Yesterday, I published a brief analytical piece for the D.C.-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)’ Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative. In it, I mainly contrast China’s explicit commitments to engage in “self-restraint” concerning development and militarization of contested territory and features in the South China Sea–pledges it has repeatedly violated in practice–with that of Japan’s rarely acknowledged, yet decades-old, policy of actually exercising self-restraint vis-a-vis the Senkaku Islands (Diaoyu Islands in Chinese).

Suggested citation and link below:

• Adam P. Liff. “‘Self-restraint’ with Japanese Characteristics.” Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (Center for Strategic and International Studies: Washington, D.C.), March 10, 2016.