In recent years, numerous analysts have warned of an increasing risk of war in the Taiwan Strait. Others, however, have argued that military conflict remains unlikely, and that the risk of war should not be over-hyped. Drawing from his recent book titled War and Peace in the Taiwan Strait, Professor Scott Kastner outlines a framework to assess the prospects for military conflict between China and Taiwan. Besides reviewing the several causal pathways through which a Taiwan Strait conflict could occur, he will assess how broad trends in China-Taiwan-US relations affect the likelihood of these different scenarios and conclude with policy suggestions for how actors in Beijing, Taipei and Washington could mitigate the risks of a war in the Taiwan Strait.
This event is organised by Yale-NUS College, in partnership with the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy and Yale Jackson School of Global Affairs, and supported by the Tan Chin Tuan Chinese Culture & Civilisation Programme.
About the speaker
Professor Scott L. Kastner
Professor, Department of Government and Politics, University of Maryland, College Park
Scott L. Kastner is a Professor in the Department of Government and Politics at the University of Maryland, College Park. His research and teaching interests centre on international politics and East Asia, and his books include Political Conflict and Economic Interdependence across the Taiwan Strait and Beyond (Stanford University Press, 2009); China’s Strategic Multilateralism: Investing in Global Governance (Cambridge University Press, 2019; with Margaret Pearson and Chad Rector); and War and Peace in the Taiwan Strait (Columbia University Press, 2022). His work has also appeared in journals such as International Security, International Studies Quarterly, Journal of Conflict Resolution, and China Quarterly. He graduated from Cornell University and received his PhD in Political Science from the University of California, San Diego.
About the moderator
Associate Professor Chin-Hao Huang
Associate Professor of Social Sciences (Political Science), and Head of Studies, Global Affairs, Yale-NUS College
Chin-Hao Huang is Associate Professor of Political Science at the National University of Singapore, with appointments in both the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy and Yale-NUS College. He serves as co-chair of the International Affairs programme at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy and is also the Head of Studies for Global Affairs at Yale-NUS. He is the author of three books, including, most recently, Power and Restraint in China’s Rise (Columbia, 2022), which received Honorable Mention for the T.V. Paul Best Book in Global International Relations. His research has been published in leading disciplinary journals such as International Organization, Perspectives on Politics, Foreign Policy Analysis, and The China Quarterly among others and he has testified on China’s foreign and security policy before the US Congress. He has also served as a consultant for US and European foundations, governments, and companies on their strategies and policies in Asia. His work has been featured in media outlets such as BBC, Bloomberg, CNBC Asia, Financial Times, and TIME. He received his B.S. with honours from Georgetown University and PhD in political science from the University of Southern California.
