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This paper analyzes how the current Global Value Chain (GVC) of East Asia has been established, and attempts to project the future trajectory of GVC under New Normal in the global trading system. For this purpose, the framework of Ideology-Technology- Institution nexus is presented with focus on the dynamics of interplay between ideology and technology, duly recognizing the dual-aspect of technology- a platform for business and also for national defense. The paper analyzes how the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) of the 1990s played a role of "facilitator" in shaping the GVC of East Asia, where China plays 'factory for final assembly' and the US plays 'the largest consumer'. Under New Normal, digital technology is likely to play the opposite role of "disrupting" the GVC of East Asia, unlike ICT. The paper explores the mechanism behind this great disruption. What is driving New Normal is the US-China power competition, seeking for dominance in East Asia and beyond. This paper argues that New Normal is not temporary shock, but will last for some time. Under this presumption, the paper presents three scenarios for the future trajectory of GVC in East Asia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

East Asia's Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) came into force in 2022 as the world's largest free trade agreement. RCEP was concluded, signed and brought into force in the face of major international uncertainty and is a significant boost to the global trading system. RCEP brings Australia, China, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand into the same agreement with the ten member ASEAN group at its centre. It keeps markets open and updates trade and investment rules in East Asia, a major centre of global economic activity, at a time of rising protectionism when the WTO itself is under threat. The agreement builds on ASEAN's free trade agreements and strengthens ASEAN centrality. One of the pillars of RCEP is an economic cooperation agenda which has its antecedents in ASEAN's approach to bringing along its least developed members and builds on the experience of capacity building in APEC and technical cooperation under the ASEAN Australia-New Zealand Free Trade Agreement. There is an opportunity to create a framework that facilitates deeper economic cooperation that involves experience-sharing, extending RCEP's rules and membership at the same time as strengthening political cooperation. The paper suggests some areas that might be best suited to cooperation -- that is confidence and trust building instead of or before negotiation -- and discusses how non-members may be engaged and the membership expanded. Options such as multilateralising provisions and becoming a platform for policy convergence and coordinating unilateral reforms are canvassed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) agreement, signed in November 2020, comes shortly after the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) entered into force and the US-China Trade War escalated. We use a computable general equilibrium model to assess the long-term effects of these three developments on income, trade, economic structure, factor returns and employment across the world, and especially in Asia-Pacific countries. The results suggest that RCEP could generate income gains that will be almost twice as large as those of the CPTPP, and that the two agreements together will largely offset the substantial negative effects of the US-China Trade War for the world as a whole. All three policy developments, but especially RCEP, will deepen East Asian production networks and will raise productivity and increase wages and employment in much of East Asia. At the sectoral level, regional trade in non-durable and durable manufactures will experience the most growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]