Publication

This paper explains that the South China Sea has become the main driver of geopolitics in East Asia as a result of competing territorial and maritime claims and warns that growing tensions pose a serious threat to stability in the region. China and ASEAN, it argues, should take advantage of the relatively calm environment in mid-2015 to establish more effective crisis management mechanisms and to push towards formulating a formal Code of Conduct to prevent any new conflicts in the South China Sea. It then offers recommendations on how to achieve this.