Educating for Peace: The Influence of Study Abroad on Asia–Pacific Leadership, 1975–2025

Tangonan, Kevin

Educating for Peace: The Influence of Study Abroad on Asia–Pacific Leadership, 1975–2025

James Alexander Gordon on 27th November 2025

Author Information

Kevin Tangonan, University of Maryland Global Campus–Hawaii, United States

Abstract

This paper investigates how study abroad experiences have shaped the leadership orientations and peace-related policy choices of Asia–Pacific political leaders over the past fifty years (1975–2025). Drawing on a qualitative review of all 162 heads of state across 18 countries in Northeast and Southeast Asia, the study assesses whether foreign post-secondary education correlates with diplomacy-oriented governance by examining interstate conflict behavior, regime type, participation in multilateral organizations, and engagement in bilateral or multilateral agreements such as FTAs, defense treaties, and cooperation frameworks. Case studies of leaders including Junichiro Koizumi, Park Geun-hye, Ma Ying-jeou, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, Lee Hsien Loong, and Thaksin Shinawatra illustrate how exposure to democratic norms, transnational networks, and intercultural environments can encourage cosmopolitan identity formation, negotiation, and peaceful conflict resolution. To provide contrast, the study also examines autocratic leaders, some of whom were educated abroad, such as Deng Xiaoping, Pol Pot, Vladimir Putin, Min Aung Hlaing, and Kim Jong Un, showing how entrenched authoritarian orientations can override the moderating effects of foreign exposure. Their governing styles amplify neorealist, unilateral, and nationalist tendencies, as well as political-psychology dynamics like cult-of-personality leadership, resulting in weaker commitments to international norms and greater willingness to employ coercive or conflict-prone behavior. Using comparative case studies and process tracing supported by content analysis of speeches, policy documents, and biographical accounts, the paper clarifies its analytical procedures while acknowledging the difficulty of isolating causal influence amid multifaceted political and social variables. Preliminary findings suggest that although foreign study is not determinative, it is a meaningful and understudied contributor to peace-oriented leadership with implications for regional stability and political behavior research.