Forging a regional security community a study of the driving forces behind ASEAN and east asian regionalism 4

186 A The security environment in Northeast Asia A remarkable feature of post-Cold War Northeast Asia is the growth of economic interdependence among Japan, China, and South Korea, desp

Contrary to claims that the ASEAN Way of cooperative security is the most

important factor in promoting Northeast Asian regionalism, this study found that

it is only one of several determinants The ASEAN Way has both strengths and

weaknesses The major criticism against the ASEAN Way (especially the ARF)

is that it is a mere ‘talk shop’ and unable to progress to the more important stages

of preventive diplomacy and conflict-resolution But the ASEAN Way is seriously weakened by the constraints of sovereignty and non-interference It is

favoured by most of the ASEAN members and China, but opposed by the Western powers and Japan The strength of the ASEAN Way is its important role

in keeping channels of communication open among its great power members It

is able to play a useful role, by default, because of Sino-Japanese rivalry The

ASEAN Way is making a useful contribution by promoting ‘soft’ regionalism,

where there is growing economic cooperation but no progress in regional political integration Besides the ASEAN Way, there are five critical determinants that can explain the dynamics of Northeast Asian regionalism over

the past two decades First, the end of Cold War antagonisms at the global level

means that interstate competition is now mainly in the economic arena Second,

the rise of China and its priority of national modernization are likely to encourage Beijing to emphasize stability and responsible international behaviour Third, Japan’s quest to be a “normal” great power and its strong support for

multilateralism mean that Tokyo has to sensitively manage its relationship with a

rising China Fourth, the regional leadership role of a middle power like South

Korea is a positive factor that contributes to the growth of regional integration Fifth, US support for open regionalism has been strongly influenced by the determination of the East Asian states to further strengthen their regional

cooperation, especially since the end of the Asian financial crisis in 1998 In the

post- cold war era, US primacy also acts as an important regional stabilizing

force by setting clear limits on Sino-Japanese rivalry

185

Introduction

For a region that is so synonymous with difference and diversity, it is

remarkable that any progress towards formal regional institutionalization

should have occurred If East Asia can develop effective institutional

forums this will be a development of long-term significance.1

The main aim of this chapter is to assess the major determinants of Northeast Asian security regionalism First, it will re-examine a claim that the ‘ASEAN Way’ is the most important factor in promoting security regionalism in Northeast Asia Second, it will assess the factors that have influenced the rise of a regional ‘security regime’ in post-cold war Northeast Asia It will conclude with observations on the main driving forces in Northeast Asia

This chapter is divided into following sections In the first section, the nature of inter-state relations in post-Cold War Northeast Asia is highlighted In the second section,

I refer to a claim made by some scholars that ASEAN elites view the ASEAN Way of cooperative security as the main factor to shape the Northeast Asian security order Examples of the ASEAN Way include the ARF, APT, and the EAS The security challenges posed by the Korean peninsula will be discussed in section three In section four, I will attempt an evaluation of the ARF’s contributions to the evolving security architecture in Northeast Asia In section five, I will discuss the major driving forces currently shaping the pattern and dynamics of Northeast Asian regionalism

1

Mark Beeson, Regionalism and Globalization in East Asia, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007

Alan Dupont has claimed that the ARF had sown the seeds of a security community in the

Asia-Pacific See Dupont, The Future of the ARF: An Australian View, Canberra: Strategic and

Defence Studies Centre, ANU, 1998, pp 2-5 Amitav Acharya, Constructing a Security

Community in Southeast Asia (2nd edition), London and New York: Routledge, 2009

186

(A) The security environment in Northeast Asia

A remarkable feature of post-Cold War Northeast Asia is the growth of economic interdependence among Japan, China, and South Korea, despite periodic tensions over the ‘history’ problem arising from the legacy of Imperial Japan’s aggression during the Second World War against its neighbours Since 2005, China has overtaken the US to become the largest trading partner of Japan and South Korea In the post-Cold War era, there have been a few occasions of regional political crises in Northeast Asia, but always short of a ‘hot war’ These range from the 1993 US-North Korean tensions over Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons programme, the 1995-96 testing of missiles by the Chinese military in the Taiwan Straits to intimidate Taiwanese voters not to support President Lee Teng-hui’s pro-independence policies, and a repeat of US-North Korean nuclear tensions when the first George W Bush administration in 2002 accused the Kim Jong-Il regime in North Korea of seeking to develop a nuclear weapons capability

All these geopolitical crises raised, for a time, concerns of escalation that could threaten East Asian stability and prosperity Fortunately, such concerns did not turn into reality Instead, in the post-Cold War era, Northeast Asia can be considered to have undergone what optimists would regard as a remarkable transformation into a regional

‘security regime’ East Asian economic interdependence, in terms of intraregional trade, and investment, has grown rapidly over the past twenty years.2

2

William W Grimes, Currency and Contest in East Asia: the Great Power Politics of

Financial Regionalism, Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2009 pp 42-49

In a 2009 study, William Grimes found that there have been “substantial increases in intraregional trade” in East Asia between 1980 and 2005: as a percentage of total trade of the East Asian economies,

187

intraregional trade has increased rapidly from a share of about one-third to over one half This means that the Northeast Asian economies have a higher percentage of trade among themselves than do the NAFTA economies.3 Since 2005, South Korea’s two top trading partners are China and Japan Japan’s top two trading partners are China and South Korea Japan’s and South Korea’s growing economic interdependence have spillover effects on their foreign policies towards China.4 China’s buoyant economy enabled Japan

to recover from its decade-long economic stagnation of the 1990s Over the past decade, China has become a key engine of economic growth for East Asian states In her 2007 study, Evelyn Goh pointed out that between 1995 and 2004, China increased its proportion of trade with ASEAN by about four percent, while the US experienced a relative decline of 3-4 percent, and Japan lost about four percent from its share of imports

by ASEAN The China-ASEAN FTA is expected to lead to more than US$10 billion increases in mutual exports between China and ASEAN.5

