Sunday April 28, 2013

Slow but steady progress

Behind the Headlines
By BUNN NAGARA

Cross-border cooperation: In the recent armed incursion by so-called royalist Sulu forces into Sabah, Malaysia and the Philippines took appropriate measures in accordance with national and international laws. — Bernama

The anger directed at those who do not share the same political beliefs is getting out of hand, especially in cyberspace.

ONE more Asean summit has come and gone, and Asean’s advocates and detractors are both as active and as divided as ever.

Asean’s champions and critics remain as far apart on a conceptual level as at anytime in the organisation’s 45-year-plus history.

This is distinct from the operational level of bureaucratic Asean functionaries, where few things other than formal political speeches are seen as impossible.

Those unhappy with Asean are generally upset with the things it has not done and the ways it has not done them in. Those hopeful about Asean are typically optimistic about what it may yet achieve.

The 22nd Asean summit in Bandar Seri Begawan last week was thus typical of the genre. It was at once both another brick in the wall, and also a window in it.

Not uncharacteristically, Philippine President Benigno Aquino III reportedly congratulated host Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah for steely courage in addressing on-going maritime challenges from China. It was an extrapolation, however unwitting, of Manila’s face-off with Beijing over disputed territory in the South China Sea.

Aquino’s point of reference was the last Asean summit in Phnom Penh just five months ago, where some saw Cambodia’s refusal to mention China’s perceived muscle-flexing as pandering to Beijing. So this time it was not so much about what Brunei actually did, but what Cambodia did not do.

Contrary to fussy and fuzzy perceptions of these diplomatic plays, they do not amount to much. Neither China nor any Asean country is affected much if at all by such speechifying and its supposed nuances.

For Asean itself, it has to be an unqualified good thing for such summits to continue. If member countries did not feel they were worthwhile, they would not keep attending them – shopping expeditions excepted.

And yet Asean’s cynics would not be stilled. If any Asean summit failed to solve any outstanding or prospective problem outright, they would consider Asean to have failed.

In that respect other, even larger institutions have not only failed but failed miserably. Those who would fault Asean for not solving the Asian financial crisis or the odd diplomatic spat would absolve Nato, the military organisation, from failing to prevent or resolve the military conflict in Bosnia.

Then there is the list of regional ills as the “usual suspects” said to prove Asean’s weakness, inefficacy or irrelevance: South China Sea incursions, big power interventions, insurgencies in the southern Philippines, southern Thailand and eastern Sabah, and the Preah Vihear bother between Thailand and Cambodia.

In the South China Sea disputes, the Spratly Islands group seems a case in point. Four Asean countries are locked in eternal struggle over those rocky outcrops (besides China and Taiwan): Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam.

All the claimants remain adamant about retaining their claims. Yet no matter how much those disputed territories overlap, no shooting war has resulted among those Asean countries.

Has Asean membership not made a difference there at all? It would be easier to imagine an unsteady situation without Asean than many of the cynical hypotheses about Asean on offer.

There is also the growing issue of major powers – principally China and the US – apparently making moves in the region that could crowd out each other and everyone else. The derisive follow-up, in the form of a rhetorical question, is what Asean would do about it.

That question presupposes that Asean or some other regional organisation can do something about it, and ought to do so. Yet there is no basis for such assumptions.

If, as it now seems evident, both China and the US are enlarging their presence in the region, then they would broadly balance each other out. The upshot for the region would then be increased opportunities for deriving concessions and productive partnerships from both major powers.

The cost, if any, would be increased vigilance against untoward or precipitate actions by any of the major powers that could destabilise the region. Asean is as good an institution as any to conduct regular exercises in such vigilance.

In moving from the macro to the micro, complaints are then sometimes heard about Asean’s seeming incapacity in dealing with occasional bilateral spasms such as the Preah Vihear land dispute between Thailand and Cambodia. Would this not prove Asean’s ineptitude in real-life issues?

Problematic issues do exist in the real world, including or especially between neighbouring countries. However, they need not be insoluble or insurmountable.

In recent months, the problem of sovereignty over the land where the Preah Vihear temple stands (on the border between the two countries) appears more amenable to a solution. There are high and low points in diplomatic possibilities, and the lows for this one seem to be over.

That may be due in part to the absence of the individual personalities involved at the time. Now that some of those leaders have left office and other individual positions, the problem is no longer magnified as it had once been.

The critical elements of crisis may therefore lie less in the issues or the institutions in the vicinity at the time, and more with particular individuals in positions of power and influence. Negative individuals may trigger or exacerbate a crisis, and positive individuals may instead contribute to resolving it.

Still on the crisis front, there are also ageless and “eternal” problems that continue to afflict South-East Asia: violence in southern Thailand, conflict in southern Philippines, and occasional unlawful incursions into eastern Sabah.

If Asean has had no impact on avoiding or mitigating such problems, would that not seriously limit its utility? It certainly would, only that Asean has in fact exerted a considerable and positive impact on them.

Despite their many unique characteristics, these issues share certain key features. Anyone who understands Asean as an association of regional governments will have no problem understanding them.

In southern Thailand and southern Philippines in particular, the violence has raged between state and non-state actors. The relations between pairs of governments with common borders and as Asean members are no problem.

Those relations have in fact grown, as the governments increasingly work together on their common challenges and for their shared interests.

Thailand and Malaysia have embarked on a new phase of dealing with the problem of sporadic violence and related challenges. The Philippines and Malaysia have been working closely on illegal cross-border activity, with Malaysia also contributing as a neutral party to peace talks between Manila and Moro rebels.

In the recent armed incursion by so-called royalist Sulu forces into Sabah, Malaysia and the Philippines took appropriate measures in accordance with national and international laws. Even when former Moro leader Nur Misuari escaped to Sabah after fomenting trouble in the Philippines, Malaysian authorities promptly arrested him and duly returned him to Manila.

Yet, despite a record of cooperation among Asean countries, there are cynics who would still deny the purpose and resolve of Asean. None of their discouraging talk, however, would deter Asean member countries from further cooperation and integration.

> Bunn Nagara is a Senior Fellow of the Institute of Strategic and International Studies.

News

Sunday April 28, 2013

Slow but steady progress

Behind the HeadlinesBy BUNN NAGARA

Behind the Headlines
By BUNN NAGARA