Conference Program

Historically, Paraguay has had a limited international insertion. Some of the continuities that can be appreciated are the pendulum policy between its large neighbours, Argentina and Brazil, and a notorious alignment with the United States, which was accentuated from the 1950s onwards. These relations were key to the model of insertion adopted in the mid-twentieth century, which also contemplated relations with like-minded regimes, particularly during the Strato period. An example of this is the establishment of diplomatic relations with the Republic of China (Taiwan) in 1957. This decision was maintained over time despite the fact that Taiwan is currently recognised by only 13 states, of which Paraguay is the only one located in South America. For its part, the rise of the People's Republic of China (PRC) raised the debate over relations with Taipei, as Beijing's "One China" policy does not allow for diplomatic relations with both sides at the same time. This debate raises the question of how a country with limited influence, a small, open, landlocked economy and weak institutions can engage, or not, with a global power. To this end, based on the theoretical framework of International Political Economy, a case study is proposed on the dimensions of the relationship between Paraguay and the PRC, beyond the diplomatic aspect. This research aims to provide a contribution to a case that has been little studied, and specifically to an aspect of this problem that has a theoretical gap in terms of its approach.

For decades, Germany has strongly shaped the economy-focused European Union's (EU) China policy. It has prospered from the long-standing liberal internationalism paradigm in EU-China relations, contributing to more than one-third of the EU's trade with China and Taiwan. On the other hand, Germany has always been negligible politically in Taiwan Strait relations. Alarmed by China's growing power, assertiveness, and military threats, Berlin issued a long-awaited "Strategy on China" in 2023, describing China as a competitor, partner, and systemic rival. How can a middle power like Germany contribute to stabilising the international order in this era of increasing hegemonic conflict? With Taiwan being a critical case, this paper traces the German-Taiwan-China triangle interactions since 2019, when Germany and the EU began to successively outline a robust liberal internationalism (RLI) paradigm with several strategy papers positioned against authoritarianism and coercion while perceiving Taiwan as like-minded that supports democracy and a rules-based order. Using the framework of RLI, which this paper introduces, it analyses the relevant strategy papers, political events, and comments among the three under the new paradigm. Theoretically, Germany's and the EU's reformed China policies represent a signalling strategy, which, in game theory, is a set of measures that do not directly deter a third actor but attempt to demonstrate that changed action will lead to consequences a third actor wants to avoid. Embedded in the EU, this policy-innovative double-track signalling towards Taiwan and China has predictable implications in case of rule-breaking, thus shaping Germany's and the EU's application of RLI.

This paper will examine the role of Zbigniew Brzezinski and the U.S. response to the October 1973 war in the Middle East. Brzezinski, then director of the newly established Trilateral Commission, was a vocal critic of the Nixon-Kissinger response to the war. As a public intellectual and adviser to Hubert Humphrey’s 1968 campaign Brzezinski had been a severe critic of the Johnson Administration’s reliance on an early “detente” with the Soviet Union while refusing to take a more assertive effort to resolve the lingering [and dangerous] territorial issues that had emerged in the wake of the 1967 Six Day War. In the wake of the 1973 Mideast War Brzezinski warned that global stability was at risk if Israel still refused to negotiate its territorial gains while the Soviet Union moved away from “detente” to take a more assertive approach to support the “rejectionist” states in the region. In 1975 Brzezinski and the Trilateral Commission outlined a “comprehensive peace plan” in an attempt to resolve the lingering territorial disputes in the region. This plan [supported by national security adviser Brzezinski] was pursued briefly in the first year of the Carter Administration. But due largely to outside influences it was eventually reformulated into the more limited bilateral Egyptian-Israeli agreement of the Camp David Accords of 1978. This limited peace, Brzezinski warned, risked the dangers of another generation of chaotic revolts and potentially the outbreak of a larger conflict in what he called the “arc of crisis.”