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With high emissions of aerosols and the known world's "Third Pole" of the Tibet Plateau (TP) in East Asia, knowledge on the energy budget over this region has been widely concerned. This study first attempts to estimate the present-day land energy balance over East Asia by combining surface and satellite observations as well as the atmospheric reanalysis and Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) simulations. Compared to the global land budget, a substantially larger fraction of atmospheric shortwave radiation of 5.2 % is reflected, highly associated with the higher aerosol loadings and more clouds over East Asian land. While a slightly smaller fraction of atmospheric shortwave absorption of 0.6 % is unexpectedly estimated, possibly related to the lower water vapor content effects due to the thinner air over the TP to overcompensate for the aerosol and cloud effects over East Asian land. The weaker greenhouse effect and fewer low clouds due to the TP are very likely the causes of the smaller fraction of East Asian land surface downward longwave radiation. Hence, high aerosol loadings, clouds, and the TP over East Asia play vital roles in the shortwave budgets, while the TP is responsible for the longwave budgets during this regional energy budget assessment. The further obtained cloud radiative effects suggest that the presence of clouds results in a larger cooling effect on the climate system over East Asian land than that over the globe. This study provides a perspective to understand fully the roles of potential factors in influencing the different energy budget assessments over regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An understanding about the dynamics of social protection spending is made in the context of structural and institutional performances. A dataset of 134 countries for the period 1999–2018 is used for analysis. Rank Analysis is made conditional on (1) fiscal budgeting; (2) structural landscapes, and (3) the institutional performance measures to generate and utilize budget efficiently. In Rank Analysis, no one country is securing the same locus in all conditions. North America and Europe & Central Asian countries are much focused on social protection spending as compared to the East Asia & Pacific, South Asia, and Sub-Saharan African countries where these countries have the least preference for social protection. In order to determine the budget for social protection purposes, the structural landscapes (GDP-per-capita, GDP-shock, Urbanization, and working-age-population), while the institutional performance via improving voice & accountability, regulation quality, and control of corruption is effective to utilize the funds for social protection purposes in an optimal way. The international organizations need to introduce the social protection programs especially in East Asia & Pacific, South Asia, and Sub-Saharan African countries that will effectively protect and prevent people from poverty and contribute to the economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the leadership capacity of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to promote international relations in East Asia. It is stated that the ASEAN Secretariat is staffed by only 243 officials and operates on an annual budget of only 9,050,000 dollars, which weakens its capacity. It is stated that ASEAN's capacity to influence great power relations in Asia does not emerge from its institutional makeup, but from social relationships with its member-states.

From 2012 to 2017, the Philippines' bottom-up budgeting (BUB) programme was a government initiative that leveraged participation to ensure the public were involved in crafting their own development programmes. This article advances notions of formal and informal spheres of participation to understand how the BUB empowered people by taking part in various participatory processes. The case study shows how participation is inherently political, but it cannot be disregarded as a potent tool for exercising democracy. The article highlights the potential of participatory practices in popular and informal spaces without abandoning the formal spheres of participation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The cloud feedback is very important for climate change. In this paper, the long-term variability of clouds in East Asia and their influence on the radiation budget are studied quantitatively by analyzing satellite observations, so as to determine the cloud feedback on regional warming. We firstly analysis the 18-year's (Mar.2000-Feb.2018) trend of cloud optical thickness (COT) over East Asia based on the retrievals of the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MODIS), and calculate the cloud radiative forcing of water cloud and ice cloud using BCC_RAD radiation transfer model based on the COTs, and then discuss the impact of COT's variation on the cloud radiative forcing. The water cloud COTw is found to increase in northeast China (~0.05 per year) and east China sea (~0.05 per year), and to decrease at south China (~-0.07 per year) and south Japan (~-0.05 per year). The ice cloud COTi is found to increase at northeast China (~0.06 per year) and north Japan (~0.08 per year), whereas decrease significantly at Tibetan plateau (~-0.07 per year). The annual mean shortwave-, longwave- and net-radiative forcing caused by the water cloud in East Asia at the top of the atmosphere are -72.4 W m-2, 15.7 W m-2 and -56.7 W m-2, respectively; the corresponding forcing caused by ice cloud are -88.5 W m-2, 55.7 W m-2 and -32.7 W m-2 respectively. The effects of COTw and COTi variations on radiation in different regions are different remarkably. Both positive feedback (e.g. south China, 0~0.4 W m-2 per year) and negative feedback (e.g. northeast China, -0.4~0 W m-2 per year) occurs, which indicates that the cloud feedback to regional warming is significant and may be opposite at different areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]