 1997 through 2020 in three prominent journals: Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior (JEAB), Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis (JABA), and Perspectives on Behavior Science (PBS). The variable of interest was the percentage of articles published per geographical category—Australasia/East Asia, Europe, Latin America, Middle East, North America, and Africa. The results showed that 79, 96, and 87% of the published articles in JEAB, JABA, and PBS, respectively, were conducted by researchers with a North American affiliation. Furthermore, 12, 4, and 4% of the articles in JEAB, JABA, and PBS, respectively, were coauthored by at least two researchers from different geographical categories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There had been constant efforts by nation-states to explain the States’ behaviour and the complexities of the international political system. Realism and Liberalism emerged as notable theories to understand these complexities. Realism focused on power acquisition, Liberalism stressed economic development and cooperation. As the global political landscape became more complex during the cold war days as a result of the emergence of new states- different theories and ideas were marked obscure. The academic insights of neorealism and new liberalism set new parameters to evaluate the state’s behaviour during the cold war days. There were again more practical efforts in post-cold-wars days by the academic community of international relations to restudy the changing behaviour of states with a new lens of analysis. It paved the way for both offensive and defensive realism. This paper investigates. Mearsheimer’s offensive realism as the offshoot of neorealism. It further develops a critical appraisal based on deductive research methodology to evaluate the reliability of this theoretical offshoot. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Schools provide an ideal setting for early, accessible intervention according to research conducted in developed countries for adolescents experiencing adverse mental health (MH). Many schools in South Asia, however, lack structured and standardized school counselling services. Research indicates that where services do exist, students are reluctant to access them due to perceived high risks and low benefits in MH help seeking. This paper explores the challenges experienced in MH provision from the perspective of school counsellors. A qualitative approach was chosen, and three main themes emerged from the data using the thematic analysis: negative perceptions of MH and counselling, the unwillingness to invest in MH services, and the challenges inherent in the system itself. The findings reveal cultural implications behind these challenges and suggest grassroots level initiatives that can be implemented within schools to reduce the barriers to service provision without the need for legislative changes at a national level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

National power has been an important discriminative signal for the evolution of great power competition and international patterns in recent years, not only in terms of the relative resource scale of the state but also in terms of the efficiency of resource use. Based on the two levels of national resources and conversion mechanisms, this article uses the entropy method to establish national power comprehensive assessment index systems covering 144 countries and 38 indicators from 1990–2020. At the same time, based on power transition theory (PTT), this article uses quadratic assignment procedures to verify the relevance and interpretation of international bilateral relations in the national power gap. The conclusion is that technology and economic elements are especially important for national power, and the conversion mechanism is icing on the cake rather than a decisive factor. The competition among great powers is transformed into nontraditional competition rather than an arms race; the international pattern has gradually developed from one superpower to a multipolar trend, and the global economic and geopolitical center has transitioned to Asia. The rise of China and the recession in the U.S. are factual; as the gap between the two countries' power narrows, their international relations become increasingly tense, confirming power transition theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes the international reserve accumulation behavior of emerging and developing economies facing "keeping‐up‐with‐the‐Joneses" externalities. I first document empirical evidence for a significant Joneses effect, which has been particularly persistent in Asia and Latin America since the late 1990s. This peer‐pressure motive could encourage excess reserve hoarding, providing a rationale for cooperation. I then develop a theoretical model of the borrowing economy featuring the Joneses effect and the interdependence between reserves and domestic capital investment. Numerical results show that international cooperation can effectively internalize negative externalities associated with competitive reserve hoarding and induce welfare‐enhancing resource allocations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

