In this, the third edition, the CIDOB Foundation, Casa Asia and the Real Instituto Elcano have once again made use of their experience and expertise to create a tool for the purpose of evaluating the current situation of the region from a multidisciplinary standpoint. To this end, the volume is divided into five complementary sections: Politics, Security, Economy, Culture and Society.

The Asia-Pacific Annual 2006 contains recurring references to subjects such as the search for Asian values in the context of the discarding of traditional structures of social organisation, in addition to examining the nature of Asian modernity, both as a phenomenon in itself and as a foreign import deriving from a fascination with the Other, or even as a reminiscence for a western colonialism that has marked both parties profoundly.

Also, the Annual features analyses of the exponential growth experienced by the main Asian economies and the positive effects of this for the more than 100 million people in Asia who have emerged from extreme poverty in the past decade. 2006 was also a year in which a general increase began to be noted in economic inequality among members of Asian societies. Likewise, there was an increase in challenges to governability in some states whose governments are still unaccustomed to dealing with an internal dissent that is growing in tandem with the degree to which countries are opening up to the rest of the world, as well as the desire among civil society for free expression.

Furthermore, a number of worrying tensions of a geopolitical nature were experienced between States during 2006, and which intensified international relations in this area. With respect to East Asia, these tensions derived from situations such as North Korea's attempts at nuclear proliferation, the rise in extremist nationalism in Japan and the development of ethnic or religious-based conflicts through insurgent groups, in some cases linked with international terrorism.

The Annual offers a compendium of such activity in its Conflicts Appendix, which contains specific articles on the conflicts in Afghanistan and North Korea, the permanent crisis in Central Asia, the violence in India and analyses focused on the Islamic Republic of Iran.

All the sections are accompanied by appendices that include chronologies of the main events, a section of maps and data on each country, as well as the more than 200 statistical indicators featured in the section 'The Asia-Pacific region in figures'.