<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> Media systems depend strongly on their political, economic, and legal environments. However, it is increasingly argued that media systems will assimilate in the course of globalisation, making a comparison based on nation-states redundant (Blum 2005: 5). Comparisons of European media systems showed that media systems develop similarly in the same regions (Hallin and Mancini 2004). On the basis of a comparison between Japan, South Korea, and the People’s Republic of China, this paper deals with the question whether this also applies to the region of East Asia. Due to the strong dependence of East Asia’s media systems on their political environment, a nationstate based comparison is still reasonable in this region. Roger Blum’s ‘extended comparison approach’ is used as a theoretical and methodological foundation for this research. This approach allows establishing a connection between political systems and media systems. It will be shown that the media systems of China, Japan, and South Korea are first and foremost dependent on the political framework within which they operate. Regional similarities exist despite different political systems, but they do so mainly on the surface. On closer examination differences prevail.</abstract>

Media Systems and Political Systems in East Asia: A Comparative Analysis of China, Japan, and South Korea

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> This paper comparatively analyses the e-waste sector in China, Japan, and Vietnam by examining progress towards the international best practice model of Integrated Sustainable Waste Management (ISWM) within each country. Through three distinct, yet interdependent dimensions of ISWM (stakeholders, waste system elements, and sustainability aspects), similarities and differences between the three East Asian countries are identified. The analysis shows that the e-waste management approaches differ substantially. The Vietnamese e-waste management approach is least consistent with the ISWM framework, while Japan complies the most with the ideals of the model and Chinese progress towards ISWM is mostly located between the two countries. However, a substantial proportion of Japanese e-waste is exported to developing countries in an uncontrolled manner. The analysis further suggests that the state of development and national characteristics have a significant impact on how the three countries approach e-waste management. In particular, the central role of the informal e-waste sectors in China and Vietnam poses a challenge to the establishment of an effective integrated sustainable e-waste management system. In light of the transnational flow of e-waste in the region, only joint actions will lead to long-term solutions to the increasing threat of e-waste to the environment and human health.</abstract>

Electronic Waste in China, Japan, and Vietnam: A Comparative Analysis of Waste Management Strategies

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> Yuánfèn can best be defined as a kind of subjectively perceived chance that brings people or people and events together. Being able to provide explanations in a positive way, Yuanfen has always functioned as an attribution, the psychological process of seeking reasons for particular events. The aim of this study was to investigate the meaning and functions of Yuanfen for university students in the PRC, which should give an insight into the meaning of the concept in a specific social context within contemporary China. The results were obtained through semi-structured interviews with 19 students from East China Normal University in Shanghai that were conducted in 2012. The data was analysed through qualitative content analysis. The findings show that if Yuanfen has individual meaning for Chinese students, attributing life events to the concept has very positive functions, leading to a positive perception of and a positive attitude towards different relationships, events, and situations. Yuanfen can therefore play a very positive role in Chinese student life, not only for the individual, but also for the social environment of university education in which the students are confronted with a range of structural and interpersonal challenges.</abstract>

The Meaning and Functions of the Concept of Yuanfen 缘分 in Contemporary China: A Qualitative Study with Students from East China Normal University

<abstract>
<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
Mascots in Japan are called kyara. They are utilised by almost all organisations, institutions, and administrative divisions and are accepted, embraced, and consumed by people of all walks of life, making them immensely popular. Although constituting an element of Japanese popular culture, they are also embedded in certain religious spaces in Japan, making them an interesting topic of research. This article will examine the reason behind the embeddedness of kyara in certain religious spaces in Japan and their impact on the practice of religion in those spaces.
</abstract>