India has used civilizational discourses as part of its foreign policy to articulate its rise and rightful place in the world order. This article primarily examines India's civilizational arguments in south Asia. India's civilizational arguments in the region demand scrutiny as the neighbourhood is a theatre of contestation between territorial India and the claims of its civilizational space. Analysing historical accounts on Indian civilization, official documents and domestic narratives in India about south Asia, the article makes three points. First, India's civilizational articulation oscillates between two paradigmatic and contrasting representations of Nehruvianism and Hindutva variants. Second, it is argued that despite the ascendancy of Hindutva 's civilizational symbolism since 2014, India's south Asia policy shows no paradigmatic change. Finally, it points to how the Hindutva project may be detrimental to India's self-image and dealings in south Asia. The article argues that while there is no official corroboration of Hindutva 's claims in India's south Asia policy, the increasing salience of the domestic discussions around Akhand Bharat (undivided India) invites complications for India in its neighbourhood. India's Hindutva -driven civilizational claims raise anxieties of an Indian cultural hegemony in an asymmetric region splintered across territorial and nationalistic lines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Past studies have shown that disease threat increases people's hostility towards immigrants. However, in our survey (N = 9571) conducted in five advanced Asian economies during the outbreak of COVID‐19, we found that COVID‐19 vulnerability was positively associated with support for immigration. Drawing on insight from policy feedback theories, we propose that the positive association is caused by the presence of widespread border crossing restrictions, which have changed the meaning and cost implications of COVID‐19. As the outbreak expands, the pandemic has become not just a threat to people's health but also a barrier to globalization. Consequently, people who are worried about the disease may see globalization processes, including migration, as signs of pandemic relief. We find supportive evidence in our analysis. First, the positive association between COVID‐19 vulnerability and support for immigration is more salient among respondents who considered restrictions on international travel to be stringent. Second, the positive association between COVID‐19 vulnerability and immigration attitude was mediated by perceived economic threat from the pandemic and contribution by immigrants towards the containment of the pandemic. These findings suggest that disease control measures adopted at the global level may alter certain widely accepted effects of disease threat on immigration attitudes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given extensive trade ties, Asia is critical not only for the prosperity of the European continent, but also for the secure flow of goods and services. Unsurprisingly, the EU has repeatedly stated that the EU's essential interests are closely tied up with developments in Asia, and with the foreign and security policies of the region's main players. But how much of this rhetoric has been translated into actual security alignments and cooperation between the EU and Asian partners? It is the aim of this article to examine existing security alignments between the EU and Asia in three ways. One is to examine the forms (inter-regional, sub-regional or bilateral) by which EU-Asia security alignments are advanced. The second is to explore the security areas (military versus non-military ones) in which alignment has either been advanced or not and to what extent. The third is to assess how existing EU-Asia security alignments are affected by geo-political changes, such as through the increasing technological, political and military strength of China, the growing political and military Sino-American rivalry, and the post-Covid environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Strategic links between Japan and Europe during the Cold War were limited. During this period the IISS helped bridge the gap between the two, exposing its membership base to the international affairs of Asia and Japan and providing Japanses scholars, strategists and diplomats with a platform from which to amplify their voices in the West. Analyses by these experts often appeared in IISS publications, but the Institute also gained key insights through its well-established conferences and lecture series. These initiatives illuminated Japanese strategic thinking and perspectives on contemporary critical issues in Japan's and Asia's foreign, security and defence policy. This Adelphi book, through its collection of earlier analysis, helps the reader to understand the evolution of Japanese strategic thought from the 1960s until today, and shines a light on the continuities and changes in this thinking. New, original analysis of the material seeks to identify areas where such thinking was prescient and remains relevant to the contemporary strategic environment, and other areas where predictions failed or assumptions were proved wrong. These new essays were also informed by interviews of Japanese senior scholars and diplomats who spent time with the IISS. This book seeks to frame, educate and guide strategic thinking on the most pressing issues of today, both in and outside Japan and Asia, and will be of great interest to analysts, practitioners and students of international affairs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Strategic links between Japan and Europe during the Cold War were limited. During this period the IISS helped bridge the gap between the two, exposing its membership base to the international affairs of Asia and Japan and providing Japanses scholars, strategists and diplomats with a platform from which to amplify their voices in the West. Analyses by these experts often appeared in IISS publications, but the Institute also gained key insights through its well-established conferences and lecture