Just a quick introduction: I am a second year graduate student at the University of Louisville, and the graduate assistant for the Institute for Democracy and Development at the political science department here. My particular focus is on Chinese politics and security politics.

Now, of actual interest, it seems that in Southeast Asia and the Pacific Islands there is a lot more unrest than normal. Between the coup in Thailand, talk a coup in Fiji, and unrest in Tonga,, things are a lot more unsteady than normal. I have no actual explanation to this, other than to point at indigenous factors in all three, but it is particularly striking.