John SEAMAN
Research Fellow, Center for Asian Studies
Research Interests:
- Chinese energy and raw materials policy
- Geopolitics of Asia (esp. energy, natural resources)
- U.S.-China and Europe-China relations
- U.S. strategy in the Asia-Pacific
- Chinese industrial strategy and foreign policy
- Political economy of East Asia
- Critical raw materials (esp. Rare Earth Elements)
John Seaman joined Ifri in 2009, where he specializes in the geopolitics and political economy of energy and natural resources in Asia, with a focus on China and Japan. He also conducts research on China's industrial strategy and foreign policy, the U.S. strategy and policy in East Asia, Europe-China relations, international relations and geopolitics in East Asia, and the political economy of critical raw materials (incl. rare earth elements).
Mr. Seaman holds a Master in International Affairs - International Security from Sciences Po, Paris, a Bachelor of Arts in International Economics from Seattle University, and studied as a NSEP David L. Boren Scholar at the Beijing Center for Chinese Studies (2002-03). In the summer of 2011 and 2013 he was a visiting researcher with the Energy and Environment Program of the Canon Institute for Global Studies (CIGS) in Tokyo, Japan and was an International Research Fellow with CIGS until 2018. He has spent a number of years studying and working in both China and Japan.
The upcoming Paris climate conference (COP21) is opening the door to a new post-2020 climate regime in which China and other large emitters will have to provide strong evidence of their domestic efforts in addressing global warming in the next century.
Asia is now a nerve center for global economic activity and a theatre of some of the most pressing security concerns of our time. So important has Asia become to global affairs today, and ostensibly for the decades to come, that many have already dubbed the 21st Century as the “Asian Century”....
China’s economic development has brought it to the center of natural resource markets.
China is poised for a dramatic increase in its demand for natural gas. As total energy demand has risen to record levels in the last five years, China has found itself in an increasingly difficult bind: the social and environmental burden from coal is becoming too heavy to bear and a growing...
As tensions persist between China and Japan in the East China Sea, it is interesting to note that one of the most symbolic actions of the previous crisis has yet to make an appearance this time around.
For China, coal is a crucial source of abundant, indigenous and affordable energy and is a pillar of economic and social stability. From a logic of energy security, and because the industry itself maintains a formidable political presence through the sheer fact of its history and size, this...
Deepening their partnership, Ifri and the Canon Institute for Global Studies (CIGS) are launching a series of op-eds, written both by Ifri and CIGS experts. This new series aims at providing the European and Asian public with...
There is a valuable lesson to be learned about raw material dependence from the tensions between China and Japan in the East China Sea. It’s not about the oil and gas that is thought to be stored under the seabed in disputed waters, but rather the so-called “rare earth elements”, of which...
An ominous resource crunch in the so-called “rare earth elements” is now threatening the development of a number of key industries from energy to defense to consumer electronics. As key components in the latest generation of technologies, including specialized magnets for windmills and hybrid...
In recent decades, China's transformation from a regional energy supplier to one of the world's largest net energy importers, in particular with regards to oil and gas, has led to an increasing sense of energy insecurity in Chinese policy circles. Guaranteeing adequate supplies of energy to...