Global pop star Justin Bieber has sparked controversy in Asia after he uploaded photos of his visit to Japan’s controversial war shrine. During a visit to Tokyo with his mother on Wednesday, Justin Bieber posted photos of himself at Japan’s controversial Yasukuni Shrine on his Instagram account, sparking outrage in some Asian countries.

While people often discuss historical problems in the bilateral relationship between China and Japan, they normally only see history as a background issue for the current tension and thus refrain from taking any actions. Most people also believe that it would take a long time to see any result from changes to the historical narrative and history education.

From territorial disputes in two of Asia's major seas to the nuclear crisis in North Korea, Chinese and US officials have exchanged sharp words - a trend that analysts say has heightened China's frustration over what it perceives as intensifying efforts to contain its rise.

Public Diplomacy: A Global Phenomenon

In 2013, at least 136 countries were active in public diplomacy, both as principals and/or receivers, and PD activity took place in every region of the world. As represented in Figure 1, the United States, China, India, Russia, Israel, and the United Kingdom were the most mentioned actors in PD stories throughout the year.

The conventional wisdom on U.S. alliances in Asia, at least in the West, Japan, and Taiwan (but not necessarily in South Korea), is that they are broadly a good thing. One hears this pretty regularly from U.S. officials and the vast network of U.S. think tanks and foundations, such as the Center for Strategic and International Studies and the American Enterprise Institute, and their many doubles in Asia.

Mainland academics argued that China was the first to discover the disputed Diaoyu Islands and insisted this be taught in schools, days after Japan declared the contrary in its elementary school textbooks.

Having generated considerable turbulence in East Asia with his nationalistic policies, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe appears to be walking back his reactionary stance on modern history—at least in public.