<italic>Kyara</italic> in Japanese Religious Spaces

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<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
This case study explores the influence of a global health crisis on contemporary Taiwanese Buddhism. As prevention and control measures of COVID-19 enforced by the Taiwanese government constitute challenges and opportunities for religious actors and practice, the article examines how Hwadzan Pure Land Society (<italic>Huazang jing zōng xuehui</italic> 華藏淨宗學會) has responded to the pandemic by skilfully utilising digital technology to relocate “communal cultivation” (<italic>gongxiū</italic> 共 修) and rituals from the physical into the virtual realm. Compared to on-site participation in ritual, live streaming enables the practitioner to tune in simultaneously from every part of the world and even after the event has concluded since all videos are uploaded to YouTube. Whereas on-site participants recite and chant sūtras, bow and prostrate in front of Buddha statues, and make offerings, thus being temporally, spatially, and bodily integrated into each part of a ritual, off-site participants are detached from it in all three aspects. The communal practice viewed on the screen essentially becomes an individual practice in a secular environment far away from the sacralised space and time during the ritual. It is therefore the aim of the article to examine how religious practice and rituals in on-site and off-site settings differ in terms of religious experience.
</abstract>

Protecting the Country and Preventing Calamities: The Pure Land Practice of Hwadzan Pure Land Society in the Physical and Virtual Realm

<abstract>
 <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
 Chinese migration to Austria displays some characteristics of the new Chinese migration order facilitated by, among other factors, globalisation and the open-door policies of the People’s Republic of China. This paper offers a historical account of Chinese migration to Austria against a broader background of Chinese migration to Europe, illustrating both the active and the passive roles of Austria in various historical periods. Moreover, through delineating and analysing the distribution by subgroups and the characteristics of the Chinese community in Austria since the 1980s, it elaborates how Austria has shifted from being a temporary transit point to becoming home for the new non-qiáoxiāng Chinese migrants.
 </abstract>

Chinese Migration and Settlement in Austria

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<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
The Universal Peace Federation or UPF is a United Nations-affiliated NGO established in 2005 by Mun Sŏn-myŏng (1920–2012), the founder of the South Korean Unification Movement. Mun deemed the UPF’s formation “the most revolutionary and wondrous event since God’s creation of human-kind,” assigning the organisation a pivotal role in his millenarian project. This article continues the discussion in Pokorny and Zoehrer 2022 (which addressed the context, birth, and millenarian anatomy of the UPF), outlining the history of the UPF with a focus on its changing self-conception, leadership shifts, and global activities. It examines how the UPF has articulated and put into practice its millenarian founding ideal over the course of three stages of its development. Finally, it highlights major external and internal challenges, which not only informed the UPF’s identity-building and public perception but render the organisation systemically vulnerable.
</abstract>

The Universal Peace Federation (UPF): Origins, Development, and Challenges of the Unificationist “Abel United Nations”

<abstract>
<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
The pandemic has been a turning point in the technologies of power deployed by the state to contain and address the COVID-19 crisis. Whereas planning and discussions on the Industrial Revolution 4.0 in the Sultanate of Brunei Darussalam had been ongoing for several years, the pandemic became an unexpected catalyst for the realisation of these digitalisation plans with the launching of a onestop mobile application called BruHealth. This article sheds light on public responses to the COVID- 19 crisis, including the state’s approach in containing the virus and a critical examination on the use of the BruHealth. Upon identifying general patterns and discourses from the data collected intermittently in the period between 2019 and 2022, the article aims to be a contribution to the epistemological debates on the place of technologies in “biopolitics” on the digitalisation of personal experiences and on self-reflexivity in the fieldwork process of collecting and analysing data during the COVID-19 crisis.
</abstract>

Technologies of Power and BruHealth Biopolitics amidst the COVID-19 Pandemic in Brunei Darussalam

<abstract>
<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
This article introduces the controversy over the naming of COVID-19 as the “Chinese Virus” and the related hate crimes in the US. It focuses on a group of Chinese Christians in North America who devote themselves to defending and legitimising the concept of the “Chinese Virus” within various social media. This research analyses the content of the related texts and videos and defines the Christian far-right narrative and reviews the relationship between the Christian far-right narrative, Christian fundamentalism, and Christian nationalism. It explores the frame alignment process of American Christian nationalism and evaluates the frame bridging, amplification, extension, and transformation dynamics of the Chinese Christian far-right narrative. It discusses the similarity between Chinese Christian far-right and religious nationalism in different countries and evaluates the cultural and structural factors that contributed to Christian nationalism with Chinese characteristics. The Chinese Christian far-right narrative tends to adopt a friend/foe binary interpretation of political issues, moralise the goal of nation-building, downplay the democratic process and legal systems, and put religious communitarian values over the secular state’s responsibility to protect human rights. The Christian far-right narrative reflects a religious nationalist sentiment to exclude political, religious, and cultural others, which is fundamentalist theologically, opposing to system politically, anti-secular humanism culturally, and anti-progressive morally.
</abstract>

