Structured Abstract
Purpose – This research analyzes the validity of the Biden administration period’s cooperation as a deviant case within the quasi-alliance model’s expectations for the period while exploring the compounding impact of building trilateralism in the U.S.-Japan-ROK relationship and U.S. involvement in Japan-Korea conflict issues.
Design – This research conducts an embedded multiple-case study design, exploring two cases with two embedded units of analysis each. The first case operates within the past quasi-alliance application by researchers in the Obama and Trump periods, applying a constructed structured framework of analysis on the building trilateralism and the United States’ involvement in defining conflict issues of the 2015 Obama-era ‘comfort women’ agreement and the 2019 Trump-era GSOMIA conflict. The second case analyzes the U.S. commitment to security made by the Biden administration through an aspect of the quasi-alliance model and applies the structured framework of analysis on the building trilateralism and U.S. involvement in the 2023 Biden-era forced labor compensation plan.
Findings – The research findings contribute to the understanding that articulating the United States’ involvement in Japan-Korea conflict issues as pressure is well-founded and that the impact of that pressure within the alliance system is multidirectional. Additionally, this research argues the importance of the compounding factor of the building trilateralism, as it impacts susceptibility to pressure over time and the accessibility for further progression through using past agreement foundations. Moreover, these research findings support the interpretation of the Biden administration period’s cooperation as a deviant case within the quasi-alliance model’s expectations for the period and discuss the future applicability of the model for the U.S.-Japan-ROK case. Specifically, the analysis’s findings elaborate on the past concerns for the model in the post-Cold War era and propose the additional difficulties it will face as the effort to build trilateralism continues to move the relationship between a quasi-alliance and alliance theory interpretation.
Value – This research expands on gaps in security studies’ theoretical frameworks, deepens understanding of a unique aspect of alliance management, produces observations on the United States’ involvement in a critical relationship, and supports the benefit that aspects of building trilateralism and pressure in the alliance system hold in supplementary analysis.
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Matthew F. FLEMING 