Since the early 1990s, Northeast Asia has actually enjoyed an enviable period of relative peace and stability, despite the periodic roller-coaster fluctuations How can this phenomenon be explained? In my view, there are two broad explanations First, it is

3

Ibid., pp 43-44 A Japan Times editorial noted: “A strong alliance with the US is only a

starting point for Japanese foreign policy Asia, and China in particular, are equally vital partners.” (‘Mr Fukuda makes progress in Asia’, 23 November 2007) Cha Hak-bong,

“Korea-Japan race to woo Chinese tourists a sign of changing times”, The Chosun Ilbo 4

August 2010

4

CIA Factbook 2007, cited in Farizal Razalli, “East Asian Regional Integration: The

Journey since the failure of the EAEG”, Journal of Management and Social Sciences, 5(1)

Spring 2009: 30-50

5

Evelyn Goh, “Great Powers and Hierarchical Order in Southeast Asia: Analyzing

regional security strategies”, International Security 32(3) 2007/8: 113-57, cited in Tan See Seng ed Regionalism in Asia, Volume II, London and New York: Routledge, 2009

188

about whether the ‘ASEAN Way’ and the kind of security community model it represents,

is exportable to Northeast Asia, and to what extent Second, are there factors specific to Northeast Asia that offers plausible explanations? This chapter proposes five factors to attempt an explanation for the ‘relative peace and stability’ in Northeast Asia despite a legacy of historical animosities, contemporary ‘clash of Chinese and Japanese nationalisms’, and inter-state rivalries over territorial claims and regional influence These five factors are the end of the Cold War antagonisms; the rise of China and its focus on domestic modernization; Japan’s quest to be a ‘normal’ country and its vision of regional integration; the leadership role of middle powers like South Korea; and the new and cautious US policy of support for open East Asian regional multilateralism

The major security challenges facing Northeast Asia are the Korean Peninsula (North Korean nuclear issue and Korean reunification), the Taiwan Issue (China’s territorial claim that Taiwan island is an integral part of Chinese territory), and China-Japan territorial disputes in the East China Sea and their regional leadership rivalry The election of Ma Ying-jeou as Taiwan’s president in March 2008 has led to intensified economic interdependence between Taiwan and mainland China and an improvement in their bilateral political relations.6

6 Goh, Sui Noi, “Sino-Taiwan uneasy embrace: signing of landmark trade pact has not reduced military

distrust.” Straits Times 30 July 2010, p A2

But the nuclear ambitions of an insecure North Korea

is the most serious geopolitical threat to East Asian security, as seen in renewed tensions

there following the sinking of the South Korean corvette Cheonan in March 2010

allegedly by a North Korean submarine We now turn to an analysis of the North Korean challenge to Northeast Asian security

189

(B) The Korean Peninsula as a major Northeast Asian security challenge

An immediate and urgent security challenge facing Northeast Asia concerns the Korean Peninsula, in particular North Korea’s nuclear ambitions and the related issue of Korean reunification North and South Korea were separated at the 38th parallel at the end of World War Two and remained so after the Korean War (1950-53) North Korea is an international issue because of its domestic economic failures and its impact on the global nuclear proliferation issue Domestically, the repressive Kim Jong-Il regime is presiding over a ‘failing state’: over the past decade, North Korea is facing famine It is only Chinese food and economic aid that is propping up the Pyongyang regime North Korea

is one of the poorest states in the world In contrast, South Korea has since the Korean War been transformed into a wealthy OECD state.7

Denuclearization of the Korean peninsula

The second North Korean nuclear crisis started in 2002 after the newly-elected George W Bush administration in the US accused Pyongyang of re-starting its nuclear weapons program, in violation of the 1994 US-DPRK Framework Agreement The crux

of the North Korean nuclear crisis can be traced to ‘regime-insecurity’ in Pyongyang, and the hard-line policy of the Bush administration In October 2002, North Korea admitted

to having developed a nuclear weapon In December 2002, Pyongyang removed its

freeze on its plutonium-based nuclear program, again refused to admit IAEA inspectors

7 David Kang, “The security of the Korean peninsula”, in Sumit Ganguly, Andrew Scobell, and Joseph

Chinyong Liow eds., The Routledge Handbook of Asian Security Studies, London and New York: 2010:

35-47 Marianne Hanson and Rajesh Rajagopalan, “Nuclear weapons: Asian case studies and global

ramifications”, in William Tow ed., Security Politics in the Asia Pacific: A Regional-Global Nexus?

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009: 228-246

190

and announced its intention to withdraw from the NPT the following month But President Bush’s inclusion in 2002 of North Korea as an ‘axis of evil’ state made the North Korean leader Kim Jong-il even more recalcitrant North Korea had good reasons

to feel threatened by President Bush’s use of force to remove Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s regime in the Iraq War of March 2003.8 The Six-Party Talks (SPT) (involving North and South Korea, the United States, China, Japan, and Russia) started in 2003 and has been marked by twists and turns since then It is aimed at the denuclearization of North Korea Washington wants the complete, irreversible, verifiable disarmament (CIVD) of North Korea’s nuclear capability For an impoverished North Korea, a nuclear weapons capability is its last option The fourth round of these negotiations held

in Beijing, led to a ‘breakthrough’: Pyongyang agreed to abandon its civilian and nuclear weapons programs and return to the NPT in exchange for economic aid and improved US-DPRK relations Other members of the SPT promised security assurances, stronger economic relations and eventual political normalization The US affirmed that it had no intention of attacking the DPRK with conventional or nuclear weapons, that it would respect North Korea’s sovereignty and work to normalize its relations with Pyongyang After the US imposed sanctions on a Macau bank, accusing it of money laundering for the DPRK, plus the troublesome question of Japanese abductees, Kim Jong-Il revoked the September 2005 agreement On 9 October 2006, North Korea tested a nuclear device.9