Understanding Chinese Christian Far-Right Narrative in the COVID-19 Context: A Cross-Disciplinary Perspective

<abstract>
<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
Throughout the two years of this pandemic, Taiwanese public authorities have obtained cooperation from religious organisations in limiting and mitigating the contagion, and the population was largely spared the influence of conspiracy theories about the virus’ origins. I have found no trace of any significant doomsday theologies among the major religions practiced in Taiwan emerging in the public health emergency caused by COVID-19. What explains this largely cooperative relationship? From the perspective of public policy, why has the government obtained the compliance of most religious actors to its directive and faced little or no opposition coming from them? I use a historical institutionalist approach to argue that decades of toleration from political leaders of all trends towards religions have generated a path dependency of mutual trust and that legacy predates the period of democratisation. The article explores the extent to which this outcome results from three factors: Taiwan’s religious diversity, or the absence of a religious hegemony opposed to the state; pragmatic and flexible theologies; and/or convergence between successive Taiwanese governments’ social policies and the social teachings of religions.
</abstract>

The Legacy of an Accommodative Secularism: Religions and Taiwan’s Responses to COVID-19

<abstract>
<title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
In February 2020, Vietnam closed its borders to prevent the emergence of COVID-19 in the country. Nevertheless, after the appearance of the first large infected cluster in March 2020, the situation gradually deteriorated since July 2020. The Vietnamese government decided to ban gatherings, and therefore certain religious practices. The religions in the country had to adapt their practices to this new situation. In this article, I will explore the situation of the Four Palaces (<italic>Tứ Phủ</italic>) and its possession ritual (<italic>len</italic> đồng). After recalling the chronology of the outbreak of COVID-19 in Vietnam, I will highlight how this worship adapted its practices in the north of the country at the beginning of the pandemic and during the Vietnamese lockdowns. Moreover, I will draw a parallel to discuss the ban of the ritual practice during the COVID-19 pandemic and the prohibition of “superstitious practices” that occurred in Vietnam between the late 1950s and the 1990s. The article will stress the importance of social media, in particular Facebook, and their uses by the mediums and followers of the Four Palaces while exploring the discourses that can be seen within the social networks.
</abstract>

The Four Palaces in Time of COVID-19 Pandemic: The Adaptation of a Vietnamese Worship between Prohibition, Safety, and Social Networks

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> In autumn 2013, Chinese President Xi Jinping presented his Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe play an important role in this ambitious infrastructure and connectivity project. The analysis of the 16+1 cooperation format, established by Beijing in 2012, shows that Beijing is able to establish new regional groupings that have the potential to undermine the unity of a larger regional bloc. Yet, it also demonstrates that China lacks a coherent BRI master plan. Rather, it pragmatically adapts its strategies to challenges and external criticism. The European Union (EU), notably the European Parliament (EP), became since 2015 more critical of the strategic impacts of BRI on Europe. Austria, which recognised the economic opportunities offered by BRI only recently, supports a common EU position. While Austria plays a strong-if not a leading-role in two Central and Eastern European cooperation mechanisms that may in the future also address BRI, that is, the Salzburg Forum and the Central European Defense Cooperation (CEDC), 16+1 remains the key institution for multi- and bilateral agreements on the New Silk Roads in this region. Austria, however, will remain only an observer and thus an ‘X’ in the 16+1+X format, reducing Vienna’s influence.</abstract>

China’s New Silk Roads. Categorising and Grouping the World: Beijing’s 16+1+X European Formula

