In the wake of the intensifying Sino–Japanese rivalry in Asia, a new third-party market cooperation (TPMC) framework emerged in late 2018. The new mechanism was inaugurated around the time of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's visit to Beijing, displaying new attempts at Sino–Japanese economic diplomacy. Nonetheless, this article highlights the absence of major cooperative outcomes and suggests a pessimistic vision of TPMC's future, as three pairs of politico-economic gaps have led to asymmetries in the approaches adopted by China and Japan. First, a government-to-government policy asymmetry occurred between China's initiatives and Japan's responsiveness, as the latter merely utilized the TPMC as a temporary diplomatic tool to restore bilateral relations in late 2018 and appeared to have lost its policy momentum in the following years. Second, asymmetries in business modes and investment management between the two countries' enterprises have led to technical barriers in materializing the two governments' agreements into specific TPMC business collaboration. This study illustrated a project of Sino–Japanese collaboration in building a high-speed railway in Thailand, and saw this failed case as a warning for existing gaps of commercial modes. Third, both countries are now confronted with domestic underdeveloped public–private partnerships between state and private sectors. This article also aims to provide some policy-oriented implications for steadily implementing the Sino–Japanese TPMC in the future.

Why do people's preferences towards trade liberalization fluctuate? And why do we observe the eventual return of public support towards free trade? The traditional literature in international political economy has typically calculated individuals' preferences based on their comparative advantage as income-earners, which arises from their specific or general skill level or employment status. What needs to be taken into account, however, is that their economic preferences are constructed based upon their intertwined identities as both income-earners and consumers. We designed and conducted an experiment in Japan (2015) that would impartially elicit answers regarding respondents' daily consumption patterns or (and) employment concerns rather than deliberately or artificially informing them of the potential benefits or harms of trade liberalization. The results display that consumer priming offsets negative impacts arising from employment priming. The consumer effect reduces individuals' concerns on income level or employment when they are exposed to consumer and employment primings simultaneously. Furthermore, our subgroup analyses reveal that the consumer effect remains even among those experiencing economic fragility such as low income or job insecurity. This suggests that potential losers have incentives to support free trade by appreciating consumer benefits.

This study examines the political dynamics that shape legislators' policy positions on importing US meat into Taiwan during the past decade, focusing on the cases of US beef in 2012 and US pork in 2021. The trade policy surrounding this issue has become politically contentious, involving conflicting national interests and constituency preferences. Legislators face a dilemma, torn between prioritizing the interests of their constituents and aligning with their party's interests. The central argument posits that legislators affiliated with the ruling party are more inclined to advocate for or adjust their stances to support the removal of import bans on American meat, while those associated with the opposition party tend to exhibit a greater reluctance to endorse such a stance. Factors such as the legislators' constituent's interests, district vs party-list affiliations, the urban–rural divide, or education level do not consistently explain legislators' positions on the US meat trade policy. To examine these arguments, this study employs a mixed-method approach, incorporating quantitative analysis and two case studies of individual legislators. The findings of this study offer empirical support for the central proposition.