191

separated plutonium, which could result in the production of between five and fifteen nuclear weapons Pyongyang is believed to have exported missile materials and technology to Egypt, Syria, Libya, Iran, Pakistan and Yemen North Korea is also pressing ahead with modernizing its missile delivery systems, including a potential ability

to reach the US mainland.10

A negotiated solution to the North Korean nuclear issue is in the overall interests

of all the parties concerned If a second Korean War were to break out, the consequences would not only devastate the economies of Northeast Asia, especially South Korea and China, but have an adverse spillover effect on Southeast Asia and indeed the rest of the world The commander of US forces in Korea estimated that a war could result in US$1 trillion in industrial damage and over 1 million casualties on the peninsula

In February 2007, the SPT achieved a historic agreement: Pyongyang agreed to declare its activities and disable its nuclear facilities in exchange for security assurances and a series of political and economic incentives, especially the provision of one million metric tons of heavy fuel oil to the DPRK by the US, China, Russia and South Korea Unfortunately, the February 2007 agreement unraveled because

of continuing mistrust between Pyongyang and Washington and disagreements on how to implement the agreement The unpredictable behavior of the Kim Jong-Il regime can be

seen in the 26 March 2010 sinking of the South Korean warship Cheonan, allegedly by a North Korean submarine torpedo

192

Korea’s: how to avoid instability on its borders.12 Japan’s role in the SPT negotiations is essentially that of a ‘bystander’, in that Tokyo is more fixated with the abductees’ issue and a reluctance to engage North Korea.13 The US role on the Korean peninsula remains critical Traditionally, the US adopts a ‘hub-and-spokes’ bilateral alliances approach with South Korea and Japan Presidents Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun adopted the Sunshine Policy aimed at political reconciliation with North Korea But this was opposed

by the George W Bush administration In May 2008, ROK President Lee Myung-bak stated: “It is not desirable that Korea sides with a particular country To maintain peace

in the region, a balanced diplomacy is needed…Korea-US relations and Korea-China relations are not contrary to each other but mutually complementary.”14 It is a plausible scenario that as South Korea increases its economic interdependence with a rising China, Seoul may increasingly opt to pursue a more equidistant policy with regards to relations with China and the US, which is likely to have implications for a peaceful solution of the Korean nuclear proliferation and reunification issues

12 Kang, ibid., p 39 Yufan Hao, “The Korean peninsula: a Chinese view on the North Korean Issue”, in

Hao, C.X George Wei, and Lowell Dittmer eds., Challenges to Chinese Foreign Policy: Diplomacy,

Globalization, and the next world power Lexington, Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky, 2009:

155-172

13 Ibid., p 39 See also Brad Williams and Erik Mobrand, “Explaining divergent responses to the North

Korean Abductions issue in Japan and South Korea”, The Journal of Asian Studies 19 (2) May 2010:

507-536

14

Ibid., p.44

193

C) Claims about extending the ASEAN Way as a model

to shape the Northeast Asian regional order

The ‘ASEAN Way’ of cooperative security reflects an ambitious attempt by the ASEAN states, a grouping of small and medium-sized states, to project their leadership credentials

in extending their consensual and informal security culture to bigger and more powerful states in the wider East Asian and Asia-Pacific regions Historically speaking, this is an audacious undertaking, given that it is usually great powers that provide the impetus for regional and global leadership The examples of such ASEAN-led regional integration initiatives are the ARF, APT, EAS, and the notion of establishing an East Asian Community (EAC) The ASEAN elites know that regional stability and security in Southeast Asia are inextricably linked to developments and trends in the wider Northeast Asian region The two sub-regions together form what Buzan and Waever call a

‘regional security complex’, where their security interests are interdependent.15

The ARF is a multilateral discussion group focussing on dialogue and building measures as a first step to cooperative security in the Asia-Pacific It is the first inclusive region-wide security arrangement The ASEAN elites see the ARF as extending the peaceful norms of the ASEAN Way to the steady building of a security community in the wider East Asian region In 1998, Singapore’s Foreign Minister S Jayakumar stated that the ARF had become “a means of encouraging the evolution of a

15 Barry Buzan and Ole Waever, Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press, 2003

I will focus attention on the claims made by the ‘ASEAN-boosters’ about the importance of extending the ‘ASEAN Way’ to promoting and shaping the Northeast Asian regional order Writing in 1997, Amitav Acharya noted that the ASEAN elites saw the extension of the ASEAN Way to the broader East Asian and Asia-Pacific regions as

an integral part of East Asian regional-identity building:

“The emergence of multilateral institutions in the Asia-Pacific

region raises a question of considerable theoretical and policy

relevance to students of international relations: is the process of

16

Ralf Emmers, “Security Cooperation in the Asia-Pacific: Evolution of Concepts and Practices”, in

Amitav Acharya and Tan See Seng eds., Asia-Pacific security cooperation: national interests and

regional order New York: M.E Sharpe Inc., 2004:

17 Lau Teik Soon, ‘ARF as a Model for Northeast Asian Security?’ in T Inoguchi and G.B Stillman eds

Northeast Asian Regional Security: The Role of International Institutions Tokyo: United Nations

University Press, 1997; Robyn Lim, ‘The ARF: Building on Sand’, Contemporary Southeast Asia, 20

(2) 1998: 115-35; J Garofano, ‘Power, Institutions and the ARF: A Security Community for Asia?’

