[Park Sang-seek] A new order emerging in the Asia-Pacific region

Two major regional organizations in the Asia-Pacific region, APEC and the East Asia Summit, held summit meetings in November consecutively. Discussions and statements made at the two conferences revealed not only participating countries’ varying positions on agenda items but also an emerging new Asia-Pacific regional order.

APEC was established as an economic regional organization to promote the economic integration of major economic entities in the Asia-Pacific region, whereas the East Asia Summit started as the initial mechanism to promote community building in East Asia. Therefore, the memberships of both organizations were bound to overlap.

APEC started with 12 states in 1989 but expanded its membership to 21 members, including Hong Kong and Taiwan. On the other hand, the EAS was initiated by ASEAN Plus Three (10 ASEAN members and South Korea, Japan and China) in 2005 and its membership has increased to 18.

Consequently, the majority of the members are common to both organizations. Four major powers, South Korea, New Zealand, Australia, and seven ASEAN member states belong to both, but the rest of the ASEAN members (Laos, Myanmar, and Cambodia), Taiwan, Hong Kong, Canada, Mexico, Chile, Peru, and Papua New Guinea are members of APEC only. India is a member of the EAS but not a member of APEC. Since the inception of APEC, the U.S. has tried to turn it into a comprehensive regional organization, but ASEAN and China oppose the establishment of a full-pledged security organization and support a lose security consultative forum only and recognize the ARF as such an organization. All members of the EAS and APEC except Hong Kong, Taiwan, Mexico, Chile and Peru belong to the ARF (26 members).

The above characteristics and each country’s position and strategy on Asia-Pacific regionalism show that the original idea of the East Asia Community is unlikely to be realized, and the U.S., which has joined only this year, may attempt to transform APEC into a full-fledged Asia-Pacific free trade area. Such a dual strategy was revealed in Obama’s emphasis on maritime security, nuclear non-proliferation and joint capacity building for disaster relief at the EAS and his statement of the United States’ strong intention to push for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, an Asia-Pacific free trade area, at the ASEAN summit.

Nine members of APEC ― four from ASEAN, two from the Oceana and three from the Pacific coast of the Americas-have already joined the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and Japan, Canada and Mexico have expressed their intention to join it. If its membership extends to other members to APEC and the EAS, the TPP will make the on-going plan for the Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP) meaningless. The implications of this trend for the Asia-Pacific order are serious: the vision of APEC as a means to accommodate Western nations conceived by ASEAN and the vision of APEC as a means to block the emergence of an East Asian economic bloc intended by the U.S. collide with each other, and the U.S. plan wins in this struggle.

Secondly, the U.S. intends to maintain its hegemony in the Asia-Pacific region just as it continues to maintain its hegemony in Europe through the Trans-Atlantic partnership since the Cold War started. The U.S. tries to build an Asia-Pacific partnership first by strengthening and expanding its bilateral security ties and the free market area, and next by influencing and controlling regional organizations. The purpose, in Secretary of State Clinton’s words, is to “sustain and secure America’s global leadership.” In order to reinforce the existing bilateral military alliances, the U.S. has decided to station its military forces in Australia and “update” the Philippine-U.S. Mutual Defense Treaty and other military alliances.

America’s Asia-Pacific strategy may provoke some countries and make others feel relieved. The U.S. claims that the Asia-Pacific region is eager for its leadership. It is true that most of the countries in the region desire U.S. engagement but not U.S. leadership.

China is particularly uneasy about the U.S.’ role in the region. Its leadership is paranoid about the revival of the U.S. containment policy. In its view, U.S. hegemony is equivalent to the encirclement of China, and China has no intention of becoming subservient to the U.S. Hu demanded a global economic governance system based on the principle of collective decision-making and equitable representation of developing countries. At the same time, he rejected an alliance of any kind and upheld regional multilateral security architectures.

The two summits have revealed that a new Asia-Pacific order is surfacing. First, there are two major powers, the U.S. and China, in the Asia-Pacific region: the former tries to reassert its leadership as “a Pacific power” and the latter desires to check and balance the former as an Asian power. Both attempt to prevent the other from dominating the EAS, APEC and the ARF. Scholars’ and political leaders’ debate on whether the Asia Pacific regional order will develop into a bipolar system will intensify.

Second, the role of ASEAN as the driving force of the three regional organizations will become eventually meaningless. However, ASEAN will continue to preserve its identity and prosper in its own way but will be economically integrated into the Asia-Pacific regional architecture.

Lastly, history tells us that no country has remained a superpower eternally. It also tells us that no hierarchical global or regional order has lasted forever.

By Park Sang-seek

Park Sang-seek is a professor at the Graduate Institute of Peace Studies, Kyung Hee University. ― Ed.