4 May 2020, NIICE Commentary 4471
Anushka Saxena
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) as an international forum for cooperation among Southeast Asian nations has been through a lot, ever since its inception. When the ASEAN was formed in 1967, it aimed to create a cohesive group of non-communist nations which were willing to counter China’s increasing interests in communism in Southeast Asia, and were seeking regional political and economic support in a post-colonial setup. Today, the ASEAN sits at the centre of one of the world’s most geo-strategically vital region, the Indo-Pacific.
For a long time, the term ‘Asia-Pacific’ was used to describe the region encompassing the Asia that lied in the Western Pacific Ocean (including East Asia, South and Southeast Asia, and Oceania). However, the term ‘Indo-Pacific’ was coined later to define a priority towards the Indian Ocean Region. The Indo-Pacific can be understood as a framework for maritime cooperation, marked by the presence of the ASEAN at the centre, and stretching up to the ends of the maritime routes that connect this centre with India, Africa, Australia, West Asia (Iran and Syria) and Northeast Asia (North Korea). The Indo-Pacific strategy sits at the underbelly of ASEAN’s maritime power, and serves as the big thing that will drive the attention of the world away from the transatlantic, projecting it towards the rising giant that is ‘Asia’. But the region comes with its contentions – with China’s rising maritime aggression and its long-term ambition of becoming world’s number one, as well as with the emergence of a power rivalling the ASEAN, called the ‘Quad’ (short for Quadrilateral Security Dialogue), there is a significant uncertainty as to what the Indo-Pacific means for the region and the world, and who gets to be the leader in the Indo-Pacific narrative.
Players of the Game
The Indo-Pacific is home to 60 percent of the world’s transit trade, making it a strategic hub and a central location for maritime connectivity. The Strait of Malacca, one of the world’s most important chokepoints for maritime oil trade, lies here. It also houses the vision for an Indo-Pacific Economic Corridor, one that aims to create a transnational trade network connecting South and Southeast Asian nations among each other and with the world. Many of the nations that can be found in the Indo-Pacific are allies to the Asia Pacific Economic Corridor (APEC) and China’s Belt and Road initiative (BRI). At the same time, the region also faces volatilities due to operation of pirates on the seas, the fear of massive interference from the US and China, and the general lack of dynamic leadership, which has been the case mostly because of conflicting Indo-Pacific strategies from the three important players in the region – China, the US and the ASEAN – and the various alliances they bring with themselves.
In 2016, Japanese President Shinzo Abe first talked about the “Free and Open Indo-Pacific Strategy” (FOIP), which has come to be an important part of the US and the Quad approach to the region. The Quad, comprising of the US, Japan, Australia and India, follows this somewhat cohesive strategy of creating an Indo-Pacific that is ‘free’ and ‘open’ for the partners, and is modelled on good regional governance and freedom of navigation. The FOIP has emerged as somewhat of a counterargument to the ASEAN’s “Open and Inclusive Indo-Pacific”, a strategy that the Association has been working on since January of 2018. The ‘inclusivity’ that the ASEAN talks about and the US opposes, refers to China’s inclusion in the region.
It must be noted here that the ASEAN’s engagements with China have been on the rise ever since the two became signatories to a Free-Trade Agreement (FTA) in 2002. Owing to the failed efforts of some ASEAN nations in being able to follow an FTA among themselves, and their increasing dependence on China for infrastructural, trade and economic support, has led them to become much closer to China than they would like. At the same time, China’s increasing presence in Southeast Asia, either through the BRI, or through its maritime aggressiveness (as evident in its ‘String of Pearls’ strategy, or its bullying mechanisms in the disputed South China Sea), threatens the stability in the Indo-Pacific. Vietnam has complained time and again about China’s military interferences in the Paracel and the Spratly Islands (islands which are claimed by both China and Vietnam). Despite being the chair of the ASEAN, Vietnam has been unable to unite ASEAN member states against China in the South China Sea. The ASEAN faces a similar dilemma in dealing with the US, primarily because the US-ASEAN economic ties are on the rise, but the strong relations of certain ASEAN nations (such as Thailand and the Philippines) with China are a bone of contention for the US. The balance game that the ASEAN member states are attempting to play, both with China and the US, is a major causality for why the global fate of the Indo-Pacific narrative is yet to be determined.
The ASEAN Outlook on Indo-Pacific, which was released as a strategy document in 2019, defined the efforts the ASEAN will be making in creating an Indo-Pacific area based on the values of mutual trust, openness, inclusivity, transparency, good governance, respect for sovereignty, a rules-based order, and most importantly, non-intervention (however, there is no direct mention of China or the US in this context). At the same time, it agrees to the “freedom of navigation” that the US emphasizes on as well. However, there is no mention of any military or defense strategy that the ASEAN will be collectively undertaking to deal with threats in the Indo-Pacific, nor does it talk about the tensions created by US-China adversity in the region, the nuclear ambitions of North Korea, or the internal factors within the ASEAN that may act as obstacles to the success of this strategy. The fact that the charting of this Outlook was an endeavour undertaken by Indonesia, a member state that is known to be the representative mediating party of the ASEAN, may work well in emancipating its image to China or the US (especially since the country wished to generate an Outlook that neither challenged the US FOIP nor China’s BRI or String of Pearls). The effort may also reiterate the idea that the role both, the Indo-Pacific and the ASEAN, play in Jakarta’s foreign policy, is vital.
Way Forward
The ASEAN as a forum is yet to decide what it exactly is. Is it an economic cooperative among Southeast Asian nations, aiming to create a mutual economic boom and reduce inequalities? Does it wish to emerge as a hegemon in the Indo-Pacific, having countered the shenanigans of China and the US successfully? Does it wish to act as the centre of trade and maritime connectivity for the world? Or is it a legal, social and political multilateral body for Southeast Asian nations that aims to resolve disputes and take necessary action against threats to the region? Some believe, the ASEAN is yet to define the priority of its existence, despite its achievements. The ten nations that the ASEAN comprises of represent a diverse spectrum of identities and political affiliations in the forum. The economic and military capacities of member nations also stand at disparity – while Singapore remains one of the most developed free-market economies, Cambodia is one of the poorest nations in the world. Poverty, inequality and a lack of focus on Sustainable Development continue to ail ASEAN member countries. The inability of the ASEAN in being able to bring about the consent of all members in policymaking and acting on issues that concern the region, which can be seen as a consequence of intra-ASEAN disparities.
The ability of the ASEAN to address its internal conflicts, and to reach a consensus among member nations on how to deal with the hindrances in its Indo-Pacific Strategy, is yet to be determined. In the context of the Indo-Pacific, the ASEAN must adopt a similar approach of discussion, debate, accommodation of dissent and rigorous implementation of the blueprint that emerges forthwith, by all members. It can only be achieved through collective action in the grouping on dealing with China and the US, and through the creation of a Joint Action Plan that addresses the economic inequalities in the region, and attempts to resolve them through cooperation, which is restricted among ASEAN members itself.