Asian Survey 42 (3) 2000: 505-521; cited in Alex Bellamy, “Security”, in Mark Beeson ed

Contemporary Southeast Asia US and UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009 (second edition)

195

institution-building in this region different from that in other

parts of the world? This question assumes particular importance

in view of the rejection by some Asian policymakers of a

European-style multilateral institution, such as NATO, the EU

and more importantly the OSCE…as a possible model for their

region Moreover, Southeast Asian leaders and intellectuals

speak of an ‘ASEAN way’ of regional cooperation, which is

being promoted by them as the organizing framework of

multilateralism at the wider Asia-Pacific regional level…”18

An assessment of the ARF’s contributions to Northeast Asian regionalism

My argument is that the ASEAN Way of cooperative security is only one of

several factors in the promotion of Northeast Asian regionalism The ASEAN

Way has played a useful contributory ‘minimalist-assurance’ role, but there are

clear inherent limitations on its ability to push forward Northeast Asian

regionalism These limitations have to do with what China, Japan, and South

Korea regard as their core national interests which may or may not be

particularly susceptible to the norms of the ASEAN Way The main point here

is that the nature of the ARF mechanism and norms do not threaten the core

vital interests of its members, especially the major powers like the US, China,

and Japan As such, ARF members can go along most of the time with the

ASEAN Way provided it does not jeopardize their core political-security

interests As Haacke and Morada have pointed out:

“Collectively, the ASEAN countries have successfully clung on to the

self-arrogated role of the ARF’s ‘primary driving force’…However…ASEAN’s own efforts at reinventing itself, partly in

18

Amitav Acharya, “Ideas, Identity, and Institution-Building: From the ‘ASEAN way’ to the

‘Asia-Pacific way’, ‘Asia-Pacific Review 10 (3) 1997: 319-46; cited in Tan See Seng ed., Regionalism in Asia:

Critical Issues in Modern Politics, Volume III London and New York: Routledge, 2009: 142-170

196

order to continue to justify this position have not inspired great confidence

Essentially, ASEAN has acted defensively within the ARF…By directly

addressing issues such as counter-terrorism, non-proliferation, or maritime

security, ASEAN states indicate their preparedness to respond positively

and constructively to concerns pushed by the US and regional allies

However, the question remains whether ASEAN’s limitations in conflict

management will allow it to play a role other than confidence building.”19

A number of factors compelled ASEAN to establish the ARF One factor was, as pointed out by Sheldon Simon, that the end of the Cold War in 1989 left the East Asian and Asia-Pacific regions “searching for a new organizing principle for security…Moreover,

‘traditional’ security issues persisted in the form of unresolved territorial disputes, divided states, nuclear-weapons proliferation, and conflicting maritime jurisdictions resulting from the 1982 Law of the Sea.”20 The thinking among ASEAN elites was that the peaceful norms of ASEAN’s Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC) of 1976 would provide a mechanism for the peaceful resolution of inter-state disputes to the wider Asia-Pacific region The immediate target of the ARF was to peacefully socialize China – the only ‘extra-regional’ state with territorial claims in Southeast Asia Second, the Northeast Asian region did not have an ARF-type regional forum: China and the two Koreas still viewed Tokyo with suspicions arising from Imperial Japan’s aggression in World War Two Hence, ASEAN was able to fill this vacuum by offering to create a new East Asia-wide entity modeled on the ‘ASEAN Way’, a process of consultation and dialogue to build regional confidence.21

19 Jurgen Haacke and Morada eds op cit., p 220

Basically, the ARF was established to help manage the East Asian regional order, but not to solve regional conflicts Its underlying assumption is that by ensuring that the Great Powers remain on speaking terms, it will

20 Sheldon W Simon, “The ASEAN Regional Forum”, in Ganguly eds op cit., 2010: 300-310

21

Ibid., p 300

197

reduce the likelihood that their security competition will spiral out of control into armed conflicts

Criticisms and Strengths of the ARF

The major criticisms are that the ARF is merely a ‘talk shop’, and that it has shown an inability to move ahead from confidence-building to its two other more important stages,

‘preventive diplomacy’ (PD) and the final stage of ‘conflict resolution’ (CR) Criticisms against the ARF came in very early As pointed out by Rizal Sukma, barely two years after its formation, the ARF was already seen as “in danger of being fractured and bypassed by events in Burma and other parts of Asia that it cannot handle”.22

The ARF consists of a total of 27 states, including the ASEAN states and the major powers, US, Russia, China, and Japan How do the non-ASEAN powers really view the ARF? According to Sheldon Simon, the major weakness of the ARF stems from the different strategic interests of Asian and Western members of the ARF

23

22

Michael Richardson, “Events in Burma threaten to fracture ASEAN Regional Forum”, International

Herald Tribune, 28 May 1996 Cited in Rizal Sukma, “The Accidental Driver: ASEAN in the ASEAN

Regional Forum”, in Jurgen Haacke and Noel Morada eds Cooperative Security in the Asia-Pacific:

The ASEAN Regional Forum, London and New York: Routledge, 2010, p 111

Simon’s views are worth quoting: “While the ARF has turned from confidence-building measures to preventive diplomacy, the transition is difficult China’s as well as some other members’ reluctance reflect a concern that basic national security issues, such as the future of Taiwan, not be subject to ARF deliberations By contrast, Canada, Australia, Japan, and the US would like to see the ARF strengthened The US particularly hopes

23 Sheldon Simon, “The ASEAN Regional Forum”, in Ganguly eds The Routledge Handbook of Asian

Security Studies London and New York: Routledge, 2010: 301-302

198

that the ARF will serve as an anti-terror cooperative mechanism However, the ARF’s consensus rule, adopted from ASEAN, has proven a serious obstacle to managing tensions that arise from the divergent strategic interests of ARF members.”

