THE IMPACT OF THE 2024 U.S. PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION ON U.S.- ASIA RELATIONS: A CASE STUDY OF POLICY SHIFTS AND REGIONAL REACTIONS

Abstract

The article analyses the findings of the study concerning the effect of the 2024 U.S Presidential Election on the policies and the regional response over the U.S-Asia relations. For the study, the researcher employs only qualitative research techniques and based the study on some key policy documents and speeches, and during the interviews with the key scholars, diplomats, and policymakers, while employing the principles of Constructivism together with other theoretical paradigms which include Neo-Realism as well as Neo-Liberal Institutionalism so as to understand the activity pattern and changes of the US-Asia relationship over time. These are trade issues, security, and diplomacy. As for the trade, this paper has found the shift in focus to digital trade and economic integration in the Indo-Pacific with technology-focused sectors as key for the U.S. Currently the U.S has placed new tariffs on Chinese technology imports as a sign of competition with China. In terms of security the US has strengthened its bilateral military relations with Japan, Korea and Australia, as well as solidifying its defence guarantee to the region. The Quad and AUKUS have managed to keep pressure on China’s armed forces. Some have criticized it as overly inclined towards Washington; the ASEAN has called on both the US and China to maintain parity in power. When accepting the initiatives of the United States, ASEAN also emphasized its multilateral diplomacy and called for more regional identity. In sum, the present research pointed out the shift character of the U.S.-Asia relations in the discussed period by the elaborate mixture of competition and cooperation accompanied by strategic reconfiguration after 2024. Asian countries engage with the U.S., on a range of issues and took up China to demonstrate that politics of the Asia-Pacific is not monochromatic.