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> Does the allocation of transboundary water strengthen cooperation among states or cause international conflicts? This is a question that is highly disputed among several scholars, whereas the arguments of both sides seem equally rational. An analogous dissent can be seen in the research area of the Mekong River. For that reason, it is rational to avoid engaging in this everlasting disagreement and rather look at the problematic question from another viewpoint. This article deals with the Mekong case from a relatively new angle by combining the concepts of power, hydro-hegemony, and coexistence of conflict and cooperation as proposed by the London Water Research Group for analysing the impacts of hydro-hegemony on water allocation. This approach enables us to observe that the power asymmetry deriving from four types of power (geographic, material, bargaining, and ideational power) gives China the position of the hydro-hegemon that is followed by five weaker non-hegemons in the following order: Laos, Thailand, Myanmar, Vietnam, and Cambodia. Despite the great number of collaborative groups, the non-hegemons have not been able to resist the hydro-hegemony of China effectively, as the unity of non-hegemons is mostly hampered by different national interests. Therefore, the bilateral relations of China with the other riparian states individually-especially with Laos and Cambodia-have been stronger than on the multilateral basis with the Mekong River Commission.</abstract>

Power Asymmetry in the Mekong River Basin: The Impact of Hydro-Hegemony on Sharing Transboundary Water

<abstract>
 <title style='display:none'>Abstract</title>
 Drawing on a variety of primary sources and numerous interviews and personal conversations with adherents from East Asia, Europe and the United States, this paper sheds light on the latest historical and doctrinal developments in the South Korean Unification Movement, following the passing of its founder and self-proclaimed Saviour, Mun Sŏn-myŏng, in September 2012. Recent personnel changes resulting in the uncontested leadership of Mun’s wife, Han Hak-cha, as well as the two key events of 2012 and 2013-Mun’s funeral and Foundation Day-will be briefly outlined. Concomitant doctrinal alterations in the interpretation of the movement’s integral millenarian vision, fleshing out as ‘Cheon Il Guk 2.0’ and entailing a revised notion of Foundation Day and the newly launched Vision 2020 scheme, will also be discussed. Ultimately, this paper shows how the Unification Movement has rendered its executive and theological base apt to preserve its systemically constitutive millenarian agenda for a post-Mun and post-Foundation Day era.
 </abstract>

‘The Millenarian Dream Continued’: Foundation Day, Vision 2020 and the Post-Mun Unification Movement

<abstract><title style='display:none'>Abstract</title> In Korea, August 15 marks both the liberation from colonialism (1945) and the promulgation of the South Korean state (1948). As a memorial day, 8.15 became to be narrated mostly as the day of liberation, while 1948 plays only a minor role. However, in the 2000s, the emergence of the New Right brought new debates on how to evaluate post-liberation history. A historical view proposing public memory on 8.15 centred on the “foundation” of South Korea emerged (kŏn’guk view). Combined with attempts to re-name 8.15 into a foundation day (kŏn’gukchŏl), an intense dispute between proponents and opponents of the re-narration was the result. This paper outlines the emergence of the New Right and traces the origins and politicisation of the kŏn’guk view and demonstrates how adopting the kŏn’guk narrative in state commemoration events led to a broad dispute in South Korean society. I trace this view’s origin to 2003 and argue that it got politicised in early 2008 during the early Lee Myung-bak administration. The politicisation resulted in a dispute in politics, civil society, and newspapers, whose progress and characteristics I analyse in detail. As a result of the 2008 Kŏn’gukchŏl Dispute, the issue of how to narrate the events of 1948 became actively discussed in academic scholarship since 2009.</abstract>

How to Place August 15 in South Korean History? The New Right, the “1948 Foundation” Historical View, and the 2008 Kŏn’gukchŏl Dispute

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Vienna Journal of East Asian Studies

 What commenced in 2009 with the chief aim to provide a platform to disseminate pioneering research especially by emerging scholars of the University of Vienna, over the years...

 What commenced in 2009 with the chief aim to provide a platform to disseminate pioneering research especially by emerging scholars of the...