Regarding the ambivalent US view, Haacke and Morada noted that ‘in the early 1990s, the US accepted the ARF but as a complement to its ‘hub-and-spokes’ model of security alliances That said, whatever hopes Washington had to work through and change the ARF to address regional security issues were disappointed The US does see the ARF as performing a useful role in signaling Washington’s commitment to support ASEAN and serves ‘as a window on Chinese intentions and behavior’.24 But in the overall American scheme of things, the ARF ranks below vital American interests in Europe, the Middle East and the Persian Gulf US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made a decision to skip ARF meetings in 2005 and 2007 As for Japan, Takeshi Yuzawa has pointed that “Tokyo initially harboured high expectations for the ARF But Tokyo’s expectations that ARF participants would be able to enhance military transparency and address regional disputes over time were sorely disappointed.25 Yuzawa concluded that Japanese policymakers now hold out very little hope of the ARF moving beyond confidence building, focusing only on engaging China and North Korea.26

24 Haacke and Morada eds 2010: 7

In the case of China, a study by Christopher Hughes argued that the ARF ‘possesses some utility for Beijing in terms of providing a venue in which it can attempt to contain American influence’, but Hughes also ‘suggests that China should be expected to continue to stifle

25 Cited in Haacke and Morada eds 2010: 10

26

Ibid., p 10

199

ARF cooperation.’27 Jurgen Haacke has argued that a major limitation on the ARF’s effectiveness is ‘the strong concern of ASEAN states about possible infringements of sovereignty’.28

The usefulness and capabilities of the ARF are inherently limited by its very nature: it is initiated and led by a grouping of small and medium-sized states, which claims to seek to socialize the great powers, especially China and the US, into the norms

of an informal ASEAN-style cooperative security; its current leadership role (“driver’s seat”) is by default because of the China-Japan historical impasse and regional leadership rivalry; continuing mistrust among China, Japan, and South Korea; and US pre-occupation with other more pressing issues in Afghanistan, Iraq, and the Middle East Should these variables change, it is very conceivable that the usefulness and continued relevance of the ASEAN Way, especially by the non-ASEAN powers, may be called into question The essence of the criticisms against the ARF is well captured by Ralf Emmers:

“The shortcomings of the ARF with respect to the traditional security flashpoints in the Asia-Pacific – the Korean Peninsula, Taiwan, and the South China Sea – are clear The institution is in no position to tackle these issues.”29

However, in my view, the critics tend to misunderstand the true purpose and term strategic significance of the ARF in influencing the evolving security architecture of East Asia It has survived for sixteen years, and has re-invented itself by including non-traditional security issues (transnational diseases and environmental crises, counter-terrorism) in its agenda ARF officials are also aware that it is facing stiff competition

27 Cited in Haacke and Morada eds 2010: 10

28 Haacke and Morada eds 2010: 11

29

Ralf Emmers, 2004, op cit., p.17

200

from other regional forums, especially the Asian Security Summit (or the Shangri-La Dialogue) hosted annually by the London-based IISS since 2001 It is important to remind ourselves of what the ARF can achieve We need to pare down our expectations about the ARF Its primary goal is to serve as a diplomatic-consultative forum, a critical, first-step mechanism to promote the discussion of regional military-security issues so as

to prevent them from escalating into hot military conflicts The ARF was never established as a conflict resolution mechanism That goal is part of the ARF’s long-term vision, and it can grow only with the full support and commitment of all its members But the essential problem facing the ARF is that its great-power members, especially the

US and China, have divergent perceptions about the ARF’s mandate and capabilities From a constructivist viewpoint, the ARF is first and foremost a ‘forum’, which can lead

to the sharing and transference of socializing norms of non-use of force and peaceful coexistence among states This function of the ARF forum should not be underestimated The ARF’s basic premise starts from recognition of regional strategic complexity, an area beset by historical, cultural, political, and strategic divides At a minimal level, the ARF performs the key role of maintaining open channels of communications, an important first step in preventing inter-state misunderstandings and misperceptions from escalating into more serious armed confrontations One value of a diplomatic-consultative forum is,

as Geoffrey Stern has pointed out, that it serves as a safety valve where different parties

to a potential conflict can articulate their viewpoints, positions and grievances.30

30

Geoffrey Stern, The Structure of International Society: an introduction to the study of

international relations (2nd edition), London and New York, 2000, pp 177-192

This basic value of the ARF should not be belittled, especially in an environment of post-Cold

201

War strategic uncertainty Thus the ARF functions to reduce tensions and prevent conflict-escalation The criticism that the ARF is merely a ‘talk shop’ is only partially valid and actually misses the point Given that the ARF membership spans the entire spectrum of different economic and political systems across the Asia-Pacific, it takes time and sustained effort to build up confidence and trust To illustrate, some analysts have pointed to the ARF’s “socializing” role in influencing the PRC’s responses to the South China Sea problem.31 Barry Desker has pointed out that an important strength of the ARF is that it has “introduced a new norm into the ASEAN process of cooperative security which emphasized inclusiveness through the promotion of dialogue among both like-minded and non-like-minded states.”32 The PRC was a founding member when the ARF was inaugurated in 1994 By 1997, the PRC had become more comfortable with the ARF and hosted and co-chaired a confidence-building group in 1997 In November 2004, Beijing hosted and co-chaired the first ARF Security Policy Conference, which contributed to building confidence and fostering mutual understanding.33

