Faculty Research Forum: Eurasian Maritime Geopolitics

Description

Join Kent E. Calder in conversation with Andrew Mertha on the changing significance of Eurasian sea lanes, with introductory remarks by Peter M. Lewis, vice dean for faculty affairs, as part of the Faculty Research Forum event series hosted by the SAIS Office of Faculty Affairs.

Eurasian Maritime Geopolitics by Kent E. Calder examines the strategic geography of the sea lanes from Northeast Asia through the Indian Ocean to Europe, through which much of the world's energy and information flows. Calder shows how changing technology and economic patterns have profoundly transformed the global significance of those passageways since the end of the Cold War, with fateful consequences for the strategic calculations of both the U.S. and a rising China. The decline of the U.S. shipping and shipbuilding sectors, coupled with the rise of their Chinese counterparts, is a major part of this hybrid equation.

The book provides readers with a history of the changing economic role of the sea lanes as well as the decline of U.S. maritime competitiveness. It chronicles how maritime flows of energy, commodities, and information through submarine cables have increased. Calder's clear eyed assessment documents the uncertainties relating to Eurasian sea lanes stretching from Taiwan to the Red Sea and beyond in the post-Ukraine world.

A light lunch will be provided at this event.