series. These initiatives illuminated Japanese strategic thinking and perspectives on contemporary critical issues in Japan's and Asia's foreign, security and defence policy. This Adelphi book, through its collection of earlier analysis, helps the reader to understand the evolution of Japanese strategic thought from the 1960s until today, and shines a light on the continuities and changes in this thinking. New, original analysis of the material seeks to identify areas where such thinking was prescient and remains relevant to the contemporary strategic environment, and other areas where predictions failed or assumptions were proved wrong. These new essays were also informed by interviews of Japanese senior scholars and diplomats who spent time with the IISS. This book seeks to frame, educate and guide strategic thinking on the most pressing issues of today, both in and outside Japan and Asia, and will be of great interest to analysts, practitioners and students of international affairs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This introductory article provides rationales and contextual background for the special issue which examines how weak states in Asia actualise and exercise their agency in the twenty-first century regional or global environments. The article opens with a consideration of why attention is drawn to the agency of the weak. Weak states are often treated as 'objects' of international politics rather than 'subjects', and their foreign policy actions are commonly taken to be 'reflexive' of external constraints, such as fluctuations in the balance of power in the international system. We disagree with this view. We argue that weak actors can demonstrate varieties of agency regardless of their position in the international system in terms of material capabilities. To clarify this point, the article reflects on the changed and changing global and regional environments and order. Rather than seeing them through the lens of great power politics and its signature concept of 'polarity', the article offers an alternative notion, namely a 'multiplex' world, and identifies the key nature of order therein: multiplicity and fluidity. Both material and normative power have already and continue to become fragmented, decentralised, and dispersed within and across states. While emphasising that such a multifaceted and fluid world opens up a wide avenue of agency for weak actors, this article also notes that the weak has varieties of agency as potentials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

East Asian countries are historically tied to each other, and sport mega-events provide an important venue in which we can observe the contemporary and changing relations between countries and their people. This study illuminates how the 2018 PyeongChang Olympics provided concentrated exposure to encountering Asian countries and athletes in both mediated and personal ways. It examines how the PyeongChang Olympics contributed to transforming South Korea's structures of feeling towards its neighbouring countries. By analyzing Korean news reports and online comments on the Olympics, it explores South Korea's changing attitudes, responses, and reactions to North Korea, Japan, and China. An analysis of the media representation and online responses both configures and reflects the changing characteristics of nationalism in Korea in tandem with the growing importance of its regional connections under the influence of globalization. This study shows that the PyeongChang Olympics serves as a platform for crystallizing regional connectivity and sensitivity both in positive and negative ways. It contends that the national-regional-global frame is both useful and necessary for understanding the impacts of sport mega-events not only on the reconstituted national and regional identities of the local society and people but also on societal and political relations in contemporary East Asia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past few decades, South Korean popular culture has not only attracted a great deal of interest in neighbouring Asian countries, but has also penetrated the West, becoming a global phenomenon. This is not the first time that the world has experienced a cultural wave from the Korean Peninsula. The Asian martial arts craze that swept the West in the 1970s and 1980s would have been incomplete without such Korean contributions as Taekwondo, Hapkido and others that introduced the world to Korean culture long before the Hallyu of the late 1990s and early 2000s. With this in mind, a closer examination of the Korean martial wave can be instrumental in understanding the country's current cultural interactions with the rest of the world. This article analyses the forces behind this wave by dividing them into two dichotomic categories: those originating from Korean culture and society (the transmitter), and those generated by cultural and social processes in the rest of the world (the receiver). The article concludes that the transmitter's promotional efforts contributed to the overall success of Korean martial arts expansion to a far greater extent than the forces on the receiving side. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the establishment of a new primary care cancer collaborative research network in the Asia-Pacific region, Asia-Pacific Primary Care Cancer Research Group (APPCCRG). APPCCRG was formed with representatives from Singapore Primary Care Cancer Network and primary care cancer research institutions in Malaysia, Hong Kong, and Australia. Its membership was multidisciplinary, with individual backgrounds in clinical epidemiology, oncology, and cancer community support.