31

Alice Ba, “Who’s socializing Whom? Complex Engagement in Sino-ASEAN Relations”, The

Pacific Review, 192) June 2006: 157-79 One could counter-argue that the peaceful norms of the

‘ASEAN Way’ have been an integral part of the PRC’s foreign policy ideals since the mid-1950s See Sophie Richardson 2010, op cit In an international system still dominated by the US, China

is using the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence to steadily achieve its longer term goal Great Power status See David M Lampton, “The United States and China in the Age of Obama:

looking each other straight in the eyes”, Journal of Contemporary China, 18 (62) November 2009:

Barry Desker, “The Future of the ASEAN Regional Forum”, IDSS Commentaries, October 2001

33 Togo 2008 op cit.: 171 Acharya has argued that “the ARF’s contribution to regional order may

well lie in the socializing impact of multilateralism on the balancing behaviour of major Pacific powers” Acharya 2009, op cit., p 214

Cheonan, allegedly by a North Korean submarine The point here is that on core, vital

issues specific to Northeast Asia, the ARF has little or no role at all But this is not a bad thing at all because ASEAN and its ASEAN Way institutions made it possible for the blossoming of the Trilateral Summit in the first place The ASEAN Way of cooperative security has done its useful function of socializing and bringing the top leaders of the three Northeast Asian powers together Whether the Trilateral Summit will further evolve into a more permanent security mechanism for Northeast Asian regionalism remains to be seen

34

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/2009-10/10/content_8774197.htm (Accessed on 16 July 2010.)

203

Reasons why ASEAN is playing the ‘driver’s’ role in the ARF

There are a number of reasons to explain ASEAN’s ability to play a central role in promoting regional community-building in East Asia First, the degree of ASEAN’s own political unity has been an important factor Through innumerable informal and formal meetings and consultations, ASEAN’s leaders have been able to steadily promote greater confidence-building among themselves on core, vital regional issues like the Cambodian Issue 1979-1991, especially the need to present a united front In this regard, Suharto’s Indonesia, by virtue of its weight as the largest ASEAN state in terms of population and territorial size, played a critical regional leadership role.35 Despite the great cultural-economic-political diversity and challenges (like the Myanmar Issue), the ASEAN political elites are strongly committed to building a united and strong regional organization One challenge is posed by the gross human rights abuses committed by the military regime in Myanmar36

35

Alice Ba 2009, op cit.: 70-71; Tommy Koh, “Why you shouldn’t yawn at ASEAN”,

Straits Times, 29 April 2009

36

See Brian L Job, “Grappling with an elusive concept”, and William Case, “Democracy and security in East Asia”, both in William Tow ed 2009, op cit., p 46 and p 129 respectively

204

Southeast Asian region, and hence must remain a member of the ASEAN ‘regional family’ The informal ASEAN Way implies that a wayward family member must be brought back into the mainstream through patient and face-saving persuasion and diplomatic consultation There are little or no signs that this basic ASEAN approach will change in the foreseeable future

Summary of the ARF’s Effectiveness

Overall, the ARF performs a useful, contributory role in promoting greater building and regional stability in Northeast Asia, but only up to a point The ARF should

confidence-be conceptualized as a ‘minimal reassurance’ dialogue mechanism which, at least, keeps channels of communications open among great power rivals This inclusive ‘information flows’ role is critical as it can help prevent inter-state misunderstandings from a dangerous cycle of escalation into armed conflicts Institutionally, the ARF is weak: it is

a purely voluntary entity, with no powers to apply sanctions against members who misbehave

But the ARF has a fundamental weakness It has the overall political-security interests of the ASEAN states as its central goal At a minimal level, most of the non-ASEAN members can go along with this However, problems will arise when matters concerning the ‘core, vital interests’ of the non-ASEAN states are at stake This is especially so on matters like Beijing’s territorial claim over Taiwan, the denuclearization

of the Korean peninsula, and the South China Sea disputes On such politically sensitive matters, the real need is for practical solutions, not mere ‘management’ of issues On issues that touch the ‘core, vital interests’ of the Northeast Asian states, the limitations of

205

the ASEAN Way are exposed Having said that, it is important to remember that the ASEAN Way had performed the important task of ‘ice-breaker’ in bringing the leaders of the three Northeast Asian states together for the first time at the inaugural APT meeting

in December 1997 in Kuala Lumpur More importantly, direct Heads of Government summit meetings of the leaders of China, Japan, and South Korea have developed a steady momentum of their own, culminating in the first Trilateral Summit of Chinese, Japanese, and South Korean leaders in Fukuoka, Japan, in 2008 It would appear to be clear that the Trilateral Summit has the potential to blossom into a Northeast Asian multilateral mechanism to deal directly with specifically regional core issues, thereby strengthening prospects for enhanced Northeast Asian regionalism

Finally, the limitations of the ASEAN Way as a model for Northeast Asian regionalism points to a real need to address a related question: what are the crucial drivers of Northeast Asian regionalism? The short answer is that the key drivers here are the key states/actors (China, Japan, Korea, and the US) and their calculations of their respective ‘national interests’ This related question will be analyzed in the next section

What are the main driving forces of Northeast Asian Regionalism?

(A) The end of Cold War antagonisms and its Implications for Northeast Asian

Regional integration

At the global level, the end of superpower Cold War antagonism by the early 1990s was

an important factor which allowed the thawing of East-West ideological divisions and a more relaxed international environment conducive for the promotion of mutually beneficial inter-state relations around the world The end of the Cold War was

206

accompanied by the steady rise of China’s economic and military power The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 ended the life-and-death struggle between the communist and capitalist great powers Its significance is that it removed a major ideological divide in the international system The Soviet collapse also highlighted the superiority and greater effectiveness of the free-market capitalist system in generating wealth and prosperity in the non-Western world It also led Francis Fukuyama37 to posit ‘the end of history’ The inefficiencies of Soviet-style central economic planning and the excesses of Maoism encouraged Deng Xiaoping to turn towards capitalism to promote higher economic growth rates in China by turning to the outside world.38

From a realist perspective, the mutual antagonism between the US-led ‘Free World’ and the communist powers during the Cold War limited the rise of mutually beneficial relations among states in the Northeast Asian region

By the time Gorbachev came to power in the mid-1980s, he knew that the USSR faced a systemic economic crisis At the global level, the end of the Cold War led to a sharp decline in ideologically-driven conflicts between the hostile political systems of democracy and communism The end

of communist regimes in Eastern Europe led to important mindset changes by national leaders and mass publics around the world It also enabled the spread of peaceful norms

of inter-state behaviour to take hold

39

37

Francis Fukuyama, “The End of History”, The National Interest, Summer 1989

The features of the

207

Cold War era were a zero-sum mentality between the two antagonistic military blocs, the US-led NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization), and the Soviet-dominated Warsaw Pact To deter the threat of Soviet expansionism, the US adopted its Containment Policy Evelyn Goh has argued that unchallenged American preponderance in the 1950s and 1960s led to a stable Asian security order, and that greater challenges in the post-Vietnam War era, especially by China since the mid-1990s, have led to greater strategic uncertainty in East Asia:

It was the end of the Cold War…that brought about the most significant

transition in the global and Asian regional orders Globally, the US

remained the only superpower with resources that outstripped those of

any other single state In Asia, China’s position continued to

strengthen, as concerns grew about the potential decline of American

strategic interest in the region The 1990s were a decade in which

regional actors became most prominent in arguably reconstituting the

regional hierarchy, to manoeuvre the US firmly back into a position of

regional primacy. 40

In East Asia, the US adopted a policy of forming bilateral ‘hub-and-spokes’ alliances, with itself as the leader, to cement its regional primacy In the wake of the North Korean invasion of South Korea in June 1950, Washington established the bilateral US-Japan Security Treaty in 1951 as its linchpin to maintain regional peace and security in East Asia During the Cold War, Northeast Asia was marked by a number of features which led realist observers like Aaron Friedberg to argue that the region was ‘ripe for rivalry’

States and Northeast Asia: Debates, Issues, and New Order, University of California:

Rowman and Littlefield, 2008

40

Evelyn Goh,, “Hegemony, hierarchy and order”, in William T Tow ed Security Politics

in the Asia-Pacific: A Regional-Global Nexus?, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,

2009, pp.109-110

208

and instability.41 These features included unresolved territorial disputes, the divided Korean peninsula, and the PRC’s claims of sovereignty over Taiwan, fears of an escalating arms race, lingering historical animosities arising from the aggression committed by Imperial Japan against China and Korea, and different political-economic systems and values Overall, the significance of the end of the Cold War is that it led to critical mindset changes which facilitated closer regional economic and political cooperation among the Northeast Asian states

(B) The Rise of China and its focus on domestic modernization

China’s rise and its ‘New Security Concept’ is a critical factor shaping Northeast Asian regionalism Historically, China had been the paramount power in East Asia Having endured ‘a century of shame and humiliations’, Beijing’s strategic goal seeks the restoration of China’s centrality in East Asian affairs A key driver for expanded regionalism in East Asia has been the rise of economic and military power in China, especially Beijing’s definition of the country’s ‘national interests’ As pointed out by the

US-based Congressional Research Service in a January 2008 study, “China’s rise

represents the key driver in the evolving security landscape in Asia China is now attracting regional states with its economic power and is offering competing vision to the

41

Friedberg 1993, op cit Michael Yahuda, The International Politics of the Asia-Pacific, New York: RoutledgeCurzon, 2004 Akira Iriye, Across the Pacific: An Inner History of

American-East Asian Relations, Chicago: Imprint Publications, 1992 See also Jae-Jung

Suh, “The Two-Wars Doctrine and the Regional Arms Race: Contradictions in US

Post-Cold War Security Policy in Northeast Asia”, Critical Asian Studies 35 (1) 2003: 3-32

209

US-centric ‘hub and spoke’ system of alliances.”42

Another…dynamic that has been driving East Asian regionalism has been the growing regional economic

integration centred on China, coupled with Beijing’s diplomatic

offensive in Southeast Asia Around 58 percent of China’s exports go to

other East Asian states, and about 47 percent of China’s imports come

from the region…China’s growth has been the single greatest driver of

the recent economic growth of other East Asian countries Trade and

investment flows demonstrate that the recent growth of regional

economies from Japan to Indonesia has been largely attributable to the

dynamism of the Chinese economy As a result, even those economies

that are threatened by the growth of China’s exports now have a vested

interest in China’s economic health and the continued success of its

economic reform process…And the spreading realization that China

shares many of the resource and financial security concerns of its

neighbours has begun to reinforce a collaborative attitude to regional

Michael Mastanundo, “The United States: regional strategies and global commitments”,

in William Tow ed Security Politics in the Asia-Pacific: A Regional-Global Nexus?,

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009, pp 61-62

210

economic growth and political-military strength would be heavily dependent on a peaceful international environment Deng calculated that the “international correlation of forces” was such that both superpowers (US and Soviet Union) posed no real danger to world peace, and hence Beijing should focus on internal economic modernization

Deng’s strategic responses to the Soviet collapse can be seen in his axiom, “taoguang yanghui” (hide one’s talents and capabilities; and bide one’s time) From Deng’s

viewpoint, China should focus on domestic economic modernization, and avoid any premature confrontations with the US, especially on the Taiwan issue Domestic stability and growing prosperity have led to a more confident PRC leadership, at ease in promoting mutually beneficial relations with the outside world In the post-Cold War era, the PRC’s strategic priorities are regime survival, domestic stability, rapid economic growth, and neutralizing any US attempt to create an anti-China alliance in East Asia.44

In many ways, Deng’s priorities are reminiscent of Meiji Japan’s focus on

building a ‘rich country, strong army’ (fuguo qiangjun) Deng’s policy line has been reconfirmed by President Hu Jintao in his doctrine of “heping jueqi” (peaceful rise).45

44

David Hale, “The outlook for economic integration in East Asia”, in Kent E Calder and

Francis Fukuyama eds East Asian Multilateralism: Prospects for Regional Stability, Baltimore, Maryland: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008 Liu Yongtao, “Northeast

Asian security regionalism: a Chinese perspective”, in Jeehoon Park, T.J Pempel, and

Gerard Roland eds Political Economy of Northeast Asian Regionalism: Political Conflict

and Economic Integration, UK and USA: Edward Elgar, 2008: 30-43 Robert S Ross

and Zhu Feng, China’s Ascent: Power, Security, and the Future of International Politics,

Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2008 Charissa Yong, ‘Wary neighbours getting close: Young Chinese are warming to Japan, although relations are still fragile”,

Straits Times, 18 August 2010, p A12

Deng Xiaoping knew that after 27 years of Maoism, China was not living up to its full

45

Ross and Zhu 2008, ibid., p 198

211

national potential After returning to power in 1978, Deng pragmatically focused China’s energies on internal economic modernization and the achievement of national prosperity, known as the Open Door Policy To achieve his ambitious goals, Deng knew that China had to pursue mutually beneficial pro-development policies towards its regional neighbors and the international community so as to win their trust and cooperation Deng’s policy turnaround was not entirely tactical Deng’s full embrace of ‘friendship and cooperation’ with the outside world was a critical turning point in the evolution of a more stable and secure Northeast Asia For the past twenty five years, China’s double-digit economic growth rate has propelled the country into the front ranks of the world’s industrial powers By 2010, China is expected to overtake Japan as the world’s second largest economy, after the US China’s rise is fundamentally changing the regional and global balance of power The result is that the West has to make adjustments The success of China’s Open Door Policy is critically dependent on the maintenance of a cooperative and peaceful international environment Growing economic interdependence between China and her Asian neighbours and with the rest of the world can have positive effects on the peaceful evolution of regional integration in East Asia and the wider Asia-Pacific region As pointed out by M.T Fravel in his 2005 study of China’s territorial disputes with its neighbours, the PRC has prudently decided to downplay the use of force

in interstate relations, unless absolutely necessary to safeguard its national interests.46

46

Since the era of Deng Xiaoping (1978-1997), the PRC’s priorities are regime survival, ensuring uninterrupted rapid economic growth, a stable external environment, and a good neighbor policy towards the outside world In a 2005 study, M.T Fravel pointed out that due to the CCP’s concerns over internal threats, Beijing had offered substantial concessions in most of the territorial settlements with its neighbours, usually receiving less than 50% of the contested land See Fravel, “Regime Insecurity and International

212

The continued expansion of China’s economic linkages with Asia and the rest of the world have important implications for the peaceful evolution of East Asian regionalism John Ravenhill has given two explanations for this peaceful trend:

The first is that, contrary to some of the hyperbole that surrounded the Asian

reaction to the financial crises of 1997-9, there is no evidence that a closed

economic bloc is emerging in East Asia, a development that had it been

realized would inevitably increase the potential for conflict over trade

relations Second, contrary to some of the expectations current at the time of

China’s accession to the WTO in 2001, China’s growth has not occurred at

the expense of other economies in the region While some dramatic changes

in trade have occurred in the last decade, with exports of finished goods from

China displacing those from both Northeast and Southeast Asia in

third-country markets, this loss of markets for finished goods has been more than

balanced for China’s Asian neighbours by increased sales of components to

the rapidly growing Chinese market itself.47

China’s Open Door Policy was the result of Deng’s willingness to learn from the outside world Deng had the political clout to convince the Chinese leadership to re-examine its overall strategy The world economy is becoming more globalized as a result of revolutionary developments in science and technology, and global communications This

is a global trend which is beyond the control of any state.48

Cooperation: Explaining China’s Compromises in Territorial Disputes”, International

Security 30 (Fall 2005): 46-83; cited in Calder and Fukuyama eds., 2008: 132 Robert

Ross and Zhu Feng eds 2008, op cit

National governments are forced to respond accordingly or be left behind in the international race for resources, markets, and national prosperity Economic globalization implies the rise of national

to domestic stability and regime-survival Deng knew that the CCP’s survival and China’s international standing would be dependent on first building up a strong national economy Deng’s willingness to learn from the outside world was revealed during his first-ever official talks in Singapore in November 1978 with then-Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew.50

In the post-Mao era, China’s leaders decided to embrace free-market capitalism to strengthen its economy, but with the CCP remaining in firm, authoritarian control At the start of his Open Door Policy in the early 1980s, Deng famously said that it did not

49

Pempel 2004 op cit Robert Gilpin, Global Political Economy: Understanding the

International Economic Order, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001

50

Lee Kuan Yew, From Third World to First: The Singapore Story, Singapore: Times

Publishing, 2000, p 665 Hale 2008 op cit., pp 76-77